Gemini PDA – new Psion-like ARM device

Well thats longer than one of ’Rick’s’ replies :-) Thanks.

A copy to ‘Archive’ list perhaps?

Your pic doesn’t show up with !Netsurf.

A search for the device – shows it does’t seem to have a mouse/pad.
Could you plug in a usb mouse-non power side.

As for price – about the same a ‘PiTop v1’ from CJE.

First out – can a version of ‘Linux’ other than ‘Android’ be made to run.

(it might be tricky – otherwise it would have been done)

I presume it uses a ARM chip of some kind.

Thank you for a very complete review.

A few comments of my own… (yes, one of Rick’s replies!)

It’s half the price of the cheapest iPhone X

It probably isn’t useful to compare anything to a device that most press outlets that aren’t sycophants to Apple describe as “overpriced and fragile”. To put it into context, your £599 price, translated into Euros, puts it into “flagship” category. Slightly less than Apple’s typical eyewatering prices, slightly more than most top of the range Samsungs.
The retail price, being what it is, puts it into competition with things like http://www.gpd.hk/pocket.asp

What’s the guarantee, by the way?

The top lid is held down magnetically, which is a nice touch.

Just like my S7’s box. Plus the thick matt black cardboard. While a nice box may provide a stylish introduction, it’s purpose is to protect the device when in transit, so at this point I’d have to wonder how much of the retail price the packaging is.

with the plastic body of the machine being wrapped in aluminium

It’s wrapped in metal? Does this affect WiFi/4G?

I think; the beeps and buzzes eventually just seemed a bit tiresome to me.

I liked the 3a’s little click. It was a useful feedback that a key had been pressed without getting annoying. Actual beeps would be too much, and vibration buzzes? Whoever thought that was a good idea?

It’s actually one of the very best screens I’ve ever seen

AMOLED? I tend to rip my DVDs to watch on my S7. It might seem a bit ridiculous given it’s a 5" screen and I have a 19" widescreen monitor; however I’m short sighted so can see close up things and the QHD resolution means that the pixels aren’t visible. But the main reason is the AMOLED. As each colour element actually gives out light (instead of the traditional way of masking a backlight), the whites are decent white and the blacks are proper black. You don’t really realise it until you do a comparison, but most LCD screens are awful. If you want a decently bright screen, the black will be some shade of dark grey. If you want a good deep black, the bright colours and whites will be dingy and muted. Not so with AMOLED.

but iOS scores are famously better than Android devices in such benchmarks;

Yes… Apple seems to have a history of “uninviting” media privilege on sites that don’t show them favourably. That is why the next new iPhone is often touted as the very bestest thing ever. I called bull on one a few years back who was making a big deal out of how some iPhone (8?) wiped the floor with the S7. Yeah, actually the “slower” S7 didn’t do badly pushing QHD data around, compared to the iPhone’s FHD (four times less data).

Take all benchmarks with a pinch of salt, and you might realise that the fanboy distortion filter is exactly that… http://bgr.com/2018/03/09/galaxy-s9-plus-vs-iphone-x-speed-test/

Also worth noting is that while a device (and yes, usually Apple) can blaze at benchmarks; the fact is that you will not be running all cores at full speed in normal use. Google navigation can cause my S7 to get worryingly warm hot; but full speed is actually prevented by the hardware. All 32 bit cores and all Thumb cores maxing out at the same time in an enclosed space? Would probably burn out the chip. Not to mention that such behaviour is a battery drain. You’ll learn to appreciate stopping the fast cores in favour of running lightweight tasks on the little cores, as your battery will keep going for longer.
So then we’re into things that benchmarks don’t tend to measure – how are different applications paged in? How responsive is the system to changes in load (and does it throttle back quickly?).

Note, by the way, that Android will give you a degree of multitasking that Apple just doesn’t cater for. In iOS, certain APIs can run in the background (music player for example, periodic email fetch), while in Android applications can run in the background. I could set off a long download then switch to an ebook app while the download continues in the background. It would also be possible to run ffmpeg to transcode an MPEG2 file to H.264 in the background at the same time (but such things use huge amounts of data and processor time, ffmpeg is best run on an x86 box really).
At the same time. At the same time. Something the benchmarks won’t indicate that can have a very real impact on how you use the device. Example? It infuriated me how my iPad Mini doing a download using Dolphin (because Safari couldn’t) required me to keep the Dolphin application on-screen. Switching to another task ended what Dolphin was doing. Hello? What? I’ve not seen that since DOSSHELL was a thing.
You may also like the fact that in Android you are able to wander the filesystem. Go install ES File Explorer and enjoy a freedom that iOS simply doesn’t offer. Plus, you can organise your files as you like, a file does not need to be squirrelled away in an application’s private space in order to be visible.
Yes, this does mean that every application can read data from other applications (unlike iOS), however I have not found this to be an issue so long as you keep an eye on application permissions and don’t install anything that looks dodgy (modern android will block reads and writes to media by default until you say otherwise).

and a GPU score that was over four times faster.

