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HOME TREADMILLS

First Class:
True Fitness 525 CI
If your cardiologist has her way, the steel-frame 525 CI will replace the refrigerator as the most rock-solid appliance in your home, answering daily megamile punishment with a smooth, quiet ride. A dozen cushioning levels suit any body type and running style, while 16 programs (including 3 you can customize) vary speed and incline to simulate different courses. Strap on the Polar chest transmitter and the 525 CI auto-adjusts to keep your ticker at its target rate, while the three-color panel displays your vital stats. Optional UltraCoach PC software (cabled to the mill's serial port) tracks training progress and prescribes custom workouts.

525 CI: $4,695. True Fitness Technology: (800) 426 6570,www.truefitness.com.

Business Class:
Aerobics PaceMaster Pro-Plus HR
A durable bang per buck, the aluminum-frame Pro-Plus HR puts top treadmill perks in a compact package. You can run eight programs: three preset, one for heart-rate monitoring, and four you can customize with a "learn" feature that memorizes speed and incline changes as you make them. The control panel shows standard data like time, speed, heart rate, and distance, as well as an approximation of the calories you've burned. Meanwhile, full-size side rails keep your happy feet from running wild.

PaceMaster Pro-Plus HR: $2,095. Aerobics: +1 (973) 276 9700,www.pacemaster.com.

Coach:
Icon Health & Fitness Image 10.4Qi
Icon's Image 10.4Qi runs heart-rate and preset programs, plus workouts from the Internet. Connect your computer's audio-out to the treadmill's controller port, then choose a course at www.ifit.com. Your speed and slope will change while your PC monitor shows outdoor scenery to match. Or train offline with optional iFit videotapes and CDs - though CDs won't give you those picturesque visuals. The lightweight steel-framed 10.4Qi folds up for storage.

Image 10.4Qi: $1,399. Icon Health & Fitness: (800) 999 6750,www.iconfitness.com.

FIXED SPLIT PC KEYBOARDS

First Class:
Logitech Cordless Desktop Pro
Unless that tingling numbness in your fingers comes from tapping the company keg, it's high time you upgrade to a split-style ergonomic keyboard like Logitech's Cordless Desktop Pro. Beyond alleviating repetitive stress injuries, the Pro offers instant relief from tangled cords, linking to your PC via 27-MHz RF from up to 6 feet away. In the same easy-access vein are iTouch Net hotkeys and one-touch sleep mode. Unlike ambitiously reimagined keyboards, the Pro presents virtually no learning curve. The package even includes a wrist rest and cordless scrolling mouse, though the mouse's design does favor right-handed users.

Cordless Desktop Pro: $129. Logitech: (800) 231 7717,www.logitech.com.

Business Class:
Microsoft Natural Keyboard Pro
The long row of programmable buttons atop Microsoft's high-end ergo keyboard may or may not catch on - some typists will set them for arcane launch sequences; others will ignore them. Either way, this flexible unit has two onboard USB connectors for peripherals as well as a built-in volume knob. The existence of both PS/2 and USB plugs means the keyboard can work on PCs and (unofficially) on Macs - Mac users, however, may be frustrated to find that the Command and Option keys are reversed.

Natural Keyboard Pro: $74.95. Microsoft: (800) 426 9400,www.microsoft.com.

Coach:
Belkin ErgoBoard F8E208
Built for middle management but priced for the masses, the PC-only ErgoBoard is designed to let hands face inward in a more natural typing posture; other standard ergo features include an integrated, contoured palm rest and adjustable height. Belkin's QuietType rubber membrane will also ease the strain on a hunt-and-pecker's eardrums. True, ErgoBoard uses the PS/2 port only, but it'll still make climbing the corporate ladder considerably less painful.

ErgoBoard F8E208: $39.99. Belkin Components: (800) 223 5546,www.belkin.com.

3-D CARDS FOR GAMING

First Class:
Guillemot 3D Prophet DDR-DVI
Though "cutting-edge" graphics cards tend to have the life span of five-thumbed Unreal players, today's accelerator heroes use Nvidia's GeForce 256, for the moment the hottest gaming silicon on the planet. With nearly 23 million transistors, the chip number-crunches 3-D instructions into liquid-smooth visuals at blistering speeds. Guillemot combines this quad-pipeline bad boy with 32 Mbytes of double-data-rate RAM to make a card that pumps out 480 million textured pixels per second, which you can funnel through VGA- and TV-output jacks or an all-digital DVI connector for supercrisp flat-panel viewing.

3D Prophet DDR-DVI: $319. Guillemot: (877) 484 5536,www.guillemot.com.

Business Class:
3dfx Voodoo3 3500 TV AGP
3dfx unites its top-of-the-line 183-MHz, 128-bit accelerator with onboard TV and FM tuners to create a pancompatible board that renders a game-crazy 366 million textured pixels per second. The card supports real-time MPEG-2 video capture and editing (both single frames and clips), while Glide3D support serves older games like Myth. Though this Voodoo has only 16 Mbytes of SDRAM, tuner inputs and I/O connectors for video, S-video, and stereo audio let you connect to almost anything.

Voodoo3 3500 TV AGP: $249. 3dfx: +1 (408) 935 4400,www.3dfx.com.

Coach:
ATI Rage Fury AGP 32MB
Rage Fury's 128-bit graphics engine and 32 Mbytes of SDRAM accelerate 3-D in 32-bit true color all the way up to 1,920 x 1,200. With a peak fill rate of 200 million pixels per second and single-pass multitexturing, the easy-to-install Rage Fury handles even demanding titles like Quake III andShogo. Hardware DVD/MPEG-2 decoding and motion compensation let ATI's cute DVD applet play full-screen movies without draining your CPU.

Rage Fury AGP 32MB: $159. ATI Technologies: +1 (905) 882 2600,www.ati.com.