By Cheryl Currid

With the blink of an eye, another new year started. Digitally speaking, are you ready to do business? Can you keep up with products, services, customers and all the nuances of keeping a business in balance? Or do you have too many plates to juggle?

If you feel the plates are headed for the floor, let me give you a few ideas to help. It's not hard, or necessarily expensive; my advice is aimed at getting the basics right so you won't waste time with break/fix work.

First, check your "digital foundation." It doesn't matter if you have one or 100 computers in your home office -- make sure the fastest one fits underneath your fingertips and the rest are connected to a local area network. You can run network cables to each computer, use one of the power line products using your electricity, try out wireless computing or do it all. Just keep them connected.

Next, make sure your network has broadband access to the Internet. (Broadband means having speedy access to the Internet. You'll need a cable modem, DSL connection, a data satellite dish, or an ISDN line.)

Depending on your neighborhood, you might not have too many choices, but get the fastest connection available.

Once you connect your home computers to the outside world, make sure you've equipped yourself with firewall and antivirus software. This capability is easy. Most routers that you need for broadband come with a firewall and are easy to install. You have two objectives: Keep the bad people away from hacking into your computers, and if you have children, keep them safe from finding objectionable sites. The firewall will do both, but you will have to check it periodically to make sure the settings are up to date.

As for antivirus software, it's best to put it on each computer. Symantec has just come out with a product called Norton Anti-Virus 2003 Professional Edition that gives you a license for two computers. Don't cringe over having to install this software, because once in place, it is great at keeping itself automatically up to date.

If you haven't already done so, take the plunge into buying a computer with plenty of power. For example, it's a completely different experience using a computer powered by the new 3.06-GHz Pentium 4 processor with Hyper-Threading technology and Windows XP. HT technology enables the computer to perform multiple tasks at once, instead of one at a time. This gives a great performance boost to everyday tasks like playing multimedia files, editing photos and even scanning for viruses.

Running Microsoft Windows XP, the computer is smarter too. You can plug in a printer, camera, PDA, portable memory card or assortment of other devices. Nine times out of 10, the computer recognizes it, does its magic configuration dance and lets you use it. When people see this for the first time, they usually utter one word: "Wow!"

Now, if I haven't spent your entire budget already, I have one more recommendation. Get a flat-panel monitor. A 15-inch screen can be found for less than $300, and a 17-inch goes for about $500. These screens are so much easier on your eyes, not to mention your air conditioning bill.

Finally, you do need a good printer for a home office. But I'm going to save my recommendations for a few weeks while I try out some of the latest models.

As for the exotic technology, stay tuned. There are plenty of new products planned for this year.