Тяжелая судьба XGP сподвигла трех энтузиастов, а именно Крейга Ротвелла (aka CraigIX), Майкла Вестона (aka MWeston) и Майкла Мрозека (aka EvilDragon), к созданию духовной преемницы GP2X, занявшего специфическую нишу портативной игровой open-source платформы, под именем Pandora. Разумеется, также как и у предшественника собственных игр помимо homebrew не будет. Предполагаемое использование, во-первых, как олдгейминговой мультиплатформы через софтварную эмуляцию, возможно, вплоть до Nintendo 64, т.е. все 5-ое поколение включительно. Охват эмулируемых платформ, разумеется, затрагивает не только консоли (все удобства - d-pad, аналоговые слайдеры, лицевые кнопки и шифты - имеются), но также ПК (для чего предусмотрена клавиатура и тачскрин) и игровые автоматы. Во-вторых, как КПК\лаптоп, коммуникатор или медиа-плеер для работы, развлечения и общения. И все это удовольствие помещается в карман, ибо по размерам один в один - NDS "толстушка". Цена предполагет быть в районе $320 (~8000 руб), выйдет в марте-апреле сего года, т.е. уже очень скоро.
Конечно, на сей момент все эти прелести - вилами на воде, но выглядит многообещающе. Очень хочется, чтобы малыш выжил в суровых джунглях рынка и окреп со временем замечательным софтом.
Тактико-технические данные:Dimensions: 140 x 83 x 27 mm (slightly larger than a DS Lite: vs 133 mm × 73.9 mm × 21.5 mm).
Core:
- Texas Instrument's OMAP3430 System-on-chip.
- PowerVR SGX GPU (OpenGL ES 2.0, several million polygons per second).
- 128MB of DDR SDRAM.
- Real Time Clock (RTC) built in, to keep track of time.
- 256MB of internal flash memory.
Display: 800x480 widescreen (5:3), 4.3 inches, touchscreen LCD.
Brightness: 300 cd/m2, Contrast ratio:450:1, Response time:tr+tf=30ms.
Dimensions: 93.6 x 56.2 mm (4.3 inches, 5:3 aspect ratio).
- TV-out included in hardware, A/V-OUT Port outputs S-Video and Composite and inputs 3,5mm Headphone/Microphone cables.
- Separate TV-out signals, picture-in-picture capabilities.
- Powerful 2D and 3D hardware acceleration, see above.
Input: Buttons, keyboard, microphone, and touchscreen.
- Directional pad will be a D-pad - not a pseudo-analog GP2X-style device.
- Two real analog nubs, will have click function. Will have a rubber grip.
- QWERTY keyboard.
- Built-In Microphone.
Connectivity: 802.11g (Wi-fi) included. USB host included. USB-on-the-go (one-port host and client) maybe.
- The USB will be fully powered (500 milliamps). You'll be able to use anything that has drivers.
- RS-232 will be included, but a level converter will be needed for the UART.
Software: Open2X-type Linux firmware.
- One-click install system - Debian ARM packages probably accepted.
- Misc. Hardware.
- Lithium-ion battery. Standard for easy replacement.
- Can charge through AC adapter or USB.
- Twin SDHC slots.
- Potentiometer based wheel or slider for volume control.
- Case will be a bit smaller the GP2X, and will be a mix of metal and plastic.
- Real-time clock.
Other info:
- Release date: March/April 2008 (predicted).
- Price: 199 GBP(incl. VAT) (approx. $320 (excl. VAT), 286 euros (incl. VAT).
- Some developers will be getting PCBs in a short time.
Some capabilities:
- Will be capable of running X11 with a window manager and desktop environment, and probably will by default.
- This includes the ability to run normal programs you can run on Modern Linux builds as well, provided it does not exceed 128MB of RAM (excluding any virtual memory for performance reasons) and is ported. This includes a full build of Firefox! Firefox 3.0 uses much less memory and resources, and should run fine on the Pandora.
- Macromedia Flash is possible on the Pandora with web browsers with some work. Maybe not full Flash support though, but http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/ can be ported to the Pandora and run up to FlashV7 guaranteed, play Youtube videos (mplayer and VLC can play FLV files just fine, play other movie files from Firefox, and VLC can stream FLV easily) and can work with Firefox or as a standalone program.
- Advanced multimedia support, including streaming: mplayer, VLC, xine and any other program that is open source is possible. For a general idea of file support for VLC see http://www.videolan.org/vlc/features.html, and for xine see http://xinehq.de/index.php/features.
- Full-speed PlayStation 1 emulation will be a given.
- Will probably be unbrickable.
- Might even have N64 emulation with some hard work.
- The system may be about as powerful (in the CPU category) as a GameCube when pushed to the limits.
- 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.
Полезные ссылки:Официальный сайт:
http://openpandora.org/ (пока пустой).
Википедия:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandora_(console).
ТТХ консоли:
http://pandora.bluwiki.org/.
GP2X-сообщество о консоли:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/20/gp2x-community-system-dubbed-pandora/.
Linux-сообщество о консоли:
http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS7004794073.html.
