Obviously many of you speed-read, so I've bolded the important parts. Read all the way through if you have the time.
Mark Watson said:
Yes, there would be a huge market for this, but I don't think Pandora will be reaching that market.
Not if they don't get the proper advertisement out there, they won't. If the world doesn't know, the world doesn't buy. Unfortunately everyone knows about Nintendo and Sony, but Pandora? And unless there's a proper library of good games (essential for good console sales) Pandora won't be reaching that particular market.
However,
the users in the same market as the Nokia, or other such devices, will not be able to resist this magnificent device, once presented with it.
Mark Watson said:
I'm not sure that you -can- have one device that covers both pocket computing and gaming, and I think the Pandora design evidences this. It doesn't quite work as a gameplaying device, as plenty of posts testify, and it simply won't work as a laptop replacement. It's just too small for a laptop replacement/substitute. I've tried several sub-micro laptops in the past, including the smaller Sony Vaio's from c2000, and there's a point below which they are just too small.
Well, here's a guy to prove you wrong. I am completely planning on this replacing my laptop. Not only will it play games better than the GP2X,
it provides the basic essentials for a laptop. E-mail, web browsing, and instant messaging are all there. And if I need something else, I'll just SSH/VNC home to my desktop and work from there. And, since it plays movies pretty much in whatever form they'll come in, I don't need to bring my Zire 71 around.
Let me give you a few of my experiences with a laptop, if you'd like to hear them:
- Whenever I know/guess I'll be sitting around for long periods of time, I always bring my laptop with me. When I get on it, I always do one of two things: Pull up BZFlag, Globulation2, or some other Linux game, and play around with that
- Pull up SSH, turn on my VNC server, pull up VNC, and start reading my mail, working on my PHP software, and instant messaging from there.
[*]Recently a college had presented a collection of classes to "outsiders" they could take during the weekend. It's a fairly laid-back event, where friends go to learn new things while having fun. Laptops are almost always brought for those computer sessions in which some new language or some new functionality is presented. Even in a pharmaceutical class, it was nice to be able to take notes and look up long words we didn't understand.
Obviously I could use my laptop a lot more, but I use my desktop the most because I like to keep all my data (IM logs, e-mail, files) in one location. Right now I am using my laptop because we have family over and they are sleeping in the same room as my desktop. What am I using it for? Browsing! Can the Pandora do that? Absolutely!
This will completely and utterly replace my laptop.
I haven't mentioned gaming yet, but
I'm not sure how you can say this is not going to work out for gaming after seeing the pictures and specs. Look at the community, their games, and the device they developed it for, and then look at the Pandora. I'm pretty sure it's a much-needed upgrade, and nothing but.
Mark Watson said:
I have to, at present, disagree with it being a 'genuinely usable pocket computing and gaming device'.
We'll have to give the Pandora time, then, to prove itself.
Mark Watson said:
I just feel its trying to be too many things at once, and will end up not doing any of them as well as it could.
First and foremost in the minds of Craigix and Co. has to be emulation for them to really go anywhere in the short term.
Please show me where the emulation part has been thinly executed (besides the shoulder buttons - the jury is still out on that). Not only that, but merely providing a touch-screen and keyboard would appear to have covered the basics needed for a PDA.
