Compaq woos channel with Net PC

Compaq?s Net PC started shipping this week as the vendor continued to push its total cost of ownership message as a sales tool for the channel.

In June, Compaq revealed at PC Expo that its Deskpro 4000N would come without ISA slots, floppy drive or CD-Rom. James Griffiths, Compaq commercial desktop product manager, said the Net PC would not be hard for the channel to sell as it is based on familiar technology, unlike the NC.

?The Net PC initiative is just an extension of the work we have been doing on total cost of ownership,? he said.

?No one will need to relearn their skills to sell the Deskpro 4000N ? it?s the sort of technology that the channel?s used to selling. It?s a PC connected to an NC server.?

He said the NC compared less than favourably with the Net PC. ?Whereas the Net PC can take advantage of different Java offerings, the NC is Java-dependent. But there are few actual Java applications around.?

Meanwhile, Sun is to announce two NCs this quarter to take advantage of technological developments in the Java operating system and tools.

A high-end Javastation will cost less than $800, said Sun. It will be based on a tower design, include flash memory for the first time and support 100Mbps Ethernet.

A $600 model will be similar to existing NCs, but run the latest Java software.