Considering that the OLPC’s XO laptop [1] was initially named the “$100 laptop,” the fact that the little machine’s price has been steadily increasing over the past year is a little bit embarrassing [2]. Now, the XO has reached a new milestone: twice its original projected price. Despite the fact that the OLPC Project said that they would work to keep the machine’s price below $190 if possible, the XO’s price has now risen to $200, placing the machine even closer to competitors like the Intel Classmate PC [3] and the Asus Eee PC [4].
Still, it’s not all bad news in the world of the OLPC project. The project has just received its first major order for 100,000 laptops from Uruguay, with the possibility of 200,000 more to be purchased in 2009. This is a big win for the OLPC folks, not just because it’s a big order but also because Intel’s competing Classmate PC was also in the running [5].
Finally, OLPC project Chairman Nicholas Negroponte recently admitted to Reuters that OLPC has been working with Microsoft from the start. “It would be hard for OLPC to say it was ‘open’ and then be closed to Microsoft. Open means open,” Negroponte was quoted as saying. According to the article, Microsoft has pushed for various changes in the device and was one of the biggest champions of an SD card slot. Can a XO running Vista be far behind?
For more on the XO:
– see this ZDnet article [6] on Negroponte’s comments
– and this Gizmodo article [7] on the new pricepoint
