OLPC's XO-3 Prototype Tablet Coming In 2010 148
itwbennett writes "During an interview Tuesday at the MIT Media Lab, OLPC project founder Nicholas Negroponte said that the group will have a working prototype of the XO-3 tablet by December of this year. 'At CES [2011] we will show a tablet that can be and will be used for children probably in the developed world,' Negroponte said. 'You'll see from us, God willing, an ARM tablet,' he said. 'The screen area will probably be a 9-inch diagonal, maybe more.' The most important feature will be a dual-mode display that will allow it to be used indoors and outdoors. Price: $75."
What's the problem with keyboards? (Score:2, Insightful)
What's the problem with keyboards? Since tablets seem to be very consumer-ey, isn't removing the keyboard from the OLPC contrary to the aims of the project?
Re: (Score:2)
They are just hedging their bets. If you don't know who you're selling your product to, you have to be open to a wide variety of customer tastes.
Re:What's the problem with keyboards? (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't say for sure that this is their thinking, but using an on screen keyboard allows for all of your localization to be done in software instead of having to make different keys for areas that use different character sets.
Re:What's the problem with keyboards? (Score:4, Insightful)
What it may be missing is a screen protector and in harsh outdoors environments, the lower keyboard area makes a great screen protector. So I hope they include a screen protector as an integral part of the tablet device.
LoB
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What's the problem with keyboards? (Score:5, Funny)
Obviously they should keep the keyboard and eliminate the screen then, right?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
> Obviously they should keep the keyboard and eliminate the screen then, right?
Actually use an iPad for awhile and get back to us.
Those screens quickly get mucked up.
Even the drones at the Apple store will freely admit this while they tell you that they don't have any screen covers. ...makes you wonder if Starfleet is like Monk when it comes to hand washing.
Re: (Score:2)
Even the drones at the Apple store will freely admit this while they tell you that they don't have any screen covers.
Really? I found this [amazon.com] in 2 seconds.
Re: (Score:2)
Apple store != amazon.com
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
There might another bonus:
keyboards can't grow with children's hands! Sure, there are three directions of change - not only 1) the hands grow, also 2) precision and profficiency of child grows and 3) strenght available for typical key press gets bigger; that still means keyboards for wide spectrum of kids have to be a compromise, probably.
UI on a tablet, not so much of a problem. It can grow with child, not only when it comes to physical size of the elements. Plus touchscreens are sensitive enough that regi
Growing things (Score:4, Funny)
I dunno, if they can grow human ears on the backs of mice [wikia.com], I don't know why it wouldn't be possible to grow a keyboard together with a spare set of hands, or find a way to grow hands out of a keyboard.
Potentially kinda kinky, though. I'm not sure I want to think too much about where you'd go with that.
Cheers,
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It also finally allows to make a device with no moving parts at all, which is much easier to seal and less prone to break. I have no doubt that a tablet is much better suited to what the OLPC project wants to do.
Re: (Score:2)
For the cost of one of those monstrosities, you could buy 32 OLPC XO-3s at $75 a piece. You could also buy a macbook pro. Interesting how one macbook pro costs the same as 32 XO-3s. Surely it does not cost 32x as much to produce the macbook pro.
Re: (Score:2)
What's the problem with keyboards? Since tablets seem to be very consumer-ey, isn't removing the keyboard from the OLPC contrary to the aims of the project?
This is an additional product, it doesn't replace the laptop in OLPC. Remember that tablets are not a replacement for laptops/netbooks, though they do share subset of similar functionality.
Re:What's the problem with keyboards? (Score:4, Informative)
If you want a keyboard, plug it in the USB port or connect it with Bluetooth, tablet willing...
Re: (Score:2)
If you want a keyboard, plug it in the USB port or connect it with Bluetooth, tablet willing...
The XO is meant for kids. In punishing third-world environments. It is supposed to be self-contained. It is supposed to be cheap. Standardized. No extraneous parts to be lost or broken. Energy efficient.
Re: (Score:2)
Understood and agreed.
