[OLPC India] EeePC now or OLPC after 2 years ?

[Marc Valentin]

Hi,
I am in charge of a Belgian NGO. We are developping projects in India.
Our main project is a school created in a backward village area in
U.P. We have almost 600 children now and 120 more are coming every
year. At the beginning, since the children in the villages didn't have
the required level of education we had to start with KG and first
primary (English medium). Each year we open a new level, now level
four is open. Since the children are growing, I started searching for
an acceptable computer lab solution (electricity is also a big problem
in these village areas).
We have a budget and OLPC looks an appealing solution but it looks the
ideas behind the project prevent NGOs to be part of it. Let me explain
: as the main person of the NGO, I have no possibility to get one of
these computers in hand, I cannot even buy one. I tried to get one
with the "G1G1 program donation" but it didn't work because I am not
living in the USA ! But even if I could get one in hand, I could not
order, because the OLPC organization is selling the computers only to
governments.
Now, I discovered the Asus Eee PC... This one is available immediately
(I will get a sample next week), the power seems great and it does
everything the OLPC does. (No fancy colors thought). So my question is
: are you really going to do something for the NGOs working in India ?
Can I tell my staff you are going to send a sample to them ? My
feeling is that it is time to act because competition is there and
OLPC will be obsolete before being released.
-Marc Valentin-
Oeuvre des pains asbl
Gramin Manav Vikas Samiti
http://www.OeuvreDesPains.org