Pandora Needs To Go X86 (eventually)

[jakewastaken]

Anyway, Im not arguing that the current breed of x86 chips and chipsets are able to take on ARM. I am saying, the battle has just begun and it should be painfully clear who is going to be the winner here.

Who gives a SHIT about winning? Were going to develop our own software to meet our own needs. We get it, the Pandora wasnt perfectly tailored for YOU. Nobody cares. Anyone who actually enjoys playing video games or using a UMPC will tell you they will take longer battery life over the ability to run windows applications for one hour.


The Pandora isnt about winning some imaginary race, it is about meeting the demands of a community that has been drooling over it for years. Maybe it doesnt meet your needs - tough. It meets most of ours.

 

[lulzfish]

"Being able to view youtube clips is a necessary prerequisite for any device claiming to be a laptop or netbook substitute."

I don't care what they're claiming.

The Pandora will replace my $100 PDA and my $100+ media player, while doing both jobs much better [Plays more video formats, has more storage, has wireless, easier to transfer files]

Even just buying it as a PDA, it's a superior product.
And you want to use an archaic standard and sacrific battery life just to watch YouTube? Just so you can continue to support a closed standard that's ruining the Internet and preventing devices like the Pandora from becoming popular?

Edit: at the whole "Apple is blah blah platforms"

Yeah I probably Did Not Do the Research there. My point was that.. Windows and Mac OS are both lame, and Linux runs fine on ARM, so why do I want x86?
It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, please disregard it.

More edit: It would be really cool to have an ARM-based laptop someday. Like a giant Pandora with a full-sized keyboard.

 

[mdefender]

Ok, so to clarify:

EVENTUALLY Pandora needs to go x86. Eventually means "not right now", because the embedded x86 blitz is just beginning. I am saying, if you have been paying attention, if you have struggled HARD and tweaked for weeks on end with Linux compatible ARM devices (e.g. Zaurus) like I have, you will understand just how big a deal x86 is when it comes to development and usability.

From my understanding, the current problem isn't with the CPUs so much as the accompanying chipsets. I will wager that within two years we will see x86 devices with over 50% of the battery life of ARM, easy.

 

[EdCa22]

Ok, so to clarify:

EVENTUALLY Pandora needs to go x86. Eventually means "not right now", because the embedded x86 blitz is just beginning. I am saying, if you have been paying attention, if you have struggled HARD and tweaked for weeks on end with Linux compatible ARM devices (e.g. Zaurus) like I have, you will understand just how big a deal x86 is when it comes to development and usability.

From my understanding, the current problem isn't with the CPUs so much as the accompanying chipsets. I will wager that within two years we will see x86 devices with over 50% of the battery life of ARM, easy.

Maybe. It's really a moot point right now though isn't it? We can't actually do anything with designs that don't exist.

 

[lulzfish]

" if you have struggled HARD and tweaked for weeks on end with Linux compatible ARM devices (e.g. Zaurus) like I have, you will understand just how big a deal x86 is when it comes to development and usability."

Well, I've never really developed for an ARM device, but I don't think the community is going to wait for technology to catch up just so we can have compatibility.

The ARM-based Pandora will go on regular wireless networks, work with regular SD cards, and edit and play regular files just fine.

By the time YouTube and x86 has come to this point, I'd still rather be years ahead in performance without YouTube.

 

[mdefender]

Anyway, Im not arguing that the current breed of x86 chips and chipsets are able to take on ARM. I am saying, the battle has just begun and it should be painfully clear who is going to be the winner here.

Who gives a SHIT about winning? Were going to develop our own software to meet our own needs. We get it, the Pandora wasnt perfectly tailored for YOU. Nobody cares. Anyone who actually enjoys playing video games or using a UMPC will tell you they will take longer battery life over the ability to run windows applications for one hour.


The Pandora isnt about winning some imaginary race, it is about meeting the demands of a community that has been drooling over it for years. Maybe it doesnt meet your needs - tough. It meets most of ours.


