Pandora

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The Pandora open-source game system.

Pandora will be an extremely powerful handheld gaming system. It is scheduled to be released in Spring of 2008. Feel free to edit this page to add info disclosed by CraigIX, EvilDragon, MWeston, or another reliable source. Most will probably come from the community forum.

Specifications

WarmFluffyUK's unnofficial render with size comparison.

Pandora's LCD as compared to a PSP.

These are constantly changing. Hopefully, this page will be updated with them. When adding information please remember to correctly reference the new information to a reliable source.

• General
  • The name: Pandora [1]
  • Dimensions: 140 x 83 x 27 mm (slightly larger than a DS Lite: vs 133 mm × 73.9 mm × 21.5 mm)
  • Price: 199 GBP(incl. VAT) (approx. $320 (excl. VAT), 212 € (excl. VAT)
  • Release date: March/April 2008 (can and will be changed if needed)
  • Case will be a bit smaller the GP2X, and will be a mix of metal and plastic. [2]

• Core Hardware:
  • Texas Instrument's OMAP3430 System-on-chip. [3] [4] Specifications can be found at this link: [5]
    • The system may be about as powerful (in the CPU category) as a GameCube when pushed to the limits. [6]
  • PowerVR SGX GPU (OpenGL ES 2.0, several million polygons per second). OpenGL ES demonstrated: [7]
  • 128MB of DDR SDRAM.
  • Real Time Clock (RTC) built in, to keep track of time. [8]
  • 256MB of internal flash memory.
  • Will probably be unbrickable.

• Display: 800x480 widescreen (5:3), 4.3 inches, touchscreen LCD.[9]
  • Brightness:300 cd/m2, Contrast ratio:450:1, Response time:tr+tf=30ms[10]
  • 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. [11]
  • Powerful 2D and 3D hardware acceleration, see above. [12]

• Input:
  • Buttons, keyboard, microphone, and touchscreen. [13]
  • Directional pad will be a D-pad - not a pseudo-analog GP2X-style device. [14]
  • Two real analog nubs, will have click function. Will have a rubber grip. A video of the analog nub to be used in Pandora's construction.
  • QWERTY keyboard. [15]
  • Built-In Microphone [16]
  • Potentiometer based wheel or slider for volume control. [17]

• Connectivity:
  • 802.11g (Wi-fi) included. USB host included. USB-on-the-go (one-port host and client) maybe. [18]
  • The USB will be fully powered (500 milliamps). You'll be able to use anything that has drivers. [19]
  • RS-232 will be included, but a level converter will be needed for the UART. [20]
  • Twin SDHC slots.

• Software:
  • Open2X-type Linux firmware. [21]
  • One-click install system - Debian ARM packages probably accepted. [22]
  • Potential Emulation: (can anyone who knows add more to this partial list?)
    • Full-speed PlayStation 1 emulation will be a given.
    • Might even have N64 emulation with some hard work.
  • Possible Software:
    • Will be capable of running X11 with a window manager and desktop environment, and probably will by default.
    • There should be 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.

• Power:
  • Lithium-ion battery. Standard for easy replacement. [23]
  • Can charge through AC adapter or USB. [24]
  • 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.[25]

Sources for some of the specifications are not mentioned. Help in this area is appreciated!

Frequently Asked Questions

The Pandora FAQ can be found here.

Events

• Some developers will be getting PCBs before release for development. [26]
• February 26th 2008: "We will be in Dallas, Texas, USA, at the TIDC with (we hope/maybe) the first prototype of the Pandora Handheld." [27]
• March/April 2008: Pandora's targeted release date (can and will be changed if needed)

Image Gallery

The following images are outdated, but kept here for archival purposes. I think.

Pandora will not have these, please don't ask

• Internal Bluetooth.
• Emulation of 6th and 7th generation consoles
• Dvorak (as default layout)
• Slide-out keyboard
• "Tablet" mode (in which the screen turns 180 degrees or similar)
• VGA, DVI, or any other output besides what's been listed. (There are adapters that can be bought, however, to provide most capabilities.)

External Links

Pandora forum - Come here for the latest news.
Official Site
Pandora article in the Wikipedia.
Engadget article.
LinuxDevices article.
The system that the Pandora is the spiritual succesor to.

Mockup Video #1 comparing size to a GP2X.
Mockup Video #2 comparing size to a GP2X.
Mockup Video #3 comparing size to a GP2X.

Credit

This wiki page was set up (and is being maintained) by atomicthumbs, using the bluwiki MediaWiki hosting service. Kudos to everybody who works on this, and to all the people involved with Pandora.