Is Gp2x.co.uk A Dodgey Online Store?

[moxie]

Exactly those. Perhaps they could come forward and explain exactly how it can be the responsibility of anybody but the designer of a software project to actually research the hardware for said project? Or how a software design, for a fairly unknown hardware system, that cannot be scaled to fit the hardware once its capabilities gets better known, isn't simply a bad design? I mean, since you can't. Or?

 

[Epicenter]

Do any of them go by the name of 'Drop dead Fred' by any chance

No, but I'm sure we can have all sorts of fun coming up with fake names for them. I'm fond of Captain G.G. Spank and Eric Q. Porkenfrost XVI, personally.

 

[moxie]

Like the one who refuses to post here due to the low quality of discussion (I think reading flamewar threads I take part in is some sort of peculiar spectator sport for him, not that I blame him)...

Well, if that is what he reads, I sure can understand his opinion on the quality of discussion... B)

 

[Epicenter]

Actually, the flame wars are the high points.

 

[moxie]

Actually, the flame wars are the high points.

Well, they got to be, since you refuse to answer simple questions like "How can it be anyone but the designers responsibility to properly research the hardware platform", thus not providing any content except for flames.

 

[Zeladin]

Also I think you'll find that a lot of places take the money immediately (play.com if I'm not mistaken). If this is actually illegal, then this law is being broken a lot - which is not a good thing.

From Play.com terms and conditions: http://play.com/HOME/HOME/navfoot/5-/About...e=terms#jump-03

Credit and Debit cards are debited on the day of shipping by Play.com. All prices include sales taxes (where applicable) unless otherwise stated, and no charge is made for shipping.

But of course they would say that wouldn't they. Sorry I must assume that I was mistaken.

The reason it always seems like Play debit the card immediately is because they usually ship immediately.

Edit; btw I dislike 'professionalism', mainly 'cause I can't do it.

When it involves taking my hard earned money I not only 'like' professionalism, I demand it.

I think I was probably talking rubbish. I think I was thinking of those companies that are really impersonal under the name of being 'professional'. But these two things are not actually the same I guess. I wouldn't like to be required to be impersonal either. As regards gp2x.co.uk they certainly have a personal touch, but I suppose the quality of service is what's in debate.

Perhaps a poll about this would be better and indeed if it shows gp2x.co.uk to have poor service then it might encourage improvement. It would have to be quite detailed to be of any use. Covering whether the order was recieved on time, if not how well customer service dealt with the problem and etc. Or maybe we could all rant about how bad it is and if even it wasn't bad it might improve - I mean how great would a free 1gb sd card with a gp2x be!! It can't go wrong - unless we manage to put the only uk provider out of business - that would go down well with epicenter no doubt. -cheers...I'll just step out of the cross fire now.

 

[id10t]

Has anyone had bad experiences with gp2x.co.uk?
Any advice would be great.
thanks

It took me two weeks, five e-mails (yes - that's right, five e-mails from five different accounts) and a PM to Craigix to get an answer to a really simple question. Ridiculous. Oh and by the way my PM was left unanswered.

Wanna buy a low mileage car mate?

You should phone us up, the order could have been lost (in the post) or your emails might be getting stopped by the spam filter.

Craig, how about whitelisting the word "order" or "gp2x" in your spamfilter? Or maybe it would be a good idea to include a contact form on your page, which gets submitted only if you punch in the right number from the image (since you have such a significant aversion for spam)? Man, imagine a respectable company saying "yeah well you might have written a letter but it might have gotten deleted".

I ordered my gp2x at the end of October (270Mhz) and had it within 2 days.
Also at this time emails were turned around within 24hrs.
A later mail about a break out board didnt get answered.

I did get the feeling it was a small operation = hit and miss service
when things get busy or someone is on holiday (or in Korea visiting gamepark)
but great service if you get their attention.

ID

 

[psj3809]

At the end of the day (For people in the UK) just call them instead of waiting for emails to be answered.

