It's been over two solid years since
we first caught wind of this here gaming handheld, and while we were initially led to believe that finalized units would be in the hands of emulation junkies long before now, we suppose loyalists are finding that late really is superior to never. After
months and months of "
almosts," the first wave of final
Pandora handhelds are shipping out, with many community followers posting up unboxing shots as they come. We're also expecting a flood of homebrewed applications to start surfacing as more of these filter out, so be sure and drop us a line if you discover and / or create something otherworldly. Plenty more shots in the links below -- you know, if you're still patiently awaiting the arrival of your own.
[Thanks, Paul]
Update: A community member pinged us to say that these units actually aren't final in terms of the cases they're in. They're only being sent out now to a few members so "development [can begin] on actual Pandora hardware." Sigh.
posted February 12th 2010 12:14AM
Can I listen to pandora on this?
@HookEmHorns
nope.
@(Unverified)
Actually, scratch that. You can run Flash and Pandora radio.
I was completely wrong.
@(Unverified)
Hopefully we can hack it to run Maemo or Moblin. It would be sweet if Maemo were the primary OS on this thing as it would speed up the app development on Maemo.
@HookEmHorns it better or I'll be pissed
@(Unverified)
Word. I just want to be able to say I'm listening to Pandora on my Pandora. haha
@HookEmHorns this look nothing like the computers used in planet Pandora...
@Eternity
You want Maemo when you can run Ubuntu and potentially Android and ChromeOS?
@JeremyBenthem
Android= Java, Ubuntu= bloated full Desktop OS, Chrome is in alpha stages and I don't see any emulators for it out as a result.
Moblin or Maemo. I prefer Maemo because it means an N64 and PSX in my next cell phone once the Pandora emulator development kicks into high gear. Any of those two OS will do for the Pandora.
@Eternity
There's already NES, SNES, GameBoy and Genesis emulators on Android ;)
I'm still hopeful for N64 and PSX to come around (not to mention a gamepad attachment for my G1)
@Eternity From the GP32X.com forums:
No chance of getting "Maemo" branded Maemo (due to Nokia owning the name and probably some non-FOSS bits) but there's not real reason why Mer shouldn't run.
http://wiki.maemo.org/Mer
[edit] it already runs on the Beagleboard so getting it on Pandora would probably be fairly straightforward.
@Eternity
You are delusional if you think your puny little G1 can handle psx/n64 emulation. You need something like my nexus one for that. ;)
DO WANT
Can't wait to see ZDooM ported over, fully running on this thing. I'd take it everywhere with me.
@r34p3r
well actually it can run full linux, so I think you're in luck
Meh. I'm guessing in the end it will be just a platform for emulators of older Nintendo consoles, just like many KIRF products out there.
@pika2000
this isn't a kirf. Far from it.
@n8equalsd Who said that it is? I said it's LIKE a KIRF, meaning that in the end, most people are using it to play old console games emulations. Sure, it runs linux, but then what. Run desktop software on a low-res and tiny screen? Yeah, you can run SNES/GBA/N64/SEGA emulators on it, which brings back my original point. It may be a nice pocket war-driving unit though.
Happy days. Still waiting on the case factory to produce a larger volume of cases, but it's really, finally happening.
People should be reading PandoraPress. It's the community Pandora blog run by Gruso and hosted by me, and updates much more often than the official dev blog. Also, it has stuff about software and programs and stuff.
http://pandorapress.net/
:)
needs more buttons
@kojo87
It has a port for a Jaguar controller
@kojo87, you mean to say: MOAR BUTTONZ!
@kojo87
I think this image is shopped. It has two analog pads.
but can it run lsdj?
What? You mean you guys aren't getting a copy to review? :(
@Eternity
OpenPandora has some set aside for sending to press people.
That is, they've reserved some of the ones that will be produced.
@atomicthumbs
Sounds cool... Hopefully it won't be 2 more years for the press versions to be shipped. We'll have Arm Cortex A11 by then.
Engadget, the Pandoras being sent out at the moment are going to a few devs that paid for a Pandora. And them Pandoras are using test prototype cases.
.
The Pandora isn't being shipped to regular customers just yet. Open Pandora are waiting for the factory to send all the finished production cases with silk screened cases they can have made before the Chinese New Year. So yes, some of people who got them Pandora did pay for them. But they are not the mass production version that the regular customers will get. Please refer to the tweets from Craig: http://twitter.com/Craigix
@Nightwheel Hopefully not they are Hideous!
@Nightwheel
they don't look like anything Apple or Sony would sell, but I like the look. Probably not the slickest design, but straightforward.
I like it.
anyone know the MSRP?
@Nightwheel if they refine the case a little bit and keep the price decent i am in for 1. somehow this thing flew totally under my radar until now. but now i am interested.
@kojo87 It's price is $330 per pandora
But you might have to wait till the second batch to get one.
Two years + and the wait is finally over, now it just time for the next version with a Dual Core Cortex A9
@pika2000 most if not all of the popular emulators were shown running on it during the long wait, but it does run a full linux OS and Firefox so that is a good thing... and its only a little larger than a NintendoDS
@r34p3r They already have Quake3 ported to it and it does look good. So I can only assume that zDoom is somewhere in the ether too.
Well we did go through a recession. That might have slowed down the manufacturing process. Good to see this product going through. I can only imagine the possibilities of what an open source device like this has to offer. Would deff consider it.
@Ollie I wouldn't be caught dead with that monster in my hands!
@Ollie Would a recession not actual help speed up production, since factories would have idle capacity? It would certainly hurt sales.
@Ollie: Most of the delays came from problems with the production and refinement of the case using a Chinese manufacturer with no Pandora team on-site presence and, until just recently, no one on the Pandora team who could even speak their language. From what I've read about the experiences of western entrepreneurs in China, that was just asking for major problems.
looks awesome, if i didn't already have so many gadgets I would probably get one of these. Looks awesome, I'd love to develop stuff on one of these too, which is what understand is the main draw to this thing. Too bad it cost so much, and I already have a DSL and a Droid. Those handle all the emulation I need right now. And my embedded system class takes care of all the developing needs for now lol, a little too much.
Inaccurate post is inaccurate.
@Pancakes I have already sent engadget a tip pointing out their inaccuracies.
Old meme is old
@EGOvoruhk Old meme is still relatively humorous and suitable for a large variety of situations, thus making it timeless.
take THAT! crunchpad..
:)
I'm not a techno guy. Your all way smarter than me. What is great about this? I'm missing something. What does it do. I assume play pandora radio but what else?
@Tangerinescream I'm not 100% sure either, but I believe it is a handheld gaming console that can emulate games from anything before playstation 1. Which is pretty incredible, if you think about how (1) it sucks to play emulators on your computer (2) You get all of the best old games, far more in volume and quality than any other new platform basically (3) it can run regular software (linux) on a handheld platform.
@Tangerinescream lol it's not about Pandora radio. It's an indie project, which is quite impressive since they managed too manufacture it without an established company backing them up. Essentially it's supposed to be a dream for someone who uses software emulators to play games from older game consoles.
Every smartphone and its best friend can emulate PS1 today. Low rank me all you want, but this was tons more impressive two years ago...
I'll change my mind when it has serious games being developed for it, and I don't think it will...
@TareG
I'll change my mind about smartphones when they have serious gaming controls.
@grruse
You're right, but in 2010, I'd rather save these $350 or whatever for the PSP2 or DS2 being announced this E3...