NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Monday, May 9, 2005

A pared down “computer” to replace bulky, grey desktop PCs could help close global digital inequalities.
Not-for-profit developers, Ndiyo – the Swahili word for “yes” – said it could open up the potential of computing to two billion more people.
The sub-?100 box, called Nivo, runs on open-source software and is known as a “thin client”. Several can be linked up to a central “brain”, or server.
Thin clients are not new, but advances have made them more user-friendly.
They have been employed in large organisations in the past, but the Ndiyo project is about “ultra-thin client” networking.
It said the small, cheap boxes were targeted at smaller companies, cybercafes, or schools, which need an affordable, reliable system for providing clusters of two to 20 workstations.
Story found here.