EXPO: WINDOWS OF OPPORTUNITY.

Byline: David E. Kalish Associated Press 

For anyone unsure about Microsoft Corp.'s quest to dominate the computer software business, the company's No. 2 executive may have put those doubts to rest Wednesday.

Touting the idea of ``Windows everywhere,'' Microsoft's Steve Ballmer told 4,000 attendees of the PC Expo trade show that the company wants its operating software to run everything from bare-bones computers to industrial-strength mainframes.

Microsoft already has made clear its ambitions to make its Windows operating software ubiquitous, spreading beyond the desktop PCs it dominates. But Ballmer sketched out a broad strategy that went beyond previous announcements by the world's largest independent software maker.

In its latest expansion, he said, Microsoft plans to introduce software to operate stripped-down versions of traditional desktops - even more bare bones than machines the company announced with great fanfare just one day earlier.

Ballmer, Microsoft's head of worldwide sales, said a future version of the Windows NT operating software for computer networks would have the ability to run the new class of simple machines, which lack hard drives and start at less than $500.

Making the disclosure of an even ``dumber'' machine at his PC Expo keynote speech, Ballmer may have been trying to upstage a media blitz at Radio City Music Hall next Tuesday by Oracle and Sun, which are presenting their latest version of stripped-down PCs.

The new Microsoft-based machines would cost less than the $750 estimated price of the Sun-Oracle machines and $1,000 for the lowest cost Net PC machines.

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Photo: (Color) Microsoft's Steve Ballmer extols the future of Windows at the PC Expo trade show in New York.

Associated Press