Dingoonity.org

Quote from: kristianity77 on March 06, 2015, 06:30:44 pm

When you say that its "only considering the Android scene", what exactly do you mean?  What does a $200 PC do that this wont and cost roughly 4-5X the electricity in the process? 

Don't say PC games natively because thats not what the Android device caters for so its not really a valid argument.

I think you've kinda answered your own question there, just because you don't consider it a valid opinion doesn't mean people with Steam etc. catalogs don't. Probably the opposite in fact.

Quote from: kristianity77 on March 06, 2015, 06:30:44 pm

Basically, this $200 box will do everything media wise and emulation wise that the equivalent PC will do connected up to a TV for a tiny fraction of the running costs (if the 5Watt - 20Watt power requirements are indeed true).  The only thing it won't do is play high end PC games natively (I dont need it to, I own a PS4 where probably 90% of the games either reside or will do anyway)

It won't match a decent but old PC for emulation though, not even a ?60 Atom TV box which hammers Android on N64. My laptop (a lowly AMD A6) which can be had for around ?200-?250 these days will easily outdo Android for emulation, purely because it runs Windows and except for DS the emulators are better. My Atom tablet runs N64 perfectly with all the fancy options maxxed.

Quote from: kristianity77 on March 06, 2015, 06:30:44 pm

I also don't think that the specs of that PC (and particular, onboard GPU) carry anywhere near the same power as the X1 does in terms of what it can produce.  Crysis 3 on the demo may be slightly stripped down on the Shield console, but I'm willing to bet anything that it still outperforms the $200 PC on the same game.

I will bet it does actually, I think you're underestimating the power of older top-spec PCs, keep in mind it's probably a machine which runs XB360/PS3 games at higher settings and resolution. If it can run Dolphin (which runs similar to Android on modern Bay Trail Atoms) then it will outstrip the Tegra. Also keep in mind the Nvidia ports of PC games will probably be at low settings with lots of cut corners, remember Half Life 2 on the Shield? My A6 laptop runs that maxxed out, as would my Windows tablet I would expect. On the Tegra 4 Shield is was struggling.

Quote from: kristianity77 on March 06, 2015, 06:30:44 pm

For the option of wanting a device to store countless movies etc all the way up to 4K, play emulation all the way up to and probably including Dolphin and using countless other media apps for almost zero running costs, I'm sorry, I just dont see how a $200 PC beats it, that has about 5x the running costs to boot.

You won't be running Dolphin on Android with smooth frame rates anytime soon, I would love nothing more than GC and Wii but I'm not expecting it to be around the corner. Hope I'm wrong on that one.

Thanks for the replies but I'm still confused.  I mean, the specs of the $200 PC that the other guy linked to I "believe" to be of a lower spec than my current laptop.  And my laptop is hopeless at running anything upwards of PSX and N64. 

Also, surely the N64 issue on android is an outdated emulator issue rather than a power one, it literally has to be.  PPSSPP on android shows that emulation of more powerful systems is streets ahead. 

Also I recognise that the device in question is niche, but then again all of these devices tend to be.  They are not out to outsell consoles are they.  I bet Nvidia would be over the moon with a few hundred thousand sales over its lifetime.

I suppose also, I wouldn't see the device as something to game on in the sense of stripped down PC ports etc, I have a 360 for older games and a PS4 for newer ones.

All I want, is a device that emulates all the older consoles through my TV and I cant see why this wouldn't when my old S7800 did perfectly well (apart from N64 as mentioned, those are emulator issues, not lack of power issues) .

In an ideal world I probably would actually have a small form factor PC tucked away out of sight, linked up to the TV and have it boot straight into something like XBMC or Hyperspin (The Windows front end to control and run all emulators from) but I've read up on it and it all just seems so confusing and probably out of reach for me setting up wise. 

Also, I love low electricity bills  and seeing as this Nvidia Shield has a quite ridiculously low power consumption ( in the UK, we are talking about ?4 for a year based on 4 hours usage every day (which is believe is about $6))  Thats another major selling point to me.  The fact that it more or less pays for itself over the period of time that its deemed relevant in terms of power. 

Like I said, if I used it primarily to house my film collection, and then any 4K films that appear, the device in that respect is timeless in its usability.  If I also wanted it to sit there with full romset collections of all the old consoles, MAME and maybe things like PSP, PSX, Dreamcast, N64 and possibly one day, Dophin, again, its pretty much timeless in that it will always run those systems.  It would only really become obsolete when Android (well IF) start to release games which the X1 isn't capable of running.  And seeing as big budget games are not likely to be on the radar anytime soon, I cant see how it would become obsolete hardware for well....literally years.

Also, if the streaming side of things does by some miracle turn out to be the next best thing (which by the way, I have no doubt will be close to terrible in the grand scheme of things), then it will play top end PC games until the device breaks, so long as I'm prepared to pay subsciption costs and Nvidia keep their servers up to scratch.

So with those points in mind, I think it represents fantastic value for money and a sound long term investment.

but as with everything, I guess its all about preference isn't it 

The bare minimum specs in the thread I found had the A6-6400K CPU. That CPU has the Radeon HD 8470D integrated GPU. This is a surprisingly powerful GPU, unlike the Intel Integrated Graphics ones, and undoubtedly factored into the decision of choosing it over others.
However, I couldn't find videos of it running Dolphin, but with a quick search I found those two:
PS2 emulation - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3thypTHDsWk
Watch Dogs (2014 game) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftJs4TskvCQ
Now, to surprise no one, Watch Dogs runs like crap. It was also very poorly optimized for PC. However, the fact that it can run it, even at minimum specs, is far better than any Android chipset could achieve at this time or in the near future, and that goes for PS2 and GC/Wii emulation as well.

Anyway, I've gone way off topic long enough, but I think I proved my point.
PC MASTER RACE.

Well, you haven't really.  Your last comment alone has shown what this really is all about, peddling a PC wherever possible.  You were doing alright until the Pc Master Race comment, now its just all gotten a bit....cringeworthy lol

This will be a day one/preorder for myself. I picked up the shield tablet with a controller about a month ago absolutely love it. Runs all my games amazing DT2, MW5, O&C and i picked up a few pc titlea like HL2 even tho of course I have it on pc. The tablet has been amazing basically turned it into a laptop (mainly do all my work in android) and a portable console for current and retro gaming.