On Thu, 14 Jul 2011 19:15:33 +1000 David Seikel <onef...@gmail.com> said:
> On Thu, 14 Jul 2011 17:41:27 +0900 Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) > <ras...@rasterman.com> wrote: > > > On Thu, 14 Jul 2011 18:23:16 +1000 David Seikel <onef...@gmail.com> > > said: > > > > > On Thu, 14 Jul 2011 17:15:53 +0900 Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) > > > <ras...@rasterman.com> wrote: > > > > > > > On Thu, 14 Jul 2011 09:27:24 +0200 Andreas Volz > > > > <li...@brachttal.net> said: > > > > > > > > for almost all soc's these days a linux port is a done deal. even > > > > older ones. the problem is things like gpu - if you want or need > > > > one. how good will that be? thats still to this day the poorest > > > > supported bit of an soc. often on older ones all u get, IF u can > > > > get source for their gles drivers is a poorly ported driver with > > > > lots of things not finished and left up to you, and even with > > > > lots of lurking bugs/gotchas. if you dont want x11 then u'd have > > > > to do a little work on making a gl_fb engine (gl_x11 but minus > > > > the x11 windowing bits and just raw gles/egl on fb). > > > > > > Don't think he mentioned gl at all. > > > > he doesnt need to mention it - he needs it if he wants high resolution > > rendering with lots of scaling, blending etc. AT high speed... > > software only goes so far. gl is not a "requirement" one should list > > - its a means to an end: "fast rendering". > > He did not mention that either, in fact what he did mention seemed to > go in the opposite direction - depends if he includes scrolling with "animation". a lot of people don't. for efl scrolling and animation is the same thing. it's all re-rendering. > > - flat board possible to mount on back of (included) display (~5-8") > > - X or framebuffer output for one single fullscreen process > > - enough memory to run OS + EFL + small application > > - less CPU usage needed (enough for simple animations) > > <snip> > > > All what I found was not tiny enough from board size and offered > > better (more expensive) hardware than I need. > > Don't sound like he's wanting to do much high resolution or high speed > rendering. Sounds more like my current project. Sometimes a slow > processor, with minimal RAM, and software rendering on a simple frame > buffer are all you need. > > If, as you say, gl is that much work, then he would need to consider if > he actually needs it, not just let it go without saying. Same with me, > I did not need X, I did not need GL, I don't even need directFB so those > are things I do not have to worry about for my project. It's all > working fine on software driven fb with much less effort. it all depends on what your final target experience is meant to be. > The older generation of gumstyx might work for him, it comes with E17 > as the default window manager, so you know it runs EFL and Linux. Only > reason I'm not using those in my current project is that the client > wanted VGA output. Just like Andreas, my client is having a hard time > sourcing stuff that is not just way overpowered for the application. that's pretty much part of the game. if you want to order in large quantities - you can get just about anything. small quantities == you have to piggyback off "excess volume" and that generally either means obsolete stock someone hasn't dumped yet, or something recent thats "out and in the mainstream and hasn't been passed up yet in favor of the next best thing". probably the only socs i know u can find readily these days that are not the cortex-a8 land (gumstix as u mention) might be the older pxa or s3c64xx ones - those are now pretty much on the "get rid of stock" list i'd think - or close to it. the gumstix verdex (pxa270) is about as old school as u get now in easy to find volume. and its a mere $20 less than the omap 3503 overo which gets you a significantly faster SoC. you're talking $150 vs $130. you seriously aren't going to get a hell of a lot cheaper unless you make your own boards, and then you'll have to pay for the board design, production runs etc up front so you'll only come out cheaper if your volume is up there. only thing i know of that might be cheaper is finding an already mass-produced device (gumstix arent mass-production really, though cool and awesome) and strip it down. chances are u will find it around a similar price range, BUt you'll get a screen, battery and other bits too. e.g. this: http://phandroid.com/2010/03/02/below-100-hivision-speedpad-android-tablet/ for $100 you get a s3c6410 (its going to beat the fastest pxa270 gumstix has at 600mhz as it'll clock in at between 800mhz AND has an opengl-es2 gpu in there too - thus why i ask about the opengl stuff). now let's compare the CHEAPESt thing gumstix has: gumstix vs speedpad price: $129 vs $99 speed: 400mhz vs 800mhz ram: 64m vs 256m storage: 16m vs 2048m camera: n/a vs yes screen: n/a vs 7" 800x480 + touch battery: n/a vs yes (4200mAh 6hrs) wifi: n/a vs 802.11b/g i'm not saying that he should go for this, i'm just saying that... a ready-made product is already cheaper than a bare bones board. i'd frankly consider buying the ready-made device and just port software to it and consider maybe a change of plastic casing and/or buttons. if you buy enough of them for an actual product i'd bet hivision would consider doing a design variation not just plastic but also buttons and other bits (at a price of course). the best thing you can do then is get a few for testing/software work, get it all booting and running, get prototype software up to "demo mode", get the ok to do product from that then cut a deal to get the plastic/button setup you want at a price you like. in the meantime keep working on polishing the software. at this point you HAVE an opengl-es2 capable gpu there, but you'd have to do the driver work - at least some of it, to get it up to snuff. if you want cheaper than $99 for a complete device... you're only going to get there if you do it all yourself AND have enough volume AND low enough costs AND good inventory sourcing people. you could knock $20 or so off the speedpad price if u took out wifi. anyway - thats a s3c6410 and linux ports are dime-a-dozen with the catch being the gpu. there have been efforts to support it last i looked. -- ------------- Codito, ergo sum - "I code, therefore I am" -------------- The Rasterman (Carsten Haitzler) ras...@rasterman.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ AppSumo Presents a FREE Video for the SourceForge Community by Eric Ries, the creator of the Lean Startup Methodology on "Lean Startup Secrets Revealed." 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