Preparing for Germany
August 30, 2011EvilDragon hits us with another enormous forum post and news about what he and the rest of the team is currently doing, how preparations for the production in Germany are going and other stuff which caused a big uproar, but read on…
- Creating a business plan
- So… what IS the plan?
- Preorders… again?
- Conclusion
A lot of important things have happened behind the curtains, I’ll try to summarize everything up here, though it might not be easy. I hope I can make myself clear and won’t forget anything.
One thing upfront:
I saw some posts that asked if Craig simply ignores the Pandora right now, as you don’t read any Pandora news from him.
Craig is still in the team, of course.
However, all he can do right now is wait for CC to produce and ship the boards. Well, and to take care about possible legal actions…I am mainly the one working on continuing the production in Germany, of course with a lot of help by Michael and Fatih.
Craig uses most of his time to take care about the iControlPad, while I am fully working on the Pandora right now.
I never was the smartphone gamer, but I love OpenSource stuff, so I’m happy to mostly work on the Pandora and not on the iCP
This is just a quick information at the beginning of my post.
Creating a business plan
You all know that we’re currently working on moving the production to Germany.
This is a very important step and therefore needs to be done very carefully.
We have no idea how fast and how many finished boards CC can provide us in the near future.
So for my business plan, I am currently assuming the worst case scenario: Not a single board from CC anymore.
That’s highly unlikely, but better be safe than sorry.In case someone doesn’t know exactly what a business plan is:
It’s basically a document you create, that includes a detailed plan of the total costs needed, any plans for production, how you plan to make profits, what issues there are left, what needs to be done, etc.
This is absolutely essential if you try to get a bank loan or an investor, as they use the business plan to calculate their risks.I’m about 90% finished with that, I just need a few more quotations, including the most important one: The PCB production. I’ll get that one probably within the next days.
So… what IS the plan?
Well, of course: Produce Pandoras
That’s the simple version.It’s much more complex though. Moving the production costs money. Thanks to the production issues, we lost an awful lot of money as well.
The goal of the plan is, to find out how much money is needed to start the production and how many Pandoras need to be sold to make sure the production will continue and we can deliver the remaining preorders as well.Altogether, there are 1200 preorders left (500 from me, 800 from Craig). This includes ALL preorders. Also the ones from Batch 2.
While the plan is not yet finished, it looks like with 3000 units produced, we’ll be able to fulfill all the remaining preorders AND have enough money left to continue the production.
Right now, it looks like about 250.000 EUR is needed to get everything rolling.This actually sounds like a lot of money, but for such a production, it is not that much. And with 3000 units produced, the money can be paid back and everyone of you would have his Pandora!
After that, profit starts.This is, as said, the worst case scenario. Every PCB delivered by CC will make things better.
Where to get that money?
I’ve got plans for that as well. Investors would be possible, I’ll also try getting a loan.
With a carefully thought business plan that shows that the loan could be paid back within a reasonable timeframe, this shouldn’t be a big issue.I’d still love to get notch as investor. He was one of the very first preorderers of the Pandora, he seems like a nice chap AND he really supports indie stuff.
I was in contact with him early this year and he was interested, however, I never got a reply from him since then.
I guess he’s just swamped with his normal eMail address, so he probably missed mine.
If anyones in good contact with him, please let him know I’m trying to contact him. It would really rock if he would support us – and it would make things so much easier!BTW: Global Components (they will most probably produce the PCBs) are also interested in investing. That would also be great
Preorders… again?
Yes, there will probably be another preorder round.
However, with ONE significant difference: NO money has to be paid upfront!What use is this, you might ask?
Easy. Imagine you are looking for investors. Or you are trying to get a loan from the bank.
Of course they are careful and will ask you: Are you sure anyone will buy that thing?
Then you’ll take out a big list with a lot of people who preordered already… and you win.
That way, getting money will be WAY more easy!I’ll inform you when that preordering starts – and then you can tell anyone who always wanted to buy a Pandora but didn’t want to pay before it’s available to go and preorder!
But please don’t order another one there if you’re not interested in actually buying it later. It would just lead to problems.It will be exciting to see how much interest there is. But based on the daily “I want to order a Pandora”-mails I get, there should be quite a few orders.
I also know some of you told me you’d want to get a few more units once they are available without prepayment.If this will be a success, getting a loan will be easy and production can continue!
What… a new CPU? What the fuck is this talk about?
This actually is one thing I’m currently thinking about a lot.
Some of you know about the BeagleBoard xM. It basically features the same SoC as the Beagleboard (or the Pandora), just with 1GHz standard clock, a faster RAM bus and a more recent 3D GPU.