Popularity counts when it comes to building an open source community. My ARM-using Zaurus wasn't terribly easy to work with, so it never became popular, so it's goddamn hard to do anything with it.

Popularity counts. If it didn't, the BSD gurus wouldn't be whining about Linux all the time.

Oh yeah, and an extra battery cost me $15. Car charger, about the same. Plenty of new and exciting eletricity storage stuff coming our way, too. I'm favoring supercapacitors myself, though consumer stupidity (electrocution) might prevent that from ever happening on such a small scale.

And once again, I am talking about being aware of the changes that are happening, preparing for the future. Pandora 2.0. If anyone were to advocate a switch to the Atom right now, I would be against it.

 

[EdCa22]

" if you have struggled HARD and tweaked for weeks on end with Linux compatible ARM devices (e.g. Zaurus) like I have, you will understand just how big a deal x86 is when it comes to development and usability."

I have been working on the openpsion project for the last 7 or 8 years, porting linux to devices that have a 27MHz ARM7 processor and just 16MB of RAM (and no hardware documentation). And these are devices whose native operating system can run a word processor, spreadsheet, emails, web, play mp3s and play doom, and still be far more responsive than any windows (and most linuxs actually) I've ever used. The damn things don't even have floating point! In general, software isn't optimal, and this is something that will probably never change. When the power is available on x86, it is used without thinking, there is no need to optimise. No one wants to write in assembler (although menuetOS is cool). It's annoying but true. Flash is one of the best examples of this I can think of.

Pandora has the power to do everything you could want, including run flash, if the software ever becomes available (come on Adobe)!

Bring on Haiku!

 

[VRAndy]

QUOTE
Pandora Needs To Go X86 (eventually)

No, thanks.

 

[darkblu]

Bring on Haiku!

amen.

 

[mdefender]

So ok, now that the knee-jerk responses have died down slightly, some parting thoughts:

Some of you seem happy with the Pandora being a PDA that does games. That's fine I guess, but I am hoping for more. We've had neat internet-capable Linux PDAs at the ~$300 price point for almost three years now. We've had linux-based PDA gaming (GP2X) for... I dunno, how long has it been?

I was under the impression that Pandora's vision was a little broader.

I hate flash and I hate Windows, but the fact is usable computer (netbook/laptop/desktop) replacements must be able to deal with these things. If some dumbass friend of mine posts a youtube video of their vacation, I want to be able to watch it. If my employer insists on using a crappy ActiveX site, I need to be able to use it (with Wine, of course. Not XP.)

And yes, though I've been an avid consoler since 1987, I really do think many of the greatest games of all time are Windows games, circa 1994-2002.

Again, for the nth time, embedded x86 isn't ready. But it is very close to being ready, and I am desperately hoping that ARM-loving idealists (keep in mind, I used to be one of them) don't steer Pandora 2.0 down the wrong road.

 

[Alpha2]

so basically your argument is based on a completly theoretical future timeline in which this phantom technology suddenly springs ahead of one that has a better history of timely advancments in a size comparable to the current version of the Pandora design?

When that bit mysterious science fiction becomes reality then it might be worth concidering. Until it beleongs in the same category as flying cars and personal jetpacks.

 

[Exophase]

Ok, so to clarify:

EVENTUALLY Pandora needs to go x86. Eventually means "not right now", because the embedded x86 blitz is just beginning. I am saying, if you have been paying attention, if you have struggled HARD and tweaked for weeks on end with Linux compatible ARM devices (e.g. Zaurus) like I have, you will understand just how big a deal x86 is when it comes to development and usability.

From my understanding, the current problem isn't with the CPUs so much as the accompanying chipsets. I will wager that within two years we will see x86 devices with over 50% of the battery life of ARM, easy.

You keep arguing that x86 is the future, but your only arguments are rooted in the past. Compatability and a bad experience with a dated device that has left you jaded.

