Creating the World's Cheapest Tablet 192
Back in October, we discussed news that India had launched a $35 tablet. Now, JohnWiney writes with a story in the Globe and Mail about the device's development. Quoting:
"Part of the difficulty in engineering such a device is that the underlying goal—that its final price should be within the means of those who can’t afford high-priced tablets—dictates crucial engineering and component decisions. A piece of high-impact-resistant glass, such as the touchscreen face of an iPad, can cost upward of $20. Datawind’s touchscreen glass, which the company had engineered down the street, costs less than $2, though it won’t allow for luxuries like pinch-and-zoom finger swiping. There were also compromises on processing power: Datawind’s 366 megahertz processor costs less than $5, a fraction of the $15-plus price tag on the chips that power iPads and other comparable tablets. And while the decision to run Google’s free Android mobile operating system on the gadget saves money, it requires coders to dig deep into the Linux kernel that underpins the software, tweaking it until it runs smoothly on Datawind’s weaker processor."
Yes please. (Score:5, Interesting)
It would also make a hella good universal remote for the lounge.
Problem is now that tablets are spiffy high price gadgets with premium hardware and spiffy graphics that cost the same as a entry level laptop. I'd have one tablet to do all those things and have to carry it with me. Things will change radically when tablets really do become as cheap as they should be. Cheap enough and we'll start covering surfaces with them.
All the interface animations and physical metaphor graphics (brushed metal, wood grain - Apple's microsoft bob era design philosophy), but after a while it's no benefit and a small waste of your time and battery power every time you watch a 500ms transition animation. They just get in the way and in the end I'd rather have more battery life/response/cheaper hardware.
I really cannot wait to get my hands on a useful $99 or less tablet that actually doesn't look good, is rugged and doesn't have fancy graphics.
Re:Race to the bottom (Score:2, Interesting)
It is actually not $35 because the company's is asking for $52 each to build it while the government pays the difference.
Also if this were a real retail product, there would be additional mark up etc making it more like a $75 item (number off my ass).
Re:Race to the bottom (Score:5, Interesting)
Then... I have an idea -- why don't you go tell them that. Someone over there thinks there is a critical need for a device at that price point. It's easy for us first world residents to say they should be buying iPads instead without any appreciation at all for what life is like in that part of the world. The last time I was there, the houseboy slept on the floor in the hallway outside my hotel door, because it was more comfortable than his home. (I asked him.) Away from the cities, the great majority don't have access to any of the things you take for granted -- GPS, cell service, access to the internet. It's a totally different environment. *We* think you're a little nuts for camping outside the AT&T store in the rain waiting to replace your 4 with a 4s. People in *that* part of the world think you're batshit crazy.
Re:Race to the bottom (Score:4, Interesting)
Now would be a good time for you to propose a low-tech alternative to a cheap tablet that holds 20,000 books about the sciences, history, the arts - that promotes literacy and hygiene and medicine. It should include instructions for various good practices such as sustainable agriculture, clean well digging and sanitary sewage practices, mortuary and food preparation practices among other things - in native language or with a suitable translation engine. All subjects introductory to advanced in math, chemistry, biology, mechanical and electrical engineering and history must be included. It must contain enough information to be able to uplift an entire village out of the stone age and into the space age - in a 7" tablet form factor that can be hidden, trekked across the desert and charged by laying it in the sun.
Ideally this low-tech solution should weigh less than half a kilogram and cost less than $35 - durable and disposable enough to smuggle into or airdrop from drones into places like southern China, North Korea, India, the Phillipines and Arkanas.
What did you have in mind?