Official blog: A dream becomes reality!
March 12, 2010
Battery covers with the final matte finish
Didn’t we all dream about that the case mass production should become reality?
Well, it has. We got some brand new pictures for you.
The mould has been successfully calibrated and mounted on the machine.
The pieces you see are the first that has been spit out by the machine, so those are testing ones which are being checked.
Not all have the finishing applied – one nice picture (above) that does show how it will look like with finishing applied is the one with the battery lids.Those samples are being checked – and if they are okay (and they really do look fine), they will continue to spit out the cases and apply finishing.
Enjoy!
(EvilDragon)
Oh, and a small addition from Fatih, the man with the translator:
The pictures are from China. We don’t need to confirm anything about the cases. Everything is on track right now.
Does anyone know if the finishing is a coating which will someday wear off, or if it’s just a treatment (like sandblasting) that evens out the optical swirls and shiny areas of the molded plastic?
AFAIK it’s a treatment. So it gets rid of all that swirly mess, and it’s permanent. I’ll post more info if I can find a source.
Love it. That’s the answer I was hoping for. If you manage to dig up that source, i’d enjoy seeing it.
Anything will wear down with regular usage, but it’s definitely not a coating, the texture is treated to the actual plastic.
It looks beadblasted, maybe.
Ummm….Yay?
What is this btw? More samples? Are they shipping a small batch? Or are they just showing us the final product? (what they should have done years ago?)
This is confirmation that the case factory is getting the job done. They have to do a lot of setup and calibration on the machinery to prepare for high volume production, and part of that process is doing small test runs like this. (This is all the preparation they didn’t do when they sent MWeston the infamous Rev3 cases).
What’s it mean? They’re on target for the 22nd as promised. Which is pretty surprising… I honestly thought we wouldn’t be seeing these first steps for another ten days, given the history.
[edit] Just to clarify, these pics were taken at the factory in China. As far as we know there are no plans to ship anything to the UK until 1,000 are made.
Thanks for the clarification
Why the roadmap is not updated?
The green light is only given for the first 1000 cases and not for all (i.e. 3000 still got a red one)
I tried to count the display case front parts in that box stuffed out with Chinese newspaper excerpts. And I almost reached 100.
Looks delicious guys!
Hey what is that part in the 6th picture (DSC07000) with the full logo and name? I cant rightly place what it is or should be. Is it maybe just a test peice?
That’s the storage case for spare batteries.
Thanks Gruso, my theory was that maybe it was the pandora logo playdoh mold that was part of the Pandora mop top hair shop that they are giving to all first batchers!!!
I get a storage case for my spare battery?
Kewl.
It’s like looking through an adoption agency window. I can see my BABY the 2nd from the left I want that one as MY CHILD…!!!!11!1!!hahaaha hah…. Ima a getting too giddy its been soooo long,
looks like a big Lego party
plus you can read chinese news
niiiiice
I’m gonna be getting one of the second batchers…
…so about 2 more months, then.
Well 2 months might be a bit optimistic. They said they’re gonna start the assembly the start of April, and considering it’s essentially then they’ll see these 1000 they still need the further 3000 of the “First batch” to get done and out the door, before they start Batch 2.
Probably be 2 months before they put a second batch order in. So I’d say 3, at least.
And it kinda depends how they are going to go about it thereafter. Will you need to lay down money up front, or will they start bankrolling this themselves so they can hold stock?
This just made my day!
Great way to start my saturday
Am I the only one feeling the Pandora has been losing wind lately? When the preorders were released back in 2008 for a release in october/november (HAH!!!) I actually thought it would be out the door withing half a year or something. I was one of the first to place the preorder and it took a LOOONG time before I cancelled it.
So now, here we are. 2010. Yeah, we’re inching closer to release, but it’s more of a farce now than ever before. I’m actually laughing at the delays and feel sorry for everyone who’ve gotten accustomed to the “two months away” mantra which has been rolling for … a year now?
Android powered devices (even console oriented, such as http://www.hardkernel.com) are gaining momentum and with ARM architecture development progressing ever so rapidly I think the Panda hardware will be pretty old when it’s actually going to be released.
I kind of feel sorry for Craig and company too. They had this very cool SoC which was top notch and due to delays, it’s going to be a piece of previous generation hardware by the time it’s actually going to be released.
Every now and then, I visit the Pandora forums and check the websites out to see any progress. Yeah, Craig and ED shows some videos and pictures which shows some hardware and software progress. I guess they would lose more pre-orders if they didn’t. I wouldn’t be surprised if another bunch of pre-order slots were made public soon.
I feel sorry for you guys who still have the faith. Keep up the spirit!
