A Look at the Next Generation of OLPC XO Laptops

This morning in Cambridge, Mass., at OLPC's Global Country Workshop, OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte announced the second generation of OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) XO laptops. Negroponte didn't share many details about the XO 2.0's hardware, but from the quick press coverage we can learn that the XO 2.0 will be half the size of the original machine, and will boast one-of-a-kind flip design with two touch sensitive displays. "The next generation laptop should be a book," Negroponte said. The design will provide a right and left page in vertical format, a hinged laptop in horizontal format, and a flat, two-screen continuous surface for use in tablet mode. "Younger children will be able to use simple keyboards to get going, and older children will be able to switch between keyboards customized for applications as well as for multiple languages," the press release reads. The XO 2.0 is scheduled to be released in 2010 with a price tag of $75, but this sounds a bit unrealistic at this point, after all we are still in 2008.