Some Less-Than-Thrilled OLPC Reviews

The Economist: One Clunky Laptop Per Child

"It would be a stunt, but one perhaps worth performing, to write this column on the tiny, green and white, $200 XO computer from One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) that sits idle before your columnist. Alas, he cannot.

"This is not because the keys are too small for his adult hands (though they are), or because the processor's slow speed makes the machine frustrating to use (though it does). Nor is it because the track pad sometimes goes screwy and the keys lack the normal pressed-key response that allows smooth typing. It isn't even because moving the column from the word-processing application to the web-mail system is prohibitively difficult..."

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Beyond Binary: Gates on OLPC, Windows Home Server

"Q: One area that I know is important to you is emerging markets. Do you take away any lessons from Intel's fallout with OLPC (One Laptop Per Child)? I know you said recently that you are going to try and make Windows work on OLPC if you can?

"Gates: OLPC hasn't done that well. Emerging markets are growing for PCs, people are doing cheap PCs. We've always believed in cheap PCs. If the hardware were free, we'd be happy. We're about the software. We're in literally over 100 countries with special versions of Windows, including Starter Edition. OLPC is nowhere compared to where we are on this thing. If that form factor, some people want to use that, we'll make sure Windows is available on that..."

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Related Stories:

• My Very Own OLPC XO Laptop(Dec 31, 2007)
• Unwrapping the XO Laptop(Dec 25, 2007)
• A Child's View of the $100 Laptop(Dec 13, 2007)
• Measuring the Value and the Worth of the OLPC's XO Laptop(Dec 07, 2007)