$10.00 Laptop?

R

Rich Tate

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Indian engineers are trying to create a extremely cheap alternative in mobile computing. Even if someone could manage to pull off a working design, people believe it would be a couple of years away.

Engineers in India are looking into ways to create a laptop that would cost a mere $10. The effort came in response to the increasing price of the so-called '$100 laptop.'
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ill take 10



seriously though, instead of trying to engineer laptops for cheap, why don't we just start a collection of all old comp parts, i mean, nowadays people just throw out PC's k7-P3 and older, people can still use these in 3rd world countries
 
A couple years ago I scored a laptop for $20. Of course, it was a 486 sx 25mhz with a black and white screen, no sound and no battery, but still!
 
The Classmate PC is looking pretty good nowadays if the price can come in at $249 (7" 800x480 LCD, Celeron M 900MHz, 256MB DDR2, 1GB flash, 6 cell battery, runs Windows and Linux). It's supposed to go into production in September, with models from $249 - $549.

Asustek to launch $249 Classmate PC design in July
 
Ohh great something else we are gonna start outsourcing to India. Not only the cheap workers, but now even cheaper equipment.
 
This is utter BS.

It is completely impossible to make anything as complex as a laptop and sell it for $10. The cost for the materials alone will be far more than that.

Heck, look at MP3 players, those are a lot less complex than a laptop would be, and cheaper and easier to make, yet they are still $100+ for a half decent one.
 
EXreaction said:
This is utter BS.

It is completely impossible to make anything as complex as a laptop and sell it for $10. The cost for the materials alone will be far more than that.

Heck, look at MP3 players, those are a lot less complex than a laptop would be, and cheaper and easier to make, yet they are still $100+ for a half decent one.
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For a half decent one yes, but you can buy really cheap ones for like $10-15. As for a laptop that is anything more than a simple data organizer I'll believe it when I see it.
 
At $249 it's coming in, oh, about $100 cheaper than the lowest low-end consumer laptops. If the price rises any more it will no longer hold any advantage over a regular low-end laptop.
 
srangara said:
VIC 20?
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If even the crappiest of MP3 players cant be made for $10.00, and if a graphing calculator with the capabilities of a Vic-20 cant be made for under $80.00..

"Ill beleive it when I see it"
 
jmag034 said:
seriously though, instead of trying to engineer laptops for cheap, why don't we just start a collection of all old comp parts, i mean, nowadays people just throw out PC's k7-P3 and older, people can still use these in 3rd world countries
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Because people in 3rd world countries don't want slow ass pieces of junk.

Just because its third world doesn't mean they don't like nice stuff too. If the technology can be recycled and made to keep up with current tech maybe but why dump old junky comps on them.

/soapbox :D
 
EXreaction said:
This is utter BS.

It is completely impossible to make anything as complex as a laptop and sell it for $10. The cost for the materials alone will be far more than that.

Heck, look at MP3 players, those are a lot less complex than a laptop would be, and cheaper and easier to make, yet they are still $100+ for a half decent one.
Click to expand...

Yea I call BS on this too. Cost nintendo more to make a gameboy. I want to know what the specs are for something for 50 bucks, let alone the 10 they want it to get too.
 
I want to know why we're so excited about giving third world kids laptops in the first place. I didn't have one until I went to college. The only time I used a computer in school was typing class in elementary school and a couple of papers in high school. Wouldn't it be much cheaper and more effective in general to provide desktops (even older ones) for schools and public facilities?

Now, if they could make a good graphing calculator type device with wireless internet access and the ability to play video/mp3s for $10, or even $100... I'd get one.
 
I don't know about $10, but I think you need to reconsider the concept and uses of a laptop for the extreme low price range.

Going back to the beginning, look at something like a Tandy Model 100. Now it doesn't seem like much more than a cheapie electronic organizer with a bigger keyboard. But it was a pretty productive device. It had applications in ROM, ran off batteries (4AA rated at 20 hours of use) or external power and had serial/modem and parallel ports for connectivity.

Extreme integration for an IC to run that thing would be cheap when mass produced, leaving a screen and possibly wireless as the 2 most expensive components. It doesn't need to run linux, it doesn't need to run windows, it doesn't need color or a high resolution screen and it doesn't need to run in the 100s of MHz range.

A useful laptop for the masses could probably be built for $30-$40, but a device like that would be uninteresting to most of us.
 
It's already been created.

It's called an "Etch-A-Sketch".

That's as close as you're going to get for $10.
 
I hope they succeed. It won't be any time soon though but could be possible in the future, especially if the specs are quite low so maybe only running Windows 95 or something. I don't think the kids would mind that for $10 :)
 
just because the technology(laptops) exists, doesn't mean it should be used in all grades.

i think schools need to get back to the basics and forget about computers for all students until 6th grade, or so. lab room use would be ok a few times a month.


ironic that this story is listed also ?

Laptops For Students Not a Good Idea?
http://www.hardocp.com/news.html?news=MjU2MDksLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdCwsLDE=
After seven years, there was literally no evidence it had any impact on student achievement -- none," said Liverpool school board president Mark Lawson.
 
Let me try and understand this logic:

$100 laptop found to be impossible to make one that cheap

Therefore, we should be able to build a $10.00 laptop.

PLEASE tell me there is something I am missing.
 
Just have every third world country person stand in line for 20+ hours at Walmart and get their super cheap $300 laptop on BF 2007. Technology to the masses baby!
 
This is impossible. Even if a paper laptop made from cardboard and garbage was possible, it would be dirt slow and no one would want to produce a product with no margins of profit.
 
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