Guessing AC isn't one of those, though, as he wants a $75 laptop instead of a tablet. Instead of a tablet of any kind, I'd guess.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I like keyboards, too, but ...
- a lot easier to add a keyboard (wireless via bluetooth, either with a dongle or internal; wireless w/ IR, if IR is available; wired via USB) than to turn a laptop into a tablet.
- Even w/ the OLPC XO's sealed keyboard, it's one point of failure avoided in a tablet-style computer.
- Tablet shape is more versatile in using a computer for (who knows?) virtual music stand, or impromptu video camera (note: offer void in Pennsylvania), or drawing device.
- Better shape, IMO, as a read
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyway, they add cost, moving parts, and complexity. If doing right the keyboards put costs too high maybe would be better to not add them at all, leaving open t
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah. This can be a totally sealed brick. Since they announced that android will be onboard, I'm actually somewhat interested. We'll have to see what the sepcs are like when it finalizes. If its 800mhz ARM8 or so with at least 256mb, I'm totally sold.
Re: (Score:2)
Tablets can be much more effectively sealed against the elements, should be useful in many places; probably also cheaper to make. Plus the plan is not to replace XO-1 (or "XO-1.75", also ARM based; they schould have done so from the beginning), only supplant it.
Generally, with $75 this should make any "buy2get1" interesting. Or if they won't manage to do 75 (perhaps at least sub-100 is likely), that should at least put some nice pressure on consumer products; exactly what happened with XO-1 -> netbooks.
Re: (Score:2)
Sell outs (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sell outs (Score:4, Insightful)
The project definitely seems to be lacking in focused leadership, but... how, exactly, does that make them "sell outs", as opposed to just incompetent?
Re:Sell outs (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
The big problem isn't that it was capable of running Windows- it was that the machine was MODIFIED to be able to use XP and wasted energy and effort trying to do THAT particular task instead of worrying about the original design goals.
They're guilty of the sin of Feature Creep and they did it to suit Microsoft and Intel, when they clearly didn't have ANYTHING to give back into the project and did all of what they DID do because it was all cutting into their market and nothing else.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The big problem isn't that it was capable of running Windows- it was that the machine was MODIFIED to be able to use XP
Oh *come on*, please! What did they do to "be able to use XP" exactly? They added an SD card reader. OHNOES! And that's certainly not be useful for anyone else but Windows (like, say, someone who wants to run an alternative OS on it without modifying the onboard flash)... nope, not at all.
Re: (Score:2)
The *claim* is that the SD card reader was added so that Windows could be booted on the XO. That doesn't make the claim true, of course, but that's almost certainly what the GP is referring to.
Re:Sell outs (Score:5, Interesting)
Negroponte was sucked into thinking his technical people were Linux and open source fanatics by the very people who were out to stop the project because it gutted their profit margins for existing products.
So it sounds like he's now seen the light but at what cost? Years have been lost and many who were behind the project left it because of the ignorance of yet another 'business' type guy believing the crap Microsoft tells them. He couldn't even figure it out that there was only one or two Microsoft guys working on Windows on the XO and not much of anything like a team and just the memory footprint Windows required should have been enough to know it was a joke.
But who knows, maybe a <$100 tablet with all the Sugar and spice of the original XO but running on a cool ARM Cortex a8 or even a9 processor might get things moving again. I'm not sure about Android though since Sugar has lots going for it as a platform for educational software.
LoB
Reality check (Score:4, Informative)
but like so many muggles out there, Negroponte believed the crap Microsoft was telling him.
OLPC was sold as a take-it-or-leave-it package deal to the third world education minister.
The hardware. The software. Linux, FOSS and SUGAR.
The constructivist philosophy of education - the classroom without a teacher, to simplify things drastically.
The education minister wasn't buying into any of this.
The push for Windows and Office came from him.
Deployment of the XO beyond Central and South America was and remains insignificant, with the sole exception of Rwanda - and that came a year after dual-booting XP and MS Office became an option.
