JR: Windows CE is part of our overall appliance strategy. So I think Windows CE is going to find itself into an ever increasing range of devices. Already it's in almost a half dozen defined platforms that Microsoft has worked on directly -- ranging from Palm-sized units to Sega game consoles. It's in about 150 other projects in the embedded space that go from milk analyzers to navigation systems. So, you know, I think Windows CE is going to find itself in an ever increasing range of devices. I think what's exciting is -- because Windows CE will be common across those devices -- there's an opportunity for them to work together in some sort of logical and connected way. And so over time, Windows CE is going to stand for "connected" and make all these appliances work together more intelligently.

DG: We've seen some of the lines blurring between Windows CE devices and Windows 98 devices in things like the Vadem Clio and the various new HP devices, where basically Windows CE is becoming an inexpensive, light laptop OS. Where is the line between the definition of what sort of a device Windows is supposed to be on and what a Windows CE device is supposed to be?

JR: Admittedly those larger form factor, Jupiter-class devices, the H/PC Pros, definitely are on the blurry part of the line. The way that I think about it is that Windows CE is for appliances. An appliance, in my definition, is something that has a specific or primary function. It can have additional functions, but it's really there to do one or maybe two things really, really well. So in the case of the Jupiter-class device, it really is a great email and browsing device, so that when you're a road warrior, and you're on the road, and that's what you want to do, it's ideal for that. It is convenient. It turns on instantly, it has an 18 hour battery life. It has a lot of flexibility on how it can be opened and used. That's what it's designed for.

A PC on the other hand, is a general purpose device. So the difference is really between specific function and a general function. In this instance (the Windows 98 laptop) we've taken your whole desktop on the road. And so that's where it boots longer and has a shorter battery life, but it also has the capability of running all of Access or all of Excel or whatever it is that you may need. Between appliances and general purpose systems, those are the sort of two ends of the spectrum. The Jupiter is a little bit closer to the center of that spectrum, but I still think it's very much on the appliance side.

DG: It also seems to me that the desktop Windows machines are generally Wintel-based [meaning Microsoft Windows running on an Intel processor] environment whereas the Windows CE devices seem to be running on a wide variety of processors.

JR: The fact of the matter is that Windows CE runs on top of five different chip architectures, including X86. So we also run on the Intel chip architecture and all of the folks that do X86. But we run on the Hitachi architecture and we run on SH4s and all these different things. So we are hosted on top of different architectures. And the reason is that these chips offer some very nice characteristics. Right? Lower power consumption so you can have longer batter life. Smaller footprints, etc., that are very appropriate for the appliance space.