Pandora 2013 revision, a musing


Batou456

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I know one could argue this has been done to death, but I'm more openly musing on what the differences in potential capabilities and problems then anything else.


Processor related


OMAP5, or a equivalent, will be available in 2012 meaning a product like Pandora would likely window 2013 if it was to use it. At that point the 20/22nm node should be considered cutting edge with 28nm being the standard. The stated clock rate for OMAP5's Cortex A15 dual core is 2 GHz, which is roughly equivalent to a Cortex A9 3GHz dual core, which is in turn roughly equivalent to a early 32-bit Athlon. In A8 terms it's theoretically the equivalent of a 3.75GHz dual core.


Using factor 8 rule of thumb and assuming full parallelism we're talking the equivalent of a 750MHz processor, based off A9 equivalence, or a 938MHz processor based off A8 equivalence. This means the power jump is enough it could emulate the Pandora 1.


In terms of other systems it should allow the XBox 1 and be able to handle Dolphin for the Gamecube and Wii. The Playstation 2's custom chipset makes emulation beyond the realm of the OMAP5. If a significant programming effort is put into it a solution like XMOS processors that may help allow a clean room solution to this problem, but that's far from guaranteed.


Emulating beyond this should be constrained as much by lack of emulator maturity, size of games, and being too close to the current lines the companies and justifications about legally bypassing encryption to pull ROMs would tend to prefer.


Windows related emulation/WinE/Qemu looks like it should be in the early Pentium III era and overall at this point the CPU shouldn't be real limiting factor. Particularly as at this point we start talking games big enough generally available SD cards start looking small.


RAM & NAND


Given the Pandaboard and the rest it seems reasonable to presume TI and other SoC providers will probably provide at least 1GB of each which given this is GNU/Linux should satisfy all but the most multitasking obsessed.


Screen related


Pixel Qi claims that they have a proven ability to reduce screen power usage to 1/5 of the standard LCD technology, and offers better outdoors capability. Currently they are mass producing 10.1” screens and developing 7” screens. Hence a screen appropriate for the Pandora will not be available for a while. Once they catch on the Smart Phone manufacturers should however push for there to be an appropriate model. I can see this potentially occurring in the 2012-2013 time frame.


Devices like the Pandora's power draw is still primarily in running the screen, so this should more then offset any potential power creep associated with the processor despite at least three process iterations, improved gate technology that reduces current leakage among other things, and potentially SOI.


Controls


To handle the systems Pandora 1 cannot, some kind of accommodate needs to be made towards more then two shoulder buttons, which will tend to demand a case redesign. Potentially along the lines of a beavertail trigger under one like the current design or something like the current trigger on the bottom of the case that just happens to line up naturally with the hand in the normal holding position. Additionally it would not be unexpected for screens designed for resistive multitouch to be the standard at that point, allowing further control options for various things.


Overall such a device should in my estimation have more power then it is easy to find something to do with, and tend to be blocked from moving meaningfully further forward for a long time, provided console manufacturers don't act entirely out of character.
 
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love it


my 2 cents:


also the ability to have the resistive multitouch screen with the ability to fold flat, screen up, on the keyboard as well as hook in 1 side to allow clamshell and varying degrees.


EDIT: gram'r
 
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This topic, is like a HUGE déjà vu, is there a bug in the matrix?
tongue.gif



All this have already been talked to death.


As for now, OP team have no plan on making a Pandora 2, they're still struggling to finish the 2 batches of the Pandora.


To be honest, seeing all the negative opinions about their work, if I was in OPT shoes, I would be glad to have finished the Pandora and would never want to go through all this again.


In facts, I would have refund everybody and gone away to live in a box under a bridge because of the money loss.
 
i hope pandora2 has dual screens so we can finally emula......ahh forget it i wont even go there
 
I think he's referring to the fact that we can't charge while it's off.
Dude, we've been over this. :p


If you really, really, REALLY want, it is actually possible to have the charge chip continue to charge the battery even while the CPU is off, there's just no indication that it's happening and no intelligence to tell the chip what to do when the battery is full.

There's nothing like waking up with 65% battery charge.
Just because yours has a problem does not mean the design doesn't work. Mine works perfectly, as do many others. Did you mention the problem in the help forum? I'm really sorry if I missed it.
 
I think he's referring to the fact that we can't charge while it's off.
Dude, we've been over this. :p


If you really, really, REALLY want, it is actually possible to have the charge chip continue to charge the battery even while the CPU is off, there's just no indication that it's happening and no intelligence to tell the chip what to do when the battery is full.

There's nothing like waking up with 65% battery charge.
Just because yours has a problem does not mean the design doesn't work. Mine works perfectly, as do many others. Did you mention the problem in the help forum? I'm really sorry if I missed it.

The design is flawed. The SoC is directly connected to the battery and the charger/power supply directly to the battery. Therefore, you can't have external power connected without at least trickle charge the battery. LiPo batteries can (and it has happened) get puffy by trickle charge, so the charger chip should cut off the power as soon at the battery when the battery is full. Mine rarely does this, but Murphy makes sure it only happens the days I need a full charge. But since you can't stop charging the battery without cutting off external power copmletly.... I think you get my point. The SoC's power supply should be separate from the charging circuit. While the current design works with most other battery types, it does not with LiPo.
 
All this have already been talked to death.
Really?

