Intel's Super-Cheap Educational Laptop
Similar to the OLPC (One Laptop per Child) program that MIT birthed in early 2005, the ClassMatePC is an effort from Intel to provide cheap laptops to children in developing countries. Designed to be lightweight, rugged, and partially water resistant, the device clearly favors practicality to performance. Unfortunately, the laptop's technical specifications only weigh in at a 900MHz Celeron processor, 256MB of RAM, and a tiny--but speedy--flash based 1GB hard drive. I guess anything to keep costs low.
Intel says it plans to start releasing ClassMatePC's in Brazil in just a few week's time. Subsequent countries, pricing, and release dates will be announced in the next few months and total 30 countries by year's end. No word yet on if we'll be able to purchase these babies in the United States. Am I the only one who wants a cheap, durable laptop which runs Windows or Linux and sports built-in Wi-Fi?
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