X86 Windows 7 Gaming Handheld Anounced.

[Fishbong]

Do note that this is being done by another Korean company. So far, only OP and Korea companies have been releasing mobile devices that have some sort of gaming controls but are poised to be more general purpose and higher end than Chinese PMPs.

.... also only Korean companies have tried pushing handhelds with two d-pads.

You forgot the Tapwave. And what's wrong with calling the Pandora the "most powerful gaming handheld"? I think it still is, although i hope i get mine before that changes.

 

[Exophase]

You forgot the Tapwave.

"Have been" means at least semi-recently, Zodiac is old.

And what's wrong with calling the Pandora the "most powerful gaming handheld"? I think it still is, although i hope i get mine before that changes.

I just asked if they'll take it down once this is out. Do you think there's really any question that this will be a more powerful gaming handheld? Are people still going to dispute that this is for gaming?

 

[Fishbong]

Ah, i misunderstood that second thing, i thought you mean right now. No, i'm not going to dispute this is a gaming handheld. Might be a gaming handheld with poor battery life and crap controls, but it wouldn't be the first.

Anyway, i wonder who builds such a thing? How do they think they will sell a handheld that will have less battery life than most laptops? Do they just assume that they will find enough people that are ignorant of the power issue and willing to buy it for probably >800$ without reading a single review first and then just put up with the <2 hours of off-grid uptime?

It really is mindboggling. I expect they'll come to their senses though.

 

[Javacat]

The battery life hasn't been announced, it's just guesswork from Exophase. The fact that it's got a big battery which Engadget weren't allowed to take pix of makes me think that they have thought about battery life and come up with something a bit.. bulky/ugly.

I've just been looking at the pix again on Engadget and have realised that their other handhelds are also shown on there. The OCS7 looks very interesting. It also appears as though the OCS5 is running Android.

Their OMOS controls look interesting and well thought out, so I wouldn't write them off as crap just yet. I did some quick searching and found a few videos of their OMOS system at work:

• This one is some guy playing American Army single handed using the O-Bar - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSBTwlgKEN0
• This one is of the OCS7 running Starcraft - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE0o87CYVpw
• This one is a loooong video about hte OCS7 thing and may be of hte most interest to people here. It shows them playing a ton of different types of games and other stuff using the OMOS thing - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3lDo8ePUPM

 

[second exodous]

I don't know, it looks uncomfortable, and since it has two d-pads and no buttons I doubt games are the first priority for this thing. Also, and I know I'll be called out on this, but do you trust windows to run on a device like this? I don't think you could get a chip that windows 7 will run on well in a device this size, especially when you consider you need virus and spy-ware protection running in the back ground.

 

[Fishbong]

The battery life hasn't been announced, it's just guesswork from Exophase. The fact that it's got a big battery which Engadget weren't allowed to take pix of makes me think that they have thought about battery life and come up with something a bit.. bulky/ugly.

Actually, they claim they'll get the battery to endure 10 hours of gaming on a full charge. Having seen some videos of it, the back looks like it is holding a really big battery, but still it is hard to believe it will be enough for more than 5 hours on full load. I couldn't find any exact figures about the Oak Trail's power consumption, but it is speculated to be around 2,75W. That's pretty impressive, so i retract my earlier assumption of a battery life below 2 hours. They'll probably be able to beat most current netbooks in terms of battery life.
Still i find the claim that it runs Starcrft 2 rather misleading. In two videos i have seen it running the game's prerendered intro, and even though it is a small screen you clearly see it is stuttering. So i don't want to know how well the actual game runs.

 

[aesir911]

so what do you think the actual gaming possibilities is with this device? can it even run age of empires?

 

[Exophase]

Actually, they claim they'll get the battery to endure 10 hours of gaming on a full charge. Having seen some videos of it, the back looks like it is holding a really big battery, but still it is hard to believe it will be enough for more than 5 hours on full load. I couldn't find any exact figures about the Oak Trail's power consumption, but it is speculated to be around 2,75W. That's pretty impressive, so i retract my earlier assumption of a battery life below 2 hours. They'll probably be able to beat most current netbooks in terms of battery life.
Still i find the claim that it runs Starcrft 2 rather misleading. In two videos i have seen it running the game's prerendered intro, and even though it is a small screen you clearly see it is stuttering. So i don't want to know how well the actual game runs.

They may be "aiming for 10 hours", but I doubt that's "10 hours of gaming." Most games aren't framelocked and are going to be either CPU bound (1.5GHz) or GPU bound (400MHz, IIRC), and neither are going to be light on the battery. umpcportal outright says 15 Wh and they've used one, so I'm guessing they know that for a fact. I'm actually surprised it's this high (about the same as Pandora's), because it looks too thin to fit that sort of battery. I guess looks are deceiving when the device is proportionately larger than the usual unit. I was expecting something more like 8Wh.

