Pandora Questions From A N00b

[quadomatic]

I'm aware that Pandora will have emulation in the bag, but I was wondering about a few other features.

First, will it be a well functioning web browser? Can I expect Firefox to work?

Second, how important will multimedia functionality be? What formats would be supported? How well will multimedia work compared to today's high-end multimedia devices?

Why is there dual SDHC card support?

What colors will Pandora come in?

How is Pandora being produced (factory or by hand)? How will it be distributed? (I'm guessing gp2x.co.uk)

Can we expect to overclock the cpu like we do on the GP2X? Will it be safe to do so?

Does anyone else think that the dpad, analog sticks, and buttons are a bit cramped at the top of the machine and will be uncomfortable? Is there any chance the placement/design will be changed?

How much will the Pandora cost in USD including VAT? I don't know what VAT is, which is why I'm asking. I'll apologize for my ignorance in advance.

Thanks, and happy holidays.

 

[Gaeryc]

http://pandora.bluwiki.com/

1.First, will it be a well functioning web browser? Can I expect Firefox to work?
-yes, it will work and will be quite fast with this

2.Second, how important will multimedia functionality be? What formats would be supported? How well will multimedia work compared to today's high-end multimedia devices?
-You can use xine or mplayer, it will support near to anything! and the high resolution screen makes the videos seem really pretty

3.Why is there dual SDHC card support?
-So that I can copy stuff to my friends without computer and I can use 2 sd cards at the same time, silly

4.Can we expect to overclock the cpu like we do on the GP2X? Will it be safe to do so?
-Advanced power management capabilities: only need to set a max clockspeed, when the CPU is not doing anything it automatically HALTs and does nothing to save a lot of power. And yes to your question, it doesn't have a "default" clockspeed if I'm right.

5.Does anyone else think that the dpad, analog sticks, and buttons are a bit cramped at the top of the machine and will be uncomfortable? Is there any chance the placement/design will be changed?
-Pandora made of paper

6.How much will the Pandora cost in USD including VAT? I don't know what VAT is, which is why I'm asking. I'll apologize for my ignorance in advance.
-Vat is a tax that they take in europe, so if you don't live in europe you don't have to pay it. It will cost approx. $320 excluding vat.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[1magus]

You know whenever a device with web browsing is released they seem to lack FLASH support and I've heard that Adobe refuses to release it's offcial dev kit to anybody but a few choice companies
Will Pandora support full flash up to the latest release?

 

[Mr B]

First, will it be a well functioning web browser? Can I expect Firefox to work?

-yes, it will work and will be quite fast with this

You know whenever a device with web browsing is released they seem to lack FLASH support and I've heard that Adobe refuses to release it's offcial dev kit to anybody but a few choice companies
Will Pandora support full flash up to the latest release?
Well, It will have web browsing capabilities, and so far it sounds like FireFox is whats going to be on it, but... It's most likely to be a slightly older version, slimmed down, and with some features, like flash, missing.

Why is there dual SDHC card support?

-So that I can copy stuff to my friends without computer and I can use 2 sd cards at the same time, silly
Actually, if you check the forum threads, it's a request being filled. There are a lot of "other" things then memorycards that works in these slots, and along with very limited onboard storage, the SD slots will be useful.

How is Pandora being produced (factory or by hand)? How will it be distributed? (I'm guessing gp2x.co.uk)
Doubt this is possible to produce by hand, not as much as for being small, and hardworked, but for warranty reasons. Less human factor, means less chance of error. It's just a guess, but building all the machines they hope to sell is going to be tiresome work aswell.

Can we expect to overclock the cpu like we do on the GP2X? Will it be safe to do so?

-Advanced power management capabilities: only need to set a max clockspeed, when the CPU is not doing anything it automatically HALTs and does nothing to save a lot of power. And yes to your question, it doesn't have a "default" clockspeed if I'm right.
Everything has a default top clockspeed, and if we will have tolls and means to pass this... Most likely. But it's never "safe" to overclock. Your always voiding warranty, and if anything goes wrong, however unlikely, your on your own.

Does anyone else think that the dpad, analog sticks, and buttons are a bit cramped at the top of the machine and will be uncomfortable? Is there any chance the placement/design will be changed?

