Or it could cost considerably less. The fear of a high cost is irrelevent until we know exactly what's going in itThose numbers are completely imaginary. It could end up costing considerably more than $500.
Hopefully not. What I'm suggesting is that this "imaginary" price point seems to be a good one (IMO) to shoot for. A "sweet spot" for the OP Team in general, considering what they have charged (in the past for the varying generations of the Pandora 1) and what most people might be willing to pay for a niche device like this. Obviously $300-$350 isn't going to cut it - the OP Team already tried that and considering what they have to pay for parts and such, that's just not leaving them any room for error(s). Take away ALL mistakes of the past - no need to go into them at this point - that still would leave the OP Team no wiggle room, and there are inherent costs that us as consumers don't see. Replacing defective parts/units under warranty. Administrative costs...repairs, labor...server and bandwidth costs for running this website and hosting the Repo which allows us to download great software for free.Those numbers are completely imaginary. It could end up costing considerably more than $500.
I'm fine with any CPU architecture, x86 or ARM or whatever. The single most important thing is perf/W, and to some extent price and availability. Compatibility with closed-source binaries is something I don't care about at all - it would be nice if Pandora 1 PNDs work without emulation, but that's not absolutely necessary since about everything in the repo can be recompiled quite easily (you would lose assembler optimizations though). I don't care at all about being able to install Windows natively on a Pandora 2, that is something I wouldn't want to do.
In terms of price: I think $500 is quite cheap for a mini-laptop. You can pay way more for a decent normal laptop, and although that one will have better performance, it lacks features like super battery life, being a handheld (pocketable, no need to bring a backpack), dual SD slots, built-in gaming controls, etc.
You gave up on Windows at jts peak?? WinXP was amazing! What did you not like about it?Likewise I gave up on windows over a decade ago, I use it when I must.. but that's it. Personally I'd rather see some of these projects like Neverwinter Nights decide to open source their code or compile ARM friendly binaries. I don't like the idea of jumping architectures..
You gave up on Windows at jts peak?? WinXP was amazing! What did you not like about it?Likewise I gave up on windows over a decade ago, I use it when I must.. but that's it. Personally I'd rather see some of these projects like Neverwinter Nights decide to open source their code or compile ARM friendly binaries. I don't like the idea of jumping architectures..
I just reinstalled windows 7, it took me about two days and an innumerable amount of reboots to have it up-to-date.
- It isn't a(n) *nix based OS.
- I have to pay for simple programs that are free in Linux..
- There has been no true improvements since Windows 98..
- Why do I need to reboot so much for installing things. XP and above still have this problem.
- It's too resource hungry.
- Like mcobit said Viruses and malware.
- I'm not supporting a closed minded developers.
- Why can't Microsoft create a decent progress bar when copying files.. It seems that these files with take thirty seconds to copy.. no wait two days.. now it's a half hour..
- Also why is it always preparing to copy, preparing to move files. why isn't it just doing..
I wouldn't too, simply because I have no creditcard. I also have bad feelings about involving a third party, but (given that kickstarter is still popular when the P2 capaign is about to start) this could give the project an significant boost in awareness. Also with the "preorder mess" still beeing in some peoples mind by that time, it may convince them to back the project as there is a "third party safety belt" they can hold on to if the P2 does not work out.More on-topic: I wouldn't back a pandora successor on kickstarter. I would rather have ED getting each and every cent on his bank account than having a third party keeping a part of the money for themselves.