• Tweet
• Email

While the OLPC XO Laptop is certainly a low power machine, that’s just not good enough if you’re in an environment where there’s sometimes no power to be had. If you can’t plug in your computer to charge it, what good is it? Well, plenty if you come up with a way to charge it without relying on the electric grid.

There are already hand cranks available that let you charge up an XO Laptop while you’re not using it. But now the folks at OLPC Afghanistan have built a machine prototype that lets you charge the laptop while you’re using it by connecting a hand crank to a pedal. In other words, you can sit at a desk and pedal away to generate electricity while your hands are free to actually use the computer.

You can find a video of the prototype in action at the OLPC Afghanistan web site.

via OLPC News