The ultimate fast, light, hack-proof notebook – for $500?
When I first heard about the Australian Labor Goverment’s plan to offer every Year 9 to 12 student a free notebook computer, I immediately thought with a fair degree of cynacism, “this’ll be good”.
Sure enough, the plan fell flat when it turned out the government had allocated insufficient money for support and maintenance (which you already makes you start wondering just how serious this whole plan was in the first place.)
Well, the government has upped the per notebook budget from the initial $1000 to $2245 to account for backup and maintenance.
But again, you have to wonder what the go is when the government puts out its contract to notebook builders to basically build a hack-proof ultraportable notebook for under $500.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald report today, the notebook will have to be:
* under 1.75kgs
* no bigger than an A4 page
* feature an 8.9-inch to 12-inch screen
* come with a webcam
* have a battery life of six-hours
* be hack-proof
Obviously, you’re only talking about netbooks here given the $500 per unit asking price.
And noticeably, there was no specification about the operating system.
Some pundits are already suggesting “this is a job for Linux” however, there are several problems here. First up, few notebook vendors offer Linux as an option in Australia and certainly the number of netbooks with a Linux distro has all but dried up as Microsoft cleaned up the local market with its Windows XP Home Edition OS. Microsoft is also just about giving the licence away for Windows XP so it’s no guarantee Linux will get a look-in here, even if it does cost nothing up-front.
The other problem with Linux is that which ever vendor ends up with the contract will have to find suitable maintenance staff able to handle the support calls for Linux. With so few Linux netbooks sold now in Australia, it’s a cinch they would have few Linux-knowledgable helpdesk staff on-hand to fill the role. Given the fact that most students (and teachers) will be far more familiar with Windows (or Mac OS) than Linux, I can’t see a Linux rollout working out all that smoothly.
But the real problem with specification is that it just isn’t doable – there are no netbooks in existance that can achieve a six-hour battery life. Based on the testing I’ve done so far on the current batch of netbooks (or even notebooks for that matter), any notebook claiming six-hours battery life has fallen well short of that mark.
And as for being “hack proof”, that’ll be a neat trick. Apparently, the idea is that the notebook will need to log onto the Department of Education & Training network in order to browse the internet, even at home. Kids aren’t supposed to be able to hack into the device and do what they want with it.
Lots of luck on that score.
It’ll be interesting to see whether it’s hours or days before it’s hacked and the details are all over YouTube.
One thing is for certain – whatever it is that notebook manufacturers come up with, it’ll have to be something new because I can’t see any of the current notebooks achieving all these requirements as they stand.
Similar Posts:
- Lenovo wins NSW schools netbook contract – but what about battery life?
- Q&A – What should I look for when buying a netbook?
- Why battery cell counts are useless for knowing battery life
- Q&A – Which is the best CULV notebook so far?
- REVIEW – MSI Wind
- Why Linux on netbooks is dead in Australia
- Q&A – What’s the biggest trick to finding out notebook battery life from the specs?
- Lenovo launches new ThinkPad L-series notebooks with 30% recycled content
- REVIEW – Asus U6V Bamboo notebook PC
- REVIEW: Samsung N310 netbook
My school next year is rolling out its Notebook Computer Program. They have offered us the choice of an Acer Aspire One, costing the parents $150 dollars over three years, and a Macbook, double the amount, at $300.
They did a trial run of the Acers for term 4. With a 6 Cell battery equipped, and using them for classes, lunch, and after school, the battery lasts around 5hrs 40mins. (For regular “High School” use)
The Acers run Windows XP Home, and has a 160GB HDD.
The main complaint from the students was that the keyboards are simply too small for continuous typing, and the screen is to small to read text comfortably for long periods.
The school has around 1700 students, (a large school) and at the moment, the ratio is 2 macbooks for every 1 Acer.
Students are smart enough to know that the Mac is better in nearly every way. 13″ screen, CD/DVD drive, much larger keyboard,a firewire port for the media students, and a fashion accessory. The disadvantage that the Mac has is that its battery life is fairly poor with continuous high school use, clocking around 4hrs 30mins.
Security wise, the Acers were partitioned by the schools ICT department.
One partition consists of Windows XP Home, where the student is given administrative control, but cannot access the schools network on that account, and Windows XP Pro, where your account is very limited, but you can access the school network and internet. You are limited with what you can do with the Acer, because it doesn’t come with a CD drive.
The funds from the government were insufficient to fund this program as a whole, so the school council is funding the majority of it. I assume they have the money for it because it is a very large school.
I feel that the NSW’s government is going to have a tough time finding any notebook producers that will take up the very difficult specifications they have set.
Again, “Hack Proof”? What the….?