A 25-cm (10-inch) netbook has been developed by IIT Bombay, which is said to be the most inexpensive netbook in the world. It costs around Rs 6,000. When the low-cost Akash tablet was worked upon, the idea of this netbook also brewed up. The IIT-B netbook is set to be launched in the second week of February.


IIT Bombay professor Kannan Moudgalya said that they wanted to build a device which would make it easy for people to create information. That's why this netbook is born now. He also explained that a tablet is useful when some information is to be retrieved, and a netbook is useful to create it through programming and data entry. IIT Bombay has designed the specifications of the netbook and has also created its OS image along with the software.

The project was taken up to understand the drawbacks and address them in their next product. That's why they felt it important to have a fully functional keyboard, more battery life, larger screen size, more memory, more storage, USB slot and so on, to help students and to encourage more information creation. The netbook also required to be a lightweight one so that it can be carried by students easily. Moudgalya also said that lots of efforts have been invested in the specifications front.

IIT Bombay tied up with Delhi-based firm Basic Computers which has delivered 1,000 netbooks for the pilot phase. Under this phase, the netbooks will be offered to first year BTech students first who are supposed to undergo an introductory programming course, CS 101. Rohin Kapoor, senior manager education practice at Deloitte, said as the new government is focused on virtual classrooms now, low-cost computing devices are urgently required with best quality at the best price. 

TAGS :