A Couple Suggestions On The Design...


Don´t forget that you can always build an exernal battery. So if Your battery´s dead and you can´t get hold of a new one, you could use that battery and still have a portable system.
 
honestly, considering how fast hardware evolves these days (moore's law ^^) do you guys really think that in about 8 years when your Li-ion battery dies there won't be another gadget you are drooling about? Let's be realistic (no pun intended): In say 10 years we might have technology that will put the pandora in the place of a c64.

I am not saying that I will be throwing mine away and such, just because I feel some mystical urge to consume and buy a new gadget each month or something. All I want to say is: Right now you make it sound like you are going to be using the pandora for the rest of your life and if it's battery is not available for replacement anymore you, your family, your pets and your neighbourhood are doomed. It's not going to be like that, don't worry! Most people are going to forget their pandora in some drawer after a year anyways. This happened with many gp2x enthusiasts who just had a very short attention span.

Also if Craig says it will be easy to source replacements and it will not be a complicated custom design, let's just believe what he says for a minute. I am pretty confident I will be enjoying my pandora retro umpc-like in 2028 and explain to my children "back in the old days we didn't have no stinkin' holoscreens and cyberspace! Games were not real 3d back then, you would have to imagine that the picture in front of you was set in a 3d environment. Also coke used to be dark brown and lemons were sweet..."
 
My suggestion is to use only one charging connector - mini USB. Many mobile phones using mini USB as a standard charging connector.

If proprietary battery will de widely available, there will be no problem with "proprietary". And more, if battery will be big enough, there no problem with integrate some new brand future battery small enough into some DIY housing as a replacemenet of old one.
 
Chip said:
Two, the plug be of the standard round variety, and the voltage be a common one (not 7.25v or something odd) so that "generic" adapters can also be used.
Click to expand...
Well, the standard round variety is the cheapest anyway, but think of it this way. How many people are going to try and use whatever they have round the house (or maybe they have two psu's next to each other). Plug in the wrong one and the Pandora smokes and then the user returns it under warranty. Having a dedicated non-common one prevents this. Weigh the cost of a dedicated connector against a smaller return rate and you often find its cheaper in the long run.

As for the voltage, well, the Pandora can charge via USB, so I would suspect the voltage to be 5V, which is not that common on your bog standard cheapo power supply (The nearest being 4.5V or 6V). The way around this would be a psu in the Pandora taking anything from 9 - 12v and giving the 5V required, but that seems a little daft having two psu's.

So I'd say "generic" adaptors are out of the Window.

Maybe :)


DaveC said:
and then go to use them when the battery in the unit dies the spares will be degraded and useless too. Won't there be the same complications if we go to swap in a new one in the Pandora but Craig no longer makes this model? Where are we going to get replacements then? You don't need to worry about that so much with big

I hate propriatary batteries, I think they are Satan reincarnate. They can be expensive, hard to get, and force you to rely on and buy them from one source. If that one source dries up, take your $250-$300 investment and all of the software you got for it and flush it. That just doesn't seem very user friendly. There should be another option available.
Click to expand...
If you think about it, even at 1000 charge cycles, doing a charge every day, thats still over 3 years. After that time, the Pandora itself will be retro, and the Pandora II will be out, so not really much to worry about :)


peca said:
My suggestion is to use only one charging connector - mini USB. Many mobile phones using mini USB as a standard charging connector.
Click to expand...
The problem with that is if you want to fast charge your Pandora whilst using it with your PC at the same time (eg. charge whilst copying files to it), you can't as there's only one charging connector. You either have to charge slowly and copy files, or charge first and then copy files.

Many mobile phones indeed use mini USB as a charging connector, but these suffer the same problem. It takes ages to charge them via usb on a pc compared to using the official psu, and you can't use the usb socket whilst the psu is connected to it. It one or the other only.
 
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Squidge said:
peca said:
My suggestion is to use only one charging connector - mini USB. Many mobile phones using mini USB as a standard charging connector.

The problem with that is if you want to fast charge your Pandora whilst using it with your PC at the same time (eg. charge whilst copying files to it), you can't as there's only one charging connector. You either have to charge slowly and copy files, or charge first and then copy files.
Or you can use PSu for fast charge and copy files directly to SD card on PC with card reader. But yes, only mini USB may be an issue in such cases.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
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Squidge said:
Chip said:
Two, the plug be of the standard round variety, and the voltage be a common one (not 7.25v or something odd) so that "generic" adapters can also be used.
Click to expand...
Well, the standard round variety is the cheapest anyway, but think of it this way. How many people are going to try and use whatever they have round the house (or maybe they have two psu's next to each other). Plug in the wrong one and the Pandora smokes and then the user returns it under warranty. Having a dedicated non-common one prevents this. Weigh the cost of a dedicated connector against a smaller return rate and you often find its cheaper in the long run.

As for the voltage, well, the Pandora can charge via USB, so I would suspect the voltage to be 5V, which is not that common on your bog standard cheapo power supply (The nearest being 4.5V or 6V). The way around this would be a psu in the Pandora taking anything from 9 - 12v and giving the 5V required, but that seems a little daft having two psu's.


Something as simple as a 5VDC regulator on the input would solve both problems.