I understand that there will always be better and faster things just over the horizon. This fact is especially true in the world of electronics. However, I think at some point people just have to realize what is good enough for the time being and for a while into the future. These new devices coming out, the ipads and the tegra 2 based tablets running android, I won’t admit that they do have some serious charm. However, I would never consider canceling my order for a pandora because I don’t think that looks or sheer processing power is the only thing that decides a devices usefulness. I am also not saying that it is not an issue, it is very much an issue, however I think the pandora is more than capable enough.
To me the most important thing that makes the pandora so special is that it is made to be flexible for the end user. You have control over what distribution you can run, what DEs you want to use and other things of that nature. Furthermore, since this development took so very long and took so much work, I don’t think that we can expect to see a pandora 2 anytime soon. This means that the people who have created the pandora will spend more time developing for it and supporting it as opposed to a company such as nokia. I used to be a nokia N800 owner… but eventually after a couple years, support and development completely ceased for the device and everybody was left with the choice of upgrade or shut up. However since the hardware, drivers and most all parts are much more accessible for the pandora, I really can’t see something like this happening. I think that people will be playing with and hacking on these things for many years to come.
Well put.
The specs of the Pandora are nice, not as nice as in 2008 but nice all the same, but the most important thing is that it’s “open” to an extent never previously seen in a device of this power or form factor and still more open than anything currently available in this space.
This Odroid thing is bullshit, sorry. No Keyboard, smaller screen, no nubs. The only thing which it can win over the pandora is the ARM V7 and more RAM.
So, if you are happy with this ugly thing…
I will be happy with the ultimative handheld ever build. The Pandora! Never seen a thing that can compare with it.
The thing is, most of the pandora’s competition is designed for other things. This is the only device designed to be as dynamic as it is because it was designed to meet the needs of people who want this type of device. You can look around for all sorts of other things like N900s or odroids but if they dont do everything you want, you’ll just eventually be disappointed by them. If you looked around and found something that does what you want better, then good for you but I see a device that meets my needs better than any cellphone, tablet or net book. If it’s not for you it probably never was.
Well, I have yet to see anything like the Pandora with higher specs. There is the Wiz, which doen’t look too bad, but other than having an LED screen its specs are less impressive. Other than that, there’s not anything too much like it.
One of the most appealing of the other devices I’ve seen is the TouchBook from Always Innovating, but it’s not the same thing, and it doesn’t have better specs, just similar ones. It’s interesting as an alternative to a netbook, but it’s not the Pandora.
The controls, the flexibility, the size. You can find a device with one or maybe two of these attributes, but not all of them together. I don’t care if something has a higher speed ARM chip if I’m fenced in for how I use it. I’m not saying the other devices don’t have their place, but it’s a different place than the Pandora.
Thing is, if you’ve come from an open handheld / homebrew background, you know that Pandora’s feature set (including the OMAP spec) still has years of potential in it. But if you spotted Pandora on Engadget and whipped out your wallet to buy the Latest Thing, then yeah, it’s fallen behind a bit in terms of power. In that case it was probably never the right device for you anyway.
The delaaaaays have sucked but I don’t feel like I need to be pitied. You understand what we’re waiting for, or you don’t.
@Alain, go troll somewhere else.
Alain is just jealous. He wanted to be first guy in the street with gadget that nobody has. Moment he took to write this comment is very symptomatic. He realized that Pandora is coming (now for sure). And he is not in the play. And what is his comment now? Trolling? Go buy your self iPad.
lol i think we all feel sorry him
( those who agree, raise your hand ^^)
*raises hand*
Think Alain is getting a lot undeserved responses. If he was a troll then he is a really cultivated one considering he isnt at all aggressive in his posting can spell and such, :p.
Alain is not a troll, his well-written critique is completely understandable in the present situation. He’s just missing the big picture…
There is still currently no devices in the market that do what Pandora does any better then the Pandora. It’s really that simple. I cannot find a more powerful gaming handheld. A more capable pocket computer. I cannot, right now today, find a single device that does what I want it to nearly as well (let alone better) then the Pandora, at anywhere /near/ $330. Moreover, even the really expensive UMPC’s don’t have the controls or battery life to be as perfectly suited to what I want as the Pandora. And this is TODAY. Right now, not 2 years ago.
My money will stay with the Pandora, until and unless something else appears that is more powerful, has better controls, is open and runs a full linux OS, and costs around $300. Fat chance.
And so ?
I don’t see where is the problem ?
I’m still enlisted to the Pandora first batch but regardless to the fact that this device is outdated seeing how much the community is intolerant and stupid does not encourage me much to stay in.
I’m a dev. and I don’t want to share with ass.
In this context the Android platform let me choose a larger and smarter community.
lol, Iphone 3GS have the same CPU how can teh pandora be “outdated”.
Apple makes lots of things that stay outdated for years (in terms of PC hardware and software pace), but at least they have image stability…
Yeah totally !