 

[stinch]

I received something faulty and it was quickly and with no problems. However I was very close to never dealing with them again simply because I decided to use a photo to illustrate the problem. I later read in this forum emails with attachments get trashed. Luckily I hosted the photo on my website and linked to it instead so my email got through.
Had my email had an attachment and not got through I probably wouldn't have just sent it again had the same problem and given up never to use them again.

Trashing emails with attachments isn't a problem, practically all of them are probably just viruses and other nasty stuff. What is a problem is the contact page on the site doesn't mention this policy or the spam filters. IMO adding a few sentences explaining this or some sure fire method to get through the filters is a no brainier.

 

[Epicenter]

Actually, the flame wars are the high points.

Well, they got to be, since you refuse to answer simple questions like "How can it be anyone but the designers responsibility to properly research the hardware platform", thus not providing any content except for flames.

There was no real documentation of the hardware, and for the most part, there still isn't. As a serious developer you have to own a GP2X to grasp what it can and can't do fully. The extremely limited (and false) info Craig gave me to convince me and the rest of our team to develop for the machine was partial basis for my spite, as I explained to you before. It's not hard to decide if you want to dev for say, the DS or GBA because both are painstakingly documented. MagicEyes barely releases any info about the chipset they provided for use in the GP2X, because they'd rather charge money to develop half-broken software for it than give out information that would allow easy development for their products, which they wouldn't directly profit from.

At any rate, the flame wars are really the most interesting things that happen here.

 

[J201605]

Your right... A large community contest, a near fullspeed gba emulator, a docking bob, and the just released payback... *yawn*... *snore*. Dont be pissed just cause the hardware doesn't match the kind of game you wanted to make. You are right, the 2d accelerator is not advanced enough to run your game, deal with it, that doesn't make the system bad, other types of games run great.

 

[Epicenter]

In regards to your sig-- It's depressing, based on the original info I was given about the hardware, it sounded very well designed. Most of it was lies or half-truths, though. In theory a machine with a snappy 200 Mhz ARM processor, 64MB of RAM and a sizable 320x240 LCD supporting lots of colors, with a Linux OS is a very good thing. Especially when there is true 2D acceleration. But, the acceleration was BS and the design was faulty.

I'm not really upset that I can't do what I wanted to development-wise with the machine. It's disappointing that the GP2X has such wasted potential because the company that produced it had no idea what they were doing. The unprofessional, deceitful and often outright hostile behaviors of Craig/GBAX however compound the issue considerably.

annyyyyyway let's not have another one of Those Threads, I'm done.

 

[J201605]

Well i do agree with one point... I do not understand GPH at all. The system is excellent and well put together... but the GPH team can't even organize a gaming compotition. Who is the mastermind there behind the gp2x design, its so basic and perfect for my needs. Someone teach him English

 

[Epicenter]

Well i do agree with one point... I do not understand GPH at all. The system is excellent and well put together... but the GPH team can't even organize a gaming compotition. Who is the mastermind there behind the gp2x design, its so basic and perfect for my needs. Someone teach him English

There was no 'masterminding'; MagicEyes, maker of the GP2X's chipset, gave GPH a platform to test out the chip on. They duplicated the platform bit for bit on a smaller board-- that's why the specifications are largely identical to MagicEyes' platform. This gives it a degree of stability in some areas and crippling weaknesses in others, for example, many components were made for a device plugged into AC power all the time, so they take a heavy toll on battery life. There was pretty much 0 engineering done to produce the GP2X; they pretty much just wrapped a new shell around MagicEyes' design. It's too bad the parts they added (the screen, the stick, the headphone jack and EXT port, the power/headphone jack [placement], and the battery terminals were what they messed up, then...

As for who the mind behind the GP2X was-- one man from GamePark who was an intern when the GP32 came out. Not precisely a shining beacon of engineering prowess. (And yes, he is the only employee who had any involvement with the GP32's design at all.)

As for why the GP2X is 'perfect for your needs'; well, to be honest, the same software that runs on the GP2X would run fine with a simple recompile on pretty much any device with a comparable ARM processor and a 320x240 screen. That's a lot of devices. It's just that most of them have controls poorly suited to gaming (PocketPCs and PalmOne devices come readily to mind.) A few exceptions are programs like PicoDrive and Vektar that utilize the ARM940T, whose implementation is proprietary and breaks ARM reference standard (there aren't very many programs like this for the '2x, however.)

