General Dynamics (GD), the big $32 billion-a-year American defense contractor, ushered in four new Tadpole ultra-thin clients Monday, two mobile, two wireless desktops.

Those up on their Sun lore will recall that Tadpole was the name of the Texas start-up that created the first and only Sparc-based laptop; that General Dynamics acquired Tadpole; and that General Dynamics is also a Sun Ray licensee, has been for 10 years.

So it will come as no great surprise that these Tadpole clients are Sun Ray clients that Itronix, part of General Dynamics' largest unit, has gussied up and means to sell into the cloud as a greener, securer, sustainable alternative to traditional desktop computing.

After all, it says, core computing is moving from the end user to secure centralized servers and the Tadpole line, with its enterprise-class features and capabilities, lets IT teams work on server-based capabilities and business process efficiencies instead of break-and-fix chores complements of a virtual computer desktop.

They should turn up a lot in finance as well as education, government, defense, healthcare and manufacturing. Itronix is expecting big deployments.

Sun Ray is part of the Sun hardware that Oracle means to exploit, so Itronix is getting plenty of cooperation, according marketing director David Miles. See, the Tadpoles aren't standard Oracle gear.

General Dynamics has dolled a couple of them up with real-time 3D and streaming video capabilities "beyond what comparable solutions can offer," it says, and they also support high-resolution displays and multi-screens for folks like those intelligence guys with 14 screens on their desk.

Like all Sun Ray widgets, Tadpoles have no hard drive, operating system, applications or data on them but are supposed to deliver PC-like performance whether working locally on a company network or connecting worldwide using a virtual private network (VPN).

They leverage the User Datagram Protocol (UDP) instead of PC/IP for network communication to optimize the speed at which users send and receive data. The result is supposed to be a delay-free experience similar to a traditional desktop PC, whether they're connecting with a server three or 3,000 miles away. Itronix will tell you this is important to traders, say, whose split-second decisions mean small fortunes.

Lacking the PC's vulnerable points, the Tadpoles are virtually immune to viruses and the security issues associated with lost or stolen computers. Plus, they're backed by Trusted Solaris, the only commercial system with an EAL 4 security rating.

A single Tadpole can access multiple networks securely. That makes it suitable for the post-9/11 charter of government agencies sharing information.

There's encryption and security certificate support.

The Tadpole M1000 and M1500 are, as one might discern from the designation, mobile units and the Tadpole Pulsar and Pulsar Premium are desktops.

The M1000 is a three-pound 10-inch notebook designed for distributed, highly mobile users and general-purpose computing; the M1500 is an upscale version of the 1000 with a 15-inch LCD screen that supports high-definition multimedia, 3-D imaging and video.

The Pulsar is a wireless desktop unit configured for complex operations including dual displays, optical networking, high-definition multimedia, 3D video and imaging while the Pulsar Premium is an entry-level version good for Word and Excel.

The more powerful units are accessible through a smart card.

Cascades' Tissue Division is going with the 1500 for employees whose jobs take them to various locations within their worksite or to facilities located throughout North America. It's part of the division's green decision to centralize its network infrastructure, reduce operating costs and cut its power consumption.

A standard PC consumes about 80 watts of electricity. The M1500 cuts that in half.

Itronix also figures a Tadpole should last two or three times longer than a traditional PC.

Sun Rays used to be a pricey proposition because they involved Sparc-based severs in the background. Now they run off of an x86 dual quad-core 1U that can support 250 users. Tadpoles start at $435.

Miles remarked that users have so much money invested in Sparc and Solaris that they're "too big to fail."