Total confirmed deployment is about 1.3 million units. One Laptop Per Child [wikipedia.org] [Summary of laptop orders}
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I won't go into how much did or didn't have to do with a constructionist
Re: (Score:2)
Bullshit. The push for Windows and Office may have been channeled through the Minister, that's true. But it came from the vested interests in the Education establishment, for a number of reasons. Some of those reasons were valid; most of them were just good, old-fashioned vested-interest conservatism in the face of change.
Re: (Score:2)
Some of those reasons were valid; most of them were just good, old-fashioned vested-interest conservatism in the face of change.
Something like 9 of 10 XO laptops are to be found in Columbia, Uraquay, and Peru.
Three common denominators: Western Hemisphere. Spanish speaking. Latin American culture. That can't be coincidence.
These countries are, of course, far from being the poorest of the poor:
My contacts in Rwanda say that MINEDUC has released the purchase order and 20% advance payment to get the XO shipme
Re: (Score:2)
Intel processors are not the most energy efficient and even after years of "new" mobile processor work, they still are no where near what the RISC designs for power and performance.
Everyone with a clue is tired of hearing someone rant about how RISC is more efficient. Every x86 processor since the Am586 and the Pentium has been internally RISCy, with an x86 decoder on the front of it. That clearly includes the Atom, which is descended from Pentium M, which is descended from Pentium III with some bits from Pentium IV.
Here's something true: ARM does more with less than anything from Intel, but in the high end, ARM doesn't even have an offering.
But who knows, maybe a <$100 tablet with all the Sugar and spice of the original XO but running on a cool ARM Cortex a8 or even a9 processor might get things moving again.
The lowest-margin blow-it-out-on-ebay table
Re: (Score:2)
<p>The lowest-margin blow-it-out-on-ebay tablets worth using (128MB RAM, 600MHz ARM) are $130 with a boring old trite WVGA LCD. There's no. fucking. way. this tablet will actually release under $100. With that said, the original was supposed to come in at $100 and was $300. If this one follows the same pricing schedule it will be $225 and I might buy one anyway.</p></quote>
in early 2009, it was said that the OLPC cost was down to $180. While this was still not $100, it surely
Re: (Score:2)
From what I can tell a used XO is about $200 shipped on eBay. (Clearly you can bid and maybe get a better deal, but I like to use eBay "Buy it Now" prices as a rough guide to real cost.) But when they first became available there the price was more like $300. Make of all that what you will. I ended up buying something from the store when I could get it for $300 because of the performance differential, although I would have enjoyed many of the XO features. Had they retained the internal hand-crank charger fr
Re: (Score:2)
I still hear people calling it the $100 laptop project. He did pretty good selling that part of the project.
LoB
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
They changed the machines to include windows and partnered with Intel. Once they started discussions with MS, i lost all respect for the project as that was what the whole idea was supposed to be against. The way OLPC was billed in the beginning was a rugged linux computer with all open sourced software to avoid software vendor lock in. AT least thats what i took away from the initial OLPC discussions.
The OLPC project is not about a rugged Linux computer with all open source software: it's about education and empowerment through the use of technology. Essentially it's Alan Kay's Dynabook: a project which predates Linux, Open Source, the Free Software Foundation and indeed Laptops. Open Source technology made OLPC possible (by empowering the devs to strip and rejig down the whole OS themselves), the Free Software ideology was a snug fit to the project's aims and Linux was the most sensible choice for OS s
Re:Sell outs (Score:4, Informative)
The OLPC project is not about a rugged Linux computer with all open source software
I heard Alan Kay talk about OLPC a few years ago, and you're not quite right. It was about those things, but it wasn't exclusively about those things. One of the goals was to help bootstrap local high-tech industry. The OLPC had to be an entirely open design in the hardware and open source in the software, because one goal was for their customers to start making their own.
He was hoping that countries like India and China, with an established manufacturing base, would take their designs, improve them, mass produce their own, and undercut them. As he said, the nice thing about being a non-profit is that you can be happy when someone manages to undercut you, because the goal is getting the machines to children, not making money.
The open source side was vital, because it meant that the customers could build their own local software industry around it. They could modify any aspect of the machine - hardware or software - and sell improved versions. The children could study every aspect of how the machine worked, could modify it, and could become the first generation of software (and hardware) developers in some of the target countries.
