Look around the office. What do you see? Offices filled with PCs in tower cases, or black notebooks neatly docked to their monitors. Could that change? This year, the enterprise will see two new types of PCs vie to replace the traditional desktop and notebook: the blade PC and the modular PC. Even the common PC and notebook designs are changing. Analysts, however, are betting on the evolutionary designs rather than the revolutionary ones. "Change is a four-letter word," says Enderle Group analyst Rob Enderle. Still, designers keep trying to come up with something new to appeal to computer buyers. Here’s a preview of the main contenders.

1 Blade PCs

Lock it up in the data center. That’s the idea behind blade PCs, such as those from ClearCube. The blade systems offer centralized, secured management advantages similar to the mainframe-and-terminal systems—while providing a standard Windows environment for applications, says IDC analyst Roger Kay. Blades rely on network connections to users’ desktops to deliver screen updates and receive mouse and keyboard input. Users can log in from any location and still see "their" PC. Companies also gain greater security since the hardware and storage all live in a secured data center. But unlike thin-client PCs and the original computer terminals of the pre-PC era, blade PCs run standard Windows programs, allowing IT to preserve the existing computing environment.

It’s not all upside for blades, of course. The systems require significant network resources—often necessitating dedicated cabling and infrastructure—and increased network management, which can neutralize any hardware savings, says Kay. Thus far, security- and space-conscious financial trading floors and other financial organizations are the primary blade users. Government institutions (particularly those involved with intelligence and defense), as well as some hospitals (where employees are mobile, and the heat and noise of a PC is intolerable), are also early blade adopters, Kay says.

ClearCube pioneered the blade design, and IBM Japan is now reselling the ClearCube blades to test the market. And Hewlett-Packard has already started selling blade PCs.

2 Modular PCs

Apple Computer’s Newton made the idea of a handheld computer seem plausible—technologically succeeding Palm and Pocket PC devices. However, Newton capabilities remain considerably less than a fully enabled PC despite its improved processing power. But designers haven’t given up. Several firms are proposing the so-called modular PC, a handheld device that runs standard Windows XP and other conventional PC applications. The goal is to give mobile users the full PC experience on the go—without the inconvenience of a notebook’s weight or size. Need a standard monitor, mouse, keyboard or extra storage? No problem, just attach them via a docking station.