The state of the $100 laptop

By JOE GRANESE
Correspondent
A hundred dollars does not go very far in the final quarter of 2007. While affordable MP3 players abound, no $100 laptop computers were available when I checked the market this month. At that time, entry level models were selling at a price point under $400.
Market conditions may change when OLPC, the One Laptop Per Child project founded by Nicholas Negroponte, moves one step closer to realizing their goal of providing the XO, their projected $100 laptop, to the children of the developing world this month. You can visit www.laptop.org to read their mission statement and find out more about Negroponte and his concept.
On Nov. 12, without the benefit of a single completed production model, OLPC will begin taking orders for donations of the XO. The price, as posted on their website, will be $200. You can view screen shots of the XO at work on the company wiki at http://wiki.laptop.org/go/608-demo-notes.
Several prototypes of the ambitiously affordable computer do exist. Mockups and trial versions of the bright green portable have been highly visible since the project was first announced in November 2006 at the World Symposium on the Information Society, held in Tunisia.
Appearing with OLPC founder Negroponte, former Secretary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan presented XO to an eagerly waiting world with words of high praise.
“This is not just a matter of giving a laptop to each child, as if bestowing on them some magical charm. The magic lies within, within each child, within each scientist, scholar, or just-plain-citizen-in-the-making. This initiative is meant to bring it forth into the light of day.”
Annan also broke the handle off his demonstration machine. It may have been an omen, but the failure did nothing to cool the warm reception the XO received. Within two weeks, President Olusegun Obasanjo, of Nigeria gleefully, signed on for one million units.
Since then, the roster of corporate sponsors and international clients has grown considerably. Libya became the first Arab nation to join the project. Peru signed in from South America, and Rwanda also committed to the One Laptop Per Child program. Thailand, Brazil, Pakistan and Uruguay, among others, have also joined the fold.
Originally brought to life by Negroponte and AMD CEO Hector Ruiz, corporate supporters of the project now include Google, News Corp., Brightstar, and Nortel. Red Hat www.redhat.com and Pentagram www.pentagram.com have been in collaboration on a Linux-based operating system designed with a child-friendly interface known as Sugar.
Quanta, the world’s largest computer manufacturer, is in place to manage production. In November of 2006, nearly 900 test units were produced at Quanta’s Shanghai facility, the first sign that the XO had a chance of becoming a reality. You can visit their website at www.quantatw.com.
With all those familiar names on board, the average home computer user could easily assume that the $100 laptop is just another portable computing platform. In reality, the XO is different from your XAIO or ThinkPad in many ways. It is designed to run on far less power than a contemporary laptop, and offers human power options that can be power the unit by operating a generator built into the device instead of plugging it into a wall. Solar options are also available.
The Linux-based operating system is a far cry from our familiar Windows OS. Designed specifically for use by children, the Sugar interface is far simpler, and the graphics demands much greater, helping ease the learning curve while further diminishing power demands.
Additionally, the XO stores data without a hard drive, using flash memory for information storage. Networking protocols are also different from our conventional systems, deploying a built-in mesh networking capability that lets users share resources, including Internet connectivity. On the eve of the first real production, the XO is a most noble idea, but many believe its time has not yet come.
The first detractors included officials from Mali and Cameroon who suspected that the project was based too strongly on American concepts and not germane to the problems in contemporary Africa. Their arguments cited that the project would cause smaller countries to incur far greater expenses in providing training and support for the machines long after they were purchased.
Other critics worldwide suggested that the money would be better spent by building schools and libraries. John Wood, a former Microsoft executive and the founder of the international education project Room To Read (www.roomtoread.org), pointed out that a library that can be built for around $2,000 can help hundreds of children rather than the 10 who receive XO laptops for the same price. In India, planning is underway on competing projects featuring computers that could be produced locally at far lower cost.
Additional competition is expected from Intel’s entry, the Classmate. Read about it at www.classmatepc.com. Boasting a more powerful processor and equipped to handle mainstream software applications, Classmate models can run under Linux and Windows environments, but bring a higher cost to the table. Other affordable laptop models are currently under development or in production from industry giants like VIA and ASUS, as well as companies in China and India.
The moment of truth has finally arrived for OLPC and the XO. When the green machine enters fulltime production this month, the One Laptop Per Child project will be starting up with a firm order for 100,000 units from Uruguay, along with an option for 300,000 more by 2009. Members of the public can support the project and even acquire an XO for their own children by participating in G1G1, the Give One Get One program. Details are available at www.laptopgiving.org.