From what I saw, the project started to go downhill as it shifted from Kay's vision to Negroponte's. Mind you, that's typical Alan Kay - he has a way of being right that makes people want to disagree with him.
Re: (Score:2)
The OLPC project is not about a rugged Linux computer with all open source software: it's about education and empowerment through the use of technology.
Really? Have they finally consulted teachers and pedagogues on what software for kids should look like? Or are they still building what they think would be good?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_Per_Child#Criticism [wikipedia.org]
It seems to me that they tangled themselves up in building the best/cheapest hardware & software platform and getting it out there. It would be great if the "teachers community" (if they are organised and exist) would contribute to the project themselves...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
>...they're using an ARM chip...
With Windows CE, no doubt.
Re: (Score:2)
It sounds like he learned his mistake having listened to Microsoft instead of h
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
> Negroponte said it would be running Linux.
He said that once before.
Re: (Score:2)
But they didn't and Asus et al ate their lunch.
Now they have another chance with this tablet. Who wouldn't be interested in a $150
Re: (Score:2)
"I realize they had lofty goals, but to see them fail so utterly in their mission takes away most of their credibility. The whole point was to bring computers to the developing world and break vendor lock in."
By kickstarting the netbook market they have done much of that.
dual-mode display (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
While your device has probably quite "ordinary" transflective screen (which is good at what it does, don't get me wrong) - this new screen is most likely very noticeably better.
Check out pics from the blog of its manufacturer [pixelqi.com] (essentially they also made the screen for XO-1). Or look up videos on Youtube - a lot of them depicting early, still unoptimised prototypes from a year ago; shot by very visibly amateur 3rd party videographers during trade shows (yes, outside), and the screen still looks fabulous. One
Re: (Score:2)
Even if it is vaporware (might as well be for all practical purposes / scale / software), there are almost certainly many more coming.
Thanks OLPC! (Score:3, Insightful)
I remenber the first time that idea was show here on slashdot, I (and lots of other geeks) where salivating about the idea of a "portable laptop". I even remenber people talking about "100$? I would pay 300$ for that!". The OLPC has made this dream real, and now we have our 200$ and 300$ cheap and very usefull "netbooks". I call this a huge succes (:
Re:Thanks OLPC! (Score:5, Interesting)
And you truly think netbooks developed from there?
Subnetbooks have been around for ages. What started the netbook revolution was the new availability of very cheap and small LCD displays, and the appearance of cheap and power-efficient x86 processors that could work well enough while being cheap and not requiring huge heat-sinks (like the Atom, some VIA chips, etc).
Do you think Apple, Dell, HP, or the damn OLPC project actually develop anything? They develop casings, at best. They just stay on top of whatever new crap is coming cheaply out of China. That's it. You can find cheap and small mobos with embedded ARM processors in China for under 30 dollars. Boards very similar in specs to the one Apple is using on the iPad can be found for ~70 dollars in China, including 900mhz ARM processors. Embedded Wifi and 3G for +20 dollars.
Things don't get to the market when they are invented, they come out when the Chinese have managed to produce the technology required to assemble them cheaply.
Re: (Score:2)
Do you think Apple, Dell, HP, or the damn OLPC project actually develop anything?
I'll agree with you as far as Apple, Dell and HP are concerned. But the OLPC was truly innovative [laptop.org]:
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. Apple's designing their own mobile CPUs [wikipedia.org] now.
Re: (Score:2)
Except the A4 is just an ARM9 processor. The only reason they are making that chip is to be incompatible with Android and other competing software.
Re: (Score:2)
Cheap manufacturing (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Given their track record, $75 will turn into $150 by the time it's ready for sale.
Which isn't such a feat -- remember all the PDAs that cost less than that?
Re: (Score:2)
No they'll double it and say they're giving one to every monk in Thailand. One laptop per Lama.
Re: (Score:2)
You would need to define exploitation first. If these folks are being paid a wage that makes for a nice income there but would not get you a cardboard box here, is that exploitation?
