By silicon.com, 29 May 2007 17:46
It's green and has a handle - is it a watering can?
No, it's the $100 laptop. Basically some clever types are trying to build a load of laptops for poor children who can't afford to get on the internet.
That's a nice idea...
Sure is. But it's not available yet. Although it won't be for sale in shops, you could see this hit the world at the end of this year or the beginning of next.
How can you make a laptop that sells for $100?
According to MIT Media Lab, it's because monitors are getting cheaper. The laptops only use a fraction of the software that most computers run and by manufacturing in real bulk - a hundred million is the aim - they hope to save a bit of cash.
So what do you get for your money?
You get a Linux-based operating system, a dual-mode display, a 500MHz processor, 128MB of DRAM and 500MB of Flash memory.
There's no hard disk but it will have four USB ports and wireless broadband that can mesh network.
Oh and a wind-up handle.
It'll do most things but you can't really save any data on it.
Who is making them and who is behind the scheme?
A Taiwanese firm, Quanta Computer, is the design manufacturer.
The idea was developed by a not-for-profit organisation called One Laptop per Child (OLPC) - set up by the MIT Media Lab. Nicholas Negroponte is chairman of that organisation.
The companies backing the scheme include AMD, Google, News Corporation, Nortel and Red Hat.
How and when can I get me one?
You probably can't unless you're a disadvantaged child, or you work for one of the companies making them or in the education business.
These machines are to be sold to governments one for every child.
Kids in Brazil were the first to get their hands on the $100 gadget when 50 devices were dished out in November 2006.
Other countries that intend to equip children with the low-cost laptops include Libya which has 1.2 million on order and due to be delivered in mid-2007.
The OLPC project recently denied reports it received four million orders from Argentina, Brazil and Thailand.
But surely we should be shipping over help and not hardware to developing countries?
It's true some critics of the project, including the Indian education secretary believe the money invested in the $100 gadgets would be better off spent on more traditional materials.
Just to pour more salt into the OLPC's well-meaning wounds, the project was further criticised when the first $100 laptop prototype was showcased with a price tag of $150 last year. The OLPC foundation hopes to get this figure to less than the $100 mark by 2008.
But Negroponte rejects the idea the developing world does not need a low-cost laptop. He told silicon.com: "People say if a child is malnourished, he doesn't have drinking water, he's sick, why do you want to give him a laptop? Substitute the word 'education' for 'laptop' and you'll never ask that question again."
Comments
There are 13 comments. Join the discussion
1. anonymous
FYI, you can save data on this laptop. Thats what the 500mb of flash is for. This is strictly for educational use, the retail product may be available later, so 500mb should be sufficient for saving data and low resolution graphics.
The low price is primarily due to the savings in marketing and other corporate fat that is avoided through the Negroponte NGO and direct selling to the nations involved.
2. Charbax
It will be available all over the world in a commercial version for 200$, of which 25-50$ would go to pay for the non-commercial 100$ ones.
500mb-1gb flash memory is enough, external harddrive can be plugged on the usb2-host connector, and the local long range wifi mesh network can have a local harddrive storage server or with the internet connection it will store big files on servers on the internet.
Games from Nintendo and Sega's NES, SNES, Sega Master System, Gamegear, Gameboy, thousands of games will be available for kids to play for free in full screen on those machines.
1 minute of cranking might work for as much as or more than 100 minutes of reading in ebook mode. 1 minute of cranking is though maybe only going to be for half an hour in video playback or games mode. 1 minute of cranking should be enough for an hour of browsing the internet.
Satellite, Wimax, wifi access point, gprs, umts, adsl technologies will be available to provide for most of the children who will receive this laptop within the end of the year.
I must say I have no insider info, I just read about this awesome laptop on the internet.
3. anonymous
A minute's cranking gets you an hour of internet browsing? That seems to be better than my month old VIAO can do with an hour of charging, can I swap?
4. Nick Cole
Great concept.
Pity that the lack of broadband or even dial up in many locations, coupled with what appears to be an inability to save data gets in the way.
The infrastructure and practicality need to be there as well as the hardware.
5. Jon Pennycook
I know that in many areas access to the Internet is through mobile phones rather than fixed lines. I think a rollout of WiMax might help though.
It's a pity that these could not be manufactured locally in the poorer countries - they would then develop expertise with hi-tec manufacture, increase employment locally, and help to reduce the amount of money each Government would have to send overseas. However I expect this would add too much to the cost.
6. Raymond Higley
I'm pretty sure the brains who came up with this great laptop will have also addressed the need for an Internet link for the villages or schools where these will be used. It cuts down on the wiring and infrastructure enormously to start out wireless. This is truly exciting, but is 100 million anywhere close to enough? We should be helping the other countries buy as many as we can afford.
7. Raymond Higley
Having the laptops manufactured locally in poorer countries might be a way to nurture technology skills and industry, but as these laptops are to be made at cost, they will be affordable. Made locally, the laptops would have to be bought or the industry would fail - no income- or be subsidized. And it would be much more expensve (for us or the country buying them) to build the machines through a dozen small companies rather than through one economy of size factory.
8. Mike
Memory: The internet gives you yahoo with 1Gb storage per ID.
Also there must be thousands of unused USB memory sticks around, given away as promos or advertising - Nice little charity project to collect them and send them out?
9. Dick Bush
Instead of buying kids laptops for porn and games, how about you greedy fcks help FEED them instead....morons.
10. anonymous
give me a break! you get what you pay for. You can buy a used 386 based laptop for less than $100 now w/mem and hdd and wireless, why would you? Technology gets better and gets cheaper, why would anyone want to give poor kids a box that has technology that dates 10+ years? The solution is that stuff is getting cheaper everyday, and the real question that needs to be answered is how kids in emerging markets will learn better and become more equipped to participate in knowledge based economies. It ain't by just cranking up a $100 "computer" invented for corruptable politicians by those who have a vested interest in licensing software to the poor for more $ by reducig the cost of hw (oops, did i just reveal someone's hidden agenda?)
11. Haydn Rees
The previous commentator seems confused. Where did any reference to 386s come from in this?
A hundred dollar wind up laptop running an open source OS sounds like its being made at cost to me, and nobody will be making anything from software licensing if Red Hat are backing it. This sounds like the IT industry doing something with some hard social benefit for once.
12. anonymous
here we usher in a new era of computer nightmares. think about it, kids from all over the developing world getting their hands on computers... script kiddies ahoy!
13. Richard
Find out for yourselves:
- Read the wiki on wiki.laptop.org
- Download a (free) LiveCD
- Boot up an ordinary PC using the LiveCD of the current software image (which includes some educational applications as well as the O/S):
- Think...
Then, and only then return to comment on this initiative.