One Hundred Dollar $100 Budget Computer develops in the Philippines
University of the Philippines Los Banos Development and Management Professor Rufino Mananghaya is the one who built this budget PC. Incidentally, his purpose was not to sell the device but to show that a budget computer can be built for the have-nots, in particular, for the educational sector. Mananghaya is also the president of the Philippine e-Learning Society, an academic group promoting the use of computers and the Internet for teaching.
Mananghaya’s budget PC uses a Taiwanese mini-motherboard with 256 megabytes of memory and integrated with a Via C3 800 megahertz processor. This is barely enough to compete with most computers today but it has fewer applications to run anyway.
Instead of having a hard disk, this budget PC has been enhanced with a memory card adapter that allows it to use a Compact Flash card, which is usually used for digital cameras and MP3 players. Mananghaya used a 128 MB Compact Flash card and it’s already an operational computer. Mananghaya’s PC is not encased in solid metal; it is fixed in a 50-peso transparent plastic briefcase that can be bought in school supply shops.
“This computer uses Puppy Linux, which only requires less than 50 MB of memory. Then it has Open Office as a cost-effective alternative to proprietary desktop applications. Both software run in less than 128 MB of memory but the card’s adapter can accommodate cards with up to 2 gigabytes,†Mananghaya said.
Via Inq7
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Nov 12th, 2006 at 11:28 am
[...] I found this article from Digg, telling about a $100 PC developed in Philippines. [...]
Nov 14th, 2006 at 1:45 am
do you have any link to the original write-up? is this supposedly a desktop pc or some sort of a notebook-wannabe? how’s the usage experience? how was the modding of the casing implemented? how was the cooling done, what monitor used?
further details?
Nov 14th, 2006 at 1:36 pm
[...] The $100 PC by Rufino Mananghaya of the University of the Philippines Los Banos has raised my usually-raised eyebrows a notch higher. [...]
Nov 30th, 2006 at 4:02 am
7 ways to use the $100 PC…
Everybody have their own lucky number, you have the 7 habits of whatever, 7 wonders of the world, i’ll start my own series with ‘Tivo’s 7′. Why not?  I  live at the 7th floor, was born on the 14th / 2, you get the point. I…