Virtual reality video games may have snagged most of the 3-D and simulation spotlight, but a steadily growing interest in using the graphics technologies for business has many companies looking to loosen the entertainment world's hold on the best simulation technology.

Companies are combining improved graphics technology with advances in compression technology to make 3-D and simulation applications useful in business scenarios, such as improving e-commerce and online catalogs and kicking up training and customer service programs.

"These simulate the real experience -- you could see what the product looks like, turn it over, examine it, take it apart if you had a 3-D application of the product," explains Rikki Kirzner, research director for application development and deployment at IDC, in Framingham, Mass. "For most people, information is much more effective if it's transmitted with a visual component."

According to Lori Dustin, president of Virtue3D, a 3-D application provider in Nadick, Mass., the technology can help cut tech support costs, because a good online simulation can show a customer how to fix a problem or program a just-bought device.

"I think humans are much more willing to see a video or an animation in 3-D than pick up a manual that's 500 pages and read through the text," she says.

The applications' large file sizes -- some files can easily reach more than 5MB in size because of their graphics-intense nature -- previously kept many businesses and consumers from seeing 3-D as anything more than a connection-clogging toy. Despite the evolution of the industry, Kirzner believes that ultimately, bandwidth "is going to be the bottleneck."

No limits on the Web

The idea of providing a more realistic experience online with simulation programs, coupled with the fact that the Web is not limited by physical boundaries, have companies banking on analysts' predictions that high-speed connections will soon become much more common in homes and businesses.

"I think 3-D technology is going to be the future way that people really interact with the Internet, whether it's shopping or playing a game or visiting different sites," says Miki Racine, director of Internet and e-commerce at LimitedToo.

With a primary target of 7-to 14-year-old girls and a secondary target of those who shop for them, Columbus, Ohio-based LimitedToo has a catalog, a brick-and-mortar business, and LimitedToo.com, which launched in February 2000 as a content-only site before adding e-commerce in May.

After adding 3-D technology in July, Racine says the site has seen about a 30 percent increase

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