USD100 laptop specs unveiled
02-01-2007
by Ciara O'Brien

The One Laptop Per Child project could become a reality by summer 2007, with plans to deliver the first low-cost portable PCs to developing countries by July.

The OLPC scheme, designed to help children in the developing world gain access to computers and IT in general, is aiming to sell the machines at a cost of USD100 per unit.

The machine, known as XO, will be based on a 366MHz processor and 128Mb of DRAM, and run a Linux operating system. Unlike traditional laptops, the USD100 notebook will not have a hard drive, but will come with 500MB of Flash memory and four USB ports. A new interface, named Sugar, has been designed for the devices.

There is also talk of the machines being powered by a wind-up charger, and it will have access to wireless broadband. The laptops will be manufactured by Taiwanese firm Qanta.

The scheme was launched by Nicholas Negroponte at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) Media Lab two years ago, but has since developed into a separate non-profit project.

Negroponte said in a recent interview that he considered the current set-up where school children were trained in using office productivity applciations such as Word, Excel, etc as "criminal". Instead, he said, they should be using technology to communicate, explore and share.

Countries such as Libya have already signed up, with Colonel Gadaffi's government shelling out 1.2 million for the machines. Other countries such as Argentina, Brazil and Thailand, are also planning to take on the low-cost laptops.

However, it hasn't all been plain sailing for the scheme. While the idea looks good on paper, some countries have refused to sign up for the programme, and it has also come under fire from IT experts who described it in some reports as based on a "misunderstanding" of IT history.

India is one country that has passed on OLPC, claiming the idea was not "mature" enough. And there are also doubts about whether Brazil will go ahead with the scheme, with reports that it is also investigating Intel's USD400 "Classmate PCs".

The OLPC project is backed by Intel's rival AMD, as well as Google, Nortel and Red Hat.