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[mtxblau]

VIA announces x86-based mobile gaming console

by Geoff Gasior - 02:27 am, May 13, 2004

VIA has announced the interesting Eve mobile gaming console with x86 roots and plenty of potential as a media playback device. Here are some highlights from Eve's hardware spec, which is based on VIA's Grace mobile console platform:

* 533MHz Eden-N Processor on a 133MHz front-side bus

* 128MB DDR266 SDRAM

* 20GB hard drive

* VIA CN400 chipset

* S3 UniChrome Pro graphics with 200MHz core clock

* VIA Vinyl six-channel audio with EAX support

* 4" 640x480 LCD display

* two USB 2.0 ports

* 802.11b Wi-Fi

Essentially, it's a little PC running Windows XP embedded. With the help of a SIM card, Eve will leverage the Eden-N's hardware cryptography engine to serve DRM-encrusted games through the GameDweller network. GameDweller doesn't currently offer a list of available titles, but Eve's x86 roots should make it easy to port a wide variety of titles to the device, if porting is necessary at all.

Eve was designed by the Ministry of Mobile Affairs, which is headed by Andrew Huang, the author of Hacking the Xbox: An Introduction to Reverse Engineering. Hacking won't be necessary to turn Eve into an open platform, though. According to the GameDweller Whitepaper, SIM cards will be sold that unlock Eve's BIOS, leaving the device open for all sorts of interesting applications.

The Ministry of Mobile Affairs' Eve FAQ claims the device will be available in the first quarter of 2005, just missing the holiday season.

 

[it290]

Sounds kind of cool, but can it run any software, or only DRM-enabled crap? And can you boot other stuff on it besides XP?

Also, is a 533 mhz Eden even enough to run full-res DivX at a decent speed? I was under the impression that a 533mhz celeron eats those things for breakfast (which isn't saying much)...

 

[Alexvrb]

Originally posted by it290@May 13, 2004 @ 09:12 PM

Sounds kind of cool, but can it run any software, or only DRM-enabled crap? And can you boot other stuff on it besides XP?

Also, is a 533 mhz Eden even enough to run full-res DivX at a decent speed? I was under the impression that a 533mhz celeron eats those things for breakfast (which isn't saying much)...

FAQ

See Q9.

You can put whatever you want on it, as long as you are willing to sacrifice some of the advantages of using XPe over, say, regular XP. It says it accelerates MPEG4, so I'm going to assume the CPU wouldn't have to suck up all the work when decoding Divx. Honestly, it doesn't sound like a bad device except for the battery life. They said around 4 hours, and that was off two (2) lithium ion batteries. Ouch. It would be nice to play all sorts of PC and console (emulated) games on a handheld, though. We'll have to wait and see what they do with this, they hinted at the possibility of offering different models/variants.

 

[it290]

Hmm.. after seeing the form factor it looks a little ridiculous. Is that just a prototype?

 

[Alexvrb]

Originally posted by it290@May 14, 2004 @ 01:39 AM

Hmm.. after seeing the form factor it looks a little ridiculous. Is that just a prototype?

Probably. It isn't going to be showing up any time soon.