Next Generation Pandora

[craigix]

You will see laptops which use the OMAP4, if they take off you will also see Windows7 for ARM I guess.

I'm sure Ubuntu will run pretty damned well too.

 

[christo930]

Sigh, this is like the thousandth topic of this exact nature, does anyone else think this is getting kind of old? Unfortunately for you it'd also never happen, because craigix doesn't want to build an Atom handheld.

I doubt that it'd achieve 5 hour battery life because my netbook doesn't achieve that (despite advertisement to the contrary), and it has a significantly higher capacity battery than what'll be in the Pandora. Wanting it for emulators of all things is pretty silly.

Do you really think x86 has such an advantage when it comes to emulators? I think there are probably more ARM optimized cores. Sure, x86 has better N64 right now, but are you sure it'll be that way forever? If you were thinking of running something like PCSX2 or even a Dreamcast emulator then you're probably entirely out of luck. Optimization has fallen to the wayside in x86 emulators and current releases haven't exactly been done with Atoms in mind.

I also don't think the compatibility with DOS is guaranteed to be great. There are certain things that DOS requires that machines have had problems with for years now, like not having certain regions of the first MB of address space taken up by various peripherals. Without this it can be impossible to use things like emm386. Also, good luck getting sound blaster compatible audio, that's extremely unlikely. And gamepad support. So for a good amount of things (and sound, in general) you'd be stuck with is DOSBox again, which in time the ARM could at least be competitive with the x86 version. Sounds like a pretty lousy win for something that cuts the battery life at least in half.

I was joking about the next gen Pandora (as I said in the other post that got brought into this one), but was just speaking of what I think would be an awesome machine. I have been able to run straight dos on my old 2.66P4 complete with sb support (of course, it was a real sb). While many dos games do require emm386.exe (to move drivers into the UMA) to be in the config.sys file, most of them don't need expanded memory, just extended(LIM EMS was rarely used). And there is always running dos games under windows 98 if need be. As for emulators, I was talking about older ones not N64 or PSX. But alas, it's just a pipe dream.

 

[neko]

Look at netbooks and current UMPCs for battery life, they are already using the Atom.

I figured the hard disk and 10" screens were sucking up a lot of that juice. It would probably need a great deal of custom stuff which would run the price through the roof. I guess we will have to make the best use of what we have. On that note, I wish someone would write a dosbox like package that was really optimized for speed, especially on arm hardware. I'd love to have at least decent 286 level performance on my gp2x.

Look harder, there are UMPCs with Flash disks and smaller screens.

With a flash drive and 9" screen, my atom netbook lasts about 3 hours with a 24WHr battery. The pandora battery is about 14.5WHr, and that's a really large battery for a handheld, it takes up nearly half the case.

 

[Blue Ion]

Déjà vu?

Anyways, in that thread I mentioned the UMID M1 as the closest alternative you'll ever get (so far) to the pandora with equal size. However, in there I also mentioned that alternative because of the size and the huge catalogue of programs and games fully available instantly, not as a more powerful alternative and with bigger battery. The reviewers claimed they could get 5 hours with normal use but efficient use, time that will probably get to 3 or 2 if you stress the poor thing.
In fact, check the gaming test the koreans made for the device. Specifically, check how Quake 3 struggles to move at a mere 20 fps (or less) with a spiced up sgx in comparison to the pandora using a quick port.

I was joking about the next gen Pandora (as I said in the other post that got brought into this one), but was just speaking of what I think would be an awesome machine. I have been able to run straight dos on my old 2.66P4 complete with sb support (of course, it was a real sb). While many dos games do require emm386.exe (to move drivers into the UMA) to be in the config.sys file, most of them don't need expanded memory, just extended(LIM EMS was rarely used). And there is always running dos games under windows 98 if need be. As for emulators, I was talking about older ones not N64 or PSX. But alas, it's just a pipe dream.

Dosemu can do a very good job at getting dos to run with full performance thanks to its virtualization, (unlike dosbox).

 

[femngi]

you will also see Windows7 for ARM I guess.

You mean Windows CE?
Though why in God's name you'd want to run Windows on ARM is beyond me.

 

[ldesnogu]

No, he meant Windows7.

See this for instance: http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/263488/windows-to-run-on-arm-processors-by-2013

 

[Exophase]

I was joking about the next gen Pandora (as I said in the other post that got brought into this one), but was just speaking of what I think would be an awesome machine. I have been able to run straight dos on my old 2.66P4 complete with sb support (of course, it was a real sb).

