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Monday, July 2, 2007

Asus and Intel slaughters OLPC with Eee-ase

From Asus Eee News, Mods, and Hacks -

Over at ZDnet, George Ou seems to have whipped up a storm after comparing the Negroponte's OLPC to the Asus Eee. As the title implies, Ou thinks the latter will beat the digital hell out of the OLPC. Based on the comments, he is being criticized for making conclusive statements without actually test driving both units. Following is part of his review:

ASUS and Intel have created an alternative for Negroponte’s OLPC called the “Eee PC”. The difference is that the ASUS Eee PC is actually something that looks usable and perhaps even desirable for everyday use as a super cheap UMPC.

The ASUS Eee will cost a mere $199 whereas the so-called $100 OLPC costs $175. Given the fact that Eee can run Linux or Windows XP and it can boot off NAND flash memory in a mere 15 seconds, the Eee slaughters the OLPC with ease.

The OLPC was originally slated to be the $100 PC but the actual production cost is somewhere around $175. I had a chance to get a test drive of the OLPC at the CTIA wireless conference and it was probably the worst computing experience I’ve had in a long time. The rubberized keyboard was virtually stuck to the surface with almost zero tactile feedback and the Operating System of the OLPC spends a painful 2-3 minutes to boot. Even launching a new application seems to take an eternity.

The user interface of the OLPC doesn’t even feel worth of a cheap fisher price toy. If I were to rank it, it would be somewhere above DOS and far below Apple’s Lisa. I can’t wait to test drive the Eee PC.

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Well, we will see if Ou is proven right once Asus starts selling the Eee. Personally I think he is. Actually I am an avid fan of Negroponte, having read and re-read his The Architecture Machine and the Soft Architecture Machines upon which the OLPC's Sugar OS seems to be loosely based. In fact, I apply a lot of the principles in designing UIs for our mobile apps.

However, in sheer practicality, if I need to procure units for our educational outreach program, I would opt for the Asus Eee. Why? It is more versatile. Since it supports Windows XP and comes bundled ready to use with Xandros and OpenOffice, adults can also use it as well. Somehow I just can't picture teaching adult public school teachers website design while they labor on colorful, toy looking OLPCs.

Granted, the OLPC's OS might be more appropriate for children. But that is just UI software that can be developed for the Eee. Where OLPC will have an advantage is in areas where electricity is not available. But it also follows that if electricity is not available, chances are the infrastructure for Internet access will likely be not available as well. These days, no computer-oriented educational program would be complete without the Internet. Thus, the effectiveness of such programs in remote areas is at best questionable.

4 comments:

Carl Gundel said...

To compare the OLPC with the Eee is really to miss the point. One is a very small and conventional laptop. That's great, and I'd like to have one myself. But the OLPC is designed to survive while being tossed around in the bush by kids. You can't do that with an Eee I bet. Also, the OLPC has a mesh network built right in (with very long range too). Even if you don't have access to the Internet directly, if you have your own mini-internet because all the laptops in a village will interconnect.

Go to video.google.com and search for olpc and pick the long videos. You will learn that there is really an awful lot that makes the OLPC very specially suited for its purpose. It's not a consumer product.

Unknown said...

The Asus Eee PC-701 looked great until I saw that it only has a video resolution of 800×480 pixels. Even the “toy” OLPC’s 7.5″ screen has 1200×900 resolution.

Some software will not even run at less than 1024×768 and reading PDF files and web browsing will be made difficult.

Asus needs to re-think the Eee PC-701 screen resolution or at least offer a same size but higher resolution option. This is supposed to be a notebook and not a PDA. 800×480 may have been okay in the 1990’s but it is way behind the technology curve these days.

xujiren said...

Hi Carl,

I do agree the OLPC and the Asus Eee are very different in the sense a Ferrari and say, a Smart car are different. But both are cars and functionally will bring you from point A to B, albeit generating different user experiences.

So it really depends on the the desired functionality and the expectations. In our case, our outreach program is to teach public high school kids the basics of Internet research and then some. We may consider OLPC simply because it is intended for that very purpose. But economics and practicality force us to consider alternatives simply because they exist in the form of the Asus Eee.

The Asus Eee simply provides more functionality at lesser costs. It is also a lot more practical in that adults would find it more appropriate for their use in comparison to the cartoonish OLPC.

I guess our situation is the very reason why Negroponte lashed out at Intel for promoting what he perceived to be as competition for the OLPC.

xujiren said...

Hi las vegas,

I also find the Asus Eee's 800 x 480 barely tolerable and would prefer a minimum of 1024 x 768. But when you take into consideration its intended purpose (surfing, writing documents, light computing tasks), then the resolution actually suffices.

Most well-written websites actually automatically detect your browser's resolution and auto-reformat to fit the screen. Thus, the 800 x 480 is actually a marginal issue when it comes to surfing. It is a livable trade-off for the convenience of really light portability.