VIA Technologies, Inc. thinks the venerable X86 CPU architecture has a future in
game platforms against the likes of Sony and Nintendo, so, under sponsorship of
the government’s Ministry of Mobile Affairs (MoMa), it has just entered the
market with the Eve Mobile Gaming Console.
Because it is the first handheld gaming device based on
the x86, the company believes that Eve has a chance of establishing more than a
foothold by making use of the wealth of support in the form of thousands of
existing PC games.
"The single largest challenge to entering the mobile
gaming console market has always been signing up developers to deliver games for
unique hardware architectures," said Richard Brown, Associate Vice President of
Marketing, VIA Technologies, Inc. "With its native x86 compatibility, Eve has
the potential to blow away any other portable gaming console on the market."
Integrating wireless connectivity as well as hardware
based security features, the company plans to promote it as a secure vehicle for
users to play online games and download content through the strategically
partnered GameDweller On-Demand content delivery service.
Based on the company’s VIA Grace Platform, the Eve
Mobile Gaming Console is powered by the VIA Eden-N Processor and the VIA CN400
digital media chipset, which supports 2D and 3D graphics as well as MPEG2/MPEG4
hardware acceleration.
The new gaming platform comes with a 20GB hard drive to
provide storage capabilities for gaming applications and digital media files. In
addition to an integrated 892.11 wireless capability, the platform also
incorporates two USB 2.0 ports and a CompactFlash Type II slot.
To provide the security that many believe will be
required on most wireless devices, the company supports the gaming platform with
its PadLock Hardware Security Suite, as well as Subscriber Identity Module (SIM)
cards.
Running Microsoft Windows XP Embedded, the Eve Mobile
Gaming Console integrates a 533MHz VIA Eden-N processor supporting SSE and MMX,
128MB DDR266 SDRAM, a 20GB hard drive, and a 4" built-in LCD monitor supporting
resolutions of up to 640x480. For advanced 2D/3D graphics performance, the Eve
Mobile Gaming Console
integrates the S3 Graphics UniChrome Pro IGP featuring a
200MHz clock that can drive a pixel rate of up to 200 million pixels per second
with two textures each. The graphics engine also features support for Z-bias,anti-aliasing,
alpha blending, Microsoft DirectX 7/8/9, and OpenGL.
The console has built in MPEG2 and MPEG4 acceleration
that enables high frame rate video, six channel Audio with optimized features
for headphone playback, and support for EAX 1.0/2.0, DirectSound3D, and A3D.
