Unlike in the past, most consumers are willing to accept computers that don't say "Intel Inside." They don't discern much difference between one brand of personal computer and another.

A number of Windows PC makers are hoping to draw a lesson from Apple Computer's successful iMac. The iMac proved that consumers are willing to pay a premium for a machine that isn't revolutionary in its basic operation, if it's stylish and very easy to set up and connect to peripheral devices. So several companies are preparing radically different-looking desktop computers.

Sony led the way earlier this year with the elegantSlimtop PC. But I've been testing a prototype of an even cooler-looking PC that is due to hit store shelves late next month. It's not only attractive, but it has a couple of real breakthroughs in upgradability. Ironically, it's from Packard Bell NEC, a company that formerly thrived on making the plainest, and cheapest, computers. The new $2,500 NEC Z1 is a sharp break from that heritage.

The Z1 is a real head-turner. It looks nothing like the typical beige tower or desktop PC. It's a thin, tall, gray metallic one-piece machine, dominated by a sharp, vivid built-in 15-inch flat-panel color screen. Below the screen are an infrared receiver, a DVD drive and a floppy drive, flanked by built-in speakers. The entire thing rests on a curved base that takes up just a 10-square-inch swath of your desktop.

All of the guts of the computer, except for the hard disk, are tucked away in a slim vertical housing that is hidden behind the screen. The connectors and ports are easily accessible along the sides of thishousing. The hard disk is secreted in the computer's base.

Setting up the Z1 was a snap. It took about five minutes, and pretty much consisted of just plugging it into an electrical socket and a phone jack. You don't even need to plug in a keyboard and mouse. The Z1 comes with a wireless keyboard that can be used from across a small room. It also includes a pointing device that replaces the mouse. In my tests, however, I found this pointer hard to use, and so I resorted to the mouse that also comes with the machine.

The Z1 has plenty of power. It has a 450 MHz Pentium III processor, a generous 96 megabytes of memory and an 8.4 gigabyte hard disk. In my tests, the Z1 had a few minor glitches typical of a prototype, but ran very crisply and well in general. The DVD and video system did a brilliant job with movies, and Internet access was also smooth and simple. The most innovative aspect of the Z1 is its expandability.

There are no internal slots for adding new circuitry, which most users shun anyway.Instead, there are four of the new, simpler USB connectors -- twice the industry norm. It also includes a PC card socket, typically found only on laptops, that makes it easy to pop in the memory cards found on digital cameras.

There's also a built-in Ethernet networking port, for hooking up cable modems. Memory can be expanded by just opening a little door on the back. And there are the standard serial and printer ports, as well as a port for connecting a second monitor.

The Z1 has two big breakthroughs in expandability. First, the flat panel screen can be easily removed, without tools or technical expertise, and replaced with a larger, optional 18-inch model the company expects to offer later this year for between $1,000 and $2,000. Then the original screen can be snapped onto an optional base NEC will also offer, which will allow it to be used as a monitor on any other PC.

Second, the Z1 offers the easiest hard-disk upgrade design I've ever seen. To add a second hard disk, or replace the hard diskwith a larger one, you don't have to be a techie. You just buy any hard disk that hooks up via a standard connector called SCSI. Then you pop it into a special external upgrade module to be offered later this year from NEC. The module docks to a built-in connector hidden on the side of the Z1's base.

You can then simply use the new hard disk as a second drive. Or, using software supplied by NEC, you can copy all the files from the old hard disk to the new one, undock the two, then remove the old drive and substitute the new one inside the base. There will be other PCs that look like the Z1. The industry is planning to simplify and restyle the basic PC, partly to compete with a coming wave of cheap, simple, so-called information appliances that can connect to the Internet. These devices, such as TV set-top boxes and souped-up phones, are the computer makers' next big worry.

Just this week, Gateway announced a $2,300 PC that looks similar to the Z1. But this new Profile model packs a bit less punch andlacks some of the innovative features NEC is offering. The Z1 isn't just pretty. It's a milestone on the way to a much simpler, much more distinctive type of personal computer for the future.

(www.ptech.wsj.com)