Some more of my ideas

[Null]

Yes, I plan to reuse the same battery.

Are we to expect a reduction in battery life, or similar to the current Pandora?

My guess (for what it's worth) is that there'll be a reduction in battery life because of the larger screen and more powerful hardware. How much it will be though is anyone's guess.

 

[WizardStan]

But there's also been improvements in battery chemistry and CPU efficiency to balance it out.

Running at the same clock speed (1Ghz) I would suspect we'd get better battery life than we're getting now. If the CPU is a quad core 1.X Ghz little beast then it'll probably be less, as you say, when more heavily taxed.

The takeaway from this is that if using the exact same battery it should be able to do the same things the Pandora can already do for at least the same length of time on a single charge.

 

[Null]

^ B)

 

[Binky]

What Stan said.

For them as like oversimplified examples:

Say, in one second a Pandora can do x calculations using y units of energy from the battery.

The Pyra will be able to do 5x calculations using 3y units of energy OR x calculations using 0.6y units of energy

 

[sepulep]

First off you were already previously trying to do android on the pandora. So the SOC shouldn't be hard to figure out.

I'd personally do the new pandaboard based system. aka the new omap 4460(if I remember right) SOC. It's essentially an upgraded omap3 that youhave in the 1ghz units atm. The instruction set is obviously a bit newer etc, but the power management are already in your kernel, and they have dev boards for them so new developers could quickly/easily get those to do the testing of their programs.

So basically you get angstrom linux(like you have already), plus a newer version of android supported on the SOC. Plus you've already got people used to how the powervr GPUs work. The clock speed increase isn't obviously anything insane. Only ~500mhz more per core, but there's a larger I/D l1 cache, more registers, and a much larger l2 cache. Plus it's got the DSP(again which I know isn't currently being used). And it has an onboard processor to decode video.

Next up about the full-size sd cards. Yes absolutely, but internally I'd move towards a micro-sd card instead of nand-flash on the new pandora. Because that'll let you salvage more units and thus be able to replace the thing more easily if the nand flash dies in the sd card vs if it was on the POP. As far as the ram goes, I'd go no lower than 1GB since that's obviously the only sane thing with it since it's a mini computer and more ram is _always_ better. As far as the screen? I think the current one looks to be perfectly fine if you do go bigger then no more than 1280x720 and even then is a useless cost. Capacitive is fine, but you may want to try to get multi-touch capacitive if it's going to do real android on it.

I haven't held one but I've seen them compared to the DSes and a tiny bit bigger is fine.

Anyway yeah, omap4460 is where I'd go for the SOC replace internal NAND with a class 10 uSD card. Any size will do, and that's because a) there's dev boards already out there for them. ( they already have angstrom/android 4.2 on it.) your kernel already has the power management stuff in it for how TI does its stuff.

Edit: One last thing, the default clock is 1.2ghz but that was only for earlier units as they weren't capable of hitting 1.5ghz the later ones should be able to do so. So it's anywhere from 1.2-1.5ghz in terms of raw clock speed. It should be like the pandora reaching 850mhz up from 600mhz. These cpus are able to hit 1.5ghz each.

Why not dispense with the internal storage completely? just have it boot from sdcard..

I would prefere 720p or FHD - makes the desktop experience better (really tiring of XFCE windows bigger than the screen ), and I would like the screen to bezel ratio improved!!

 

[sepulep]

The same way people use the internal 3ds camera

No one uses that thing. People try the picture-into-Mii thing for the novelty, see it makes something that doesn't look a thing like them, and then don't use the internal camera ever again. The only game I know of that even used it was Starfox 64 for the multiplayer mode. (Now, the outer cameras on the 3DS? Still not used much, but used more than the internal one: MGS, Chibi Robo, Pokemon Dream Radar, etc.)

-God Ginrai

So, what exactly is the problem with having a self-facing camera, besides the fact that you don't think there's much use for it? Because clearly, a lot of people Do think there is use for it. Will it cost a ton more, or will it infringe on privacy, or will it mess with the design of the entire device? What exactly are the negatives of having it there?

Camera is a though one I would say - would be nice for video conferencing etc, but software is a though one here...the pandora is powerful enough to do VoIP calls, but somehow the software never cuts it..add to that the considerable cost in manufactering and design for a camera..maybe it is too risky to add...

 

[Binky]

Why not dispense with the internal storage completely? just have it boot from sdcard..

Because that would mean that one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

 

[Grench]

Yes, I plan to reuse the same battery.

I think at some point you also implied that the battery door would be going away too.  I'm trying to picture how that will work mechanically.  Would the battery slide in from one side or the other on the Pyra?

Having the thick end of the battery hold the contacts makes having it slide in from the side an interesting mechanical puzzle.  Whether the battery lays in from the bottom of the device (Pandora style) or slides in from a side, it is still going to need some form of door - which leads to a potential mechanical point of failure.

If the battery slid in from the left with the contacts facing up on the left side, a post-battery plug/cover with contacts could have a set of contacts on a thin wedge to connect the battery to the device.  Then hold the plug in with either sliding clips or screws?

