I have a Pocket CHIP. It's pretty dire. The keyboard is useless. The screen is too low-resolution (480 x 272) to display the CPC's MODE 2. I had to hack in an amplifier and speakers, which barely fit in the case. When NTC were trading, they were pretty shady. Now it's just another abandoned machine running an old version of Debian Jessie on an obsolete single-core SoC (Allwinner R8), with a firmware you can't update because the nextthing.co repos are dead.
Or you could spend $80 on a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ Kit + HDMI cable and still have change.
(disclosure: I used to work for the Canadian side of Chicago Distribution, linked above. We sold a lot of Raspberry Pis. Don't think we sold a single other ARM SBC the whole time I was there.)
Coudln't disagree more. The firmware is fine by now, no need for further updates. Debian ist getting updated. So what? Doesn't matter if the company is no longer around.
No offense of course.
The keyboard is not good enough for programming session, but better than a touch screen Android screen keyboard on a phone for sure. Good enough to play basic games and enter basic commands for cat, run, etc. That's all a pocket CPC needs.
Screen resolution MODE 2 is hard too read, agreed, but who needs MODE 2 on a pocket CPC? Again, it depends on the use case. This is not a replacement for a "real" CPC, but a CPC which fits in your pocket. Hence the title
So, I consider all of your points irrelevant
I am not doing word processing or CP/M or other applications. This is for games and a "fun CPC to go" mainly. Not a replacement for my physical CPCs for sure (but no emulator could replace them anyway).
In general I would agree with the "no firmware update" is bad statement, in case it was security related or the like. But I guess I won't even update the Pocket CHIP anymore, in order to prevent it from breaking. It does everything it needs to do and I'll just keep it the way it is.