I suspect it's the sort of irrational planning that produced the GP2X that leads to the fiasco of a game competition they held, and what's plaguing their firmware release schedule and development timeframe for a breakout box (come on, it's been what, 7 months now and we get .. concept renders for the 'BoB' and fading menus?)

 

[moxie]

There was no real documentation of the hardware, and for the most part, there still isn't. As a serious developer you have to own a GP2X to grasp what it can and can't do fully.

Yes. And if you decide to develop for it, without owning a machine yourself, based on the information of a reseller of the unit...the implication of that must be that you're not a serious developer, then, because that is just plain naive. And making a design based an almost no specs, without enough leeway for the unknown hardware, is just plain bad design, as can happen if you're not a serious developer. An I right?

 

[gokalp]

... There was pretty much 0 engineering done to produce the GP2X; they pretty much just wrapped a new shell around MagicEyes' design. It's too bad the parts they added (the screen, the stick, the headphone jack and EXT port, the power/headphone jack [placement], and the battery terminals were what they messed up, then...

As an engineer, I have learned not to underestimate the enginnering in even the trivial tasks, and your comment is an insult to the people involved. Honestly I have expected more from you, mainly because you seemed the know about the difficulties in creating or developing something.

Furthermore, you just draw my attention to one particular difference between GPH software guys and you: You have both used to same hardware, experienced the same flaws yet they are the ones who did not give up and fixed the problems, which makes them better coders in my view.

Part of my job is to code programs that control individual instruments, and very frequently I encounter problematic drivers, limited or even faulty hardware. Every day we find solutions to these, sometimes in direct form (writing the drivers ourselves, or commanding the devices in the low level), others indirect (playing with the drivers until it 'accidentally' works right).

Generally, hardware at hand is either not enough for the tasks in mind, or simply has flaws that require workarounds. If this bussiness was trivial it would not be hard, everybody would have done it, and that is precisely why this is called "Engineering".

And, oh, please do not tell the excuse "it is not sufficiently documented". Clearly it was like that from the beginning, and you simply had to look in these documents in detail and should not accept coding on this platform. You are the developer, you have the requirements in mind and it is still your responsibility to check if the platform is adequate. Don't blame others.

Finally I am sorry that you feel that the chip or the device or whatever has problems, and you have suffered because of that. However, constantly bashing/blaming others for a failed development is not healthy. Note that I still respect you views; but I used to believe in and listen to what you said, now I feel that you are just looking for a scapegoat...

Disclaimer: I am in no way a fanboy to gp2x, I am well aware of its abilities and drawbacks [just like any other device]; and I chose it knowing both sides. Thus I experience problems with it from time to time, but I feel that it is improving with the efforts of GPH and especially the efforts of the community.

 

[gaterooze]

annyyyyyway let's not have another one of Those Threads, I'm done.

 

[nickspoon]

annyyyyyway let's not have another one of Those Threads, I'm done.

Oohhhh no you don't. What were this lies that he gave you? Everything you've listed so far is true. OK, the build quality is rubbish. The efficiency is rubbish. The control system - rubbish. However, it does house 2 ARM cores, clocked at 200MHz, sharp 320x240 LCD, Linux and a community. Frankly, for homebrew, is there a better console out there? I doubt it - at least not yet.

 

[Epicenter]

What were this lies that he gave you? Everything you've listed so far is true. OK, the build quality is rubbish. The efficiency is rubbish.

