Based on past experience (personal and otherwise), any technology or project touted by the Indian government (and most governments, at that) is vaporware until shipped.<p>The $30 number is doubtful because quite regularly, the government subsidizes projects to meet numerical targets like this. But the article says the $30 cost doesn't consider the cost of distribution. Even if the hardware really costs only $30 to make, distribution is going to at least double that. If this is to be sold by retail vendors, which is the only real way to sell this in a country like India, add another $30 to the cost.
Indian government has really ambitious plans here, I will wait to see that how many of them actually reach to students. The rampant corruption in the bureaucracy in India, make sure that needy students hardly get any advantage of this schemes. Best way to make sure that this laptops reaches the students is to outsource the supply chain to some NGO.
This thing is not going to market for Rs. 1500. That much just about gets you a barely usable dumbphone around here, no way it's going to get you a tablet -- even if it runs a free OS like Android.<p>It's quite an ugly beast though ... anything on the resolution of that display? Looks very stretched to me.
This would be an interesting thing to give to students here in the US, where $30 dollars is, at most, a day's salary. In India, it could take a month for a family to earn enough to buy one.
Something like this is an excellent candidate for Android OS. If they just design it with Android in mind they will have quality software and save a huge amount of money since Android is free.
<i>The device, no bigger than a conventional laptop, …</i> – by which they mean "about 1/4 the size of a conventional laptop"<p><i>… along with 2GB RAM</i> – Almost certainly they mean 2GB of flash.<p><i>… powered by a 2-watt system to suit poor power supply areas.</i> – Ok, that's it. You have overspun my ability to respond.<p>Except, in the picture, I think the man's eyes say "Take the picture already and let me stop touching this ghastly thing!"
Please downvote till you actually hear about these being used by real people, not just a fat Indian minister who probably thinks 8 asterisks is his password because that's what he sees on the screen when his secretary open his email for him.