I'm not sure how many people are stupid enough to just plug in any old AC adapter into a device without checking the voltage and current draw, but you could significantly lower this risk with a regulator. They're usually good for 2-3 times their output as an input, so even if some dope shoves a 12v plug into the device, they're probably safe. You might run into overheating issues with much higher-than-expected voltages, but generally the regulator will simply stop functioning before you melt anything. Besides, do we really want to cater to the lowest common denominator at the expense of the intelligent majority?

This also fixes the 5v adapter problem. It could take a commonly available 6v input and charge the battery at 5v.
Click to expand...
 
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Can't we change the cells in the battery ourselves? I mean, people are doing it all the time with laptop batteries.

Squidge, didn't you talk about changing cells in your laptop some months ago?
 
Chip said:
I'm not sure how many people are stupid enough to just plug in any old AC adapter into a device without checking the voltage and current draw
Click to expand...
Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaany people, let me tell you! Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaany people!
Not necessarily the kind of people who register at these forums, but some of the things I've seen even here say otherwise.
 
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Chip said:
Something as simple as a 5VDC regulator on the input would solve both problems.
Click to expand...
Show me a regulator that can provide 5V 2-3A output from a 6V input. I can't think of one. A linear reg would be a waste of time as it would end up desoldering itself from the board with the amount of heat it generates. Switch mode PSUs would be too costly for something that's not really necessary. That's why I disregarded the idea when thinking about it in my post.

QUOTE
I'm not sure how many people are stupid enough to just plug in any old AC adapter into a device without checking the voltage and current draw


You need to check the posts on this board. Not only have people shoved in totally the wrong adaptor (wrong voltage, too low current, wrong polarity), but there are even people that have managed to connect mobile phone chargers to the ext port. Go outside this board, and the number of people grows exponentially.
 
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Don't most cell phones use a universal generic Li-Ion battery design? Couldn't you just use two of those batteries in the Pandora?
 
Squidge said:
Chip said:
Something as simple as a 5VDC regulator on the input would solve both problems.
Click to expand...
Show me a regulator that can provide 5V 2-3A output from a 6V input. I can't think of one. A linear reg would be a waste of time as it would end up desoldering itself from the board with the amount of heat it generates. Switch mode PSUs would be too costly for something that's not really necessary. That's why I disregarded the idea when thinking about it in my post.

OK, you're probably right. A regulator that would handle 2-3A is probably not prectical from a size/cost/heat angle. They do exist, however.

QUOTE

QUOTE
I'm not sure how many people are stupid enough to just plug in any old AC adapter into a device without checking the voltage and current draw


You need to check the posts on this board. Not only have people shoved in totally the wrong adaptor (wrong voltage, too low current, wrong polarity), but there are even people that have managed to connect mobile phone chargers to the ext port. Go outside this board, and the number of people grows exponentially.

I feel it would be undesirable to have a weird, proprietary power adapter on an "open" device like this unless there is really no other option. If it is not technically feasible to have Pandora work with readily available, universal power supplies, then so be it. But it would be a real shame to artificially limit the options for the device just to make it "idiot proof".
Click to expand...
 
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Squidge said:
Show me a regulator that can provide 5V 2-3A output from a 6V input. I can't think of one. A linear reg would be a waste of time as it would end up desoldering itself from the board with the amount of heat it generates. Switch mode PSUs would be too costly for something that's not really necessary. That's why I disregarded the idea when thinking about it in my post.
Click to expand...
http://focus.ti.com/docs/prod/folders/print/pth08t260w.html

I have used these in a modular form on my robot, i'm sure TI sell the SMD IC for it seperately for people to put them on their own boards.
 
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MWeston said:
To make sure the system doesn't cost more, maybe the DC adapter should stay as an add on and just provide a USB cable? Those who will never use it, don't get stuck paying for it.
Click to expand...
How much will the DC adapter cost? How fast will the USB thing charge? I'm always on the move, and usually only have a few hours to charge things unless it is overnight.

Which brings up another question: how easy will it be to swap batteries around? I was thinking about keeping a spare with me, but if it's a couple-hundred screws and a few wires, or something insane (no offense ;) ) I might as well forget about getting that spare.
 
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MWeston said:
To make sure the system doesn't cost more, maybe the DC adapter should stay as an add on and just provide a USB cable? Those who will never use it, don't get stuck paying for it.
Click to expand...
The only problem with that is then those who do want it (such as myself) will complain about having to spend extra money for something that should be included.

I believe that it is better to have something and not need it, than to not have something and find that you need/want it.
 
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I'd say keep the DC unit in the box, because I would want to have it. I have no idea how many would want it in the package, though. I don't think I would complain if it didn't come with it, either, as long as the unit is reasonably priced (I guess it would have to be if it's a standard size.)
 
Just a minor note; please include a DC brick that has a regular plug at the end and the transformer brick somewhere in the middle. I've already got 2 power strips filled with bricks for all my consoles, wasting precious outlets and I really don't need one more like that..... opt for a very small notebook-style adapter if possible. A lot of people will thank you. :)

Something that accepts 100-230V at 50-60Hz would be ideal, with multiple region plugs depending on where it's sold.
 
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You know, power consumption for the whole unit might be being overestimated. If the logical high voltage is 1.8v (most modern SOCs) 2A, which would be a lot for a handheld with an ARM based chipset and LED backlighting (not a cold cathode tube) but be just under 4 watts. I'm honestly kind of surprised 5V stepped down isn't enough to charge rapidly from USB being more than twice the system logic level....
 
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