It’s a bit like Nintendo DS
Plus the CPU isn’t what I was referring to with “outdated”.
drewl*
Thank you China for sending the pictures. We have been hard on you but we will love you forever once the cases are safely in Blighty. Thanks to Fatih and ED also.
Yes, the Pandora is late. It would kick so hard 1-2 years back, but you know what? It still kicks butt. And, considering the progress of the handheld industry, it will keep kicking butt for a whole lot of years.
Light-weight and small, gaming console, with keyboard, touchscreen, which is essentially a computer, made to be COMPLETELY OPEN. There are no developers sitting making it as difficult as possible for modders to create their own homebrew, forcing users to purchase mod-chips and voiding their warranty. There is no forced-upon-the-user operating system even, if you just have the know-how to change it.
Honestly, I hear a lot of people saying things like “it’s too late”, and sometimes I’m almost close to fall for that, but then I think of what the Pandora is and what alternatives there are… and I’m instantly back grinning, perhaps even laughing, at how awesome the Pandora is.
I’ll keep saving for one and order one as soon as I can afford it, regardless if it comes out this summer or fall, or maybe even x-mas. Seriously.
I’ve been using my Nintendo DS with an R4 chip for playing emulators (Nes mostly) and for reading books, chatting, watching movies (needs converting), and writing some, painting. It works, but is clumsy, and you can only do one thing at a time really. The thing is… my DS is running hot, and I use it almost every day since I bought it years ago.
Then we have the Pandora… that can do all that my DS can do and a WHOLE lot more, simultaneously, and with no extra chip (the R4 chip that I use is no longer supported by the manufacturer btw), and with almost no more hassle than transfer the files to a mem card and run it.
= The day when I stop using my Pandora is the day when it breaks.
This post was… well uh, an “anti-trolling” post I guess. I just had to vent, again, after all the negative garbage people write. Yes, waiting sucks. But it’s worth it, imho, even if I have to wait another year.
I would call your post a warm and comforting blanket, and I enjoyed it.
the picture(DSC07011, showing the part of the case with the Pandora box logo that covers the back of the lcd) still shows what looks like discoloration from a difference of case thickness. I wonder, will the final production units still have this noticeable and rather unfortunate look about them?..I hope not.
The answer is in EvilDragon’s text:
The picture he refers to is the one that leads the article. Those battery lids are the only things that have the matte finishing applied. All the other pieces will look like that too when they’re done.
Oh…ok, I wasn’t aware that the finishing would have such an impact on the Pandora’s appearance.
I haven’t seen it explicitly stated that the finishing will remove the cosmetic blemish caused by the thinner case section, but on the other hand the amount of work that’s visible in these case parts shows these guys do know what they’re doing.
Plus the finished battery cover looks teh aw3some!
Personally i don’t give a penny about slight colour variations .
If that case is strong , black and fits I’m happy…
Get the moulds rolling out those cases!
Hmm I think I should have ordered one!
You still can, I’ll wager. I put in an order a month ago.
Maybe I will cancel my iPad pre-order. It is a race against time to see who gets my money
Although I will admit I am an Apple fanboy… before I get flamed I should say that I’d rather be supporting open source. Although I am not a game developer I was very excited about this project. I even bought a beagleboard and have Ubuntu and OpenCPN running via solar power on my sailboat. I have setup VPNC and can connect to all my work servers. My environment is all prepped to go. However, I got tired of waiting. I hope the 22nd will happen… if so I will cancel my iPad order (or return it to Apple). The unfortunately closed ipad requires me to add ec2 servers to my config and use the ipad more of a terminal for my unix/linux tasks. I’d rather have a pandora. Either solution requires RDP to EC2 for windows… and in that case the ipad probably wins out in terms of screen size. If only I didn’t have to use windows for my job sometimes my life would be much better.
Maybe they will pass a healthcare bill in the U.S. before the pandora is released.
ahahahahahahahahahahahaha +1000
At least Pandora doesn’t require you to replace the whole thing when the battery goes…
It’s great to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I, for one, believe it’s been more than worth the wait to get a nice piece of hardware with the potential of the Pandora. I knew when I placed my order it might take this long, or a little longer.
The only thing I would request is an HDMI port on Pandora v2.0.
I would “request” the waiting time to be less than “2 months”…
“I knew when I placed my order it might take this long, or a little longer.”
Next weeks Lottery numbers must be easy, come on, share.
I haven’t ordered the Pandora and I’m not currently planning to, but, as people have said, open hardware is an awesome idea, and I hope we see more of it. This is really a pioneering venture and I’m sure if the people behind it make a Pandora 2 they’ll be a lot more capable of dealing with the suppliers and keeping the project on schedule. Open hardware is only going to get better and better.
Thanks the author for article. The main thing do not forget about users, and continue in the same spirit.
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