-Pandora made of paper
Short answer, yes quite a few people, including myself, are having major concerns about the layout, and included input devices. Long answer, search the forum.

How much will the Pandora cost in USD including VAT? I don't know what VAT is, which is why I'm asking. I'll apologize for my ignorance in advance.

-Vat is a tax that they take in europe, so if you don't live in europe you don't have to pay it. It will cost approx. $320 excluding vat.
This is the first price quote I've seen at all. I ain't saying its wrong, but all I've seen so far is "not much more then the GP2X F-200"

Apparently i passed max allowed quotations, or something, coz if i added this last bit to my previews post, all the code was visible, instead of the quotation boxes.
B!

(But i could cheat it in with the fast reply? Cool feature...)

 

[Squidge]

If you have 2x32GB SD cards, that's obviously 64GB of space. How many people will still want to add an external harddrive with that amount of space available?

Also, the price would be somewhere in the region of £200 (Craigix said this a while ago in one of the first topics), which at the current exchange rate will be $400 minus vat -> ~$340 ish.

 

[atomicthumbs]

I'm aware that Pandora will have emulation in the bag, but I was wondering about a few other features.

First, will it be a well functioning web browser? Can I expect Firefox to work?

Second, how important will multimedia functionality be? What formats would be supported? How well will multimedia work compared to today's high-end multimedia devices?

Why is there dual SDHC card support?

What colors will Pandora come in?

How is Pandora being produced (factory or by hand)? How will it be distributed? (I'm guessing gp2x.co.uk)

Can we expect to overclock the cpu like we do on the GP2X? Will it be safe to do so?

Does anyone else think that the dpad, analog sticks, and buttons are a bit cramped at the top of the machine and will be uncomfortable? Is there any chance the placement/design will be changed?

How much will the Pandora cost in USD including VAT? I don't know what VAT is, which is why I'm asking. I'll apologize for my ignorance in advance.

Thanks, and happy holidays.

1. Yes, and hopefully Flock. (I sure hope we have that as our default browser, anyway.)

2. Yes!

3. Why not?

4. We'll see.

5. Injection molding, and the Internet.

6. Yes.

7. Probably, but not me.

8. $320.

9. You too!

 

[Perky_Goth]

Well, It will have web browsing capabilities, and so far it sounds like FireFox is whats going to be on it, but... It's most likely to be a slightly older version, slimmed down, and with some features, like flash, missing.

I would actually hope that opera on konqui would run on the thing, firefox is a hog and will probably run out of memory after a few open tabs. as for flash, maybe gnash will make up for it.

QUOTE

-You can use xine or mplayer, it will support near to anything! and the high resolution screen makes the videos seem really pretty


can it? without win32codecs, which won't run? it'd be nice, but it couldn't be publicized

 

[Clad]

"But it's never "safe" to overclock. Your always voiding warranty, and if anything goes wrong, however unlikely, your on your own."

Not at all. The GP2X was perfectly safe to O/C (it crashes before it get dangerous for the hardware) and Pandora will probably act the same.

As far as we know, O/C will be covered by warranty. It was on the GP2X anyway.

Regarding the VAT, that depends of your state actually, the rate isn't fixed on a national scale. In some state, there is no VAT, in other there is.

Finally, for the flash issue, very very unlikely we'll get proper flash support. However, we will have a limited flash compatibility (no youtube/dailymotion though) through the open-source flash implementation.

I haven't heard about the overclock on the go before, that seems pretty interesting. You just set the maximum clock speed your device can achieve and everything else is handled by the system. Maybe we could have a burst speed too, for high frequency that won't be stable for more than 2 or 3 seconds. Would help having a very responsive system. (like, it would enable when you click on a menu). And maybe on the first boot an utility could run and set automatically max speed and burst speed through automated trial and error.

 

[Mr B]

"But it's never "safe" to overclock. Your always voiding warranty, and if anything goes wrong, however unlikely, your on your own."

Not at all. The GP2X was perfectly safe to O/C (it crashes before it get dangerous for the hardware) and Pandora will probably act the same.

