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VIA-sponsored IkamvaYouth tuXlab – one year of empowerment
In September of 2006 VIA Technologies, Inc. revealed details of a VIA pc-1 Initiative project that has since its opening been making a real difference in one of the poorest townships in South Africa. It is the IkamvaYouth computer lab in Khayelitsha, where computer training is improving the prospects of the local youth and the community. Opened in May 2006, the IkamvaYouth tuXlab is teaching e-literacy curriculum to dozens of grade 10-12 children, as well as offering computer access to the local community with all its inhabitants.
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Friday, 20 June 2008 |
 Asustek Computer’s Jerry Shen declared on 11 June at an investor’s conference that Asus is convinced it will sell 5 million units of its Eee PC this year even though there is a presiding shortage in components; batteries and CPUs. Shen mentioned further that the total market size should reach 10 million in 2008, and not 3 millions which was suggested by IDC, and that he thinks Asus will meet 50% of that demand.
Digitimes reports further: “Regarding component shortages, Shen said the current battery shortage is expected to ease in July, whereas shortages of Intel Atom processors may persist through September. Since Asustek adopts both Atom and Celeron M CPUs from Intel, Shen stressed that the company is able to minimize the risk from possible shortages.”
With so many players in the market for mini-notebooks (HP, Dell, Acer, Everex etc); competition is going to be very strenuous, and if Asus can indeed sell 5 million units in 2008 remains to be seen.
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Tuesday, 17 June 2008 |
IDC projects that worldwide PC shipments will grow by 15.2% in 2008 as a result of the growing popularity of low-cost laptops, with unit sales of 310 million PCs which is an increase on IDC's earlier projection of 12.8% growth, three months ago.
The analyst says the increase is partly due to the fact that it's now including low-cost designs such as the Eee PC and the Everex CloudBook as full PCs, whereas before they had been excluded "due to use of non-traditional PC designs, including the use of embedded or custom operating systems, reduced processing power and storage, and questions about actual production volumes versus declared targets."
IDC says the low-budget portables are now the driving force in the PC market. "Even as the PC market grapples with slower growth in more developed markets, adoption cycles for new operating systems, processors, and other components, and convergence of media and devices, the success of portable PCs continues to drive the market," claims Loren Loverde, director of IDC's worldwide quarterly PC tracker. "Despite recent economic pressure, the consistent gains fueled by portable adoption, falling prices, and new users - particularly in emerging regions - will continue to drive growth during the forecast."
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Monday, 02 June 2008 |
Last year at Computex VIA announced their VIA NanoBook reference design which since then has received much notice and several design wins and last week, just one week before Computex 2008 opens its doors in Taipei they announced their follow-up to this little notebook; the VIA OpenBook Mini-Note reference design.
In the new design, VIA is providing an open approach by providing a choice of WiMAX™, HSDPA and EV-DO/W-CDMA modules and also CAD files of the external panels of the reference design under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0 license which gives third-party PC makers greater freedom in remaking the outer look of the device. It also comes with three USB 2.0 ports, a VGA port, and audio-in/audio-out jacks as well as a 4-in-1 card reader (SD/SDIO/MMC/MS) and a 2 mega-pixel dual-headed web camera. The design supports a wide range of operating systems, including Vista Basic, Windows XP, and various Linux distributions. The device features up to 2GB DDR2 DRAM and can be equipped with a choice of hard disk drive and solid state storage options and is powered by a C7-M ULV processor and the VX800 IGP chipset.
For more information, file downloads, video and images of the VIA OpenBook mini-note reference design VIA is providing a dedicated website that can be found here:
www.viaopenbook.com
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Friday, 23 May 2008 |
Last week, Microsoft and One Laptop per Child (OLPC) announced an agreement that will make the Microsoft Windows operating system available on OLPC’s low-cost XO laptops. Through this agreement, trials of the XO running Windows are planned to begin as soon as June in key emerging markets. Recognizing that the challenge of providing high-quality education for children in the developing world is too large to be solved by any single organization, Microsoft and OLPC are committed to working with governments and nongovernmental organizations to ensure the success of these pilot programs.
The availability of Windows, in addition to Linux, on the XO laptop will allow customers to have an expanded choice of operating environments that best fit their requirements. The intention is to create a version of the XO laptop that provides the ability to host both Windows and Linux operating systems, giving users the ability to run either on the XO laptop.
Customers and partners worldwide have requested Windows support for the XO laptop, because it opens the door for students and educators to access the benefits of existing Windows-based educational software and tools, as well as a broad ecosystem that provides extensive relevant and local educational content. |
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Wednesday, 14 May 2008 |
Services like the “Call Me” person-to-person data service and the use of SMS for banking services provides examples of African innovation according to an article in South African IT publication IT- Online. Through the “Call Me” service the caller can send up to 7 messages per day to a receiver who pays normal rates to return the call. This service is offered in South Africa where cell phone infiltration is high but a large number of people can’t afford to top-up their phones with airtime. This service averages more than 13-million messages a day (on the MTN network alone).
IT-Online reports further; “The use of SMS for banking services provides another example of African innovation. While the rest of the world is only starting to explore the use of SMS messaging for banking, MTN already has six years experience in the sector and has learnt many lessons during its early years in SMS banking. MTN found solutions to fraud problems, such as SIM swap, before international experts even identified these threats.
In the rest of Africa, where fixed line networks are poor, farmers now receive financial returns of up to 40% more for their produce as a result of pricing transparency facilitated by SMS messaging. SMS communications also enable young people in rural areas to find jobs in cities. Previously, responding to job adverts in the newspapers was futile as by the time a person has travelled to the city the vacancy had been filled.”