So I'll take my initial 2 hour estimation and double it to 4 hours under full load, which would be 3.75W, which is actually pretty generous if the core chip (mainly CPU + GPU) uses anywhere near 3W. I don't think they'll beat most current netbooks in battery life because despite using a large battery for a handheld it's still less than 1/4th the capacity of what you typically see in typical 10" netbooks.

 

[Fishbong]

so what do you think the actual gaming possibilities is with this device? can it even run age of empires?

Well it uses an intel GMA600, so It should play games like Quake 4, WoW, Serious Sam 2, Morrowind etc just fine. Remember it has quite a low resolution (compared to normal PCs) so that helps too.

 

[Exophase]

Well it uses an intel GMA600, so It should play games like Quake 4, WoW, Serious Sam 2, Morrowind etc just fine. Remember it has quite a low resolution (compared to normal PCs) so that helps too.

Huum, I wouldn't be entirely positive for a couple of them:

Quake 4 requirements:
Pentium 4 2.0 GHz or G4 1.67 GHz CPU, OpenGL compatible 64 MB video card, Radeon 9700 or GeForce 3

Serious Sam 2:
1.5 GHz Athlon or Pentium M or 2 GHz Pentium 4 CPU, 3D graphics card, DirectX 8.0 and OpenGL

CPU is actually looking unhopeful, I fully expect an Atom to be clock for clock behind even a P4. SGX 535 at 400MHz is another question, I don't really know where that stacks when compared to PC video cards, maybe could beat a GF3 at half the clock.

 

[dnlgreenwood]

(covers eyes in horror)  

DO NOT WANT!!!!!!!

No, really, I don't want it. Windows 7??? WHY WINDOWS 7??? XP runs faster on my laptop (Intel Atom CPU, 1GB RAM) than 7... I can't really play any games on 7. and why is the resolution the same as my laptop?

 

[equlizer]

Throw XP on it then

 

[EvilDragon]

Well... to be honest, I have no ideas what I would want to do with that thing.
And no, I don't say this because I'm part of the Pandora crew, there are other devices that interest me... but this one?

Okay...

• Awful looking controls. The double-dpad is not gonna work - believe me. I also thought it couldn't be that bad when they announced it for the WIZ - then I tried playing Super Mario World. Jumping while running is simply not possible with a double DPad.
• Keyboard: Looks like those of any random mobile phone... never found it really usable unless for typing SMS, URLs or tweets.
• Windows 7: For what? For modern games? I doubt the CPU / GPU is fast enough for modern games.. so XP would've been better here.

So basically, for console style games, the controls are bad.
For touchscreen games, I could get a tablet PC which would make more sense.
For office work, the keyboard is not usable.

So... erm... yeah, I have no idea really why I would want this...

 

[SoleGrave]

It just looks so . . . . . . . ugly. This prototype needs some severe revisions.

 

[Exophase]

It just looks so . . . . . . . ugly. This prototype needs some severe revisions.

Really? I think it looks pretty good. Better than Pandora at least. Good thing looks don't really matter.

 

[EvilDragon]

Looks are always in the eye of the beholder anyways.
I like the look of the Pandora more than this one, too, however, I also prefer the look of an NDS lite over any iPhone, too.
I like things that look unique, not just like another one of the typical nowadays shiny gadgets.
But as said, that's always a personal preference

I don't think it's ugly, it just looks like a generic nowadays smartphone.
One thing could be weird though: If it's closed, you can't determine where up and down is, right?

 

[sebt3]

One thing could be weird though: If it's closed, you can't determine where up and down is, right?

The web cam eyes and the logo at the bottom of the screen help to know... but still

 

[Fishbong]

Looks are always in the eye of the beholder anyways.
I like the look of the Pandora more than this one, too, however, I also prefer the look of an NDS lite over any iPhone, too.
I like things that look unique, not just like another one of the typical nowadays shiny gadgets.
But as said, that's always a personal preference

I don't think it's ugly, it just looks like a generic nowadays smartphone.
One thing could be weird though: If it's closed, you can't determine where up and down is, right?

Hey ED, i just wondered what Phone do you use? A Freerunner?

 

[aesir911]

For touchscreen games, I could get a tablet PC which would make more sense.

what do you think about the exopc that is coming out? it looks amazing, do you think it will live up to the hype?

 

[GroteBlup]

So, did anyone notice that extreme big notebook cooler underneath the OCS-1? And the fact that the powersupply *and* the usb needs to be attached for a tech demo?

Other than that: the OCS-5 looks like a nice remote control for the tv.