6 Comments

$100 OLPC to Cost $176 and May Run WINDOWS!

April 27, 2007 by in News with 6 Comments

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If you weren’t sick of the OLPC, here is even more news. Nicholas Negroponte, the head of the One Laptop Per Child project, has almost confirmed that the cost of the laptop would be close to $176 but also make a reference to the machines may be adopted in US schools and it may run Windows.

XO’s developers have been working with Microsoft so a version of Windows can run on the machines [...] It could be the $3 software package that Microsoft announced last week for governments that subsidize student computers. It includes Windows XP Starter Edition and some of Microsoft’s “productivity” software.

That would be a direct blow to Steve Jobs who offered MacOS X for Intel to run on the upcoming laptop – for free. However, Jobs’ offer was declined in 2005 as the organization is searching for a 100% open source solution.

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  • morepowerr

    Hope ubuntu throw there hat in the ring on this one. Would be nice to see M$ cry over every student in the US using linux. /evil gren

  • Jeff Decker

    I think it’s funny that Windows might run on it when OS X was refused because it is not open source. And Windows is???

  • Chris

    The article’s tense is a bit off. The Windows development is recent. The group was originally looking for an open source solution and rejected OSX because they wanted something open source. It seems like their views have changed, but it still seems a bit odd that Windows might be a possibility. I got the impression that they wanted to use an open source solution so the could grind it down to the simplest setup possible for the kids and I don’t know if they can do that nearly as well with Windows.

  • Josh

    If they were to choose Windows to run on the OLPC, I would have to reverse my support for it and actively campaign against it. We have already subjected the “third” world to far too much already, forcing them to have to deal with the nightmare that is Windows would be cruel and unfair.

  • Tony Agudo

    @Chris and Jeff:

    The reason that OLPC has opened up to Windows is a bit lost in the media hype. From the OLPC Wiki’s FAQ page(http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_myths), you’ll see an item that explains their view on alternate software packages:

    “The proposed $100 machine will run a Microsoft Windows operating system

    True: Microsoft is working on a Windows based system that can be executed on the OLPC laptop. False: There is no strategy change. The OLPC is continuing to develop a Linux-based software set for the laptop in conjunction with Red Hat. But since the OLPC project is open we cannot (and maybe even don’t want to) stop other people from developing and supplying alternate software packages.”

    And keep in mind that entry has been there for a while, long before today’s announcement from Nicholas Negroponte. And Apple can still get on board, but the project will still focus on the Linux platform, since it’s the most open option.

  • Conner

    Dumb choice. It better run linux though, cause windows is not open source either.

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