OLPC's "XO" Laptop

nospam@example.com (Dustin) — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:49:11 -0500

Although the laptop may look like a joke, it is a serious computer. It is not intended for business use or any type of use in the United States. It's meant for people who could not otherwise afford a computer, let alone used on in their lifetime.

The XO laptop is a revolutionary step towards making computers available to the world, especially underdeveloped countries. The entire laptop costs $188, and isn't a bad deal.

It features a 433 MHz AMD Geode processor and 256 megabytes of 166 MHz DDR333 SDRAM.

The hard drive? One gigabyte of flash storage.

There are some surprising details about this computer that might spark your interest. It has a built-in webcam and microphone, and has an SD card slot behind the display. It also has wireless networking built into it, supporting both 802.11b and 802.11g standards.

However, the operating system might set many users back (if they've used a computer before). The XO laptop runs a Fedora Linux Core, modified to fit the interface and specifications of the OLPC's desires. Applications are called "Activities", and many of the "activities" are based off of actual Linux programs. However, as mentioned before, they're modified to create a unified UI.

The web browser is loosely based on Mozilla's Firefox browser, and as PC World put it "doesn't function very well, and they need to work on the program."

All around, however, OLPC's XO Laptop is a super good choice for those who need a computer and have never been exposed to one. It's not meant to be a beast. It's meant to be used in minimal ways, exploring what a computer is, and exploring the internet.

It's revolutionary, to say the least.

PC World [[article]]
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OLPC's "XO" Laptop