(FORTUNE Magazine) – Not every top manager gets the kick from a nifty gadget that Greyhound Chairman John Teets does. He has a telephone with a touch-sensitive screen that he can use to summon his executives at a tap, a tiny doodad on his desk that combines scissors, stapler, tape dispenser, magnifying glass, staple remover, and hole punch, and a credit card-size electronic phone directory in his wallet. Says he: ''Having a gadget in your pocket makes you feel warm and important.''

Even so, most of the cornucopia of electronic helpers cascading onto executive desktops and into executive pockets are serious tools. Last year U.S. companies and individuals bought 700,000 laptop computers, 700,000 small fax machines, and 630,000 cellular telephones -- all worth more than $3 billion. Don't count on all these gadgets shortening the workweek. Russell Walker, president of Walker Enterprises, a Denver-area industrial packager, recently pulled a 4 1/2-pound walleye from a reservoir while not exactly relaxing. He closed a deal using a laptop computer, a battery-powered fax machine, and a cellular phone on the boat as he angled for the pike. These and other brand-new breeds of productivity-enhancing tools are pictured here and on the following pages. They were picked for maximum convenience and utility, as well as for fun.

The race is on to build the lightest, the handiest, and the most powerful portable computer. The overall winner is NEC's Ultralite laptop. Battery operated, no bigger than a loose-leaf binder, and weighing only 4.4 pounds, it offers features and computing power not found on most desktop machines. To accomplish this, NEC compromised on data storage and batteries: Unless it is plugged in, the machine can be used for barely two hours at a time. List price: $3,699. The bigger Toshiba T1600 has many features the Ultralite lacks: substantial data storage, larger batteries, and faster microprocessors. At 11.6 pounds it has formidable number-crunching ability and better graphics quality on the screen. Price: $4,999. Dynabook, the newest portable, sports one of the largest liquid-crystal screens of any portable -- 11 inches measured diagonally. One of Dynabook's chief attractions is its modular design: The screen and a thin, flat battery pack can be removed, reducing its weight to a comfortable 6.4 pounds. Price: $5,195. Electronic organizers such as the Sharp Wizard and the Casio Boss are for someone who wants to travel light and needs to jot down memos, keep on top of a busy schedule, and store phone numbers. The Wizard accommodates slip-in memory cards that track expenses, define words, and translate foreign languages. The Boss has a screen twice the size of the Wizard's and uses a standard typewriter keyboard, making entry of information easier. The nine- ounce Wizard is priced at $299; the 11-ounce Boss, $259.

It's the very popularity of the big-office fax machines that makes desktop versions appealing. As faxes become nearly universal, everybody wants to be reachable by this newly popular means of business communication. Chances are that you don't need a top-of-the-line fax -- there are $5,000 units that send images in 16 shades of gray, store incoming messages in secret memories accessible only if you type in your password, or send a page of text in 15 seconds. However, plenty of reliable, inexpensive machines are adequate for anyone who expects to send or receive a half dozen memos a day or wants to get faxed messages at home. The best of the inexpensive ones is the Murata M900, a minimum-frills fax with a document feeder that can handle five pages at a time and an automatic dialer that stores 20 phone numbers. The price is $899. Panasonic has handily combined a fax and a telephone answering machine in its KX-F120, which can distinguish an incoming fax call from a voice call and thus requires only a single telephone line for both purposes. Casey Dworkin, general manager of Personal Technology Research, a Boston-area firm that evaluates office equipment, uses one at home. Price: $1,869. If you need a fax machine while fishing for walleyed pike, the battery- powered Medbar Portafax III is the one. It lacks a sheet feeder and the recharging apparatus is bulky, but the machine can send or receive up to 25 pages per charge from a cellular or pay phone. Price: $1,995. The three-pound Ricoh MC 50 copier not only scans and duplicates images up to 4 by 6 inches, but with a two-pound attachment it also serves as a portable fax sender and receiver. Price: $540 for the copier, $540 for the fax.

All portable cellular phones look about the same, with one stunning exception: the Motorola MicroTac 950. At 12 ounces it is barely half the size and weight of its rivals and fits comfortably in a shirt pocket. At $2,995 it's also the most expensive. The model shown is available only by direct order from Motorola, with about a six-week delivery time. It stores and displays 120 phone numbers. It sends a signal as powerful as any portable twice its size. Motorola outfoxed the competition by devising chips that can be packed into a small space without overheating. Portable phones won't get a lot smaller than this one. After all, they have to reach from your ear to your mouth.

Stuffing all these gadgets into your pockets won't do much for your silhouette, but they can streamline common chores. In major cities the portable Lotus QuoTrek radio device keeps tabs on 30,000 stocks, options, and futures, and will display the latest quotes and other data on any 72 of them you choose. Price: $399, plus a minimum $63 monthly fee. Bad spellers can be grateful for Franklin's Language Master 3000, which stores an 83,000-word dictionary and a thesaurus in a 5-by-7-by-1.5-inch portable computer. Type in a misspelled word and the machine displays a correct one. Or, type in a properly spelled word and the machine defines it. Price: $299. Just half an inch thick and weighing four ounces, the Olympus Pearlcorder L- 200 is one of the smallest microcassette recorders. Price: $249.95. To help your audience get the point, there's the Laserex Laser Pointer, hand-held and battery powered, which shoots a pencil-thin beam of red light more than 50 yards for singling out details in a visual presentation. It works in daylight -- and unlike any other gadget in this article, it has only one button to press. Price: $395.