As years have passed since we designed the Pandora, this faster SoC [possibly the DM3730, which has 1Ghz standard clock, faster GPU and better RAM transfer rates --foxblock, Source] shouldn’t cost much more than the old OMAP one.
According to TI, it’s also easier to get.As it is compatible [It's not a simple drop-in replacement though and would require a slight redesign of the board! see below for more info --foxblock], we can simply put it onto the new PCBs. It would be compatible with our OS, so all Pandora stuff would work on both units.
The new one simply would run a bit faster but would be completel compatbie.
OS and programs would be the same.There are a few reasons that speak for that SoC:
* Wouldn’t affect price
* Would make the Pandora more attractive
* Compatible, faster speed
* Preorderers who are still waiting would receive that one as bonus as well!Of course – it could annoy the ones who already have a Pandora.
So what to do?
It’s not easy.Well, I don’t know if the price will be the same as for the OMAP anyways. Maybe it’s not worth it.
But if it IS worth it, I need to know what to do.I’ll make a poll about that tomorrow, please help me decide then!
On a sidenote, we might use a different paint on the case as well. Granite black metallic.
You might remember the blue metallic one Fatih showed us. He’s been using it for six months yet.
The paint looks better (still looks like it is brand new) and as the paint is a bit thicker, the display stays open in every position.Conclusion
Well, there’s still a lot of work for me to get things started.
Things are looking good though. There are no debts except for the preorders, so as long as you will support me, I’ll continue to work on the Pandora as mch as I can! That’s a promise!Nothing is carved in stone yet, I’m still checking out different options, but I’m getting there.
I hope I could give you a basic idea of what I’m planning to achieve.If not, just ask, I’ll try to answer it
Of course, you’ll be the first to know once some stuff is fixed and done
Additional details on the new chip and “upgrade” process:
It is NOT possible to upgrade the old board with a new SoC. First, this would not make sense as it would probably be as expensive as simply producing a new board. Second, the circuit had to be changed a bit, so it’s not just a drop-in-replacement.
However, I can very well imagine some upgrade program if people are interested in.
I would have to charge at least the price for the new PCB though, which seems to be roughly 200 EUR. I wouldn’t charge for the time I need to replace the PCB.
Most people who got the Pandora already paid 250 EUR, except for the Premium customers. 200 EUR more would roughly be the same price a new customer would pay, seems fair to me.
Of course I want to help the already premium-sold Pandora-Owners as well, but as I need to be VERY accurate and careful with money, this needs to be very well thought of.
In worst case I could give existing users a discount for the new version, so they would have two Pandoras if they want to.It’s all being thought of right now, and I want the best solution for everyone, you can be sure of that.
BTW: I don’t think the new Pandora would make the old one obsolete. Most ports we have are straight ports, since they run fullspeed without doing anything also on the current models.
Most emulators like PSX and N64 are already optimized as hell, it might be hard to squeeze more out of them.
Future more complicated emulators will probably also be optimized as good as possible, as then they would run faster on the new model as well.The new version would be mostly helpful for stuff like FireFox and Desktop usages – or for emulators that are so demanding that they would never really be playable on the old system anyways.
The OS is the same and all PNDs would work on both system. Some might run slower on the current system, but that’s also the case right now.
Most devs port and set optimization flags. There are not that many who actually take the time to really optimize a program for the current unit.
Okay so after you have read up to this point you are probably already writing a mail with the desire to upgrade your order (or existing Pandora) to the new chip, but please stay with me for a minute and read on, because it’s not happening any time soon (if ever) – those were just some ideas floating around EvilDragon’s head and a plan for the distant future.
MWeston explains why:
There isn’t going to be a 1GHz chip going into Pandora for a long time if ever. We ordered THOUSANDS of 3530′s a long time ago thinking that CC would actually produce boards on a schedule and those chips are going to run into batch 3. We can’t just tell the distributor, “oh sorry, here take these back” because the parts are in our possession and the deal is done. If you don’t want to take my or OP’s word for it, you can ask Notaz and maybe other software devs. I discussed this with Notaz ages ago. We both agreed that we would love to go to the DM3730 but we pre-ordered a ton of 3530 stock that prevents any further discussion of such thing unfortunately. ED’s wishful thinking has the unfortunate side effect of sounding official and he doesn’t deal with parts ordering. Craig and I do (did) but now he knows the situation. Hopefully people keep reading this topic and realize that other than a possibly better paint job, their Pandora will be the same as everyone else. It has to be. We have no choice. We can’t just toss $100k+ worth of chips in the garbage.
Finally EvilDragon posts a clarification:
Wellwellwell, this post is no news, but just a small reminder to read my posts CAREFULLY.
I heard from Craig that a lot of people sent him an angry mail about the SoC upgrade and want to cancel right away, etc.
