Any Cruz sightings?
1 - 20 of 47 Posts
Yeah, I hope so too. Our Cinderella PDN, full of crappy firmwares and dirty hacks will turn into a real Princess any day now, lol.OT: For all tablet fans who wait for Tegra 2 based devices after this November, maybe there's a reason to stay with Samsung longer: Samsung Introduces High Performance, Low Power Dual CORTEXTM - A9 Application Processor for Mobile Devices Press-release is Samsung talking about Samsung, but here is some short writeup copied from Liliputing:
Woohoo! After 2D/3D driver and new overlay is done, plus 2.1 is stable, wake me up in the first half of 2011, lol. (No, need to finish better serifs for my Better fonts for PDN projects first.)
Joined
·
3,286 Posts
I'm not convinced that it's the same chipset as ours. I know that the prototype pics and videos look almost identical (ie the batttery, wireless and microsd location) but that was a pre-release version and could have been altered since then. Also, just because the shell / battery is the same doesn't mean the chipset is, also.What bothers me is that they are advertising WMA playback and 720p video, which our device does not have. Either they've made significant alterations to the kernel and/or OS build, or the chipset is actually different. I guess we will find out in the next few days, and I certainly hope the chipset is the same as ours.
Not trying to be argumentative but... 
Usually, pre-releases are still developed on the same platform, to avoid any issues cropping up later in the process if a company switches over. Also, the gadgetnutz video for when the comparison was made was very recent (a little over a week ago), so I doubt it is still pre-release hardware this close to shipping.Also, Cruz is selling this as an actual Tablet with reader capabilities, rather than the other way around, so it seems they put a bit more polish into it than PD cared to. They probably put in the effort to get GUI acceleration working, which for a "real" company that actually gives a crap, is probably not all that difficult. The significant differences are just a matter of time and money. We've gotten close to the same spot on 2.1 with spare time and no money. I guess I just think it's a really long shot that it isn't the same platform, but I guess we'll see in a couple days.
Usually, pre-releases are still developed on the same platform, to avoid any issues cropping up later in the process if a company switches over. Also, the gadgetnutz video for when the comparison was made was very recent (a little over a week ago), so I doubt it is still pre-release hardware this close to shipping.Also, Cruz is selling this as an actual Tablet with reader capabilities, rather than the other way around, so it seems they put a bit more polish into it than PD cared to. They probably put in the effort to get GUI acceleration working, which for a "real" company that actually gives a crap, is probably not all that difficult. The significant differences are just a matter of time and money. We've gotten close to the same spot on 2.1 with spare time and no money. I guess I just think it's a really long shot that it isn't the same platform, but I guess we'll see in a couple days.
Joined
·
3,286 Posts
Nah, it's not even an argument - it's just a discussion. I actually hope that my concerns are unfounded and that you are right. But, I also don't want to get my hopes up. I still don't know why they are being so secretive on the specs.Also agree on the pluses on Velocity Micro being a real hardware company versus Pandigital. They've probably put a lot more R&D into this thing and, if it is the same chipset, they certainly could have optimized it.
Joined
·
87 Posts
I was hopeful that the internals would be the same but am curious as to why there aren't many details except I do remember reading in one article that they claim to have designed the device entirely in house. If these are indeed built on the same platform that would make them look pretty foolish to have made those comments, so maybe this is why they are tight lipped???roebeet;52656 said:
Joined
·
576 Posts
[quote name='fatbastard;52706]I was hopeful that the internals would be the same but am curious as to why there aren't many details except I do remember reading in one article that they claim to have designed the device entirely in house. If these are indeed built on the same platform that would make them look pretty foolish to have made those comments' date=' so maybe this is why they are tight lipped???[/QUOTE']I really doubt that VM has the technical expertise to design a tablet from scratch, and further doubt that they'd have the necessary capital available to make it happen. I WOULD believe that they either paid MORE for fw or went so far as to hire their own contractors to produce their fw releases.They're, basically, an ODM re-seller who slaps their branding on it and add in a warranty, and possibly support along with a hefty markup on the individual components. (I build my own desktops from components myself. It's pretty easy. Just takes a budget, research, purchase(and waiting usually as best prices are etail) and assembly time c 30m. The good thing is that I save $$$ and get to pick particular components v. taking what is offered by e.g. VM, alienware, etc.)As to whether or not the Reader is a PDN re-badge? Won't know for certain until we see internal component pix and/or the Reader fw at least partially(well it's entirely possible that they used SOME different components) runs on a PDN. The Mali-200 driver stack could be handy though for any ARM w/mali & running 2.6.29 kernel. Dunno if more will be needed other than to just get the modules loading yet or not... (Well this is ASSUMING that they actually do have the full driver stack which I'm not ENTIRELY sold on yet given the sketchy info known about this device to date.)
Joined
·
2,216 Posts
[quote name='clockworx;52659]It would be hilarious to see Cruz Micro take off as better-known company just due to their Tablet line. I'm hoping Pandigital would kick themselves for being so short-sighted' date=' but I doubt they'd notice.[/QUOTE'] I've been sort of telling them that...
Joined
·
87 Posts
[quote name='cutterjohn;52733]I really doubt that VM has the technical expertise to design a tablet from scratch' date=' and further doubt that they'd have the necessary capital available to make it happen. I WOULD believe that they either paid MORE for fw or went so far as to hire their own contractors to produce their fw releases.[/QUOTE'] This quote "Velocity Micro tells us that this was designed completely in-house by their engineers." is from an article previously linked in another thread. Based on that quote they are making it sound as if they designed the unit from the ground up, not just made a better front end.
One slight thing.. The dimensions for the Cruz Reader are : 5.6 x 7.5 x .57 inches.White PDN: 5.5 x 7.5 x .5" inchesBlack PDN: 5.25 x 7.25 x .5 inchesNow maybe VM is just being more exact with the Cruz, but it seems they aren't exactly the same size. Which I find strange, cause if nothing else we thought the casings were the same, with the movement of a few buttons, holes etc..CPG
Joined
·
548 Posts
[quote name='roebeet;52634]I'm not convinced that it's the same chipset as ours. I know that the prototype pics and videos look almost identical (ie the batttery' date=' wireless and microsd location) but that was a pre-release version and could have been altered since then. Also, just because the shell / battery is the same doesn't mean the chipset is, also.What bothers me is that they are advertising WMA playback and 720p video, which our device does not have. Either they've made significant alterations to the kernel and/or OS build, or the chipset is actually different. I guess we will find out in the next few days, and I certainly hope the chipset is the same as ours.[/QUOTE']I share your concerns(and hope i'm wrong) as I have the s3c6410 spec pdf in front of me talking about max resolution for on board hardware decoding as 720X576 and reality they say is 640X480 30fps h.264,mp4 and wmv(yes it does have wmv decoding). So unless we have a different dedicated gpu inside that they are able to take advantage of and I have not heard mentioned here I just don't see how 720p is likely. More likely and still probably a good thing for us would be if they are identical and VM is just "lying" about the video capabilities.
1 - 20 of 47 Posts
Join the discussion
