Craigix Discloses Information On New Gp2x?

[X-Code]

Just remember to never forget that hardware is only just hardware, and that software is the part that makes that hardware shine bright ( I hope to have made it sound simple enough ) .


A new machine is always welcome, as long as it has support and devs behind it.

 

[lubidog]

Having just read through the whole thread in one sitting I would bet that Craig has more input this time. He talks about 'we' when he says who is making it etc. And he sounds even more excited than usual etc.

So, is this a new Ninja but with real backing?

Also, wifi and touch screen and USB. I want them.

 

[nubie]

Why the GP2x hate...?

Let's see, hmmm, it sucks maybe?

Just from the top of my head are 10 big mistakes that were never fixed or addressed.

Internal USB ($0.50 worth of parts needed)
Proper Video out on the headphone jack (proper jack is already there, improper sense circuit hogging video pin)
Lousy headphone sense circuit.
Crap Cradle/BoB, can't reach power switch, forced to buy $30-60 worth of power supplies to run it.
No USB support to speak of. (keyboard not supported well or at all, gamepad support fairly lousy)
TV-Out looks like crap, even though the chip used supports VGA, HDTV and RGB output, we are saddled with S-Video
"USB 2.0" is a load of crap, doesn't support card reader function reliably or at all.

Battery ill-thought out, 2 AA NiMH barely keep it going, 3 or 4 minimum, Li-Ion should be used.

Not enough computing power, or a proper 2D acceleration, let alone 3D accel.

Closed source video player acceleration can't even play B-Frame DiVX properly, Mpeg2 support non-existant (Shouldn't say non-existant, but GPH didn't even give us the option of the $35 license to use the codec. If there was a "media player" package I would have bought it.)

"Value" (Removed) package has the added benefit of $5 worth of crappy plastic/fabric addons that you should avoid tacked on for $30 and made Manditory. UGH!!

So that is why all the hate. I tried (through 4 different GP2X's) to love it, and it came damn close until the USB support was crap, I need to use the keyboard, but the way GPH stifled the USB no progs supported it, even those ported directly from the PC. I can't abide it.

The worst problem hands down? The lousy POS stick, the dead-zone is 98% larger than the switch contact area, so it is nearly impossible and finicky to use. A simple D-Pad or even round buttons for directions would be preferred.

The final Jab to the eye was the well-intentioned efforts of Hacker/Engineer DaveC to provide an aftermarket D-Pad, he shipped them all the Germany where ED's shop had to charge $50 just for shipping (or some ridiculous price), even though I live in the same country as DaveC.

BOOOOOO!

(on a side note, I plan on keeping track of this new console, but the EEE PC from ASUS has a much better chance of taking my money, for $250 it will have 800x480 screen, VGA output, 900Mhz Pentium Mobile, full Intel 3D video card, Xandros with Firefox built in, a battery, charger 3x USB, internal Atheros Wifi, and a 4-8GB Solid-State storage medium. As well as an SD/Memstick reader built-in Oh yeah, and 512MB of DDR2. Suck on that handhelds , I can play a proper PSX emu [ePSXe], and a real N64 emulator. It can run full XP too, so Real Gaming can take place, Halo is entirely within the specs, not to mention Adaptec Gamebridge is $10 on ebay and provides a slick S-Video input to allow it to function as a wide-screen portable TV. I can also turn it into a Projector for about $200 more and display at 10 Feet wide if I like, so it would make a very nice buy)

 

[jmetal88]

Man, I'm already wanting whatever one of these new devicess will be, and I don't even know what it is yet!

 

[efegea]

(on a side note, I plan on keeping track of this new console, but the EEE PC from ASUS has a much better chance of taking my money, for $250 it will have 800x480 screen, VGA output, 900Mhz Pentium Mobile, full Intel 3D video card, Xandros with Firefox built in, a battery, charger 3x USB, internal Atheros Wifi, and a 4-8GB Solid-State storage medium. As well as an SD/Memstick reader built-in Oh yeah, and 512MB of DDR2. Suck on that handhelds , I can play a proper PSX emu [ePSXe], and a real N64 emulator. It can run full XP too, so Real Gaming can take place, Halo is entirely within the specs, not to mention Adaptec Gamebridge is $10 on ebay and provides a slick S-Video input to allow it to function as a wide-screen portable TV. I can also turn it into a Projector for about $200 more and display at 10 Feet wide if I like, so it would make a very nice buy)

craig, do a GP3X better than that, please!!!

 

[gamercorps]

craigx.... Will there be better retail distribution? Asside from the handheld itself do you see other avenues for making revenue? accessories? bundles? etc. I realize we all want some form of standardization but we need for someone to make money to keep the plane flying...

 

[craigix]

There will be a better distribution this time yes.

I've looked over the specs of the EEE PC, to add all those things we would end up with a brick.

However, you might be surprised how close we can get...

 

[efegea]

There will be a better distribution this time yes.

I've looked over the specs of the EEE PC, to add all those things we would end up with a brick.

However, you might be surprised how close we can get...

I was just joking. The EEE PC is, well, a PC

 

[Dr_Ian]

I hope it has a 320x240 resolution because I like that. The resolution is very standard size and it fits well on a handheld sized screen.

 

[Alex.]

