General Thoughts On The Pandora, Laptops Et Al


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ljones

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Hello all :) !

I've just been going over all the various posts and points on this board regarding the pandora. And overall, and hopefully :) I'm making the right decision I've decided to go with pandora. For me, it ticks a lot of the boxes which other systems simply don't do. Let me elaborate. Ok, here goes (brief) brain dump! :) ....

Ok, let's think back 10 years ago. Back to 1998. If you were like me then (i.e. poor :( ) you probably didn't own a 'phone, nor a laptop PC as even a second hand one would cost a bucketful of cash. Chances are you might have 1 new PC and (maybe) 1 old second hand PC - both desktops. There were very few portable computing devices around.

And 5 years ago? You might have your first mobile phone and maybe even your first laptop PC (I got mine 5 years ago, but only just after many months of saving!). But even just 5 years ago any sort of small mobile computing devices that you could buy and which actually did something useful(!) was pretty limited.

And it's intresting to see how the way some see laptops, desktops et al how they have changed over the (say) last 10 years or so. 10 years ago, the desktop PC was the system you did everything at, while the laptop was your "tiny" portable version of the desktop (albeit rather limited). Today that's less of the case; desktop PCs seem to be being used more and more for single task purposes (e.g. video editing or server). Laptops have become what desktop PCs were once, as they can do most of the functions but take up less space.

Coming back to today that then leaves stuff like the EEE pc's of this world. Yes, they're great for running apps but not so hot for games. And portable game consoles are great for games, but without a keyboard they aren't so hot for apps. Which is kinda where pandora sneaks in :) .

So for me, pandora ticks all the boxes. I don't profess to be the greatest gameplayer in the world, but pandora does *both* apps and games. Yes a brand new laptop even of the el-cheapo variety could do more, but it isn't something you can put in your pocket. The EEE PC and its kind aren't bad, but it won't be so hot for playing games. I'd never really use a portable games console, as I don't play a huge amount of games. And a desktop PC has well....err....0% portability!

Once I get my paws on a pandora :) I just hope I'll be able to compile stuff for it!!

Just my misc thoughts and ramblings!

ljones
 
ljones said:
And a desktop PC has well....err....0% portability!
Click to expand...
Not true, I go to lan parties all the time :)
 
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Joppu said:
ljones said:
And a desktop PC has well....err....0% portability!
Click to expand...
Not true, I go to lan parties all the time :)


carrying.jpg
Click to expand...
 
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ljones said:
So for me, pandora ticks all the boxes. I don't profess to be the greatest gameplayer in the world, but pandora does *both* apps and games. Yes a brand new laptop even of the el-cheapo variety could do more, but it isn't something you can put in your pocket. The EEE PC and its kind aren't bad, but it won't be so hot for playing games. I'd never really use a portable games console, as I don't play a huge amount of games. And a desktop PC has well....err....0% portability!
Click to expand...

This pretty much sums up my feelings on the Pandora, and why I'm so thrilled by it (except that gaming is a must for me).
 
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Well ive just saved up enough money for this and two 32 gig sd cards. I have a gp2x f200 and used it since 2 months after it came out. I was very pleased with it and ever since news of the pandora came out ive been absolutely amazed by all of its functions. Recently ive been looking at VIA C7M ULV 1.2 GHz powered devices such as the WIBRAIN. I honestly can't decide, and im looking for outside opinions.
 
hey

ljones, nice read :).

Anyhows I myself very recently was thinking about getting a laptop after looking into them for my mum who is looking to get one some day.

I'm not sure how to compare the graphical side of gaming of the eeepc to the pandora, I'm really not sure how they match up, as I know nothing about the graphics hardware of the pandora. Regardless, I see the pandora as something completly different, as firstly it's on a far different scale of portability. Simply put, you can put the pandora in your pocket and what not. Another key difference to me is that the pandora has game controls and a touch screen :), and so there are some really exciting prospects for new and original games. I mean, it's a wonderful thing for a homebrew developer, to have a system to develop for with the features of something found in those big commercial portable devices. Finally, as the pandora stands on it's own as a portable gaming and computing device, I think you can also expect far more interest in developing games or whatever else for it, and so there will be more games and software made specifically and optimised for the pandora :). I also like how it uses a different CPU architecture, and it's also nice how it has a community behind it :).

I hope I make some sense here anyhows, hehe.

cyas
 
trooper said:
PortableComputer.jpg


Even more portable, And usable at the same time. :rolleyes:

Trooper
Click to expand...
I once had a dream where I was wearing a similar construction to school. That was such and awesome and weird dream.

I'm getting more and more of these "if I had the pandora..." moments too, now on a daily basis. Like right now I'm sitting in the car with this web and walk internet phone thing and a laptop on my... lap, It'd be cool to have the pandora for this kind of drive because it's smaller, can play games better, I'm allowed to install stuff on it (my own laptop doesn't have this web and walk thingy) and I could use it as portable movie player.

