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The Kano PC offers specs similar to this year’s Chromebooks, at a similar price, but it runs Windows, not ChromeOS.
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This is the rear view of a fully assembled Kano PC. Note the transparent case and the battery connected via USB.
Kano
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The Kano PC is delivered disassembled: you and your children can assemble it like Legos.
Kano
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Kano claims many things about the Kano PC. “Elegant” is not one of them, as this side view shows: its modularity comes at a price.
Kano
Last June, educational software and hardware vendor Kano announced an ambitious new project: a computer kit to build your own x86 and Windows 10-based hardware. This replaces similar products that Kano has offered for years, based on on Raspberry Pi. The finished product, designed in association with Microsoft, was released today.
The Kano PC, with a sale price of $ 299, is a two-in-one design with an 11.6 “touch screen, which can be used as a tablet or laptop, although it is a Windows system, it looks much more like an Android tablet Extremely thick in a foldable case with a built-in keyboard device The case includes a built-in stand to hold the screen at a horizontal viewing angle, as well as the integrated keyboard and touchpad.
The Kano PC ships with Windows 10 Home in S mode and runs on an Intel Celeron N4000 CPU, 4GB of DDR3L RAM, and 64GB of eMMC storage. It also has a Micro SD card slot for adding storage later. Wi-Fi connectivity is included, but not stellar: Specifications describe it as dual-band b / g / n, with Bluetooth 5.0. The resolution on the touch screen is 1366×768, and the video can be sent to an external display via an HDMI port. The system also offers two USB 3.0 ports, a USB-C port, and three audio jacks (two outputs, one input).
Child friendly
The Kano PC is cheerfully and blatantly aimed at kids, with bright colors and plastic throughout. But the best part of the system is probably its modular design; The reason it’s so thick is that the main components come together like Legos and can be individually replaced (and eventually upgraded).
The back of the Kano PC case is transparent, so kids can see what’s inside even after it’s been assembled, and it should be quite sturdy. Kano says the display “supports a six foot dropped steel ball,” although he does not specify how large that steel ball is.
Kano hopes the device will compete with Chromebooks to become the primary device for students in classrooms, rather than being relegated to a single strange device in the corner. Running a full Windows operating system, even in S mode, offers more flexibility than ChromeOS, but that flexibility is a double-edged sword. Students can learn more from devices that are not as well locked as a Chromebook, but they also have many more opportunities to render them unusable due to malware or incorrect settings.
It’s hard to say what the actual performance of the Kano PC will feel like until we have one in our hands to test, and yes, we’ve ordered one for us to review here soon. Kano provided Novabench with results that position the Kano PC north of a $ 350 Acer Spin 11, which shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, since the Spin 11 uses a Celeron N3350 instead of the Kano’s N4000.
Although we’re not particularly familiar with Novabench, it’s reassuring to see that the Kano PC-specified CPU score of 225 is slightly higher than the N4000’s average CPU score of 212. This is a strong indicator that we won’t see any EVOO. Underclocking-style antics that keep little Celeron from working at its full potential.
The Kano PC is available today through the company’s store, Best Buy, and Microsoft Store, and in-store stock is expected to be available soon at Best Buy locations in the United States and Canada.
Kano listing image
