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First Review of Intel's New Classmate PC

An anonymous reader writes "Intel gave the press a sneak preview of its 3rd generation Classmate PC at IDF. It looks like this guy managed to kidnap the only working sample for a while and write up a full report. It looks like a major departure from the original, with a rotating touch screen and Atom processor. There's no official word on pricing yet, but no doubt the OLPC guys will try to rain on Intel's parade."

10 of 79 comments (clear)

  1. meanwhile, OLPC firmware gets edits to support XP by schwaang · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Among other things, of course.
    OLPC seems to be plugging away as hard as ever since all that angst over XP.

    And some users are figuring out how to install regular linux desktops in an easier way. (Sugar's pretty hard for expert users to get used to.)

    Obligatory on-topic snark: does ClassmatePC come with a virus checker?

  2. Are these kind of devises more for the show or ... by BlueTrin · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Are these kind of devises more for the show or are they really useful.

    Personally, I always find myself writing notes faster with a pen and paper. I have tried several alternatives ranging from Palm, Pocket PCs, having a laptop with me ... but from my point of view nothing beat having a pen and a paper to take quick notes, making a drawing, ... during a speech/course.

    If anybody here know a good solution, I would be glad to know how I could find a good replacement. My principal issue with paper notes is that it is easy to lose and take more time to classify them.

    --
    Don't you know it is now both immoral and criminal to think beyond the next quarterly report?
  3. Re:Let's remember who started the parade by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    WTF? The OLPC may have started th fad but Wintel mini-laptops existed well before OLPC ever started tooting their own horn. The Gateway Handbook, the Toshiba Libretto's, the OQO, the various UMPCs, the list goes on and on.

  4. Only working sample? Really? by Yvan256 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Then how come in one of the photo the laptop has the "intel inside" sticker and in another photo it's not there?

  5. Zero mention of OLPC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    The review doesn't mention OLPC once, and we're supposed to take it even remotely seriously? Why would that possibly happen if not for a requirement from Intel that the review not mention the OLPC.

    That's like reviewing a portable music player and not comparing it against an iPod. Once a product has that kind of mindshare, it's just irresponsible not to compare.

    (verification word: reinvent. yeah, that's about right)

  6. Re:Rotating screen by Gates82 · · Score: 2, Interesting
    While for children it may be a cause for concern it seems to work fine on my X61 tablet and I have a 3 year old who is pretty rough with it when in tablet mode (though he does not rotate the screen yet). I must say that with this connection and a few other tablet function based components that my new X series is not nearly as ironclad as my old A31 was.

    --
    So who is hotter? Ali or Ali's Sister?

  7. Re:meanwhile, OLPC firmware gets edits to support by bstone · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I thought the XP version that was allowed on low cost PCs had restrictions that prohibited using touch screens. Did Microsoft change those rules?

  8. Re:OLPC is about the software, not the hardware... by deanston · · Score: 4, Interesting

    On a high level, yes, but the stumbling block up to this point is that they cannot figure the hardware piece out to make it cheap but good. For $200, my XO is barely better than a USB stick, and less than 6 months later, my iPhone is 10 time the 'computer' the XO is, with just half the screen. Not taking Steve Jobs' offer for FREE OS X and then substituting with XP is IMO the single greatest disservice to the high tech education of the children around the world whom the OLPC claims to want to help.

  9. Re:Intel's parade? by mspohr · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I thought the whole purpose of the creation of the Classmate was to rain on the OLPC parade....

    (I think there's an 'In Russia...' joke in here somewhere.)

    --
    I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
  10. Re:Are these kind of devises more for the show or by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Personally, I always find myself writing notes faster with a pen and paper.

    I am as quick when using an already booted computer ...

    I have tried several alternatives ranging from Palm, Pocket PCs, having a laptop with me ... but from my point of view nothing beat having a pen and a paper to take quick notes, making a drawing, ... during a speech/course.

    For quick note taking, nothing beats paper and pencil, I believe. (To take audio recordings is annoying for your environment, and it takes much more time to rehear those notes than to read them written on paper or some electronic device.)

    If anybody here know a good solution, I would be glad to know how I could find a good replacement. My principal issue with paper notes is that it is easy to lose and take more time to classify them.

    Not that I have a good solution for you, but I use a bunch of text files (with descriptive names) as my main store of notes. When my computer is powered off, I use paper. Most important is to transcribe these notes as soon as possible to the searchable digital archive (and then immediately[1] destroy the paper note). Alternatively, mark the note as read.

    I dislike those fluorescent or bright yellow and green markers which some people use to highlight text (after copying, the highlighted text becomes hard to decipher; those markers are *not* useful for highlighting). But they are ideal for marking notes as read. ;) Just cross out your note; it is still readable in an emergency, but you know you can destroy it after your next backup.

    [1] Not immediately, but as soon as you've backed up your digital transcription.