[photopress:121505_100_dollar_laptop.jpg,full,alignright]Is it possible to build and sell a proper PC for $100 or less? The answer is that it is plainly possible and, in China, could be of great help to rural people. True, also, in all developing countries.
The laptop is the child, the creation, in a sense, of Nicholas Negroponte, and is developed by the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) trade association. OLPC is a Delaware based, non-profit organization created by faculty members of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab. Quanta, which manufactures computers for Hewlett Packard and Dell, is the original design manufacturer of the US$100 laptop.
The first five million to 15 million units will be shipped to Brazil, India, Argentina, Egypt, Nigeria and Thailand as well as China. The computers will be sold to governments and aid agencies and not be available on the retail market.
Taiwan’s Quanta Computer,the world’s biggest personal computer manufacturer, will start production on the entry-level laptop and and an entry level desktop in Changshu, Jiangsu Province at the beginning of next year. This news came at the IT exhibition eMEX 2006, which opened yesterday in Suzhou.
Important that both machines run on Linux, not Windows, which is a free operating systen with a lot of free software and it can run on a fairly small power input.
Is Linux better or worse than Windows? At this level it is not relevant. What you need is a computer that performs basic functions easily and well and is affordable. Linux allows this although Microsoft will possibly run a scare campaign to say it is not so.
Will there be competition? Sure.
[photopress:EG_20050711_100laptop2.jpg,full,alignright]Jiangsu Lemote Technology is scheduled to start mass production on the low-cost Godson chips (sometimes spelled Godsen) by the end of this year.
Godson is the first China-developed central processing unit, and computers carrying the chip will initially cost about RMB1,000 ($125) excluding monitor. Make it a CRT monitor and it will not make much difference to the price. LCD would be different but not an insuperable hurdle.
Yu Jianwen, Lemote’s engineer said at the exhibition, ‘We have made dozens of models and they are still in strict tests.’
Godson computers will have a CPU similar in ability to Intel’s Pentium 4 1.5 gigahertz chip, which is capable of Internet browsing and word processing. The products are designed for students and rural people in the rural regions.
Source: Shanghai Daily