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Monday, October 14, 1996
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[Image] Appliance
[Image]AP By LESLIE HELM
BUSINESS
ΚΚΚΚΚThe Internet appliance, that
INTERNET elusive consumer electronic device
ACADEMY that affords connections to cyberspace
without the expensive hardware of a
TIMES PICK computer, is beginning to take form as
a practical, useful product.
SPECIAL ΚΚΚΚΚ Japanese telephone giant Uniden,
REPORTS for example, has announced it will
begin selling a $299 telephone that
FRONT PAGE automatically downloads e-mail so it
[Image] can be read on the phone's display at
NATION & the user's convenience.
WORLD ΚΚΚΚΚ Last week, Sun Microsystems
[Image] announced details of a new generation
STATE & of cyber-ready computer chips that
LOCAL will be available for as little as $25
[Image] each. The chips will enable phones and
SPORTS televisions to run mini-applications
[Image] that might, for example, display stock
BUSINESS & quotes or a revolving set of news
TECHNOLOGY headlines.
[Image] ΚΚΚΚΚ
LIFE & STYLE ΚΚΚΚΚ The device closest to
[Image] commercialization is Uniden's Internet
CALENDAR phone, which will be shown at the
[Image] trade show Comdex next month and will
COMMENTARY be available in January.
[Image] ΚΚΚΚΚ The product, which includes an
WEEKLY electronic address book, note pad and
SECTIONS calendar, periodically connects to the
Internet and automatically downloads
ORANGE its user's e-mail. The user can then
COUNTY summon, at the touch of a button, his
or her messages on a liquid crystal
SAN FERNANDO display screen.
VALLEY ΚΚΚΚΚ "We see this as the beginning of
a whole new product category," said
VENTURA Greg Jones, vice president at Uniden
COUNTY America's Internet division.
ΚΚΚΚΚ Sun wants to make future
versions of products such as Uniden's
phone far more sophisticated with its
new line of microprocessor chips
custom-designed for Java, its popular
language for programming on the Net.
ΚΚΚΚΚ Sun claims its picoJava
processors, which will be available at
the end of next year, will operate as
much as five times faster than an
Intel Pentium chip, at a fraction of
the Pentium's cost.
ΚΚΚΚΚ Because the chip is hard-wired
to run Java code--meaning the Java
program is built directly into the
chip--Sun says it will be smaller and
require less memory than a
general-purpose processor such as the
Intel Pentium.
ΚΚΚΚΚ Analysts doubt any of these
products will soon find a mass
audience. But they are a start.
ΚΚΚΚΚ "It gets people thinking of what
you get when you stir up the
ingredients of Internet, phone and
computers," says Jim Turley, senior
editor of Microprocessor Report, a
Sunnyvale, Calif.-based industry
newsletter.
ΚΚΚΚΚ
Copyright Los Angeles Times
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