TechWatch: PDAs; Projectors; Printers

In the holiday spirit, we've tried to dig up products that will help resellers ring up sales in the new year. Got any hot prospects of your own? Send them to [email protected].

ENTERPRISing PDA

PDAs may not have lived up to their promise in the consumer space, but they're certainly going gangbusters in vertical markets. Now, Symbol Technologies has launched a new family of enterprise personal digital assistants that are specifically aimed at the growing cadre of mobile workers who need to connect into the corporate network. The Symbol MC50 is equipped with integrated Wi-Fi and features a bar-code scanner and image-capture options. Software is supplied by Microsoft in the form of PDA stalwart Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition. For enterprises that will deploy thousands of these devices, Symbol's mobility-services platform can be applied to monitor the units on a real-time basis and manage the deployment of software upgrades.

MC50, www.symbol.com Price: $925 to $1,200 (depending on options)

BRIGHT LIGHTS, SMALL UNIT

Did you know ultralight portables are the fastest-growing segment of the digital-projector market? The latest 2.9-pound offering from Toshiba--the TDP-P7U--fits right into that niche. For resellers, such projectors often constitute a nice add-on sales opportunity. This one delivers 1,100 lumens of brightness with a 1,024-x-768 pixel resolution and a 2,000-to-1 contrast ratio. Composite and S-video inputs, along with audio-in capability and digital keystone-correction technology for distortion-free operation, complete the picture. Setup is particularly easy on this stylishly designed model.

TDP-P7U, www.toshiba.com Price: $1,900

WORKHORSE PRINTER+

It's a printer. It's a scanner. It's a copier. No, it's a digital productivity center. That's what Samsung is calling its new SCX-4100. Compatible with both Windows and Linux, SCX-4100 is a perfect SMB solution for workhorse environments. The unit boasts 15-page-per-minute black-and-white printing, a 10,000-page-per-month duty cycle, 4,800-dpi color scanning and the ability to handle different paper types, such as transparencies and card stock. And for really hard-working offices, two users can print simultaneously using a first-in, first-out (FIFO) multiport-sensing feature tacked onto the USB and parallel interfaces.

SCX-4100, www.samsung.com Price: $199 (est. street price)