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"We see a dramatic rise in wireless adoption," said Leo Suarez, vice president of worldwide product marketing at IBM. A year from now, 40 percent to 50 percent of notebooks will come with built-in wireless, he said. Two years from now the figure will climb past 70 percent.toshiba Satellite A70 adapter Aspire aspire 5560 adapter sony VGP-AC19V11 adapter toshiba Satellite A205 Adapter

The new ThinkPad X30 also comes with a portable docking bay that plugs into the back of the notebook, giving it an extra battery and an optical drive. With the bay plugged in, the ThinkPad X30 can run for more than eight hours, the company said.

Despite a slump in PC sales in general, notebook sales continue to climb. Prices have been steadily declining, and consumers and IT managers have begun to more readily see the advantages of wireless computing, said Alan Promisel, an analyst with market research firm IDC. Notebook sales will increase 16.3 percent in 2003, he predicted.

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Increasing sales, combined with customer demands for performance, are prompting manufacturers to tweak and enhance their designs. Wireless connectivity, for instance, can sap battery

Also, in its networking product lines, Compaq lowered prices on its line of Netelligent network interface controllers by up to 13 percent. For example, the Netelligent 10/100TX PCI UTP NIC is now priced at $139, or about 12 percent less

Compaq, the world's largest server vendor, also continued its drive to reduce server prices. ProLiant 5000 6/200 models, based on the Pentium Pro processor, were reduced in price from 4 to 11 percent and now start at $13,920. ProLiant 5000 6/166 models were reduced in price from 7 to 10 percent and now start at $10,970. Pentium-based ProSignia 300 models were reduced in price from 9 to 20 percent and now start at $1,330.acer PA-1750-04 Adapter toshiba Tecra A8 adapter Acer TravelMate 600 AC Adapter

The company announced a processor promotion for the ProLiant 5000 Model 6/166, a system capable of supporting four Pentium Pro processors. The promotion provides customers who purchase a single processor system with a second processor at no additional cost. In addition, customers who purchase just the processor option kit will receive a second processor at no additional cost. The offer is available through April 30 and will be handled by resellers, Compaq said.

In the company's workstation line, two promotional programs were introduced for its Professional Workstation 5000 line. Through April 30, Compaq is providing a $400 rebate to its reseller partners on select workstation configurations. As a result, the estimated street price of its entry-level Compaq Professional Workstation configuration is expected to be around $3,900. Separately, Compaq is doubling the system memory on one of its high-end 3D graphics workstation models. The programs will run through April 30.

The new ThinkPad X30, appearing Thursday, combines a number of features found on larger notebooks and puts them into a 3.6-pound frame.

The notebook comes with built-in WiFi wireless networking and Bluetooth capabilities, software for network hopping, a security chip for hardened authentication and encryption, and a FireWire port for plugging in consumer-electronics devices such as digital cameras.