A Mixed-Bag Morning for Tech Stocks

SAN FRANCISCO -- Attempting to ignore the Dow 10,000 party, tech stocks are doing their own thing. But like the overall market, it's been a mixed picture early on.

Semiconductor-equipment makers are trading strong after

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter

upgraded several companies. Upgraded to strong buy from outperform were

ASM Lithography

(ASML) - Get Report

, with a price target of 60;

Cymer

(CYMI)

, with a price target of 37;

DuPont Photomasks

(DPMI)

, with a price target of 55; and

Etec Systems

(ETEC)

, with a price target of 60. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter has done underwriting for ASM Lithography, Cymer and DuPont Photomasks.

In early trading, ASM Lithography was trading 1 13/16 higher, or 4.3%, at 44 1/4. Cymer was up 1 3/8, or 5.8%, at 25. DuPont Photomasks was up 3/8 at 39 3/4, and Etec Systems was up 1 7/8, or 4.1%, at 46 3/8.

Nets in Play

Cyberian Outpost

(COOL)

was sharply higher following an announcement that it has introduced an online auction site at

www.outpostauctions.com

for users to buy and sell computer equipment. Cyberian Outpost was trading 7 1/2 higher, or 44%, at 26.

On the downside,

Xoom.com

(XMCM)

, a community Internet site, was trading lower after filing with the

SEC

an offering of 4 million shares, half of which will be sold by the company and stockholders. Xoom.com was trading 6 lower, or 8.6%, at 63 5/8.

Shares of

Vignette

(VIGN)

were down 5, or 6.8%, at 68 1/2.

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter

, which was the lead underwriter for the company when it went public last month, initiated coverage of the Internet software maker with a neutral rating.

Hambrecht & Quist

also an underwriter, initiated coverage with a buy rating.