I wonder if my expensive made in the USA tshirts are less exploitive or worse than imports. The workers that make these shirts get only about 25k/year in California vs whatever someone gets at a t-shirt factory in Honduras. I buy the USA made ones due to the quality not the lack of exploitation though, but it makes me wonder.
Re: (Score:2)
So then you think my buying shirts made by people making 25k/year in CA is better than the alternative?
I just think that 25k/year is not a lot and in CA it seems like it would be very little.
What is your alternative? (Score:2)
That those children or young adults go to the local rubbish dump and try to make a living by collecting anything that may still have some minimal value?
What we should be fighting for is for good working conditions for children and people in general (children, when they need to work, should do it in very controlled conditions ensuring no abuse takes place, short shifts, all pay paid, etc. A blanket ban on working children may actually be not in the interests of many children out there ).
What many people in r
Eithyer he is going to be (Score:3, Interesting)
lockup up in the loony bin or change the industry in a huge way.
If he can deliver what the render is, or even close, it will basically make tablet/ebook reader like the digital watch. Mass produced, inexpensive and everywhere.
There will be a flood of those things... (Score:2)
I have no doubt that you will be able to buy several sub-$100 tablets later this year, running Android. They will be mostly crap (slow hardware, small batteries, resistive touchscreens), but they will be there. The markets in Asia and especially China are huge.
Here [shanzai.com] is an iPad-clone for $73.
Pixel Qi display? (Score:3, Informative)
Boy, I hope they're using Mary Lou Jepsen's Pixel Qi (http://www.pixelqi.com/) screens. I am far from a hardcore programming geek, but I could use something like this for a simple E-reader and Mutt email device.
She also has a blog: http://pixelqi.com/blog1/ [pixelqi.com]
Supposedly, hackers will be able to buy raw screens for DIY projects. Might be ideal for hooking up to a BeagleBoard.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Wow, have people forgotten already? Mary Lou Jepsen developed the Pixel Qi display technology while working on the XO-1. She then created Pixel Qi to commercialize that technology. Why is everyone acting like these displays are something new? They were in the XO-1 and are one of the features that haven't been matched by netbooks. So yeah, these displays in the XO-3 are probably (definitely) using the same technology, and I wouldn't be surprised if they are somehow subcontracting to Pixel Qi.
Re: (Score:2)
Considering this press release [laptop.org], it does indeed seem likely the OLPC will use it.
Quoting:
Re: (Score:2)
No one has forgotten because this is tech that Mary Lou developed *after* she left OLPC and started Pixel Qi. Current OLPC kits do *not* have Pixel Qi screens.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
LoB
At what price for non-target market? :) (Score:3, Insightful)
9" transflective ARM tablet? I want one. Price $75? Well ... that price might have *some* basis, but I suspect that's not the out-the-door price.
The $100 laptop (and note, I'm not complaining, and I realize that the $100 figure was not promised to Moses on Mt. Sinai) turned out to be, realistically for me and many others, $400, through the Give One Get One program. (And I think $400 well spent; I like the idea, and the hardware is really cool, despite its limitations.)
Does that mean a 9" ARM tablet would be $300? :) Hey, $150 would be even better, and $75 would mean I could buy one apiece for several young relatives. (And I'd rather get them that way than, say, a big misguided, mismanaged government school Program.)
Tim
Re: (Score:2)
I gave a cheap netbook to my sister-in-law for her to web surf. She had problems with accidentally disabling the WiFi chip, and eventually dropped the netbook and broke the case. Hopefully these devices will be a lot more idiot-proof than netbooks.
Re:At what price for non-target market? :) (Score:4, Informative)
That thing is not idiot-proof. It is for children, and built in a way to survive them, but not idiot-proof. The designers even expect the children to learn Python.
Re: (Score:2)
They're not targeting you, so they don't care what you are willing to pay for it!
Re: (Score:2)
Besides getting the mesh networking firmware and display firmware working with an ARM processor, we sho
Re:At what price for non-target market? :) (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.39169 [dealextreme.com]
There you go... Android tablet for $100 shipped.