As far as we know, O/C will be covered by warranty. It was on the GP2X anyway.
I haven't ever heard of any manufacturer that says "Sure, go ahead, use our stuff out of spec, and if you manage to break it, we will still replace it." but there might be one.... More likely is that people who did overclock there stuff, and got ill side-effects if any from it, got theres replaced since they cant really tell a overclocking damage from a degraded CPU for any other reason. That doesn't make it covered by warranty, it makes it possible to get it replaced if you don't care about being honest and actually admit the fault is yours when it breaks. Of course, a statement that says just that "Overclock our stuff, and we will still honor full warranties" would be nice to see.
B!

 

[Gaeryc]

Flash is possible on firefox, I have used it on computer that had 64mb ram and 400mhz. Youtube lagged like hell on windows but with almost every linux that I tried it workt.
http://xinehq.de/index.php/features Xine worked like dream on same computer with linux and it playes lots of stuff http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/info.html is a good player but it has crashed on me almost on every mkv while using windows.
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/features.html VLC player will be another good player that should work so I think that we will be able to play every fucking video on this thing.

 

[atomicthumbs]

1. Flash for ARM is no small feat.

2. We don't get Opera, unless there's something secret going on.

3. I'd much rather have Flock than Firefox.

 

[Mr B]

Flash is possible on firefox, I have used it on computer that had 64mb ram and 400mhz. Youtube lagged like hell on windows but with almost every linux that I tried it workt.
It should work on every Linux you ever tested, but still wont work on the Panda. All the Linux systems you've been playing around with, have been x86, 32, or 64 bit systems, and will most likely continue to be so, with the exception for the Panda. It makes a HUGE difference.

http://xinehq.de/index.php/features Xine worked like dream on same computer with linux and it playes lots of stuff http://www.mplayerhq.hu/design7/info.html is a good player but it has crashed on me almost on every mkv while using windows.
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/features.html VLC player will be another good player that should work so I think that we will be able to play every fucking video on this thing.
VLC might have a good shot, if someone gets the source and recompiles it, and fixes possible code issues that wont work with the ARM type cpu's. Might. It's not just an issue of finding software that works for the OS, you also has to find a binary that works with the CPU architecture. The Panda isn't exactly a i386 compatible device.
B!

 

[Javi]

Lastest version of Gnash plays youtube videos well so flash isn't a problem (except from some random swf v9 strange games/apps).

I prefer Mplayer over other options for the embeded multimedia player, but this is only my personal taste.

 

[Karel Jansens]

QUOTE
It should work on every Linux you ever tested, but still wont work on the Panda. All the Linux systems you've been playing around with, have been x86, 32, or 64 bit systems, and will most likely continue to be so, with the exception for the Panda. It makes a HUGE difference.


The Nokia N8X0 has Flash 9 since the latest iteration of its OS. So at least it's out there.

Somewhere...

 

[Squidge]

I haven't ever heard of any manufacturer that says "Sure, go ahead, use our stuff out of spec, and if you manage to break it, we will still replace it." but there might be one.... More likely is that people who did

I think it's more like "This is the speed we guarantee the chips for. If you can get it to go faster, fair enough, but don't expect them all to run at that speed, so we advise you to stay in spec for production runs.". We have been told that at work from a few people who make arm-compatible chips.

However, it *is* possible for over clocking to cause a certain amount of damage. For example, if your over clocking causes the processor to crash or generate an incorrect value whilst writing to the sd card. This could render the sd card unusable until it's reformatted, thus losing some or all of the data on the card. If you don't want this to happen, don't over clock.

If you over volt a processor beyond spec, then you are clearly on your own.

 

[darkowl]

Sorry to post in such an old topic but I couldn't find any other topics discussing flash. I was wondering if the plugin used in the n810 which is a linux based arm (omap 2420) device would work on the pandora, it has a firefox/mozilla based browser too. Eitherway the flash plugin files are included in the following archive

Edit; I removed the files for the time being, don't wan't to get sued...

 

[mali]

Sorry to post in such an old topic but I couldn't find any other topics discussing flash. I was wondering if the plugin used in the n810 which is a linux based arm (omap 2420) device would work on the pandora, it has a firefox/mozilla based browser too. Eitherway the flash plugin files are included in the following archive

n810 flash files



Maybe yes, maybe no, there are legal concerns. Wait for Tor to do his magic, maybe he will make us happy