Unofficial Openpandora Community Blog

[Butterman]

So, you can see other peoples comments?

I made a comment, that I could see until I cleared my cache, now I can't see it anymore.

"There might be a connectivity issue between you and Defensio. Your comments will automatically processed within the next 10 minutes"

That MAY have been there since I can remember, but I'm not sure.

 

[Prometheus]

Yeah, I can. For what it's worth, I've noticed that happen on other blogs - it usually means (at least in those cases - I don't know how you guys are set up here :lol: ) that the comment is awaiting moderation, but you can see it yourself until/unless you clear your cache. At least, that's what I've seen on SOSFakeFlash on occasion.

Give me a moment and I'll clear mine and see what happens on my end.

EDIT: Cleared. Can't see mine now.

 

[Butterman]

Yeah, I think the problem is that the comments are stuck in the Defensio queue. I have next to no access on the admin site, we're gonna have to wait for Gruso.

 

[atomicthumbs]

Defensio is down, apparently - disabling defensio spam protection for a while

also hashcash does cause problems so I'm disabling it and using just Cookies for Comments

(splogs are a problem)

 

[Butterman]

Defensio is down, apparently - disabling defensio spam protection for a while

also hashcash does cause problems so I'm disabling it and using just Cookies for Comments

(splogs are a problem)

Good man.

 

[mali]

Maybe not for the blog, but important info.

We have placed the same order for the same chips. The 720 chips are *TWICE* the price. It is exactly the same chip it just *might* have been tested, but who knows what the test even is or how many they are testing? The lead time on the 720 is also about 6 months.

We will just stick to the 600mhz ones. It's not like they are not amazingly fast anyway. We will do some overclocking experiments on them though to see if there is any difference.

Pandora booting Android
http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51707-pandora-booting-android/

 

[atomicthumbs]

blog is down currently. attempting to SSH in to read error logs results in "fork: resource unavailable" when trying ls. problem is on webhost side and will be fixed soon, hopefully.

 

[mali]

(about the manual)

[...]It will only be a quickstart guide, mainly explaining the hardware and special buttons, a quick run-down on how to download and play games and some dev infos.
The major guide should be in the internet - as I'm pretty sure that a lot of stuff will be enhanced and changed once a few devs get their hands on it
It will be a very dynamic device

Don't worry, once done (I'll do it in Scribus), I'll release the source so that anyone can translate it and put it online

(minor info from ED's twitter)

Just found out that notaz did fix a few weird issues that lead to crashing and DPad issues since the latest xserver updates. Cool

Just tried a video comparison of F200 / WIZ / PSP /Pandora LCD... as thought, not much can be seen, but will upload it anyways.

Video:
http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51731-new-vid-from-ed/

(Hammer of Thyrion)

This is basically hexen2. Ive had the SDL software render version working for a while, but I just was able to get the opengl render to work using nanoGL and EGL.
Ive also added my raw quake control code, so nubs are also working.

 

[(naw)mcx]

EvilDragon1717 Fatih and his friend are constantly phoning up the chinese company to make them work faster. Not easy dealing with chinese companies...

Source
http://twitter.com/EvilDragon1717


Maybe not news worth, but shows there is some life.

 

[(naw)mcx]

EvilDragon1717 Fresh news from Fatihs chinese speaking friend. He phoned with the company.

EvilDragon1717

he wanted me to explain you that you will thank him when you see the case he had to make a lot of working on current mould. and tested a lot

EvilDragon1717

"now they are 100% sure, it's perfect. he will send the samples tomorrow morning." It's night in China already. Let's hope...

 

[mali]

A translation from the German boards
http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51736-it-is-now-time/page__view__findpost__p__806574
#2 http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51736-it-is-now-time/page__view__findpost__p__806582
#3 http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51736-it-is-now-time/page__view__findpost__p__806591
#4 http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/51736-it-is-now-time/page__view__findpost__p__806609

I had to drive to shittingham yesterday, managed to avoid the black on black gang violence by being white, then drove back, didn't get in until late.

Just sat down at my desk, put on some calming music (Paul Hardcastle) and checked my emails, then I checked the forums, and see this thread FFFUUUU....

But anyhow, I the team does not check the forum 24/7 (but we get close no doubt). The cases are finished. They said they think we are going to be really impressed when we see them.

I personally think we just demanded a higher standard of work that they are used to and they had to really put some hours in to match the output of a western factory.

Anyhow, they are ready to roll once we evaluate these, and they are ready to run off the cases before the new year which is good news.

 

[Vlynndar]

Looks like I'm on LinuxHotels CeBit stage to tell the folks about OpenSource Handhelds (gp2x, WIZ, Pandora). Questions welcome

From ED's Twitter.

