Hum, lots of new questions/suggestions, I'll give it a shot..
MacX said:
Just another opinion from a forum lurker:
- Scrape everything that's not necessity: Wifi/BT (use usb dongle if people want it), motion control, extra usb ports...
- Keep it as portable/pocket-able as possible.
- Go for speed instead of outer functions (see first point)
- Working software, people not knowledgeable about open development only care for working software.
- Don't make a pandora without a keyboard and extra stuff added.
- in other words keep it simple enough...
If they want to make a handheld for a large group of people (and sell a lot) they need to do a lot of work/research about the people they want to target and what they want to accomplice in the end IMHO...
If they want to make a handheld for around 10,000 people, then keep it as it is, I'll probably buy one...
- Wifi is important (although it's also important that the thing works decently, Pandora's module has been problematic), the situation with requiring an addon like for Caanoo is problematic, even if you standardize it. I would figure that a vast majority of users will want to use this with wifi, and dongles are awkward and use more power.
- A triaxial accelerometer is fairly cheap, and it helps for making this more Android compatible, which is too big software-wise to completely ignore the possibility of.
- USB host and OTG both serve useful separate purposes and aren't really something you want to consolidate. The SoC has PHYs for both, so it's not a big parts cost to have both. For something you can plug into a TV, the ability to add standard USB components (keyboard, mice, joysticks, harddrives) is very nice. While OTG would be useful for charging and USB device sort of stuff. The reason they want a USB port in the battery compartment is to add 3G dongles; otherwise a dongle would stick out awkwardly. The other reason is that this allows the host port to use micro or mini instead of full sized USB - if you're attaching dongles you want a full USB-B, but if you're attaching something that goes to a cable using an adapter isn't a big deal.
- As I said in the first post, the emphasis is on ergonomics/presentation over raw size. With everyone else emphasizing size it's nice to have something with a little more room for comfort, and I for one vastly appreciate this and figure there's at least some market for it.
- There's no possible tradeoff for speed involved, this is a function of part availability.
- I'm sure they'll do their best with software, given a limited team of course. One benefit of using the i.MX53 is that there is fairly mature Linux software support for it already, and it should benefit somewhat from software efforts on Pandora as well.
- The "no keyboard" part already makes things a lot simpler mechanically. Although, they would like to design it to accommodate an add-on keyboard like the one available for XBox 360 controllers.
- This isn't intended to sell to millions, 10-20k is probably a reasonable figure, although I wouldn't really know for sure. I don't think that something like this has that broad appeal.
awoma said:
Another lurker reply.
- Agreed with the last poster about scraping certain bells and whistles that people don't need. Only one USB port is necessary. Motion controls, if cheap, are nice for homebrew, but wouldn't actually be used for any emulators, so aren't really required. One thing that products these days like adding are microphones and cameras. Nobody uses those, so don't bother. Only point I disagree with is wifi. Wifi should be built in. Everything has wifi.
- Agreed with pocket-able as possible, but it doesn't have to be as thin as modern handhelds are. The 3DS is 2cm thick. My old gameboy is 50% thicker at 3cm, and is perfectly pocketable. I don't know if giving yourself extra room in the device would help with development, but don't sacrifice device capability for the sake of it being smaller.
- Prioritise CPU and RAM. Things like display and audio are totally fine on the devices that are already out (we're only emulating display and sounds from 15+ years ago) but all seem to be dragged back by less-than-impressive specs in these areas.
- That price point is very cheap. For someone in the UK like me, that's half the price of a Pandora, or an upcoming PSVita. This is a good thing, but don't be too strict with yourselves over the price. If $200 is possible, but if the design you really want would need a price of $240, then feel free to bump it up.
- Stay focussed on the aim for the console. A lot of consoles have things like radio or ebook reader. I don't know about other people, but I wouldn't in my life consider reading a whole book off a handheld console.
- I disagree that nobody uses cameras and they're pretty cheap, and they want one for this ;p (I didn't know at the time so didn't list it); I'd probably use it occasionally.. As said, motion is nice for the prospect of Android, but they wouldn't want to spend a bunch for gyros. A microphone would be good if anyone attempted DS emulation.. not saying that such a thing is at all feasible on this platform, but it'd be annoying if somehow it were and those gimmicky games didn't support it (it's another pretty cheap feature since the codecs all have it, but I don't know how much the part itself costs)
- Thickness probably only really gives you more battery. I agree it doesn't have to be as thin as handhelds and phones have gotten, but I think it should be thinner than Pandora (which it will be automatically by virtue of not being a clamshell) Length may be around PSP/PSVita level.
- CPU is restrained by the SoC, and RAM.. honestly I don't think 1GB over 512MB gives you a lot for something emulator-centric, and it can be very expensive (like +$20 or more).. so I completely disagree that emulators are being held back by not enough RAM. While we're emulating 15+ year old devices, it's also stuff that was meant to run on CRTs, and are hurt by LCDs with poor response for instance. Pandora's isn't too bad but it's not really what I'd call great and would prefer something better, although you pay for this in power consumption.
- $200 is an aggressive and maybe overly optimistic goal and if it has to go higher it'll go higher. The more expensive first batch will help determine appropriate pricing.
- Without a lot of people doing software for this first party the focus will be spread out to whatever outside devs want to do, really.
Com64 said:
I kind of like the Genesis-style shape.
Do you know how the shoulder buttons would function? It would be nice if they function like Wii Classic Controller or GameCube controller shoulder buttons, so they function as an analog button and a digital button; two buttons at once. That way I guess you could have larger, more comfortable shoulder buttons. However, I doubt everyone likes these kinds of triggers.
I'd say it would be best to keep the built-in wifi. You don't have to have something hanging off the bottom of it that way.
I think one USB port should be enough, but more than one would be nice... I guess that way you could use a mouse and a keyboard at once, or a keyboard/mouse wireless combo and a usb stick or something.
Ubuntu! That's a surprise. Would it be able to run Ubuntu 11.04 and Unity? I hope so. I think it's well-suited for handheld devices.
About internal MicroSD storage... just to be clear, does that describe a card slot hidden behind a battery, or a built-in card that comes with the console? Could it be swapped with a larger-capacity card, like a high-capacity card, for example?
Would an IR port be too much to ask for? I know it's kind of out-dated technology, but still... in theory, I could control TVs, control my sound system, send files to or network with my Palm, and control various home-made electronic doodads that may or may not be equipped with ground transportation equipment and may or may not be programmed to fetch snacks. :lol: Now that I think about it, it could probably be used with those old IR Genesis controllers. However, an IR port would probably add to the expenses, and it would benefit few.
All the buttons would probably be digital. It doesn't seem like pressure sensitive buttons get a lot of usage, especially for emulating older things. Bear in mind, we're still talking about one normally accessible USB host with one OTG, like on the Pandora. So you'd want to put the host stuff on a hub. The other USB would be behind the battery cover. Micro-SD is behind the battery cover and comes with the console, and could be swapped out for larger/faster - note that this is in addition to an external SD port (the micro-SD one is the one you'd boot from). Capacity limits would be whatever you can get for SDHC for both. IRDA seems pretty niche, and would require some amount of space on the edge for it, that's probably pushing the limits of having extras.
Nova said:
I just got my BA in Product Design, so I might have a little tinker with the aesthetics if thats ok? Maybe come up with a render or two.
Yes, please join the IRC channel
