3D WEB THE KILLER APP.
DAYTON, Ohio (March 26) - Microsoft Corp. plans to release a computer browser designed to deliver television-quality 3-D animation and high-fidelity sound at a fraction of the download time of conventional Web browsers, the Dayton Daily News reported today.
The browser is code-named Chrome and was revealed at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference in Orlando, Fla., on Wednesday, the newspaper said.
''It can create a phenomenal multimedia experience, certainly well beyond anything that we have today,'' said Rob Enderle, an analyst with Giga Information Group.
If successful, Chrome developers say, the new technology will allow the Web to compete with television for advertising revenue.
A message seeking information was left today at Microsoft's headquarters in Redmond, Wash.
Dayton-based Cast Communications Corp. has been helping Microsoft develop the new browser, the Daily News said. For the past six months, Cast Communications has been building prototype 3-D Web sites that take advantage of Chrome.
Chrome will only work on extremely fast, expensive Windows-based computers not yet available in a market currently dominated by personal computers selling for under $1,000. However, the price of those high-end machines will eventually come down, said Enderle.
Scheduled for release in August, Chrome will be an option on Windows 98. Unlike its Internet Explorer 4.0 browser, Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft will not offer Chrome as a separate product.
Eric Engstrom, multimedia general manager for Microsoft's Windows Client and Collaboration Division, told the Daily News that Chrome is designed to enhance Windows 98 and that its features may be used in spreadsheets and others Windows 98 applications, not just for Web browsing.
Instead of relying on limited capacity in phone and cable lines, Chrome will make a PC's central processing unit do all the work when reading Chrome-content Web pages. Rather than sending memory-hogging images, Chrome Web pages will send ''skinny'' text instructions that Chrome interprets.
By relying on computational power, Chrome will be able to render 3-D graphics much like those seen on ABC's Monday Night Football, Engstrom said.
Greg---> Ah I can see it now, PC envy returns. It will be like this--> "Hay I have Chrome do you? |
