All of these features will help take the new, dual-function XO to a new level.
ENGADGET: One Laptop Per Child's XO-4 Touch 'expected' to be released in Q1 2013
The XO-4 Touch will combine the XO's existing laptop functionality and sunlight-usable display with a full-fledged tablet mode.
ENGADGET: One Laptop Per Child's XO-4 Touch 'expected' to be released in Q1 2013
Part laptop, part tablet, the XO-4 Touch will represent a huge leap forward in what OLPC can offer.
ENGADGET: One Laptop Per Child's XO-4 Touch 'expected' to be released in Q1 2013
The new XO-4 Touch is more than just a device, it's a new way of facilitating learning.
ENGADGET: One Laptop Per Child's XO-4 Touch 'expected' to be released in Q1 2013
But for all that high-minded ambition, the XO falls flat in a key area: the Web.
Once that rural Indian nine-year-old gets a peak at YouTube, the XO doesn't stand a chance.
Even the OLPC XO-3 plans to eschew the clickity keyboard in favor of a touchscreen version.
ENGADGET: Acer working on frameless laptop with touchscreen keyboard?
The YouTube video shows some of the various standard applications that come with the XO-1: Firefox, an unnamed instant messaging program, a variant of Abiword (word processing), and an application called eToys that looks like a combination of traditional computer games (such as Chinese Checkers) combined with something resembling the children's art program Kid Pix.
At first glance, PeeWee PC's Pivot Tablet Laptop is a formidable rival to the long-standing OLPC XO.
The XO is packed with hyper-designed creativity worthy of Apple, including a unique software environment that lets kids collaborate in real time on applications ranging from a simple programming simulation to music-making programs (three come pre-installed) and even an application for using sonar to pinpoint the computer's distance from other nearby XOs.
To save power, for instance, the XO's liquid-crystal display (the biggest consumer of juice in a laptop) can be flipped from backlit colour to self-reflecting monochrome.
In mid-May the OLPC group unveiled a deal with Microsoft to put the Windows XP operating system on the XO.
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