@ aristos_achaion
But the fascination of the XO isn't in the $100-ness...
It isn't a
fascination it is the
purpose of olpc:
The mission of this non-profit association is to develop a low-cost laptop—the "$100 Laptop"—a technology that could revolutionize how we educate the world's children. (OLPC mission statement)
It's not like Michael Dell and Nicholas Negroponte were sitting in a bar , slamming shots of Jägermeister, and Neg was like "but I need you to make me a laptop for $100" and Dell was like
"Sorry, dude, can't be done." And Neg was like
"Oh, yeah?"
"Yeah!"
"Well I'll show you. I'll find someone who
can make a laptop for... " EEERRRPPpp... "$100. You'll see."
The point IS to develop a very inexpensive laptop -the $100 laptop.
As for M$'s part (or Apple -who already bases their OS on Unix) I'm sure it could be done. It wouldn't be a simple port to be sure. It would likely have to be a ground-up development (perhaps even the impetus for a new, revolutionary windows unfettered by the limitations of DOS -what a concept).
The point here isn't that XP won't or can't run on the XO, the point is a free, open-source version could be developed for it; and, in exchange for subsidizing the cost of the laptop a Windows (or Apple) logo would be emblazoned somewhere, tastefully, on the thing.
The company who does this gets good-will points:
"Oh, aren't we so great here at M$. We really want to help developing countries move into the digital age... blah blah blah" and twice as many laptops can be delivered because the cost has been subsidized to half of the current cost.
@ aristos_achaion
In short--there would be major hardware issues putting XP on an XO.
As soon as the XO delivers to the general public (I should have mine in two weeks) some 14 year-old kid is going to find a way to port XP and make it work. It will happen. It won't be great, or necessarily 100% stable but it will happen. All I'm saying is Apple or M$ could do it and profit while helping other at the same time.
IMHO
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