Give one good reason why Linux should perform better on x86 than ARM. Linux keeps getting more multi-platform friendly, not less, and ARM is probably the most used after x86 (but it supports far more than that). Ubuntu is fully geared up for ARM now. Then there's Angstrom.

The only sensible argument you've offered in favor of x86 devices is compatibility. I've given several reasons why this problem will only be reduced in time and you've ignored them all. You're off on Flash too - what makes you think that Flash for Linux won't continue to move forward? There are other ARM Linux devices that are boasting flash, it isn't all Symbian (which is probably a bigger dead end) or Windows Mobile (which is pretty much dead in the water now, especially since Intel flushed XScale down the toilet). Proprietary operating systems have too little to offer ARM handhelds to make them worth the cost per unit, so no one wants them now except the first parties selling the devices. And MS isn't even selling handhelds (except Zune but we all know how hopeless that is)

By the way, your arguments about your needs for using WINE are a joke, that automatically makes you non-mainstream. Contrary to popular misconception, the mainstream audience doesn't really care to have Windows proper on their portables. See iPhone vs any UMPC (not counting devices like Eee that win on being cheap laptops).

 

[lulzfish]

They got 4000 people to pre-order before the first prototype was even built.

I'd say the Pandora is popular.

 

[Qwertyuiop]

...There's no easy way to get a legal copy of XP...

Oh really?

CODE
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116511

 

[jakewastaken]

If better technology exists in the future of course the next version of the Pandora will use whatever is best and affordable and practical.


For right now, absolutely nothing you are saying is of any consequence.


Your point is the next gen x86 might be cool and should be considered. Please consider this point noted.

If its as awesome as you say it is, Im sure it will be considered.

Future models of Pandora dont NEED to go x86 (eventually). Pandora 2.0 needs to use whatever makes the most sense.


This will probably not be X86, no matter what you seem to keep telling yourself.

 

[darkblu]

I hate flash and I hate Windows, but the fact is usable computer (netbook/laptop/desktop) replacements must be able to deal with these things. If some dumbass friend of mine posts a youtube video of their vacation, I want to be able to watch it. If my employer insists on using a crappy ActiveX site, I need to be able to use it (with Wine, of course. Not XP.)

of all technologies on earth, you decide to use activeX for your argument? christ on a bike! activeX for web is dead. has been dead for some time now. do you have any more outdated arguments (yes, we are already well familiar with your zaurus experience).

QUOTE
Again, for the nth time, embedded x86 is not ready. But it is very close to being ready, and I am desperately hoping that ARM-loving idealists (keep in mind, I used to be one of them) do not steer Pandora 2.0 down the wrong road.

intrawebz. serious business.

 

[sold]

So you like an hour and a half of battery life? Because even if you put an Atom in something the size of a Pandora, that''''s probably what you''''d get, max. Then you''''d have a much more difficult to design board because you need a lot of extra chips in an x86 (e.g. GPU) so you need more layers on the PCB as well so the whole thing will be even more expensive and take longer to design and test, and it may even be impossible to make it that small. Then you''''ve got heat issues. I''''ll place money that a machine as small as the pandora but with an x86 will get hot, and your hands will get sweaty. Or worse, burn.

Most of the size of the pandora seems to be the battery And as x86 mobile platforms get smaller and more efficient, there would be less radiant heat and all necessary extra chips would be incorporated into the soc design. I believe this is already being done and the products will only get smaller, faster and more efficient as time goes by.

Anyway, why argue about the hardware of the future? If software developers and publishers release source code for all their entire back catalogues, that would eliminate the backwards compatibility/legacy pc argument and let the hardware speak for itself.

 

[lulzfish]

"and publishers release source code for all their entire back catalogues,"

It confuses me that more people don't do this.

 

[Swiss_Cheeseman]

It's possible to use Youtube without flash with a relatively easy to make Firefox plugin, or by using that open source flash alternative (It's incomplete but I remember reading it was compatible with Youtube's applets).

 

[Sphinxter]

Arm will crush them or choke their rivers with their dead.
CODE

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10165230-64.html