Keeping the OLPC dream alive: One Education's XO-Infinity modular laptop design

One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) was an ambitious project aimed at bringing modern technology to students in the developing nations. It’s been sometime since the new OLPC laptop was launched, but most of the core team has already left the project. The company has teamed up Vivitar to provide cheaper Android tablets instead of laptops. However, OLPC’s Australian partner One Education has decided to keep the dream alive and introduced a new laptop design called XO-Infinity, reports The Sydney Morning Herald. It’s a modular laptop that can be improved and upgraded, expected to start shipping in 2016. “Rangan Srikhanta wants to ensure every child has a free, modular computer to last throughout primary school, in the process teaching them self-reliance and allowing Australia to contribute to changing the world,” said the report. With this laptop, the company aims at a device that students can use throughout their school years. The design will allow students to change the components as per their needs. The design could allow it to be useful for around ten years and won’t get outdated in mere two years, adds the report. The main computer is said to be small, durable and support a range of hardware including touchscreens and keyboards, ARM or x86 chips, and operating systems like Linux, Android, and Windows. For instance, you could give a tablet with an ARM-based chip and Android-based software to a child too young to read and they could use the computer to interact with educational apps using a touchscreen. As they get older they can add a keyboard to turn the tablet into a laptop, swap out the processor and operating system, and start using the machine as a Linux or Windows computer, according to Liliputing. Basically, it will be designed in such a way that each component is very easy to replace, be it battery, wireless module or any other component. However, it is still a prototype and the first module is expected sometime in August. To make this possible, the company plans to launch a new crowdfunding project soon.