Naturally any machine made today (or in the last nearly 10 years...) isn't going to be using a soundblaster compatible audio chip. I'm surprised you even found a PCI one, but nevertheless.

While many dos games do require emm386.exe (to move drivers into the UMA) to be in the config.sys file, most of them don't need expanded memory, just extended(LIM EMS was rarely used). And there is always running dos games under windows 98 if need be. As for emulators, I was talking about older ones not N64 or PSX. But alas, it's just a pipe dream.

I don't really know what you're getting at here, emm386 isn't used to load things in the high 384KB of the virtual mode address space, it's for EMS which is definitely used at least as much as XMS was because starting with 386 CPUs it could be done using the MMU. emm386 relies on having a 64KB window in upper memory space which is impossible if there are devices mapping I/O at those spaces. It'll outright fail. I know because I used to maintain a piece of software (MegaZeux) that for a long time was 16bit DOS only and I got to watch fewer and fewer people be capable of using it because of problems like this.

Why do you care about x86 emulators older than N64 and PS1? This doesn't make any sense to me - do you think that they're faster than their ARM counterparts? The only major case I can see where this would still hold is ZSNES, but current ARM SoCs shouldn't have a problem with SNES emulation.

dosemu is only an option if you're willing to use Linux, which defeats all the gaming you'd want to do in Windows.. and of course it's not a perfect solution. So should people really have Windows AND Linux on this?

 

[Kramy]

With such a small screen and good design, I would think it could easily reach 5 hours battery time

No. The most power efficient Atom + Chipset combos still consume about 8x what the OMAP 3530 does. Also keep in mind that ARM vs x86 emulation of DOS won't make a huge difference in performance, because to get decent battery life, your Atom CPU won't be running full speed.

If you want proof, look at an energy efficient atom notebook. The EEE PC 1000HE, which easily gets 7-8 hours battery life, has a battery many times the capacity of the Pandora. Not only is the MaH higher, but also the voltage, which gives it something ludicrous like 7x the capacity. That's also why the thing is as heavy as a brick.

To get "At least 5 hours battery life" out of an Atom Handheld, that sucker is going to have to weigh more than an old Gameboy + power brick! And if you're going for a handheld that heavy, why not just put the same massive battery on the Pandora for 50 hours battery life?

And there is always running dos games under windows 98 if need be.

There is a 0% chance of getting something like Windows 98 running on the Pandora, or a Pandora-like device. There is a far greater chance that some miraculous developers will come from nowhere and release a cut-down 100% assembly 1MB OS for gaming. (perhaps with DOS compatibility, perhaps not)

 

[darkblu]

wait, are people still wishing for a x86 in a sub-netbook?

haven't you, people, noticed that there isn't a single popular such device, despite the abundance of the tech involved?

this is because the more portable a device is, the more it matters what its power efficiency is. while people are willing to use their laptop running off from the mains, that usage pattern decreases with going down the miniaturisation scale. in this regard, a pocketable device that lasts a couple of hours is flat out useless.

so, again, why would you want one?

 

[WizardStan]

so, again, why would you want one?

Because they're near sighted, thinking only about what they can play now, not what they will be able to do later. A surprising number of people don't understand "sacrifice a little now for a big payoff later".
I should probably use something more like "invest" rather than sacrifice, because it is a gamble on technology that, if no one else gambles on, will fail miserably. I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

 

[Trip]

I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

Same here.
It even looks like most netbooks/laptops will be using two processors in the future; an Arm CPU for fast booting, saving battery and general use + an X86 compatible CPU for when more power is needed

 

[lulzfish]

I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

Same here.
It even looks like most netbooks/laptops will be using two processors in the future; an Arm CPU for fast booting, saving battery and general use + an X86 compatible CPU for when more power is needed

Hmm, that way we can make bigger laptops, good thinking.

 

[john4p]

wait, are people still wishing for a x86 in a sub-netbook?

haven't you, people, noticed that there isn't a single popular such device, despite the abundance of the tech involved?

this is because the more portable a device is, the more it matters what its power efficiency is. while people are willing to use their laptop running off from the mains, that usage pattern decreases with going down the miniaturisation scale. in this regard, a pocketable device that lasts a couple of hours is flat out useless.

so, again, why would you want one?