Then what was the agreed upon solution to the best approach to handle the Gamecube's central shoulder clicker and/or the doubled up shoulder buttons? Some kind of shallow clicker/slider arrangement on the bottom, which will tend to require thickening the case? Going up through the sides of the stylus well in a two pronged fashion, which may allow it with minor revision work? A beaver tail, which tends to make it wider?


What other control uses could such buttons provide? What was the conclusion about viability of gesture recognition with Smart Phones and tablets tending to insure firms development costs are covered potentially making it feasible to import the required hardware?


If those aren't answered, I don't think you can call it done to death.
 
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pandora 2013 ?


don't you know that the world ends on december 21st 2012 ?


so just enjoy the present pandora ;-)
 
The design is flawed. The SoC is directly connected to the battery and the charger/power supply directly to the battery.
No it's not. The soc is connected to the TWL charge chip which redirects power from the AC or the battery as needed.

Therefore, you can't have external power connected without at least trickle charge the battery.
Yes you can. You can even have the charge chip drive in constant voltage mode (or so far everyone has been able to, but TI doesn't guarantee this feature) which allows you to remove the battery and run the Pandora off AC power completely. Do not remove or insert the battery while it is connected to the AC: that is a feature that doesn't work. Yet. Basically when you remove or insert the battery, there's a fraction of a second while the charge chip swaps from battery to AC power (or vice versa) which causes either interruption or a sudden surge of unrestrained electricity, neither of which is good. In theory it can be software controlled to avoid this, but the documentation is a little unclear on the subject.

LiPo batteries can (and it has happened) get puffy by trickle charge, so the charger chip should cut off the power as soon at the battery when the battery is full.
Which it does when working properly. The End Of Charge trigger isn't high enough for all batteries. See this thread for further explanation, and a hack which I hope to have included in hotfix 6. My Pandora is never below 93% when I wake up in the morning now. The charge chip stops the flow of electricity into the battery when it reaches end-of-charge, running off battery, letling it discharge a little, relaxing it, before turning the charge back on. As I said above, in theory the chip can be told to go into constant voltage mode and bypass the battery, but the documentation isn't entirely clear on how we're supposed to be able to do that.

Mine rarely does this, but Murphy makes sure it only happens the days I need a full charge. But since you can't stop charging the battery without cutting off external power copmletly.... I think you get my point. The SoC's power supply should be separate from the charging circuit. While the current design works with most other battery types, it does not with LiPo.
Chris_c also has his own hack which initiates a shut down when the battery is full. Combined with my hack to ensure the end of charge status is actually reached, you should have no problems. We're also working on a bunch of other features, but you'll have to wait for those. ;)
 
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i hope pandora2 has dual screens so we can finally emula......ahh forget it i wont even go there
Well you could swap the key mat for another screen, but availability of an appropriate sized screen is a legitimate concern. On one hand you gain the flexibility of being able to utilize multiple control map options, and at that point it's now basically a dual screen GNU/Linux tablet with gaming controls crammed in the middle. On the other a real keyboard, to the extent device of the size can have such a thing, has significant value of its own.

While there's something to be said for that, if done it should be done for its own sake. The resolution the DS used means without good upscaling algorithms for each screen they will not take up even a quarter of the current screen and thus you're demanding a major redesign to accommodate something which can be handled adequately with the current design. It is also a emphasis of somewhat questionable legality without some kind of cross licensing agreement due to backward compatibility bridge not being burned. To legally dump ROMs, and hence bypass copyright security measures, guidelines tend to be that there needs to be a dwindling supply of aging hardware and a legitimate concern of the material being lost as a result.


Nintendo seems currently content to have their pure handheld design, while according to Qualcomm Sony and Microsoft have certified their new line with the Adreno 3xx series GPU for natively handling Playstation [3] and XBox [360] games respectively. Naturally on Android and Windows Phone 7 operating systems respectively, which given Sony's current habit along those lines will not be open to anything that isn't a licensed authorized product by them. If those three uncharacteristically opened up and offered recompiled binaries, hardware available 2013-2015 for a Pandora revision should be able to handle any current or projected system.


Maybe AMD will actually effectively restart the division the closed down when they sold the old ATI design the Adreno 3xx series is based on, and we'll see what the master instead of the copier can do.
 
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For the same reason the current Pandora can theoretically do Dreamcast emulation, but not Saturn; it's simply too much of a clusterfuck.
 
I just hope that they'll implement a charging circuit that actually works.
It doesn't?

There's nothing like waking up with 65% battery charge.
Mine only charges when the unit is on, both through USB and the charging port. I thought it was USB but I tried the charger when it was completely dead and nothing, I had to switch it on to get it to charge. Luckily when you live a device off for a while for some reason it runs for a second longer or I would have been screwed.


Also, next revision or Pandora can we loose the worthless wifi chip in it and get one that functions correctly? I was in a motel and the connection kept dropping, I had to constantly disconnect and re-connect to get it to work. I finally got sick of doing that and switched on my DSi XL and problem solved, it has no problem with it's wifi. That and it is painfully slowwwwwwwwwwwwwww.


I think there should be a revision that fixes the wifi and power issues and have that out for a year before Pandora2 comes out.
 
Well you could swap the key mat for another screen, but availability of an appropriate sized screen is a legitimate concern. On one hand you gain the flexibility of being able to utilize multiple control map options, and at that point it's now basically a dual screen GNU/Linux tablet with gaming controls crammed in the middle. On the other a real keyboard, to the extent device of the size can have such a thing, has significant value of its own.
If the keyboard was changed to a second touch screen then I would not buy the Pandora 2.
 
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