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Indian Company Shows Off Sub-$200 Laptop

Posted by timothy on from the progress-toward-the-negroponte-device dept.

geo_2677 writes "The Indian company which came out with the Simputer has now come with a PC which cost roughly INR 10,000; that's just about US $200. The project was backed by the Indian government R&D department Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)." Geo2677 points out an article on the low-cost computer at hinduonline.net and another at the Times of India, and writes "The new PC is Linux-based and has office applications, a browser and audio/video capabilities. With a keyboard that can be rolled up, it looks pretty sleek. A U.S. company is already using it in pilot projects, and many more have shown interest. The Indian government hopes that this will push the PC revolution to the masses. It aimed for home users and small businesses/shops. The PC penetration in India is very low, at a measly 13 million, due to the high costs involved."

5 of 318 comments (clear)

  1. interesting by tont0r · · Score: 5, Insightful

    after watching a few "internet PC's" drop off the face of the earth due to the fact that it was $300 and all it did was internet, it would be interesting to see how well this actual PC would end up doing. $200 for basically something that can do work processing, internet, music?(not sure since they didnt specify what they mean by audio...) but still. thats a hell of a deal. and big surprise.. it came from india :).

    1. Re:interesting by harrkev · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If history is any indicator, this will bomb. I have seen more than a few "sub-(one/two/three)-hundred-dollar" systems. They are eventually built, greeted with millions of yawns, and soon disappear. What makes this one any different?

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  2. Re:Ok, so, no storage... by GweeDo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "but will have built-in memory"

    More than likely it has some built in CF memory or something like that. Even if it is only 512MB...for Word docs and web browsing how much do you need? I would bet the apps are in some form of flash memory or something (similar to a PDA) so no worries there.

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  3. Re:Ok, so, no storage... by garcia · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Even if it is only 512MB...for Word docs and web browsing how much do you need?

    Well, if you had read the non-slashdotted article:

    Vinay L. Deshpande, chairman and chief executive officer of Encore Software, told a press conference the system would have the essential features of a conventional personal computer: everyday applications such as word processing, spreadsheet, personal information manager, e-mail and web-browser. It will play music and movies, have text-to-speech conversion facility and built-in local-language support.

    Movies and music on 512MB? Get serious. As I said, you will likely be shelling out 150+ for memory. I found it VERY suspicious that they were touting the price when they aren't including any storage space.

    $199 doesn't impress me with slow specs and no storage.

  4. Re:Ok, so, no storage... by GweeDo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    While 512MB isn't gonna work for movies, it is fine for music. I have a 512MB iPod Shuffle and love it. For features like that they probably intend for you to sync it with a desktop.

    If you are someone with NO computer at all in India right now do you really think no movie/music support is the end of the world?

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