One Laptop Per Child founder Nicholas Negroponte tells Xconomy that the group has received a $5.6 million grant from chip-maker Marvell to develop low cost tablets built around Marvell’s low power chips. That’s not a huge surprise, since the two have been working together since earlier this year. But here’s what I learned from the Xconomy article that I didn’t already know:
- OLPC and Marvell will be showing off a product at CES in January, 2011
- What they show off will most likely be a tablet for students in developed nations based on the Marvell Moby design
- Negroponte says a tablet for students in developing nations is due out on 2012, and that will be the XO 3
The XO 3 is the evolution of the XO Laptop which OLPC has been offering in developing nations for the past few years. Like the XO Laptop, the XO 3 tablet will have a rugged plastic case and a dual mode display which can be viewed just as easily outdoors as indoors. The tablet will also likely run Linux, while the Moby is currently designed to run Google Android.
Last year OLPC released a set of somewhat unrealistic looking images of a concept XO tablet. My guess is that the finished product will look more like the Moby tablet pictured at the top of this article — but with a better screen and a green plastic case.
“Tablet for students” is a non-sense… A student is supposed to take notes, to write report, and not only to “consume” electronic media !
The biggest cost challenge will be getting the cost of the Pixel Qi/e-ink type display down. The Aluratek Libre ebook reader was on sale at Borders.com for $99.99 these past few days. The $100 price is probably already attainable using LCD displays.
Negroponte’s perseverence gave consumers netbooks. Here’s hoping he keeps pushing the computer industry to greater innovation.
They look to resemble the iPad somewhat. It’ll be great for students to have those resources at their fingertips.
these things are the cheapest pieces of wasted money and resources…. ive had 3 of these OLPC products and am convinced that someone had someone else by the nutz on these things. money pit whoever is manufacturing this kind of garbage