The Hindu : Front Page : Hang my PC on the wall!

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Sunday, Apr 06, 2008
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Hang my PC on the wall!

Anand Parthasarathy

Versatile made-in-India design lets you use PC as tabletop — or wall hanging

— Photo: Anand Parthasarathy

Smart package: Zenith Computers’ Executive Director Devita Saraf unveils the SmartStyle PC, which squeezes all the electronic parts into the casing of the LCD display.

Bangalore: ‘Is that a shrunken desktop or a laptop on steroids?’ We have to think up a new product category before we can even begin describing the personal computer avatar unveiled on Friday by Zenith Computers.

It has a large 17 inch LCD flat screen. It comes with a keyboard and mouse. But where are all the electronics, the motherboard with the processor chip, the graphics card, the power supply and audio circuits?

If you are looking for a small ‘tower’ cabinet, you won’t find one: It’s all been tucked into the casing which protects the display. “It is the first of its kind to squeeze the entire CPU or central processing unit into the monitor — and it was designed by Indian engineers,” says Zenith’s Managing Director Raj Saraf with pride.

What is offered is a full function PC fuelled by a dual-core Intel processor, 1 gigabytes of memory and a hard disk that starts at 80 GB. There are built-in speakers and a full set of networking and wireless slots.

The Zenith engineers, who designed the machine in Mumbai, have come up with some clever ideas: The display can be hung flat on the wall, placed upright on a desk or fitted to be a small tabletop. They call it the SmartStyle PC and it costs Rs. 20,000 — which would be considered ‘paisa vasool’ by canny buyers, even without its flexible physical possibilities.

What might be missed is a CD/DVD drive but Devita Saraf, Zenith’s Executive Director, who is known to have inspired the unusual packaging, told The Hindu on the sidelines of the product launch here that the company expects a significant corporate demand for enterprises such as banks and hotels which don’t need an optical drive.

However, there is a slot in the display casing to include a DVD burner for home users who might well like to throw in an external TV tuner for a couple of thousand rupees and hang the SmartStyle PC on their bedroom wall where they can watch TV or movies — or surf the Net in comfort. With space at a premium at both home and office, the Zenith SmartStyle looks like a clever idea whose time has come.

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