But one wire remains.   Every time we want to recharge a battery (or work for a long time in one place) we have to find a power outlet and connect with a wire.  Hopefully, not for too long, if the research reported from Intel has legs.

This also has implications for the generation of clean power from the sun using satellites in orbit.  Can easily be done, but the problem is getting the power down to earth.   Intel’s work in close range, but may be someone else is working on the long range.

When asked this was Intel’s response to the $ 100 (er…$ 176) laptop, pat came the reply: “Yeah, you could call that” It is meant for children, but classmate PC is not a toy. It is a tiny version of a fully pledged PC. (512 M memory 2 GB in a flash, though no hard drive) The screen size is smaller, but on the other hand it is not easy to break even if you dropped it from a height. (Yes, they demonstrated it!)

This was seen at the GK3 exhibition at Kuala Lumpur Conventional Centre where the so-called $100 green coloured OLPC laptop was a notable absentee. By the way Intel classmate costs $220, and will be available for the governments to buy in bulk

A product brochure is available here. 

The United Nations telecommunications agency in Geneva gave the upstart technology called WiMax a vote of approval, providing a sizable victory for Intel and something of a defeat for competing technologies from Qualcomm and Ericsson.

The International Telecommunication Union’s radio assembly agreed late Thursday to include WiMax, a wireless technology that allows Internet and other data connections across much broader areas than Wi-Fi, as part of what is called the third-generation family of mobile standards.

That endorsement opens the way for many of the union’s member countries to devote a part of the public radio spectrum to WiMax, and receivers for it could be built into laptop computers, phones, music players and other portable devices.

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Nicholas Negroponte, founder of One Laptop per Child, said: “Intel joins the OLPC board as a world leader in technology,
helping reach the world’s children. Collaboration with Intel means that the maximum number of laptops will reach children.”

Intel inside

The new agreement means that Intel will sit alongside the 11 companies, including Google and Red Hat, which are partners in
the OLPC scheme.

It will also join rival chip-maker AMD, which supplies the processor at the heart of the $100 laptop.

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The Ubuntu Mobile and Embedded project aims to create the open source platform for initial release in October 2007. The operating system will be developed by members of the Ubuntu community, along with staff from chip giant Intel. Its development was prompted by the growth of power hungry portable devices that place new demands on software.

“It is clear that new types of device – small, handheld, graphical tablets which are Internet-enabled – are going to change the way we communicate and collaborate,” said Ubuntu CTO Matt Zimmerman.

“These devices place new demands on open-source software and require innovative graphical interfaces, improved power management and better responsiveness.”

Mobile firms such as Nokia are already using open source technologies in some of its products. Ubuntu is already a popular choice of operating system on desktop and laptop computers. In contrast to offerings from companies such as Microsoft that earn money by licensing and charging for use of their products, Linux code is freely available.

That means anyone can modify it or develop applications for it. As a result, there are many different types, or distributions, of Linux operating systems.

The driving force behind the Ubuntu project is Mark Shuttleworth, one of the world’s first space tourists.

The self-made millionaire from South Africa founded the firm Canonical in 2004 to promote and support open source software projects.

The firm’s partnership with Intel to develop the mobile operating system is just the latest deal with some of the powerhouses of the technology world.

In April this year, Ubuntu announced a deal with Dell, the world’s second largest manufacturer of PCs, to offer certain computers with the operating system preinstalled.

“We are delighted to be working with Intel on this version of Ubuntu,” said Mr Zimmerman. “Intel is making significant contributions of technology, people and expertise to the project.”

The chip-maker has already shown off a device running a prototype of the Ubuntu mobile platform.

At a recent meeting Intel CEO Paul Otellini held up a prototype device, like a large cell phone, running the system, although he said it was also capable of running versions of Microsoft’s Windows.

Intel is keen to grab a slice of the fast growing market for net-enabled phones and devices.

It has already endorsed another open source project to develop applications for mobile devices known as the Gnome Mobile & Embedded Initiative (GMAE).

The firm also recently unveiled plans for a tiny low-energy chip designed specifically for mobiles and portable computers.

Codenamed Silverthorn, the chips will be one-seventh the size of conventional processors and consume just 10% of the power, Intel said.

Hardware developments such as this are important to maximise battery life for portable devices that are required to run increasingly sophisticated software and deliver relatively power-hungry applications like the web.

The new Ubuntu platform will also aim to maximise energy efficiency whilst offering a graphical interface designed specifically for the small screen.

More details of the new operating system will be announced at the Ubuntu Developer Summit being held in Seville, Spain from 06 to 11 May.

An initial version will be released in October this year.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6634195.stm

Looks like this will change the nature of the debate.   The report states that Intel and Microsoft are not happy with Negoponte’s baby. 

For $150, Third-World Laptop Stirs a Big Debate – New York Times

Mary Lou Jepsen, the chief technologist for the project, likes to refer to the insight that transformed the machine from utopian dream to working prototype as “a really wacky idea.”

Ms. Jepsen, a former Intel chip designer, found a way to modify conventional laptop displays, cutting the screen’s manufacturing cost to $40 while reducing its power consumption by more than 80 percent. As a bonus, the display is clearly visible in sunlight.

That advance and others have allowed the nonprofit project, One Laptop Per Child, to win over many skeptics over the last two and a half years. Five countries — Argentina, Brazil, Libya, Nigeria and Thailand — have made tentative commitments to put the computers into the hands of millions of students, with production in Taiwan expected to begin by mid-2007.

The laptop does not come with a Microsoft Windows operating system or even a hard drive, and the screen is small. And the cost is now closer to $150 than $100. But the price tag, even compared with low-end $500 laptops now widely available, transforms the economic equation for developing countries.

By JOHN MARKOFF,
SAN FRANCISCO,

In an effort to create a global wireless alternative to cable and telephone Internet service, Intel said on Monday that it would collaborate with Clearwire, a wireless broadband company, in developing and deploying the new technology. The companies said that Intel would make a "significant” investment in Clearwire, which has begun building long-range wireless data networks around the world. Clearwire, founded by Craig O. McCaw, a pioneer of the cellular industry, said in August that it had raised $160 million from 23 investors in a private stock transaction. The companies are betting that a new wireless technology called WiMax – which is intended to extend the reach of Wi-Fi wireless networks by permitting a single transceiver to connect hundreds or thousands of customers to the Internet over distances of many miles – will succeed where other long-range wireless data technologies have failed in the past.

Intel is spending $150 million to jumpstart WiMax technology by creating a series of new chips designed to support the WiMax standard. Clearwire recently began offering wireless Internet service in Jacksonville, Fla., for about $25 a month.

During a news conference on Monday, Mr. McCaw said that Clearwire was moving more quickly to deploy the service in major cities in Canada and Mexico and that it was also active in developing countries like Bangladesh. The company said that it could be in as many as 20 American markets next year, but Mr. McCaw said getting access to radio spectrum was more difficult in this country than in Canada and Mexico. He also said that Clearwire could succeed at offering high-speed wireless Internet access where others have failed, in part because it hoped to take advantage of Intel’s efforts to create a global technology standard. "We are tempered by the fact that everyone who has tried this has failed," Mr. McCaw said, "but we’re crossing the river on the backs of pioneers." During the 1990′s there were a number of efforts to provide Internet access wirelessly both in urban and rural areas in the United States, but they have all failed financially. Intel executives said on Monday that they believed that by creating a single global standard for WiMax technology, wireless access could become an alternative to digital subscriber lines and cable.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/26/technology/26intel.html?ex=1099786570&ei=1&en=b1f3317f6ee75a58