11JAN08 – Happy Birthday, Mom! – You’ve heard it before, but now Bill Gates really means it. Tabletop PC’s are the future. Seen it? It’s a big, shiny monitor that responds to touch and is connected to a Media Center PC. The Media Center PC is able to control sound, radio, MP3 collections, downloaded movies and music and sometimes even webcams, gaming applications and, in Smart Homes, lights, atmostphere and security details and alarms.

Don’t think that the touchscreen is just a phase we computer geeks are going through. For decades, improvments to the mouse and keyboard have been sought. Most improvements were just variations of the existing hardware: Optical mouse, smaller keyboard, wireless mouse, roll-up keybard, etc. Not new, just different.

In the picture above, Barb Marshall demonstrates the Microsoft Surface at the Microsoft booth at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Monday, Jan. 7, 2008. The computer in a table responds to users’ touches and gestures. Surface is debuting as a virtual concierge in hotels, but Mi0crosoft chairman Bill Gates hopes it will soon be used in retail stores. AP