Whoever did that: Please read my posts CAREFULLY.
So far, this is just a possible option that MIGHT happen.
As I said, we neither have a price yet and we also already own more OMAPs, so we’d need to discuss with our distributor about that upgrade as well.This is far from actually being happening, I just wanted to share my thoughts and ask up front what you think about that.
It’s a VERY big IF, but before trying to waste time to check if we can pull that through, we wanted to know what the community is thinking.
No need for a panic at the moment.
Thanks for reading
A lot of uproar in here (which has been closed at the time of writing), but you can still join the discussion here, also don’t forget this news has not been all about the new CPU 
Production in Germany also will not start before December 2011 as the factory has to get the parts, set-up the machines and produce some prototypes (also ED has to get the money for the move) – Source
via Pandora-Blog
I’ve been waiting for my Pandora for over 2 years.. Id like to say – Keep my money, let’s just get them shipped!
I’ll happily pre-order the Pandora 2 with a new SOC.
How many 3530 SOCs do they have left?
~4000
i got my first pandora and would order a pandora 2 (as long as it has a better processer and a slightly better case, mine cracked rather quickly) other than that would buy a second one with slightly upgraded specks
Keep up the good work, I am loving my pandora and if the time comes to goto a 1ghz chip, just do it, progress, I think people lose the concept of what a start up company is and you guys are doing this for the community of hand held gaming and not to be another apple ipad ect…. we all want a hand held linux console, no one made one, you guys make one, your dealing with the trials of a start up company & no one should ever get mad at the open pandora, because your doing just what needs to be done to survive and succeed! keep at it!
“Altogether, there are 1200 preorders left” ? Wait, what. I haven’t gotten mine and I was around 1400 in queue! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!?
You already received your Pandora.
heh looks like i am not the only one who’s order has been skipped. welcome to the club.
That was my thought, I”m not sure how those numbers can possibly be right when I haven’t received mine yet either. I ordered mine during the initial pre-order, so I’m not sure how it is that they’ve got a total of 1200 pre-orders left for both batch 1 and batch 2.
I was estimated at 1500-1600 in the kue.
cancelled orders.
This is a big confusion. Essentially that queue number doesn’t mean what you think it means. The queue represents only the ones sold by Craig (definitely not all of them) and many people wordered more then one pandora… *and* the queue is an estimate. The best way to know how close you are to getting one is by your preorder date… almost everyone who ordered on the 1st of Oct has got there’s (and some people from the 2nd of Oct too).
I ordered my Pandora on 10/1/2008 and was later told that my queue position was approximately 1300-1400 and I still haven not received it either. Because of the credit card fiasco I had to reorder with a bank transfer and although I was assured that I would not lose my place in line, I am starting to think that I did.
Here here! I am 1550-1650 and don’t have mine yet either. WHAT GIVES
Why does everyone still think that craigs-queue == overal-queue == Pandora?
I was guestimated at ~2000 of Craigs queue, which should be ~3000 overal queue, but since many people before me ordered more than one Pandora I’m probably near the end of batch 1 in regards to Pandora-number.
People, don’t, but if there’s only 800 left to fill Craig’s queue, then we’re puzzled as to how come so many of us haven’t received ours yet.
Ultimately, it was a mistake on their part to provide multiple units to people before ensuring that everybody got at least one. Had they made that decision before the preorders went out, it’s doubtful that they would have had any complaints.
Consequently a lot of us have written what is essentially a no interest loan. ED has been making a valiant effort at keeping us informed, but at some point we really do need information which apparently only Craig can provide.
Well this is a sort of bite to the balls. The one’s who paid later are getting a better CPU and GPU. Oh well I’ve sort of gotten tired of my Pandora since GBA (gpsp crashes on the games I like to play) and PSX (some are glitchy) are not yet up to specs.
Did you finish the article? It seems like the upgrade is pretty much not happening, or if it does it’s way off in the future.
glad to see things moving along a bit. i have a pandora and i see all the above as a good thing. i would rather see the pandora continue forward as a product continuing to have great support and a good community rather than stall and die on its ass.
think about the upgrade as say the changes between psp models. its a small change but you’ll still be able to do pretty much the same stuff. maybe the dslite/dsi might be a better comparison. either way, you bought what you bought, get over it.
When EvilDragon said they were thinking about upgrading to a faster CPU, I thought – just for a second – “wow – I bought a cuttong-edge most-powerful-handheld” there is, and maybe it actually WILL be “powerful” and “cutting edge-ish” when I receive it!
But no, they aren’t selling their old CPUs, they aren’t upgrading to the 3730, it was just another bit of “other people who haven’t ordered yet and didn’t support us from the very start will get a better machine than you will, if we even bother to deliver yours”. Great. So now I feel even WORSE than before Ed teased us all with the idea that we might get a machine that would be as fast as the thing has been marketed as. Borrox.
