I just ran across the Korean GP32 console, which, although still 10-20x
Kragen's target price, is at least a linux-based open platform intended
for third-party development.
There seems to have been a corporate fork, and the original handhelds
are no longer in production, but the GP2X is available now, at about
USD 170-180:
http://wiki.gp2x.org/wiki/Main_Page
Of interest to the CEDP, it uses a pair of ARMs, with one core as a
problem state CPU, and the other to run the graphics. (QVGA built-in
display, S-Video out). It uses SD cards (USD 24 at the low end?) for
storage.
On the vaporware front, the original company (without the original
engineers, who produce the box above) claims to have a "GP32 kids" in
the pipeline, with a 2.2" 220*176, 65k colors, 4:3 screen to be offered
at USD 75.
Although TVs are probably at or below the metric of "suitable for
viewing web content on" (especially if driven by cheap microcontrollers
and minimal DACs) at this point they still seem like the best chance of
finding a cheap and cheerful medium-bandwidth display.
The ever-prolific Fabrice BELLARD has a small project which produces
mono PAL and SECAM still images as well as Digital TV-out:
"A Low Cost Analog and Digital TV (DVB-T) Modulator"
http://fabrice.bellard.free.fr/dvbt/
with the caveat that his "low cost" assumes one already has a VGA card
(he uses a 76.5 Mhz pixel clock for the DVB-T, and a harmonic for VHF)
-Dave
:: :: ::
Just for completeness, from another Kragen thread:
From John Canny's "The Future of Human-Computer Interaction" in the
July/August ACM Queue, some optimistic notes about current speech
recognition. The URL is
http://www.acmqueue.com/modules.php?
name=Content&pa=printer_friendly&pid=402&page=1
even though VUIs don't seem relevant for a cheap device.
Somewhere I had a bunch of thoughts about using the piezoelectric
diffraction gratings used in confocal microscopes to scan the laser in
the horizontal direction
There is a group in Zürich who are using electroactive polymers instead
of piezo for gratings. I doubt the switching frequencies are as high,
but the achievable strains are much greater.
