The XO-1.5 baseboard as an upgrade for the XO-1

[sola]

Since the XO-1.5 casing and connector positions is the same as the XO-1 and generally seems to use very similar components (same battery, same screen ...etc) it seems possible to make the XO-1.5 baseboard compatible with the XO-1.

This would mean that the huge number of XO-1s deployed (more than 100K G1G1 owners and 900K units in country projects) could be upgraded into a much more powerful machine for a small cost.

The XO-1.5 will have similar performance than todays low power netbooks. Admittedly, it will not be the fastest in the leage but it will be in the same category.

This upgrade could transform XO-1 machines into completely usable, responsive browsing devices with acceptable Flash and Java speed.

If anyone has information about this possibility, please let us know.

[sola]

Also, I would like to know if it is possible to purchase XO-1.5 baseboards anywhere.

Neither ilovemyxo.com nor xoexplosion.com sell them.

[sandy|XO]

Over time there may be others interested in the answers to your good questions....yet it is still is way early in the roll out of XO 1.5 hardware to have useful answers.

Maybe you could apply to the Contributor's Program for OLPC hardware to test out motherboard and power requirement issues for backward compatibility.

See: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Contributors_program

Message me if you are interested.

[sola]

I have submitted a project proposal to OLPC.