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Intel to Make Cheap Flash Laptop
sien writes "In a similar vein to the One Laptop Per Child computer Intel have announced that they intend to produce a similar cheap laptop using flash storage.The entry of Intel and the declaration that Microsoft intend to get Windows running on the One Laptop Per Child machine suggests that there may be a general market for a cheap, robust laptop without hard drive or optical storage."
Microsoft and inexpensive seems like an odd combination to me. Same goes for flash drives. Durable? Yes. Cheap? No.
SIG: TAKE OFF EVERY 'CAPTAIN'!!
Isn't the weakest point of a laptop the LCD screen rather than the hard-disk?
Plus, it's too big to be a PDA, too small to be a usable laptop. Maybe a decent movie player, but that seems about it.
If I could buy a drop in flash memory replacement for my laptop's hard drive and the economics made sense (say US$500 for a 20gig device), I'd buy it tomorrow. 99% of the data that I use could easily be fit in that amount of space and if it didn't, I could keep relatively cheap removable flash cards around for data that I need once in a blue moon. The increase in battery life, decrease in heat, and decrease in noise would be well worth the additional expense for me.
As a third world country, why should I buy this for $400 when I can buy OLPCs for like $150?
As someone in a first world country, why should I buy this when I can buy a REAL laptop for $400 or under thanks to sales, rebates, the used/refurbished/surplus market, etc?
As for the optical drive, this made be think that I use mine for two things: ripping CDs and installing software. I can see why someone wouldn't need on in an OLPC type situation (or where they want to sell these), not to mention that they are fragile (relative to flash memory and other parts of the computer).
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Yes, but these companies don't make their money on food or shelter.
Most of the OLPCs are going to countries where the people have shelter and food and water, but are in desperate need of decent education.
Plus I'd love a small laptop I could play simple games or read web-pages on while I had nothing better to do. I have a pocket pc, but software is lacking for it and typing on it is a pain. (I'm not a child btw)
Intel and Microsoft are big corporations. Big corporations:
1. can't afford to take chances when there's even slight chance a startup may become a viable competitor
2. can afford money-wise and resource-wise to react to even the silliest of those potential competitors
I'm not saying OLPC is silly, but I'm just saying: don't make a big deal of it. Intel/MS just want their options covered.
Let's not forget that cheap computers for poor countries were made long before OLPC (and all failed) and will continue to be made. The least thing: it'll be fun to watch the development in this "market".
In fact, it is 4 times costlier than the one hundred dollar laptop being developed by OLPC. And more over, OLPC project is purely a humanitarian project aimed at improving the education of the children. Where as Intel's project even though commendable is no where near to the lofty ideals of OLPC.
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...you can look up stuff.
Might I recommend the OLPC home page for starters - which is where you end up if you type "one laptop per child" in pretty much any search engine (or your browser's search bar, if you have one)?
Take ten seconds to learn about something before commenting on it, and you will look like a genius compared to most people around here. Your question is answered in the WIKI, and probably about ten thousand other places already.
Come on, what could *possibly* be more important than making sure every child in this country can post mindless drivel on their MySpace account at any time?
In Soviet Russia, Chuck Norris will still kick your ass.
And the Final Jeopardy question is:
Q: What do I really need in a laptop?
I figure NX, vnc, GoToMyPC or one if its friends, or any other remote-screen system will let me get to my office or home PC from the road or around the campus and really, that's all I need in a laptop. Of course, it should have local audio/camera for videoconferencing and local printing for when I need it.
As far as truly local/disconnected operation goes, I need lightweight viewers for Microsoft Office so I can read and print files and do presentations, a notepad for taking notes, and maybe some games to keep my mind sharp when I'm in a motel room out in the boondocks. I'll need a small amount of local read-write storage for these files, which should auto-sync with the office machine upon connect.
Just make sure I can add on new wireless technologies as they become available.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Windows CE Licensing, you would probably want 'core' ($15) as it comes with Word and the other goodies ...
said better elsewhere...
Microsoft/Intel cannot lose the Windows mindshare, marketshare, niche market, quarterly analysis, exposure, or allow the embarrasment of missing a potentially revolutionary nascent technology or low-budget competition.
How much is the exposure worth? Brand imprint? Visual or Process (how to do things) imprint? Said to be lots.
They would do the project(s) at a loss.
Seeing as how MS seems to favor a $100 price-point for its OS, the laptop would have to cost $0.
If that actually happens, and then if, by some remote chance, refunds for the Microsoft Tax were suddenly made mandatory (by a state's law, say, Massachussetts). Wowee-Zowee. Free laptops for everyone, courtesy Mr. Gates!
(I'm not holding my breath)
MjM
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
I think the project is doing ok. I've seen one in person. It has 2GB of flash memory, a 200mhz processor, a Microsoft OS and high speed wireless internet. It happens to also be one of the most portable computers I've ever seen. They didn't get it down to $100, but even with the storage upgrade it was only about $350. I think they called it a Cingular 8125.
Nice machine, and it even makes phone calls.
TW
I am not sure how a laptop with flash memory would be any cheaper than one with a hard drive. Also, Microsoft is not going to be doing this for free, so the OS would be adding to the cost (unlike one with Linux). Last but not least, flash memory has a limited number of read/writes, and it gets slower as it approaches that limit.
I like the idea of a cheap laptop for the world masses, I just don't see how this fits the requirements.
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Paul C.