I hate going over this again and again
- When we discussed the specs with him, he described a 2D accelerator unit. What is really present is just a simple blitter. It can do very little besides draw to the screen and provides no real acceleration where it counts (e.g. transferring large amounts of sprites and graphical data between multiple SDL surfaces, manipulating graphics via scaling/rotation, accelerating solid-color screen filling and other operations.)
- The original plan was for a game based on Quake, not an original engine. He stated there were active developers dedicated to the project of porting Quake. (There weren't. Just Woogal, and he was just porting it for fun. The implication was, this 'Quake team' worked for Craig.)
- Info all over gp2x.co.uk (it's still there) suggests Quake as a basis for 3D development on the GP2X.
- Craig told me in PM the game would run at '20-30 fps' when the 'optimization' was done. It runs at ~15 FPS with a 305 MHz overclock. And most units don't overclock as far as mine did, so this is pretty irrelevant.
- He also related a design for an extravagant VooDoo-style SLI-similar implementation of the engine. This would render every other line of the display on a different processor for a theoretical 2x framerate increase. No such project was in progress, and we never heard a word of it again. He clearly knew it was fantasy.
- Craig was extremely difficult to reach. He never replied to a PM, ever. We had to hunt him down on IRC to talk, and he was never positive again after that original PM. Due to his negative attitude we took the high road and pitched a few more ideas, including a 2D shooter we were designing. He said he'd like to see it once we began development.
- We showed him what we were working on, and he basically spat in our faces. Said it wasn't 3D, and 3D is all anyone wanted to play. He said, who wants to play a 2D commercial game when you have emulators already? (...) He said Odonata was a great 3D game, so who would really want to buy ours? (This was BS, the game is 2D, and he later said it was horseshit he had no interest in selling, right here on GP32X.)
- I spoke with him regarding a potential design for a new system from GPH when GP2X sales trail off. He said Christmas sales would be the deciding factor in if GPH would make a new machine to replace the GP2X as interest declined. He pitched an impossible design based on fantasy hardware (e.g. a 600 Mhz ARM9, which doesn't exist.) I proposed a perfectly sensible design based on Samsung's S3C2460 SoC. Craig spewed a lot of ignorant nonsense about how no one would ever use its 2D or 3D acceleration, and a fast CPU is all that mattered (it's in fact, what cripples the GP2X worst, next to the stick.)

He suggested I make a poll on GP32X to ask which design would be preferable. He then stated I had revealed confidential information (which he entrusted to me .. why?) which he had never told me NOT to release. Then he lied to the forum by saying GPH was not planning any new system.

He also lied to EvilDragon, which I learned after speaking with ED directly. He told ED that he has never approached us about producing any sort of commercial game. That's not what this PM from 'craigix' of this very forum shows.

Hi there,

Craig here, from gp2x.co.uk,

I'd be really interested in working with you on a commercial game using the quake engine or the yeti engine.

Once the optimisation is finished quake should be up in the 20-30fps region on high detail @ 320*240.

What do you think?

You can email me if you like craig@cdworld.co.uk or answer on here

Thanks,

Craig

HMMMM.

Frankly, for homebrew, is there a better console out there? I doubt it - at least not yet.

The GP32 is a better console. But it isn't as powerful. The Gizmondo is more powerful but worse hardware. The situation sucks, and I wait in breathless anticipation for the day a company tops the GP2X. (It shouldn't be difficult.)

 

[mcr]

I ordered 3 GP2x's (One for me and the others for my two kids for xmas) and the units arrived as advertised. My wife emailed them once with a question about memory card compatibility and they replied within 24hours. The units all had 'faulty' USB connection cables, but apparently this is a known issue and we have the cables here anyhow.

It would be better for the company if they mention the cables are crap and offer replacements for sale rather than have people sodding around with 'unknown device' USB problems for hours. If not a warning about the cable would have been nice, even if its only in email format. This fault isnt really the fault of gp2x.co.uk, but they are technically competent and understand their product so I cannot believe they are not aware of the issue. I tried all three cables with my unit from the other GP2x's delivered (no luck), but used my spare USB cable and it worked flawlessly.

I think you have to remember this is a niche product, so resellers don't have a huge untapped market of eager buyers like the DS or the PSP. I bought it in spite of the issues with the build quality of the units themselves (many people moaning about thumb pad issues) and so far I am really happy. There's not many devices where you can play the spectrum version of starquake on the move!

Forums are a good place to seek help in solving problems, in fact googling for it can solve the problem (like I did with the Unknown USB issue) so that should always be the 1st port of call for tech support rather than a small reseller.

As for the reseller, a test of their honesty and competence is the question 'Would you buy from them again?' and I have to say, for me, the answer is yes.