What do you think of this "xpPhone" coming this fall: http://www.slashgear.com/itg-xpphone-wvga-touchscreen-qwerty-3g-2945295/

 

[Exophase]

What do you think of this "xpPhone" coming this fall: http://www.slashgear...rty-3g-2945295/

Unspecified AMD mobile processor.. I think that leaves one of three possibilities:

- AMD Geode class similar to what's in the OLPC, which is super slow for x86 (a lot slower than OMAP3530 anyway)
- Turion like what's in laptops, that suck up tons of battery so the thing will last 20 minutes
- I'm way out of touch with what mobile CPUs AMD has available.

 

[darkblu]

What do you think of this "xpPhone" coming this fall: http://www.slashgear.com/itg-xpphone-wvga-touchscreen-qwerty-3g-2945295/

sounds interesting, but the info is too scarce, and the power characterstics given sound more like optimistic estimates.
also, its cpu is clearly a geode (there are no other AMD cpu's that could fit the bill), and depending whether that's the GX or the LX geode (NX is out of the device's league), the device would be somewhere in the ARM11's, maybe cortex A8's performance ballpark. unfortunately, all geodes are produced at rather old litography nodes (130-150nm, as per AMD's product page) and thus are not particularly competitive with the 65nm OMAP3 watt-wise.

 

[Trip]

I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

Same here.
It even looks like most netbooks/laptops will be using two processors in the future; an Arm CPU for fast booting, saving battery and general use + an X86 compatible CPU for when more power is needed

Hmm, that way we can make bigger laptops, good thinking.

:blink:
As laptop hardware gets increasingly smaller due to improvements in fabricating the circuit boards, solid state drives get big enough to replace the old fashioned hard drives and file encryption improves negating the need for such large means of storage; they still need the laptops to be big enough for the screen and CD/DVD/Blueray drive otherwise they loose the whole point of a laptop and people might as well just buy a Netbook.

I think you'll find that they will have plenty of room to spare inside anyway. I don't see the problem.

 

[craigix]

People still use DVD/Bluray? Pretty retro stuff h34r:

 

[Enverex]

I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

Same here.
It even looks like most netbooks/laptops will be using two processors in the future; an Arm CPU for fast booting, saving battery and general use + an X86 compatible CPU for when more power is needed

Hmm, that way we can make bigger laptops, good thinking.

:blink:
As laptop hardware gets increasingly smaller due to improvements in fabricating the circuit boards, solid state drives get big enough to replace the old fashioned hard drives and file encryption improves negating the need for such large means of storage; they still need the laptops to be big enough for the screen and CD/DVD/Blueray drive otherwise they loose the whole point of a laptop and people might as well just buy a Netbook.

I think you'll find that they will have plenty of room to spare inside anyway. I don't see the problem.

That makes -no- sense. How on earth do you expect the laptop to use two processors as the main CPU when they are completely different architectures?

 

[Trip]

I've put my chips into the ARM ring.

Same here.
It even looks like most netbooks/laptops will be using two processors in the future; an Arm CPU for fast booting, saving battery and general use + an X86 compatible CPU for when more power is needed

Hmm, that way we can make bigger laptops, good thinking.

:blink:
As laptop hardware gets increasingly smaller due to improvements in fabricating the circuit boards, solid state drives get big enough to replace the old fashioned hard drives and file encryption improves negating the need for such large means of storage; they still need the laptops to be big enough for the screen and CD/DVD/Blueray drive otherwise they loose the whole point of a laptop and people might as well just buy a Netbook.

I think you'll find that they will have plenty of room to spare inside anyway. I don't see the problem.

That makes -no- sense. How on earth do you expect the laptop to use two processors as the main CPU when they are completely different architectures?

I never said that they would be used together??
You can boot the laptop into using the ARM CPU and if you need more power for a task you can restart to use the X86 CPU.

 

[WizardStan]

That makes -no- sense. How on earth do you expect the laptop to use two processors as the main CPU when they are completely different architectures?

The PS2 used the PS1 processor as one of it's subsystem processors. That's how it achieved backwards compatibility, by simply starting up the second processor as a primary when it was needed.
Most modern graphics cards have their own processors on the board which have absolutely nothing in common with the x86, just waiting for a program to be fed to them. Desktops don't have any problems with these "dual" setups.
The NDS has both an ARM7 and an ARM9 based CPU which, while very close, are not the same architecture, and both CPUs operate mostly independently within the system.
Bringing closer to home, the Pandora has a primary processor, but it also carries a DSP, which is a processor in its own right and yet another different architecture.

So there's no reason that two CPUs of differing architecture can't exist within the same system, with one acting as primary and the other just waiting to be turned on and given a task.