Cheap budget PC in the Philippines

One Hundred Dollar $100 Budget Computer develops in the Philippines. University of the Philippines Los Banos Development and Management Professor Rufino Mananghaya is the one who built this budget PC. Incidentally, his purpose was not to sell the device but to show that a budget computer can be built for the have-nots, in particular, for the educational sector. Mananghaya is also the president of the Philippine e-Learning Society, an academic group promoting the use of computers and the Internet for teaching.

Mananghaya’s budget PC uses a Taiwanese mini-motherboard with 256 megabytes of memory and integrated with a Via C3 800 megahertz processor. This is barely enough to compete with most computers today but it has fewer applications to run anyway.

Instead of having a hard disk, this budget PC has been enhanced with a memory card adapter that allows it to use a Compact Flash card, which is usually used for digital cameras and MP3 players. Mananghaya used a 128 MB Compact Flash card and it’s already an operational computer. Mananghaya’s PC is not encased in solid metal; it is fixed in a 50-peso transparent plastic briefcase that can be bought in school supply shops.

“This computer uses Puppy Linux, which only requires less than 50 MB of memory. Then it has Open Office as a cost-effective alternative to proprietary desktop applications. Both software run in less than 128 MB of memory but the card’s adapter can accommodate cards with up to 2 gigabytes,” Mananghaya said.