Kids in Australia have never been luckier, with the New South Wales Department of Education and Communities announcing that thousands of laptops will be landing in the hands of students in the new year.
The laptops have been manufactured by Lenovo based on feedback by the NSW department, designed to be both rugged and more than capable in the classroom and out of it.
“It has been a pleasure to work directly with Lenovo throughout the development of this unique laptop,” said Dianne Marshall from the NSW Department of Education and Communities. “We are proud to be providing NSW students with cutting edge PC tools to help support their education.”
More than the netbooks originally released to students, the new computers feature an 11.6 inch screen, second-generation Intel Celeron or Core i3 processor, and a battery capable of lasting up to 8.5 hours. The specs won’t be enough to let them play games, but these computers have been designed for work.
The ruggedisation is important too, with Lenovo making the X130e laptop stronger than the average notebook computer, enough to survive the life of a regular student. To help with this, Lenovo has added a rubber protection to the top to absorb impacts, made the corners stronger, added better hinges, made the ports recessed, and designed the keyboard so that the keys are harder to remove.
In fact, Lenovo says that this is the world’s first value notebook tested for military specifications in durability.
Students won’t be the only ones able to grab this machine, though, with the X130e arriving for $673. And just think: your kid could be getting one for free.
If you have a student in year 9 at a NSW school, they will be getting one for free in 2012.
This afternoon, we were told that “every student in year 9 at a public school in New South Wales will receive a free laptop” with the program limited to public schools only at this stage. Students will have the laptop until they’ve completed the year 12 HSC, at which point they will own the laptops.
Tracking technology has apparently been built into the computers, with “security features allowing authorities to pinpoint and lost or stolen devices”. It’s worth noting that until the student finishes year 12, NSW Department of Education and Communities owns the laptops, and not the student; they’re just borrowing them until graduation.
While it’s unlikely that the specs of the X130e will be perfectly matched for the entirety of the four years of high school, a free laptop with current technology is better than no laptop at all.
Here’s hoping the education departments around the rest of the country jump on the bandwagon and give every student this sort of opportunity.
I don’t think that “up to 8.5 hours” is poor battery life. It’s not like they’re going to be using the laptops completely during the course of a school day.Â
As for the tracking measures, not sure if they can go around them easily. From what I understand, it’s built into the machine.Â
Guess we’ll see.Â
the tracking system is built into the motherboard so its practically impossible to get around
Yup, that’s what we noticed. Our review models had the systems turned off, but we suspect it’ll be different when they start sending the laptops to schools.
Everybody
loves a great deal no matter what time of year it is. With Christmas slowly passing by there will
be some awesome after Christmas deals to be had on refurbished laptops and
desktops. Finding the right
refurbished laptop or desktop for yourself is not a hard thing. Most sites
offer customer reviews of each product they sell and market which allows
previous buyers to give present buyers an idea of what they are buying. It is always helpful to read those reviews
before you make your decision. You can check
“ElectroComputerWarehouse” and I am sure you will find a good one
for you..
Cant wait to get mine this year XD
What colour are they going to be for this year (2012)?
From the looks of the model we’ve been checking out, black.Â
Sorry Leigh, but black is a colour reserved for staff. we, however, are definitely etting silver
So far, everyone i know has black…
they will actually be silver (says my tso)
Challenge accepted.
Don’t think they can’t play games! There is a way of changing .exe files into batch files to run them! My year is full of minecraft addicts and they will find a way somehow 🙂
ewww, minecraft
Does anybody know how to get WORKING internet connection at home…it works at school, but nobody at my school or my old school has been able to access internet at home.
Thanks
Students in public system don’t deserve these laptops! They are defaced, ruined and destroyed at tax payers expense. I thought that ended this laptop programme. It is a privlidge not a right! But of course these students don’t care and they abuse the system!
hey guys to make the laptop play anything and run anything, as if it were a new pc all you have to do is rest the laptop, or install/overwrite a new windows OEM, or to the method that will probally delete EVERYTHING on the laptop is get a new hard drive HDD.
i got one there the shittest computer i used im thinking of buying my own and taking it to school there an x130e u can play some games like if you get it hacked or you get non exe. games
there not very rugged people break them all the time