What did you expect? It’s a Mali-T880. The iPhones and Samsungs will likely be able to run a modern game in full resolution at 60fps. You’ll be lucky to get 20fps out of a Mali. Clearly the Gemini is not intended for graphics intensive activities…

deciding on which OS to boot into is a simple matter of holding down a button on the side of the machine at switch-on

The Beagle xM can do that. ;-) I have the default boot being my old 2012 era ROM, and alternative boot (USER button pressed) being a recent 5.25 build. It’s a shame the Pi can’t do something like that, but then again tweaking the config file isn’t too hard…

I would have liked there to be a mute switch and volume up/down buttons on the edge of the case somewhere, but there are no such controls.

Does it have a jack for hands free headset? If so, Android defines a specification for a control protocol (really different resistances across the microphone) which is typically used to provide an “action” button (play/next/pause in music, answer/hangup in calls, etc) but more advanced headsets can also adjust the volume. Not through the built in speakers, of course, but how often do you see using them given their side will mean…exactly what you’d expect from a speaker of that size…

You can’t even use it for file transfer.

The USB arrangement sounds incredibly obtuse, and the inability to use the expander and charge is downright stupid. Does it not even support Qi wireless charging? I can understand with a phone where the one USB socket is all there is, but this device? Incomprehensible.
[technically, it is probably because USB uses 5V while the charging system uses something else like 9V or 12V; but if this is the case then the other port should support charging, not be a nonstandard video output…]

The five colourful LEDs are intended to address this shortcoming

For the price, you’d have thought it wouldn’t have been too hard to put some sort of small display on the outside, like certain clamshell phones do.

The keyboard may be small, but it’s very useful,

Certainly. The only thing that caused me to leave my S3a behind was that modern computers don’t come with serial ports (or fully wired in the case of RISC OS). I got myself a Bluetooth keyboard for my phone which is okay, better than tapping bits of glass. I hope as the Pi created an explosion of little ARM boards, the Gemini might kick off a class of Android/Linux devices with real keyboards.

at half price as a backer…

That’s the thing though. At three hundred and something, it might be a device to consider saving up for (even with its shortcomings). At twice that, forget it – I simply cannot justify that sort of outlay on a piece of shiny-shiny. The only reason I have an S7 is the price is spread across 24 months (and compared to the price of the phone free contact, I’m only paying 20 euros difference, so while that’s 480 across two years, at 20 a month I might as well get a decent phone).

though I can’t see any major reasons why it shouldn’t be feasible at least.

It’s an Allwinner X27 isn’t it? The usual obstacle is the documentation, I note that Linux support isn’t mainstream which raises a question mark.
Another question mark is the connectivity. RISC OS doesn’t currently do WiFi, which would mean a USB network adaptor, in a device that can’t charge while the USB hub is connected…

Consider: the WiFi-only model costs £500

And the Pi-Top costs?
BTW, whatever happened to the Pandora thing?

recall that the Psion Series 5 cost £500 at launch;

It’s not really valid to point out the price compared to the S5 at launch, for this is a different era. This is an era where I can go buy a little Asus netbook for two hundred euros. A hundred extra will get me quite a nice spec, and as an Amazon Prime customer, I could order it today and have it couriered to me on Tuesday.
Okay, x86 is not ARM native and I’d be stuck with VRPC for RISC OS; however it is intended to throw the price into perspective.

hopefully with more visibility than happened on the Raspberry Pi.

Hehe, no. What made the Pi visible on a way that nothing has matched is the fact that at the time it was a complete little ARM board only marginally below the spec of a Beagle for ~€35, and now it’s a device with a better spec for the same ~€35. We won’t even talk about the Pi Zero – that for the same price as a Happy Meal is just crazy.
It’s that that gave the Pi visibility (and turned the pricey ARM board market upside down) and it’s probably RISC OS on that which gave RISC OS more visibility then anything else since Acorn.

It would be great to have a complete integrated RISC OS “netbook”, certainly. I’m just not convinced that this is “it”.

OTT – I see that you Rick have some kind of ‘ereader’ App on your Phone – what would it be – and is it usable ie [size wise]?

RO Manual’s in ‘ereader’ format?

[edit] Android ‘StrongHlp’ reader :-)

A copy to ‘Archive’ list perhaps?

Whatever you like.

Your pic doesn’t show up with !Netsurf.

You mean my avatar? No, it seems to be broken, and I’ve no idea how to fix it. I can’t remember how it was set up in the first place, but there’s no option on the account-editing page to upload a picture. Several other user images suggest that Gravatar.com is being used, and I do have an account on Gravatar from which this site could be getting my picture. But it isn’t, and I don’t know why.

A search for the device – shows it does’t seem to have a mouse/pad. Could you plug in a usb mouse-non power side.

No, it doesn’t have a mouse or trackpad because the screen is multitouch, so most of the time you don’t need a pointer (at least, with Android). But obviously it’s very helpful to have one with a Linux desktop, and yes, you can plug a USB mouse in. I haven’t yet tried that myself, but Planet Computers refer specifically to doing so.

