[HH] open laptop design

[Kurt Keville]

The "fun features" mentioned in that article are tempting to ponder... Ras Pi GPIO header? Use it as a low-power processor for the non-math intensive operations? That would put a new spin on the low-power heterogeneous designs... when Cortex-A9 is your power hog and ARM11 is your energy-efficient processor...  not sure how you would make the connection to it but sounds interesting....

On Dec 30, 2012, at 6:18 PM, Tom Metro wrote:

> Tom Metro wrote:
>> Here's a blog posting about a group developing an open laptop design.
>> 
>> Building my Own Laptop
>> http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=2686
> 
> I wasn't aware the guy behind the above open laptop idea was also the
> developer of the open hardware Chumby. Here's another article on the
> laptop project:
> 
> http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Chumby-developer-building-open-source-laptop-1771223.html
> 
>  Huang made his name as one of the first Xbox hackers and the developer
>  of Chumby. Huang wants to make it possible for other enthusiasts to
>  build and modify his laptop design, to which end he and his team have
>  manufactured a motherboard using only hardware with open source
>  specifications and drivers.
>  ...
>  Hardware hackers will, however, find the "fun features" much more
>  interesting. A second Ethernet port allows the laptop to be used as a
>  packet filter (firewall) or router. USB-to-go allows the laptop to run
>  as an Ethernet, serial spoofer/fuzzer or to connect to a computer as a
>  USB device. The laptop also contains a Spartan-6 CSG324 packaged FPGA,
>  plus eight analogue and eight digital FPGA inputs/outputs and another
>  eight PWM headers for directly connecting RC motors or servos. It is
>  also has a Raspberry Pi compatible expansion header.
>  ...
>  If there is enough interest, Huang is considering starting a
>  Kickstarter campaign a few months down the line, once the components
>  have been adequately tested. The aim, however, is not to produce a
>  cheap laptop - for Huang, it's more about the exclusivity of a
>  handmade product of this kind and it would be priced to reflect that.
> 
> -Tom
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