The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) organization seems to have shifted its view to tablets. They have been trying to get a laptop in the hands of children in low-income areas but have so far been unable to fully realize their dream. Now, it seems that the OLPC initiative has turned its sights from laptops to tablets – tablets that run on Android and cost a lot less than the shiny, brushed aluminum iPad.
The tablet OLPC has its sights set on is the Marvell Technology Group Ltd.’s Moby tablet. The Moby tablet runs around $99, and is powered by none other than the Google-made Android OS. Marvell will be pushing its tablet to schools and health care institutions. The previous laptop sold by the organization ran about $200, and the keyboard needed to be customized to those students who didn’t use the Latin alphabet. Adding a tablet into the mix may curb these problems, and having Android, or any other version of Linux could help in the customization of educational programs for the device.
The tablets that will be given to students should have at least one video camera, WiFi, multitouch screens, and a GPU that has enough power to output HD and 3D video. The tablets will also be able to connect a mouse and keyboard to them, making it very versatile. While it may not make it to the final product, Marvell has played with the idea of adding a Pixel Qi screen to the tablets, which could help on battery life, and could make reading textbooks on the tablet easier on the student’s eyes. It’s really anyone’s guess as to what will make the cut for final hardware.
As fun as they may be on their own, I think we may actually have a real use case for tablets now. The iPad, while good for reading, and for light work and school duties, is really aimed to be an entertainment device. So is every other “i” product. The Marvell Moby tablet looks to take a straight shot at education, and by doing this may give the tablet world some sort of functional use. Go Android!
[Via: CellularNews]