Pandora pre-orders go live

Author: Joe Martin
Published: 2nd October 2008
Comments (12) Stumble
The Pandora handheld system is completely open source and already boasts full-speed Amiga emulation.

The Pandora handheld system is completely open source and already boasts full-speed Amiga emulation.

The Pandora, the open-source handheld gaming platform, has just become available for pre-order and is selling out fast according to figures posted on the official site which show that the rush of pre-orders has claimed more than two thirds of the planned first batch in under six hours.

The Pandora itself is a completely open-source system that aims to become the king of the emulator and homebrew community. The design showcases a whole load of connectivity options ranging from WiFi to USB and SD slots, plus a miniature keyboard - yet all of it fits within a clamshell design just a little larger than a DS Lite.

The first batch of 3000 units is set to ship by the end of November, though the company is currently trying to respond to demand and make more units available. The entire system is to be priced at £199 / $329 too, which should make the Pandora a tasty stocking filler for any enthusiast this year. Check out the system specs below.
  • ARM® Cortex™-A8 600Mhz+ CPU running Linux
  • 430-MHz TMS320C64x+™ DSP Core
  • PowerVR SGX OpenGL 2.0 ES compliant 3D hardware
  • 800x480 4.3" 16.7 million colours touchscreen LCD
  • Wifi 802.11b/g, Bluetooth & High Speed USB 2.0 Host
  • Dual SDHC card slots & SVideo TV output
  • Dual Analogue and Digital gaming controls
  • 43 button QWERTY and numeric keypad
  • Around 10+ Hours battery life
With the Pandora selling out faster than an ageing rock band, it's definitely worth grabbing one now if you can as you may otherwise have to wait until next year to get your hands on one.

Planning on picking one up, or has the new Nintendo DSi got your attention instead? Let us know in the forums.
Quote Jordan Wise 2nd October 2008, 11:04
Sometimes I wish I wasn't a student.... it'll be June 09 when I can afford one of these
Quote Firehed 2nd October 2008, 11:57
That looks like quite possibly the clumsiest handheld device I've ever seen. And it's not like there's a limit on pre-orders (maybe on units that you can expect by some date, but not overall) so "selling out fast" is... completely meaningless.
Quote DougEdey 2nd October 2008, 12:12
I'm going to stick an OS on it, Netbook? PAH They're wayyyy too big
Quote Daniel114 2nd October 2008, 12:31
Full speed Amiga emulation!!! My God, if it wasn't so ugly I'd be all over this
Quote p3n 2nd October 2008, 14:29
Quote:
Originally Posted by Daniel114
Full speed Amiga emulation!!! My God, if it wasn't so ugly I'd be all over this

Does anyone really use an emulator for more than a month? Apart from good old PC games (full throttle/DOTT/Monkey island) my emu experience has been mostly anticlimactic about revisiting old games!
Quote proxess 2nd October 2008, 14:32
I don't see whats it with the looks. Your meant to play it, not admire it. Admire women! ;)
Quote Daniel114 2nd October 2008, 15:21
But I want to be able to play Amiga games for a month on a pretty machine :'(
Quote proxess 2nd October 2008, 15:53
Also, does WINE run on this? some classic games could run on this.
Quote Vash-HT 2nd October 2008, 16:14
I don't see why people say this is ugly, it looks like a DS with a keyboard instead of a second screen. Yeah its obviously thicker but it doesn't look huge or anything. Looking at the pics on their site it actually looks pretty comfortable to use, the DS lite hurt my hands playing some games cause it was so small (metroid hunters...), so if this is a little wider it would make me happy.
Quote hozkinz 2nd October 2008, 20:08
tbh, this does look interesting, im actually looking into buying one, something ive never done with anything that isnt mainstream before
Quote DXR_13KE 3rd October 2008, 00:13
Quote:
Originally Posted by proxess
Also, does WINE run on this? some classic games could run on this.

shamefully not, this is an arm cpu, not an x86 cpu, it may run dos-box games, if someone ports dos-box....

this console has some nice projects with it, like a minigame portal were you can download minigames.... and other cool stuff.... and i think it rocks major ass, it looks almost like a DS lite, but bigger.
Quote metarinka 3rd October 2008, 03:52
I wish someone would brew up a graphing calculator emulator that had a better screen resolution and crunching power than anything ti-83 offered.

It's a good platform but TI has grown so lazy with no competition in the graphing calculator market the ti-83 has been around for over 8 years with very little change besides USB and extra memory, yet they charge the same for the early 90's B&W low res screen -_-

big tangent
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