^ wth? The device you ordered and will get _will_ be exactly as they marketed it.
Even still it will be cutting edge. Name one single device that comes remotely close to the spec the Pandora has.
The SoC is just one part of the equation that is the quantum mechanics of the Pandora.
Name one device that comes remotely close to the Pandora Specs?
How about … PSP
How about … PSV ( PSP Vita ) with 4 ARM Cores, and a quad GPU solution, that runs circles around the Pandora.
Sure, its not out yet, but then again, as a lot of people who ordered 2+ years ago, still have not gotten there product, can you say anything better?
How about … in the hardware department, about EVERY smartphone released in the last 2 years, from High end, to now almost low end.
——-
If they want to trow in a new CPU, then do a decent upgrade. Not just a … lets trow a in slight faster CPU. One that is by today’s standard, already moving to the medium to lower market area. The new playground is Dual, Quad core, 1.2GHz, 1.4Ghz, …
Maybe by 2017 People will have there new Pandora 2 if they start pre-ordering tomorrow.
———
Also: And only NOW they are making a business plan??? No wonder thing gone terrible wrong.
Yeah, the Pandora is pretty much stuffed in terms of specs. But really, we’ve all known that for a while now- it’s simply a nice portable system with an awesome level of geekery. I’m keeping my pre-order because none of the devices you mentioned above fulfill my needs like the Pandora will- just like every other patient bastard around here.
Oh, but this isn’t OPL’s first business plan: this is just them creating a new one due to an unexpected change in environment. As a software-engineer in training, I couldn’t tell you enough about how iteration and incrementation of the planning processes are vital.
I really loved the idea of a CPU upgrade.
Have the thousands of old 3530 CPUs actually been SHIPPED?
If not: I think MWeston should at least ASK the distributor. Maybe they do not mind a change of the order. You cannot KNOW before you have asked.
If yes: Try selling the old chips to China or on EBay
Even with the old CPU, the Pandora still rocks and it is good to hear that production moves to Germany. But the additional delay (not before December) is really bad (defined as: longer than 2 months!).
Therefore I suggest that a HUGE effort is made to find a compromise with CircuitCo. It is better to pay them an additional 20K (on delivery!!!) and have them produce the rest of the boards for the old CPUs than to waste the same money on legal battles.
Best outcome: Produce as many Pandoras as quickly as possible (CircuitCo, then Germany) for as many old CPUs as must be used. Then uprade to Pandora II, which will enormously benefit from the experience gained.
Have all the old CPUs shipped? Yes they have. See above: “the parts are in our possession”.
I would feel a little slighted if they updated the chip within another year. I would like the project to continue and have updated versions of the pandora, and it would have been okay with me if I had been enjoying my first gen pandora the whole time, but I’ve been waiting for 3 years now. I mean it’s not really fair that I should essentially have to pay for something as if it’s new when it’s the old model.
Of course, who knows if I’ll ever even get that.
I really, really, really, tried to believe them the third year after my $$$ went flying away.
But it has been a learning experience. NEVER do a preorder, its just wasting your money.
Emulation is cool, but not $300.00 cool. I would like to do the ‘emulator’ extension to the iphone, but don’t trust these folks as far as I can throw them.
Oh well. It was a good lesson, if I EVER see a pandora, I rather believe that there will be snow in hell.
Thomas
you’re either in it for the long hall or not. i have no time for people sulking about their pre-order because they have had ample opportunity to seek a refund from day 1. you knew were you were in for and if you didn’t you had plenty of options.
quit crying about a situation you were basically in control of. its not a waste of money if you get the device. my pandora is fantastic. and its not a waste of money if you get that money back, which you can do. if it was just pissed into the wind with no recompense then sure, waste of money, but that is just not the case.
if you distrust OPL this much then WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE?!?!
Vain Hope.
“Long Haul” has taken on new definitions here… It’s been almost 3 years since I preordered, Fall of 2008. I know waiting as opposed to refunding and then purchasing when they’re easily available would cost more, but I’m better off financially and the extra cost would be worth not having the angst of “will it ever come?”
I still like OpenPandora as a console, heck, I dabbled in writing a game for it, but I can’t see myself holding out too much longer. If I do ask for a refund it will be out of sadness rather than spite.
*haul
It looks like the Raspberry Pi is going to beat them to shipping…
Did say it would be 2012 at least before Pandora preorders get shipped.
Based on December 2011 production starting in Germany (if it does), I would now say that it will be Spring 2012 before this happens.
Nice and well into the 4th year of preorders.
4 years.
4