Cell phones play an important role in contributing to local economic development in African countries with 282 million mobile phone users out of a population of around 960 million. However, more than 300 million people living in rural areas still have no cell phone coverage, according to the GSM Association. Around 66% of the population are reached by a mobile phone signal, up from 62% in 2007. Some African countries, such as Egypt, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, already have a coverage well above 90%.
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Thursday, 08 May 2008 |
Back in January there were news floating around that Gigabyte was going to launch their own low-cost PC but since then there has been total silence, until last week when Digitimes published a follow-up to this piece of news.
According to Digitimes, Gigabyte is preparing to launch their 8.9-inch contender in the low-cost PC sphere, the M912. The system is to be ready by the end of June.
The M912 is going to be equipped with an Intel Atom processor and will support either Linux or Windows XP and might possibly also include Bluetooth
The M912 is going to be designed in-house in order to keep costs at a low level and to have better control of the development schedule, specification and quality and also to remain more flexible to market feedback. |
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Wednesday, 07 May 2008 |
 Last week The One Laptop per Child foundation announced that it has appointed Charles Kane as the new president and COO to run daily operations, whilst the founder and Chairman Nicholas Negroponte will "focus on fund-raising and promoting the project to governments worldwide. Kane was appointed COO and President by Negroponte in hope that the foundation is going to recover from the loss of key personnel that is has experienced of late.
Charles Kane will move from the part-time role as chief financial officer to oversee the organization's operational matters and distribution of the XO laptop on a day-to-day basis. Kane will provide OLPC the leadership needed to deliver on its commitments to partners and governments, said Nicholas Negroponte in a statement.
"Now that global distribution deployment are underway, OLPC needs a leader with strong operational experience to ensure that the organization delivers on its commitments to numerous partners and governments," said Nicholas Negroponte, Founder and Chairman of One Laptop per Child. "During the past year Chuck has generously helped out on a part-time basis and his counsel has been invaluable. We're delighted that he can now join us on a full-time basis and apply his extensive experience to moving OLPC forward."
OLPC recently restructured into four departments - development, technology, deployment and learning - and the organization is now focusing on making the XO laptop more appealing to customers.
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Friday, 25 April 2008 |
 A recent report from the European Commission; the i2010 report gives encouraging figures on overall web use in the region but disguises gaps in tech use that could damage Europe's competitiveness. i2010 is the EU policy framework for the information society and media. It promotes the positive contribution that information and communication technologies (ICT) can make to the economy, society and personal quality of life.
The number of European broadband users has reached 100 million which is about 20 per cent higher than in the United States and Canada combined.
A few highlights of the European Commission’s i2010 report are:
- Nearly 80% of all European internet users are hooked up to a high-speed broadband connection.
- The number of regular internet users in the 27 EU countries has surpassed the 50 per cent mark, after 40 million new users went online last year.
- Nearly 40% of internet users are shopping online.
- 77% of all businesses in the EU have Internet access.
- e-government initiatives are up promisingly with more than 40% of government forms now being filled in online.
- 14 of the 27 member states have surpassed the 50% mark for online penetration (as a percentage of total population). They include The Netherlands at the top end with roughly 82%, the United Kingdom, in the middle, at about 65% and Ireland, on the lower end, matching the EU average of 52%.
At a glance, these numbers all look very good but...
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Tuesday, 22 April 2008 |
Last week Asus confirmed that it will launch the Eee PC 900 in the US on May 12 and it is going to cost $549. The Eee PC 900 uses either Windows XP Home Edition or the open source operating system; Linux, where the Linux system boasts 20GB of flash memory-based storage space and the Windows version only 12GB of solid-state storage. The difference in storage space in the two configurations is explained as a “strategic decisions” by Asus spokesperson Charlton Ho.
"Cost would be one of the reasons, but not the main one. Also the Linux version is our main Eee PC model with our unique interface, so the consumer not only can get the great and easy-to-use interface on the Linux version but extra storage space," according to Ho.
The new Eee PC 900 sports an 8.9-inch LCD display with 1,024 x 600 resolution, an integrated 1.3 megapixel camera, a touchpad called FingerGlide by which you can zoom in and out of pictures, or scroll up and down for easier document viewing with just two-finger movements on the touchpad.
Riyad Emeran from Trusted Reviews points out that “Asus has done a brilliant job of updating an already great product. The engineers have clearly listened to all the comments regarding the original Eee PC and attempted to put them right. The 1,024 wide screen makes the Eee PC 900 a joy to use, especially if you spend a lot of your time in a browser window. The extra memory and storage are also very welcome additions, and help make this version of the Eee PC a real alternative to a fully featured notebook.” |
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Thursday, 17 April 2008 |
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 Taiwan-based laptop and PC-maker, Compal Electronics will build a budget notebook for Dell, as Dell plans to step into the market for low-price notebook computers, according to Reuters India.
Compal, which is already a supplier to Dell, is looking to ship one million to two million low-cost notebook computers to the company this year. The product will be available globally.
Dell spokesperson Colleen Ryan says: "The bottom line is that we are going to enter the market with products that are smaller, lighter and address the more mobile users in a very cost-effective way."
Furthermore, Associated Press reports that Dell will expand its presence in China by selling desktop and notebook computers at Suning, the country's second-largest electronics chain, and doubling the number of Gome stores that carry Dell machines. Dell believes that young Chinese consumers buying their first computer will prefer the superstore format of larger Gome and Suning locations to the country's hectic PC malls. |
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