Craig, what's the screen aspect ratio?

Also, how does it stand in terms of 2D acceleration?

 

[techFreak]

It'll be a nice screen for *ALL* gaming *DREAMS* as well as some other applications like web browsing, movies and etc.

Yep... 2D and 3D hardware acceleration. B)

 

[predatorramboxxx]

"on a side note, I plan on keeping track of this new console, but the EEE PC from ASUS has a much better chance of taking my money, for $250 it will have 800x480 screen, VGA output, 900Mhz Pentium Mobile, full Intel 3D video card, Xandros with Firefox built in, a battery, charger 3x USB, internal Atheros Wifi, and a 4-8GB Solid-State storage medium. As well as an SD/Memstick reader built-in Oh yeah, and 512MB of DDR2. Suck on that handhelds , I can play a proper PSX emu [ePSXe], and a real N64 emulator. It can run full XP too, so Real Gaming can take place, Halo is entirely within the specs, not to mention Adaptec Gamebridge is $10 on ebay and provides a slick S-Video input to allow it to function as a wide-screen portable TV. I can also turn it into a Projector for about $200 more and display at 10 Feet wide if I like, so it would make a very nice buy)"


umm wow the EEE PC is more reasonable and iam def buying one if it less then 300.
looks much better then this new system

 

[craigix]

umm wow the EEE PC is more reasonable and iam def buying one if it less then 300.
looks much better then this new system

Err apart from the fact one is a handheld (10 hours bat) and the other is a laptop (2-3 hours bat)?

 

[stinch]

Oh, another point springs to mind. I wonder if there is any chance whatsoever of using an SOC that's actually got developer documents released to the public? That's been a huge nuissance for the 2x, really, if I understand the situation correctly (especially with scalling and the 2d accelleration features).

It's a bit sad when handhelds released by nintendo have better publicly available documentation than an "open" device. I guess trying to figure out unknown hardware is much more difficult when there are less devs, no games to reverse and no professional developers using official dev kits to leak secrets.

Making the OS completely open and reasonably easy to build from source would help as well. That way community projects like open2x can get up and running faster and with less effort.

Perhaps also having an ext port that doesn't need a large fragile looking connector. Perhaps even more like a cartridge slot so things like this motion sensor for nds could be developed.
http://ndsmotion.com/

 

[telengard]

Wow this is cool. This could rejuvenate my desire to code again. gp3xmess??

Here's my wishlist:

- Hardware volume control (no need for software control)
- Better control/stick/whatever
- Touch screen
- Keep SDL support
- Keep Linux
- Keep the emu friendly aspect ratio screen

BONUS: Built in wifi (for accessing games over samba/nfs)

I'm actually pretty happy with the gp2x. The above things (except for the stick) would be "nice to have". I have a DaveC d-pad on mine now so it's much more usable.

~telengard

 

[icurafu]

umm wow the EEE PC is more reasonable and iam def buying one if it less then 300.
looks much better then this new system

Err apart from the fact one is a handheld (10 hours bat) and the other is a laptop (2-3 hours bat)?


Yeah, 2 hours because it is based on pre-centrino technology. Weighs 2 pounds and the last I heard it will cost $300 US in most places of the world, unless you live in the UK, where it will cost 300 pounds.

 

[craigix]

£300 = $600 what is it with ripping off the UK?

 

[predatorramboxxx]

umm wow the EEE PC is more reasonable and iam def buying one if it less then 300.
looks much better then this new system

Err apart from the fact one is a handheld (10 hours bat) and the other is a laptop (2-3 hours bat)?


Yeah, 2 hours because it is based on pre-centrino technology. Weighs 2 pounds and the last I heard it will cost $300 US in most places of the world, unless you live in the UK, where it will cost 300 pounds.

well its 200 us dollars for one version and 300 us dollars for another version the difference is the screen and storage memory. Its running xandros linux so its complety open source and almost all pc games before 2001ish or peraphs later willl run using that program lets you play windows gams(cedega i believe) and has some great emus for linux.
umm i bet it can get more then 2 hours my laptop gets 6 hours running vista and watching movies and like 3 hrs playing games like doom3 and etc
i mean the gp2x for me only gets a max 5 hours and my zodiac only got like 2 hours
if this gp3x is like the ds lite and is similar like the battery then its beliveable for ten hours of straight play becuase the ds lite is like 23 hours of battery life....
i highly doubt this new system will get 10 hours of battery life...

 

[jmetal88]

£300 = $600 what is it with ripping off the UK?

I dunno. Why is it that when US companies sell Mini parts it's so much more expensive than importing from the UK? Something you never really figure out.

 

[Alex.]

You're twisting some facts there. I'm pretty sure the DS gets <20 hours max, on the dimmest backlight setting. Secondly, the DS has <70Mhz processors, versus the 200Mhz+ we're talking about here.

Regarding your laptop, the EEE PC isn't a high end laptop with long battery life, that much was made obvious from the first time it was introduced.

I think you shouldn't be so critical of a device you didn't even see or get the exact specs of. I don't know about you, but I hope for the best



By the way, what is the estimated time life of this device before it will get replaced by a new one? I'm curious, because judging from what the people in the know said, it seems like the sky will be the limit in terms of what you can do with this thing.