I got a 7 inch netbook off eBay (from Hong Kong) for $60 shipped. It has crappy WinCE 5, though. :P
Bound to fail (Score:2, Funny)
'You'll see from us, God willing, an Arm tablet,'
Jesus already created the iPad
Buisness model (Score:3, Interesting)
"God Willing" Project Management (Score:2)
Any time you hear a project manager say "God Willing" about a deliverable or date you know they are flat out lying.
OLPC for Haiti (Score:2)
Update: It's a drop-ship Marvel Pad (Score:2, Informative)
Please, don't inflict this on the kids anywhere (Score:3, Insightful)
I did the buy one, donate one to a 3rd world kid program with the first OLPC. I could not believe what a piece of crap the OLPC was when I got it. I could not even IM from it. I felt so bad that I had inflicted that on some poor child somewhere. If I could find the poor kid that ended up with the OLPC I paid for, I would happily send them a MacBook Air as a way of apologizing and showing that not all computers sucked.
Re: (Score:2)
What kind of IM were you trying to do? The in-built serverless XMPP chat works fine, and if you want to use an existing account on an existing server then yum install pidgin and that works great too. If individual anecdotes are the way forward then the XO beats the hell out of a MacBook Air since it's got 3 times as many USB ports.
The only annoyance I've had with my XO is the lack of tabs in the activities like the browser and terminal, but that's mainly a preference thing and was easily fixed with yum inst
I Wonder if They've Learned Yet . . . (Score:2)
. . . that allowing the manufacturer to sell directly to the public (Perhaps in a different color) will drive down the cost of the unit because of larger production volumes. That is after all why the origional OLPC missed the $100 PC missed it's target price.
Re:Really? No, seriouslly? (Score:4, Informative)
you've obviously never understood what the original requirements for the OLPC project was. Google for how Intel loaded up a classroom with their little ClassmatePC netbooks and then had to go back and drop a large diesel generator outside the classroom so the kids could use the devices throughout the day.
OLPC XO is not a netbook.
LoB
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Or describing some of the desing criteria shortly: OLPC XO is an inexpensive variant of...Toughbook.
BTW, screens essentially from the XO are perhaps finally coming also to some netbooks, via Pixel Qi (PQ also seems to start supplying them to tablets in general of course; and will do it for XO-3)
Re: (Score:2)
Heh... That's even inaccurate, even though it does a better job of things than many have in the past. A Toughbook fails on power endurance and sunglight display function compared to an XO-1
Re: (Score:2)
Hence "some of the desing criteria" (still large part either way)
Re: (Score:2)
802.11s [wikipedia.org] is the IEEE standard for mesh networking. It works at level 3 in the networking stack which means it abstracts the mesh specific details away from the operating system level.
There is already a project similar to Netsukuku called OLSR [wikipedia.org] which has a 700 node mesh networking in Germany I believe. OLSR works at level 4 and runs on windows, linux, osx, android, etc. It works so well that the IETF has put out a draft spec [isoc.org] for a version 2 of the protocol.
Re: (Score:2)
OLPC XO-1 is the thing that largely brought you netbooks & cheap ultraportables in the first place.
Now, as far as consumer markets are concerned, they might be doing this with tablets. Publicly showing PR drones what's their proper price range.
Re: (Score:2)
> OLPC XO-1 is the thing that largely brought you netbooks & cheap ultraportables in the first place.
Rubbish.
Moore's law is what brought us netbooks and cheap ultraportables.
The march of technology is what turns a $2000 vaio into a $400 vaio.
Moore's law was turning Amigas into PalmPilots long before it occured to Negroponte to try and be the world's benefactor.
Re: (Score:2)
You have short memory. When was the time that Intel introduced first netbook design / first cheap ultraportable? (not relying much on proper application of Moore's law too - they simply quickly threw together a bit old at that point, and not fully adequate, tech)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Deployment of the XO beyond Central and South America is almost non-existent. Rwanda is the only real success story.
Re: (Score:2)
So Central and South America do not count?
Those kids do not need these laptops?