Alternatives to the pyra?


I wonder if they'd be interested in partnering with ED. Rather than design something entirely from scratch they could design a module for the Pyra.
That may be premature thinking, though. Might be worth mentioning anyway.
Wouldn't they want to slap their branding on it also? I mean, if they only make an x86 module then the device would still look like a Dragonbox Pyra from the outside.
 
Yeah I doubt they would team up with anyone. They are a fairly sized company that just focus on designing and building gaming devices like the GPD XD, GPD G5A, G7 etc etc

I think they have between 50-100 staff last I looked. It's normal for these companies to also populate their own boards with their own SMT machines and do most stuff in house etc

As SNESFAN said, last time they built the XD , they went from here's an idea, to product in super quick time.
 
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I wonder if they'd be interested in partnering with ED. Rather than design something entirely from scratch they could design a module for the Pyra.
That may be premature thinking, though. Might be worth mentioning anyway.

I doubt it. I'm impressed to see that a chinese company is getting feedback from the community, to be honest, but I don't think they'd partner up.
 
I just looked again at the GPD XD thread. They went from here's a very rough concept render of what we want to build, to product for sale via Geekbuying etc, all in 4 months. April to August.

If they did that again, this would be out in April.. Though who knows if it will even come out. Will be following though.
 
Is that right? Deanx or whatever his name was reported on the concept some time before the XD, I felt it was closer to a year for some reason. Either way, way less than the norm of 2 years of concept design to finished product.

While I don't feel the XD is as completely polished as a product in development for 2 years, it by no means feels like a product with less than half that. It would appear the rule of diminishing returns applies in regards to overall product quality and time in development.

Anyway, off subject, my asus transformer with a Intel z3775 does PS2 emulation, (FInal Fantasy 12) at a playable frame rate. So if the chosen chipset is as good or better than that bay trail atom chip, then this could really end up for me as the device to get.
 
One thing to take into account is the complexity of the new device.
A chinese company can create a new tablet within 2 months, simply because all parts already exist: They buy a finished PCB design, an existing touch, a battery, etc. and slap it into a very simple case.

I learned that when I had to replace the touchscreen of a cheap chinese tablet: when looking for the part number, I found out it's a standard part that's used on hundreds of different tablets.
The touchscreen was complete with glass, frame and even clips where it's clipped together with the tablet.

So in that case, they simply slap everything together, which is a quick and easy task (the designs are tested to work, so not much debugging needed) and incredible cheap, as all parts are being produced in millions or billions of quantities.

The handhelds like the GPD XD are a bit more complex, as they add gaming controls, but it's still one simple case and probably only a minimally changed existing PCB layout.

Now, to create something like their Windows device, things get more complex.
The case is far more complex (not just a top and bottom), the PCB isn't a simple standard design anymore if you want to fit it into a case as small as Pandoras together with a keyboard.
And they'd need a design for Windows 10 - and I haven't seen many chinese Windows 10 devices yet.

So maybe they're waiting for a Windows10 PCB design they can buy and change it to their needs or they design it themselves, which will take quite a bit of time (a bare PCB takes 4 - 6 weeks to produce, so if they need to debug it and have different revisions, it adds costs and time).

Some companies in China where I asked for some stuff sent me finished handhelds which I could simply get from them with small design changes and my own branding :)
That's pretty common :)

Well, that's just based on my experience, don't blame me if they can slap up the device within a few months, but I personally doubt it and would be careful :)
 
It might be possible to hack together a Frankenstein X86 handheld from these parts:

http://creotech.pl/en/produkt/mipi-dsi-display-shieldhdmi-adapter-2/
(see https://hackaday.io/project/364/logs)

Would work very well with this high resolution screen: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Black-To...404050?hash=item280bb99712:g:zmsAAOSw8d9UwMHE

And one of the computers on a stick: eg, http://www.target.com.au/p/pro-tab-32gb-mini-pc-with-windows-1/58069356

Battery would have to power both the LCD and mini PC and everything would have to fit into a clamshell handheld design. It would be possible to strip the plastic off the mini computer stick

Not the cheapest or the fastest solution (and battery life might suck) but parts are all ready made, other than a 3D printed case.
 
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