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Minimatech at UPLB

Chancellor Velasco tests the eBox2300.

UPLB through the College of Public Affairs has been researching on low-cost computing solutions since 2005. The technology package is called eMinima, which means “easy” to use and “minimalist” in its requirements.

In November 2006, through the support of Chancellor Luis Rey Velasco and pioneering work of Dr. Raffy Mananghaya, the chipmaker VIA Technologies, the Philippine eLearning Society and the ICT Commission (CICT) launched an Affordable Computing Workshop that demonstrated low-cost PC solutions. The workshop featured the VIA integrated board and Puppy Linux Operating System. It also featured a tiny PC, the eBox2300 (shown in the picture being tested by Chancellor Velasco), which can deliver day-to-day computing at only 15 watts maximum power consumption.

The successful workshop prompted CICT in January 2007 to adopt a PC4ALL program that advocated the use of $200 PC package (P10,000, given the exchange rate at the time).

Intel's D201GLY integrated board.

However, commercial products under the PC4ALL initiative have not become available in the local market until the last quarter of 2007.

In October 2007, Intel exhibited through the Philippine eLearning Society and commercial distributor Infoworx a low-cost integrated board solution. Named “Xplore Avenger”, the PC uses Intel's D201GLY board and comes with an integrated 1.33 Ghz Celeron processor. This is more than adequate for office computing using modern operating systems such as Linux or BSD.

The low-cost PC conforms with the PC4ALL low-cost target, and was exhibited at the UPLB Admin Building in March 2008.

Dr. Ranola with the eee PC.

Also in October 2007, ASUS and Intel introduced the eee PC, a low-cost but versatile laptop. Whereas small laptops have been priced upwards of P80,000, the eee PC costs only P18,000 when purchased on COD.

UPLB assists its employees in buying a PC through its Computer Loan Program. In February 2008, affordable computing pioneer Dr. Raffy Mananghaya availed of this loan to purchase an eee PC.

Vice-Chancellor Bert Ranola is proud that UPLB is in the frontier of grassroots computing, and he is happy that employees enjoy a loan program for purchasing their own low-cost PC.

Added by raffy December 3, 2009 (11:05AM)

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