Hmmm...  you probably already have this all sorted out.

 

[sepulep]

Why not dispense with the internal storage completely? just have it boot from sdcard..

Because that would mean that one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

 is that a problem??

 

[Tenka]

Why not dispense with the internal storage completely? just have it boot from sdcard..

Because that would mean that one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

 is that a problem??

That'd be a problem if there were still only two SD cards, for it would be a downgrade.  But otherwise I don't think that's any more of a problem than desktops experience, you can always yank out your system drive while it's on, if you really wanted to.

 

[Mycohl]

one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

is that a problem??

That'd be a problem if there were still only two SD cards, for it would be a downgrade. But otherwise I don't think that's any more of a problem than desktops experience, you can always yank out your system drive while it's on, if you really wanted to.

This is why I am in favor of an internal MicroSD slot (maybe next to the SIM slot if it has one), rather than eMMC on a BGA. User-replaceable. You want to run three different distros, for whatever reason? You can keep each on a MicroSD, and still have both full SD slots available for apps and media. Also, worries about limited write cycles on non-replaceable internal storage would be a thing of the past.

 

[Grench]

one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

is that a problem??

That'd be a problem if there were still only two SD cards, for it would be a downgrade. But otherwise I don't think that's any more of a problem than desktops experience, you can always yank out your system drive while it's on, if you really wanted to.

This is why I am in favor of an internal MicroSD slot (maybe next to the SIM slot if it has one), rather than eMMC on a BGA. User-replaceable. You want to run three different distros, for whatever reason? You can keep each on a MicroSD, and still have both full SD slots available for apps and media. Also, worries about limited write cycles on non-replaceable internal storage would be a thing of the past.

There was some talk in another thread about having the eMMC on a small daughter-board all it's own so that it can be upgraded.  I'm not sure if this idea went anywhere.

 

[Mycohl]

There was some talk in another thread about having the eMMC on a small daughter-board all it's own so that it can be upgraded.  I'm not sure if this idea went anywhere.

Even if that were to be implemented (which I doubt ED would consider due to the design costs for such a custom daughter board), it still would be incredibly difficult for end-users to replace. A MicroSD slot would be significantly easier to design in, and then the unit could ship with as small a stock card as would be feasible for the default distro, potentially saving some money. ED could also then sell MicroSD upgrades as well as full SD, for additional revenue. End-users could leave the stock card in place (probably the most likely use case) or replace it with whatever capacity running whatever distro they choose, and could also swap them fairly easily without opening the case proper or sending the unit in.

 

[sepulep]

Why not dispense with the internal storage completely? just have it boot from sdcard..

Because that would mean that one of the SD cards couldn't be removed while the device was on.

 is that a problem??

That'd be a problem if there were still only two SD cards, for it would be a downgrade.  But otherwise I don't think that's any more of a problem than desktops experience, you can always yank out your system drive while it's on, if you really wanted to.

would be interesting to know in any case how many people are using flash and how many people put the FW on an SD...

 

[Granitehead]

I dislike non-replaceable internal storage too. I would like an internal micro sd card. If possible it could also be alongside the two full size sd cards, on the outside.

 

[hdonk]

There was some talk in another thread about having the eMMC on a small daughter-board all it's own so that it can be upgraded.  I'm not sure if this idea went anywhere.

Even if that were to be implemented (which I doubt ED would consider due to the design costs for such a custom daughter board), it still would be incredibly difficult for end-users to replace. A MicroSD slot would be significantly easier to design in, and then the unit could ship with as small a stock card as would be feasible for the default distro, potentially saving some money. ED could also then sell MicroSD upgrades as well as full SD, for additional revenue. End-users could leave the stock card in place (probably the most likely use case) or replace it with whatever capacity running whatever distro they choose, and could also swap them fairly easily without opening the case proper or sending the unit in.

Have a look at the ODroid XU, it has a replaceable eMMC module. The only thing needed are a couple of holes for a cable tie - otherwise from past experience cards like these fall off during customer shipping, or dropping 8)

 

[ShleeDragon]

Yes, I plan to reuse the same battery.

Why? has battery tech really not improved in any way?

 

[WizardStan]

Why? has battery tech really not improved in any way?

Such as what? Better processes can make the same battery denser to hold more energy, but other than that there hasn't been a paradigm shift that would require changing the design of a battery. Super capacitors and graphene are basically stalled in the commercial sector for reasons I don't understand. Maybe in a few years there might be something new to start looking at, but for right now and the forseeable future lithium polymer is all we got.

 

[EvilDragon]

Yes, I plan to reuse the same battery.

Why? has battery tech really not improved in any way?

No, Lithium is maxed out. We need to wait for new technologies which are not available yet.

The only way to improve the size right now is by improving the size.

Using the same battery has multiple advantages:

1. Pandora users can be sure they can get new batteries in the future.

2. Owners of both the Pyra and the Pandora can use the same batteries on both systems.

3. We know the battery manufacturer is good and reliable, and we won't have any additional setup-costs.

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

Maybe a stupid question, but can the current battery be increased to 10,000mAh without increasing the physical size?