I've been sitting in the car for about 15 hours now, surfing for about 6 hours and I'd really dig a pandora for long drives like this as gaming console and semi-laptop.
I too have never been too blessed with current electronics, mostly because I never really needed or wanted them, but I'd really dig a pandora, and I'm definitely trying to get one of the first 3000.

p&|a FTW
 
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I must say, I agree with all of you that the Pandora sounds absolutely perfect. However, I feel I should state the minor quibbles I have with it. July drawing to a close, I think it's very safe to say that we didn't exactly get the "flood" of videos we were promised. Sure, a clip of Pandora emulating arcade machines I expected it to handle already was nice, I guess, but a working OS and GUI are FAR overdue. No matter how committed you are to the project, that's an undeniable fact.

Though the Pandora is truly an all-in-one device, the lack of substantial proof-of-concept until this point leads me to believe that a ) I'll be buying at least semi-blind, or b ) It won't be out for a while. I'm thinking more the latter than the former, because I truly believe that the dev staff will hold out as long as it takes to make a perfect device and keep us informed, regardless of how it may hurt the community/consumer.

It's also a bit too big replace everything I own, and too small to replace other things. It can't be my laptop, and it's simply too chunky to be my main audio player. I guess what I'm trying to say is that, while I used to view this device as the messiah, I now see it as a niche thing whose only true advantage is raw processing power.

I'm not trying to start a flame war here or anything, honestly. I want to be convinced otherwise through an intelligent debate of some sort. But with the myriad of apps and games the iPod Touch now has, it's safe to say the only advantage Pandora has over iControlpad is potential for bigger games. This advantage will force me to get a Pandora someday, I assure you. However, my "get one at launch" thoughts are quickly diminishing as the release of the iControlpad draws near.

Especially with the Zod port of Quake 1 and netplay... :D
 
i have to say that gaming on the ipod touch has really gone well but it still won't come close to using a pandora
if you have an ipod touch you'll know that when gaming on it you get maybe 2 hours tops of battery life compared to about 10 hours on the pandora
also for me i use a case on my ipod touch meaning that if i were to use the icontrolpad i would have to take off the case and put on the controlpad
plus it's just another thing to carry in my pocket (along with my phone, wallet, shures, ipod) i would much rather have an all in one device like the pandora
 
By and large one of the reasons for me getting a pandora is because it well.....ticks several of my boxes. The other systems avaliable just don't do that; there is always something which is either dissapointing, annoying or something that I'd probably never use at all.

If the pandora turned out to be vaporware, then I'd probably go with an EEE PC. Though I've chosen the pandora over the EEE since although I am no big gamesplayer the pandora will handle games better, plus you can't put the EEE in your pocket. Also in the UK, the EEE is overpriced. By the time you've paid out for one you could get an el-cheapo ordinary laptop for its price.

There is also the UMPC but the better ones are absolutely enormous - long and narrow. If I'm right I have a solar panel for charging small batteries here, one of the UMPCs I saw was as big! Plus there's no keyboard. And very expensive. I remember years back when the 1st win ce devices were being sold - they cost a fortune and I don't ever recall anyone jumping for joy or going crazy for them. Same seems to be true of UMPC. There dosen't seem to be much advantage for the UMPC over a normal run-of-the-mill laptop.

As for apple's iphone/new ipod (whatever it's called!) it is quite expensive and again has no keyboard. I would also guess the hardware is locked down and if linux could run on it, it wouldn't run properly or would be hard to do. And there's another thing about the iphone/new ipod too - if it has no keyboard then presumably it has some sort of on screen keyboard. I just wonder about everyone who has bought one and who is now finding out that a screen really isn't exactly the greatest of things to type on - it must be like trying to type on a ZX81!

By and large pandora ticks two of my most important boxes: number one it runs linux and is open source, and number two it is just about as far away from windows as is possible (which is something I like - none of my computers run windows). For what it is it isn't expensive, it is only a little bigger than a blackberry but yet does a whole bunch of things; a blackberry in comparison is *very* slow and propietary (about the only thing a blackberry can do that the pandora can't is be a phone!).

So for me, it's definately pandora. EEE I know runs linux too but it also runs windows which makes me wonder was the EEE PC designed to run linux first, and then its makers found it runs windows or was it the other way round?

And after years of waiting, I'll finally have a workable C64 in my pocket ;) ! hehe!

ljones
 
CronoTriggerfan said:
I must say, I agree with all of you that the Pandora sounds absolutely perfect. However, I feel I should state the minor quibbles I have with it. July drawing to a close, I think it's very safe to say that we didn't exactly get the "flood" of videos we were promised. Sure, a clip of Pandora emulating arcade machines I expected it to handle already was nice, I guess, but a working OS and GUI are FAR overdue. No matter how committed you are to the project, that's an undeniable fact.....
Click to expand...
I wouldn't mind just seeing some photos of the developers at work on the linux OS for the pandora! :)

ljones
 
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