Until the advent of the personal computer, you may not have thought that anything would lose value faster than a car driven off a dealer's lot. But in recent years the one certainty about PCs has been that they are already obsolete within a nanosecond of the ch-ching of the cash register at the check out counter. That's about to change for a number of business-related reasons.

The typical business in Southwest Florida is computer-dependent and probably has one PC for each knowledge or administrative worker. Many of these companies also have linked all or most of their PCs in a local area network to increase productivity. But, with the exception of technology companies or architectural and engineering firms that require lots of computing horsepower, few companies have invested in state of the art PCs. In fact, many struggle along with 1990 vintage pre-Pentium PCs, sometimes still running PC-DOS or very early versions of Windows. It's time to stop struggling and move on to the next generation of PC technology.

As of the third quarter of 1998, there are five important reasons to consider buying new PCs:

1. The price/performance equation has never been better.

2. A new generation of technologies comes together for the first time in mid-1998.

3. Today's new PCs will significantly increase office productivity.

4. New PCs, even at budget prices, will be more than adequate for business applications for the next five years.

5. New PCs are universally Year 2000 compliant.

There are plenty of reliable PC vendors in the U.S. Specific mentions below serve as illustrations of performance and value. They aren't meant to exclude either name brands or custom-built machines available from local computer companies. Whatever brand you select -- at whatever price -- you will find available power and capability that blows away PCs bought as recently as a year ago.

The new PC generation is more than just faster and cheaper. There are important technologies incorporated into the newest generation of desktop and laptop computers that will protect them from obsolescence:

· Very Large Hard Drives: 12 gigabytes in desktops and 8-10 gigabytes in laptops will accommodate even the porkiest applications and multimedia files. If your PC is more than 2 years old, you probably have only 10 percent of this available space.

· USB Ports. The typical 1998 PC has two USB (universal serial bus) ports that replace the problematic serial ports we now wrestle with in getting modems, Palm Pilots and other peripherals to work together. USB ports permit the daisy-chaining of up to 99 peripherals -- including digital monitors -- so that you don't run out of connections. This will be the standard for many years to come.

· High Speed 100mhz bus replaces the 60/66mhz bus in most desktop PCs. This makes for much faster communication within your PC. It's not enough to have a fast Pentium brain; your computer must also speed data to memory to disk and to peripherals. The 100mhz bus enables this.

· DVD-Roms in both desktops and laptops. DVD devices will replace the now ubiquitous CD-ROM player in short order. DVD disks store 4.7GB of data -- that's seven times more than a CD-ROM's 650MB. PC-based DVDs are interchangeable with TV/Stereo DVDs. First generation DVD players will read CD-ROMs and Second generation DVDs will read CD-Rs (recordable CDs).

Productivity Goes Up, Way Up

None of us can afford a big staff. Therefore we need to give each of our staffers the tools that will optimize their productivity. This year's PCs and laptops should be on the top of the list of productivity tools. They are not only cheaper and faster, but they are running the most bug-free versions of Windows 95. Today's software applications will flourish on the Class of 98 PC. You and your staff will get much more done in less time with quick, intuitive software and hardware.

There Will Be Newer and Faster PCs Next Year, But You Won't Need Them

There are no new, must-have business applications on the near-term horizon that will require more speed, power or storage than this year's PCs deliver for most applications. Arguably, voice-activated software or 3-D applications may stretch computing resources in the next few years. But, the typical business owner won't see them in mainstream applications before the turn of the century. If you invest today in a 300-400mhz Pentium desktop or 266mhz laptop with 32-64MB of RAM, you won't need to worry about obsolescence anytime soon.

Your Company Must be Year 2000 Compliant -- and Installing New PCs May be the Easiest Part of that Process

We have written extensively about the Year 2000 problem (check out our website: BusinessNewsNow.Com to get the latest). Suffice it to say that many older PCs will be expensive to bring up to compliance. Even on a budget you can increase productivity and eliminate one major Y2K pitfall, by acquiring new PCs for less than $1000 each. Don't be the last on your business block to achieve Year 2000 compliance.

Find a good home for your micro-dinosaurs. We'll be right there with you. We don't like to spend money on new equipment when we can avoid it, but we will be junking at least one and probably two PCs in the next few months. It will only hurt for a minute.

Windows 98: Just Say No!

Because there aren't enough compelling advantages to Windows 98 vs. Windows 95 -- and because numerous PC vendors are waving red flags -- you should postpone its installation within an office environment. This is particularly true if your PCs are networked.

Ron Welebny, President of Westside Automation in Cape Coral, tells of one local client who insisted on putting Win98 on every networked PC and suffered a pervasive failure as a direct result.

There will be a time to upgrade, when bugs have been fixed and hardware vendors have appropriate Win98 support. But this isn't it. You won't regret waiting.