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Each charitable group should work with their ability. If you are good at clothes, then so be it. If you are good at food, then so be it. Computer companies are good with computers. Duh! Right? So, solve that need. The needs of these poor countries go beyond just food, water and shelter. They need education so they can lift themselves out of poverty. And since this world is becoming heavily computerized, give them the tools that will benefit them. I fully support any effort to get computers to the poor.
Bearded Dragon
It is actually sub-$300, better specced than an OLPC, several *gigs* of memory (512M in the OLPC) and a faster processor. This is beefier than an OLPC and built to survive a harsher environment than a standard notebook. It fits a need, IMO.
engadget's review from 2 months ago.
No: Flash is more expensive per GB when measured in quantities.
Yes: look at PDA memorey requirements, or PCs just for Mail, Web and a bit of letter writing - there 1 GB is plenty. And in Flash still cheaper than the cheapest HD (80GB or where is the cheapest HD nowadays?)
Simputer comes to mind...
Making windows run on the OLPC laptop has nothing to do with perceived marketability.
Microsoft are just trying to establish/maintain a monopoly on schools software. They are trying to brainwash kids into the microsoft mentality so they've got customers for life.
Those of us who actually want to help the third world are against simply giving them food. If you're going to give them anything, you give them what they need to produce food. Otherwise people just have more babies because they're healthier, they're even further beyond their ability to feed themselves, and now you have MORE mouths to feed. Or children to die of starvation.
Giving them computers, if done properly, is giving the gift of education. The only way out is through.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
No matter how much RAM you have, Windows still seems to need a swap file that is constantly being written to (not to mention all the writing to the registry). Given that current flash technologies have a limited number erase/write cycles, I hope the flash-based hard-drive is replaceable (CF card maybe?).
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
Within a decade, mobile phones will be the primary computing device for the majority of the market. Yes, you'd connect it to a docking station at home and at the office so there's a proper input device (keyboard/mouse) and output device (TV/monitor).. but for 90% mobile devices will be powerful enough to handle e-mail, the interweb and calendar/groupware functionality.
Heck, even as a software engineer the only reason I use a laptop is the lack of a proper Wifi, keyboard and screen for my phone.
400 dollars is still 400 dollars, whether for a scaled down laptop or for a full-blown laptop.
Just out of curiosity, were you using the CF as swap space? I can imagine it wouldn't last long under those conditions, particularly if the system was also RAM-starved (or any situation where RAM working set). But as a regular hard drive, it seems like it ought to be okay for a while (though I suppose you'd want to disable logging, too, as much as possible). How fast were your systems failing?
I've often wondered how CF or other limited-write systems handle swapping and memory-management. It seems like it introduces a whole new set of trade-offs; in addition to the usual speed vs. cost and speed vs. space on disk trade-offs, you also have to deal with speed vs. system life.
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I think it depends on your viewpoint. The OLPC initiative was willing to make a lot changes in the typical configuration of a laptop in order to make their project work. They have a much smaller screen, a different OS than most people in the world use, a non-standard and very small "hard drive" and an unusual wireless configuration.
On the other hand, I have a full-size external keyboard, an email client, a web browser, the ability to use quite a large number of off the shelf software packages, many of them free or open source, and a full blown SDK available from the OS vendor.
It may not technically be a laptop, but I'd be interested in hearing your take about the things the make the OLPC more of a laptop than my 8125? After you get past form factor, I think it's going to be kind of hard.
BTW, can you guess why I wouldn't include a Leapfrog? No open programing support. If you can't write programs for your general-purpose computer, then it's not a general-purpose computer.
Agriculture is one of the more intensively computerised industries out there right now. I am in agriculture and we use computers all over. In the house, in the buildings, in the equipment, and having a lot of it net enabled is a big help. I mean there is an A to Z list of where computers are useful and are being used in everything from the backyard garden to the highest levels of commercial production. There's some pretty darn neat stuff too, for example, we just bought a few truckloads of corn for our beefers. The guys we get it from use an autonomous tractor to work their fields. That's right, no humans drive the thing, GPS and a computer does it once the field is surveyed once to define the limits and shape (by driving the perimeter once), a computer analyses it and determines the most efficient planting and harvesting pattern, and then goes and does it with little human intervention. Where we live part of the operation is poultry and the houses are heavily computerised, everything, temperature, feeding, watering, electricity supply for all of that, all mostly automated now, and net enabled so it can be remotely monitored and trouble-shot if needs be.
If I was joe farmer in the developing world, I would want at least one computer and net access, for the weather, looking up parts and suppliers, monitoring the markets, learning about new techniques and improving technology, etc, etc. All good stuff and useful. Heck, I use the net just to look up weeds to see what they are sometimes, or to look up more exotic seeds to try for instance, or to look at new breeds of animals, etc. I've ordered a lot of old weird parts for machinery online, because that is a lot more efficient than driving around dealer to dealer. I use the net all the time for stuff like that.
Short version is "A guy named Nick Negroponte, who has devoted large portions of his life to helping others, experimented with giving used laptops to kids in areas where the population was technologically illiterate. The results were astounding , yet clearly the lack of power and networking in technologically underdeveloped areas was holding the children back. Thus Nickneg gathered a corps of geeks and industrialists to push human-powered, mesh-networked systems outwards from the edge of the developed world. The phenomenal success of cell phones in Africa and Asia indicates this could work. Extremely well-informed scientists and government agencies have examined the project's supporting science and data and are enthusiastic about the project, but because it has the potential to bring millions of 3rd world children into cyberspace without any dependency on telephone companies or software suppliers there is growing opposition to the project."
As for "looking like a genius compared to most people around here"... not my job, man!