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The Hundred-Buck PC

Posted by michael on from the buy-two-get-one-free dept.

skreuzer writes "MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte has a plan to build a $100 PC for the developing world, which is supposedly going to have a 14-inch color screen and run on Linux, has the backing of AMD, Google, Motorola, Samsung, and News Corp. Apparently they're all getting mixed up in a joint-venture to produce the PC, which will be sold directly to governments only."

4 of 562 comments (clear)

  1. $100 is still a lot. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I hate to say this, but with the exchange rates, $100 is well beyond an average third-world citizen's one year salary.

  2. A laudable project by btempleton · · Score: 5, Interesting

    But would it not be even better to work a way to use our vast supply of old computers, many of which are being thrown out and face a recycling problem?

    Take all the best linux hardware detection and auto-configuration software from the various distros -- kudzu and the like -- and make an installer that takes an old PC, and first tells you if the hardware in it can run linux decently, and if so, automatically installs it, otherwise redirects the PC to be recycled or sold for low power windows.

    People would happily donate these PCs, possibly even running the linuxizing CD themselves, since perhaps they don't qualify for the donation tax deduction of the PC doesn't pass the test on the CD.

    Yes, these machines might not be as fast as the bottom end AMD chip (Sempron 2000?) that will go into them, but not only are they semi-free, they solve a recycling problem at the same time.

    --
    Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
  3. Biggest Market for $100 PC? Developed World by reporter · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Actually, the biggest market for the $100 personal computer (PC) might actually be the developed world. Given that most customers use PCs almost exclusively for word processing, e-mail, and web surfing, a $100 PC with a low-cost, less-powerful processor like a Pentium II would meet the needs of most customers. Such a PC would sell like hotcakes.

    Today's, over-powered (not just in terms of wattage) PCs are overkill for the typical consumer. The bottleneck in downloading pornography is not the rendering done by the processor; the bottleneck is the network. Depending on the size of the pornographic file, 384K DSL line is slow; a 56K line is a pain in the you know where.

    The cynical side of me says that Dell, Samsung, and the other major PC makers will keep the $100 PC out of the developed markets like the USA in order to maintain the $600 price point that they are currently stealing from the consumers.

  4. Financing Jokes Aside by zogger · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ..and this is the same observations and therefore advice I had for the lack of any credible warning system for the Tsunami, despite the fact it hit asia, the home of cheap labor, and even cheaper electronics. Most of these "developing nations" seem to have no problem supporting a military/industrial/politician/ generic fatcat class with all the latest expensive toys. One less jet fighter plane per nation would pay for a lot of simple basic computers and dedicated tsunami and earthquake warning radios, probably more than one per poor village. A few less tanks pays for some decent electrical generational facilities of the small scale and distributed nature. One less high muckety muck mercedes limo buys a lot of DC solar panels and simple DC charge controllers. One less governmental fatcat palace = a few radio station/cell/net setups. And so on and so forth.

    It's not so much a technological problem or even an economic problem, it's a political problem, and the problem is that the global *two* class society is being pushed (from the top down obviously, from the folks with the guns and money and power) instead of the global *three* class heavy on the middle society like it should be.