Might be interesting.

 

[gruso]

Thanks for all the tips & stuff guys. I had to fill up half a blog entry with credits this time.

 

[mali]

Notaz fixed some software issues and now Pandora runs from mains alone without battery being needed

Why Doesn't someone just PM Notaz? His new pics showed the Pandora next to a PSP, maybe he can just yank the battery and plug in his PSP adapter and then we can have a definite answer as to if the battery has to be there or not!? I'm really surprised that this late in the game there are still not definite answers to something like this.
I remember reading that if the battery was unable to charge that was OK, but it had to be there for the AC to function. So in less than a minute Notaz could solve the issue once and for all. I would ask him myslef but my internet access is temporarily out and I can only catch a nearby access point for a few moments at a time. Here's hoping THIS goes through to the router on the next block!

Look, it's a question about Notaz's Pandora.

Oh wow, I thought this thread was sabotaged and derailed ages ago.

Yes it works fine without a battery with my PSP adepter. For a long time it would just reset whenever higher load came up (turning on the backlight), but after combination of software and hardware tweaks it works.

Clarification: No user MOD is required for it to work

Yeah it was tweaked a revision or 2 back. Or maybe it was a revert of some older "bad" tweak, don't know the details, in either case the current ones have it right.

Further clarification

Working with no battery is pretty new. Every board since rev1 was capable of it based on a connection being populated or not with a specific part. Recently, the final decision on which part to populate was made based on the performance of the battery charger. There was a software fix to re-enable a bit that the TI boot ROM had turned off before it exited. This was messing stuff up with the adapter input path and caused the board to reboot in an infinite cycle once the board current got above a couple hundred milliamps, sometimes less and sometimes more. Since the fix, I've only seen one board not work without the battery and it had other issues which may have been related.

The no-battery mode is still being considered experimental until thousands of customers all say it works, but it certainly doesn't damage anything to use it in this way and requires no internal modifications. Also, the 1A restriction on no-battery mode is a hardware limitation designed in by TI and not something that can be changed. I have played games, operated the WiFi and done all the normal stuff on adapter only and it worked fine. The current never peaked above about 720mA so it was under the 1A limit. You just can't expect to power stuff with the host port while the battery is out.

(Boards in production)

I do my best to show my respect and admiration for Notaz's work with everything he does and whenever I get to make a new Youtube video. Perhaps it isn't enough. I just don't want to sound like a giant brown noser.

It's worth saying again that Notaz's work on the kernel is clearly the reason the device is as advanced as it is today. Sure the hardware may have come along fine with minimal testing as the assembler learned how to solder the boards better but Notaz has helped me develop a comprehensive suite of test software that has helped the assembler perfect their process. So good in fact that they have started building a batch of 1000 this week after tweaking their pilot runs.

[...]Final test cases should ship tonight then hopefully at least 1000 more on Feb.13. Boards are being assembled by the hundreds each day and we're going to just keep going until all 4000 are ready and tested with no break. The wait is finally coming to an end. The trolls will have to move on to batch #2 I guess.

(Firmware status)

It's no wonder the last firmware images did crash, as there are some half-implemented things in there.
An older image (from before christmas) runs stable but had some issues like slow working WiFi, a hacked up touchscreen driver, etc.
DJWillis even was online with xchat for a few days with that image.

Now we're using XInput for touchscreen driver which is working way better. This needed a new X version (AFAIK) and not all things have been fixed yet.
SDL crashing is one of the last serious issues at the moment. PND Discovery does work, XFCE4 works nicely, SDL did work at some point and I'm sure it'll be fixed up[...]

The f* cases are shipping!

EvilDragon1717 We got a tracking number! It's not yet in the UPS system (always takes some time, even longer in China). Good news, I'll keep you updated!

 

[Qwertyuiop]

ED Twitter update-

We got a tracking number! It's not yet in the UPS system (always takes some time, even longer in China). Good news, I'll keep you updated!

edit: Ninja'd

 

[kuru]

Hallelujah.

 

[Unfathomable Depths]

Someone give Mali permissions to edit the blog while Gruso is in bed

 

[mali]

Someone give Mali permissions to edit the blog while Gruso is in bed

Thanks for your credit But I repeat what I said a year ago

Thanks for the offer, but I'm just a forums trawler and that is enough for me You have got a good team of capable community enthusiasts, already

 

[Unfathomable Depths]

Shame. You and Gruso - the dream team

 

[WhiteBat]

EvilDragon1717 We got a tracking number! It's not yet in the UPS system (always takes some time, even longer in China). Good news, I'll keep you updated!