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To: John F. Dowd who wrote (165026)	5/9/2002 12:31:25 PM
From: Road Walker	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 186894

Transmeta finds a niche????? Ten O'Clock Tech A Silent Desktop PC Arik Hesseldahl, 05.09.02, 10:00 AM ET NEW YORK - As great as they are, PCs have an endless list of annoying qualities that have nothing to do with the frustrating and often crash-prone software they run. One of those annoyances is noise. Most desktop PCs have a fast microprocessor chip busily crunching numbers and executing millions of instructions every second. It's hard work for a piece of silicon smaller than a postage stamp. The harder a chip works, the hotter it gets, and that heat is generally kept at bay by a noisy fan. NEC's Mate PC runs silently Noisy computers are apparently a big issue in Japan, where the workplace tends to be a little more crowded than U.S. workers are used to. Cubicles apparently aren't the standard allotment of space, and co-workers--and their whirring computers--are likely to be in each other's faces throughout the day. Japanese PC maker NEC yesterday announced a desktop computer called the Mate, which is designed to be silent. There's no fan cooling the processor, and the hard drive is constructed without noisy elements such as ball bearings, in order to keep its movement as quiet as possible. And, in a nod to another crucial point about PC design in Japan, the PC components are all built into the frame of a flat-panel display, saving space. The computer is a big design win for U.S.-based chipmaker Transmeta (nasdaq: TMTA - news - people ), which has traditionally landed its chip designs in small notebook PCs and other portable devices like Web tablets and so-called Internet appliances of every shape and size. This is the first desktop PC to use Transmeta's Crusoe processor. As luck would have it, the Crusoe chip is designed to regulate its power consumption intelligently by changing its clock speed as the need for computing power fluctuates. Among other things, that helps keep the chip cool, eliminating the need for a fan. That's also a useful feature for Japanese companies that are conscious of expensive electricity. The Mate is available only as a build-to-order product directly from NEC--and only in Japan. But NEC, like most Japanese electronics manufacturers, often launches a product in Japan before bringing it to the U.S. Prices start at the equivalent of about $1,900 for machines running Microsoft's (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) Windows XP Pro edition, lower for machines with Windows XP Home edition.