The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) XO is basically an ebook reader that was disguised as a bright green toy laptop. Created around 2005, it was def way ahead of its time. Background on the project: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_per_Child
Best feature is the screen. The 7.5-inch display had a sharp 1200 × 900 resolution at 200 dpi, which was impressive in 2007. Indoors, it works as a color LCD.
I don't know why screens like this didn't take off. Outside, you can turn off the backlight and use it as a crisp black-and-white reflective screen that is amazing to read in direct sunlight. It used as little as 0.1 watt in reflective mode, so super low power.
The display rotates and folds flat over the keyboard, turning the XO into a chunky tablet. Buttons around the screen work as page controls, and the vertical layout feels like it was designed with ebooks in mind.
The built-in Read activity handles digital books and PDFs. You can load books through USB or an SD card, so the machine doesn’t depend on internet access.
The XO is designed around a simple idea: one small machine can hold an entire library. In places where schools have few textbooks or almost no library, that’s a big deal. Even now, it makes a neat offline reader for public-domain books, manuals, old magazines, and PDFs.
The hardware looks like something that escaped from a cartoon and volunteered for humanitarian work. White shell, bright green trim, a carry handle, rubberized edges, covered ports, and those fold-out Wi-Fi ears.
This mofo is built for dust, heat, rough handling, and children who'd mess around and test whether it can also serve as sports equipment. Tonka Tough, for those of us old enough to remember that phrase.
It runs from wall power or its battery, and it can also work with solar charging setups. Hand cranks show up in early publicity, but they never become the practical everyday power source people sometimes imagine. Solar power makes much more sense.
Sucks that the project never fully got off the ground, because it had real potential as a cheap, tough ebook reader for underprivileged kids.
The screen is sharp, easy to read in full daylight, and uses very little power, while the case can take abuse that would probably kill a normal tablet. It could’ve been a rugged little portable library, packed with textbooks and free books, and carried anywhere without needing constant internet access or perfect conditions.
Mine still loads up fine, as you can see. I did hack it and put linux on it, but ugh, it's super slow now, so this will be an ongoing project.
10 Comments
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 6 pts · 9h
Here are more pics. I love the idea of this thing so much, I can't part with it. It's bulky and a product of it's time for sure, but it's so tough. You can drop it, get it dirty, etc. We need more perma-tech like this.
mesamunefire@piefed.social · 10 pts · 9h
OMG I remember the OLPC! I had one back a LONG time ago. It was soooo sloooww. But it turned heads when I brought it into the linux meetups. I didnt even think of using it as an ebook reader!
Im also kinda sad it never took off. Like it ha extra screws and parts INSIDE it for crying out loud.
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 9h
Yeah, they def didn't play it up as an ereader, but in early design sessions, that was one of their main ideas for it. And when you flip the screen around on itself, that's what it was designed for. Screen works great outside in the sunlight too.
But as they starting going multi-purpose, and tablets weren't a thing back in the early 2000s, they focused on the laptop show. Which makes sense, I just wish they wouldn't have downplayed the ereader part so much.
It's funny, because the thing is so slow, an ereader is about the practical use it has! Because that part of it is pretty snappy and the battery lasts forever in ereader mode.
They had prototypes that had a little hand crank for power so you didn't even need electricity! So much potential and it could have evolved into something great! But then chromebooks came out, and boom! OLPC died. But chromebooks never solved all the issues that OLPC was trying to solve.
If somethign like this were combined with an equally tough "internet-in-a-box" project and raspberry pi, so that connection wasn't needed for info or books, and have it run on solar...awesome.
Imagine this thing being all opensource, easily repaired, running on solar and hand crank, and based on free education for all, everywhere. I think it STILL has potential even today. With new lighting fast linux systems, this thing would be awesome if it were updated. If I were rich, that'd be my thing to do!
mesamunefire@piefed.social · 3 pts · 9h
Oh yeah I forgot this was about the same time chromebooks came out. Still some good came out of it and they apparently are still around haha.
Solar is a better option I agree. The hand crank really only works for VERY low power devices. Even then, I remember hooking one of those up to a multimeter. You dont get much.
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 9h
Yeah, maybe a sit down bike pedal crank would be better? Exercise and power! And make use of solar. It's be great to have something combined with "Internet-in-a-box" and you could just never have to connect to anything.
mesamunefire@piefed.social · 2 pts · 9h
Maybe? Haven't tested one of those.
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 9h
I wish I were capable and smart enough to build and test it all out! lol Because I do wonder if a pedal bike generator could power a raspberry pi and a small screen...
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 9h
The XO screen really was ahead of its time, especially for reading. It wasn’t E Ink. It was a custom dual-mode transflective LCD designed under Mary Lou Jepsen at OLPC. With the backlight on, it worked as a color laptop screen. Turn the backlight down or off, and ambient light reflected through the panel, producing a sharp grayscale image that stayed readable in direct sunlight. Bright sunshine helped rather than washed it out.
A few details make it especially interesting as an ebook display:
The screen measures 7.5 inches and has a physical matrix of 1200 × 900 pixels, about 200 dpi. In reflective monochrome mode, it uses the full resolution and can display 64 gray levels. Unusually sharp for a small portable screen in 2007.
The color mode works differently. Instead of each pixel having the usual three separate red, green, and blue subpixels, the XO uses a special arrangement that shares color information across the high-resolution grid. That allows one inexpensive panel to provide both color indoors and much sharper monochrome text outdoors. The perceived color resolution is lower than the full 1200 × 900 monochrome resolution, although it can appear roughly comparable to 1024 × 768 under good conditions.
With the backlight off, the display itself reportedly draws around 0.1 to 0.2 watts, compared with up to about one watt with the backlight operating. That's a pretty cool detail because the backlight is normally one of the biggest power users in a portable computer.
The XO also has a separate display-controller chip called the DCON. It can keep a static page visible while the main processor sleeps. In practice, that means the computer doesn’t need to run at full power just to leave a page of text on the screen.
The display rotates and folds over the keyboard into a dedicated ebook position. Side buttons remain accessible for page turning, and the hardware can detect when it is in ebook mode. This wasn’t an accidental extra. Reading was part of the physical design.
It also has advantages and disadvantages compared with E Ink. Unlike early Kindles, the XO can show animation, scrolling, video, and color. It doesn’t have the slow full-page flashing associated with older E Ink screens. The downside is that it still uses LCD technology, so it doesn’t have the paper-like contrast or extremely low static power of a true electrophoretic display. The panel also looks somewhat unusual in color mode because of its special pixel arrangement.
HubertManne@piefed.social · 2 pts · 4h
So a few things. One is tablets did not even really exist at the time it was coming out as a thing and the project drove the creation of the netbook market. Basically when they showed what could be done the tech sector took notice and made their own thing. This is partially why it did not take off. Its kinda why tech research is useful. I worked at a lab that had a big impact on our monitors, tvs, and projectors of today. These things move the needle.
quantumlover@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 4h
Fun to know, thank you!