First out – can a version of ‘Linux’ other than ‘Android’ be made to run.

Yes. I mention this somewhere in the review. It does yet ship with the dual-boot feature installed, but if you want to dual-boot Linux you can do so right now. Five Linux versions are currently supported (including Ubuntu). Follow the support links in my review for more info.

(it might be tricky – otherwise it would have been done)

It has been done.

I presume it uses a ARM chip of some kind.

Several, in fact. See the Planet Computers tech specs.

BTW, whatever happened to the Pandora thing?

http://riscos.openpandora.org courtesy of our very own Raik, I believe.

Thank you for a very complete review.

It was a pleasure to write one again after so many years.

It’s half the price of the cheapest iPhone X

It probably isn’t useful to compare anything to a device that most press outlets that aren’t sycophants to Apple describe as “overpriced and fragile”. To put it into context, your £599 price, translated into Euros, puts it into “flagship” category.

I don’t want this review (or follow-ups to it) to turn into yet another Fandroid vs Sheeple slanging match. (Not accusing you of that; just saying…) People have different tastes, perspectives and ideas about what’s good quality and good value. I happen to be a pretty big Apple fan these days because I like their products and think that a lot of their values are good (though by no means all of them) – but it doesn’t (I hope) block my objectivity or cause me to dismiss other companies’ products. If it did, I doubt I’d be so positive about the Gemini.

Anyway, this is ‘personal noise’, really. I made a comparison with the iPhone X purely for context – for the simple reason that the iPhone X has had so much media attention recently, and everyone knows what it is and what it costs. And it’s been an amazingly hot seller in spite of the price, so the Gemini looks really good value by comparison.

What’s the guarantee, by the way?

Dunno, sorry. I expect there’s some such information to be found somewhere, but I haven’t looked for it. It might say on Planet Computers’ website.

It’s wrapped in metal? Does this affect WiFi/4G?

Presumably not, or else it wouldn’t work as a phone. I haven’t yet installed a SIM to try it, but obviously other people have been using it as a phone and have claimed it works well. Both ends are plastic, so presumably that’s where the antennae are.

the beeps and buzzes eventually just seemed a bit tiresome to me.

I liked the 3a’s little click. It was a useful feedback that a key had been pressed without getting annoying. Actual beeps would be too much, and vibration buzzes? Whoever thought that was a good idea?

Fair comment, and basically I agree. Anyway, both the clicks and buzzes are pretty configurable via the supplied app, and the default click that’s enabled is very similar to the little click that you’re talking about.

AMOLED? I tend to rip my DVDs to watch on my S7. It might seem a bit ridiculous given it’s a 5" screen and I have a 19" widescreen monitor; however I’m short sighted so can see close up things and the QHD resolution means that the pixels aren’t visible. But the main reason is the AMOLED.

I’m similarly pretty short-sighted, which is perhaps one reason why I like this screen so much.

No, I don’t think it is AMOLED; it’s just a very high quality LCD. Blacks aren’t quite true black on this screen (so, unless I’m seeing an intentionally very dark grey, it’s not OLED), but nevertheless the contrast ratio is very good indeed. Also, the viewing angle is better than you’d get from an AMOLED display (that being that technology’s primary weakness), which again points to LCD.

You say that most LCD screens are awful. I think it depends very much on the screen. Some of the best ones are pretty close to AMOLED. For example, not long ago I spent some time comparing the screens of an iPhone 8 Plus (LCD) and an iPhone X (AMOLED), displaying the same images – and quite honestly, I found it hard to tell the difference between them, or say which looked the more natural. Both are wide-gamut displays (even the 8’s LCD), and though the X’s display obviously has the better contrast ratio thanks to the true blacks, in terms of photographic reproduction and colour quality, there’s really not much to choose between them. (And although my eyesight is terrible in all too many ways, I do actually have above-average colour perception.)

It’s a pity that Planet doesn’t give more detailed specs, but as far as I can tell, the Gemini just has a particularly high quality LCD display.

Go install ES File Explorer and enjoy a freedom that iOS simply doesn’t offer.

Thanks for the tip; that looks to be a useful app.

and a GPU score that was over four times faster.

What did you expect? It’s a Mali-T880.

I didn’t know exactly what to expect. All I was doing was reporting the results of benchmarks and putting them in context for the benefit of readers who might find the information interesting/useful, not making a value judgement.

I repeat: I had (and have) no interest in making this an ‘Android vs iOS’ or ‘Apple vs the rest of the world’ exercise. I like Apple, and have experience with their products. I liked Psions, and I like the Gemini. I have no axe to grind. All I was trying to do was report some performance figures, not to start a flame war.

Also, I’m not sufficiently ‘up’ on benchmarks these days to know what really constitutes the sort of reasonable performance that one might expect from a device such as this. I certainly wouldn’t expect it to compete on a level with the latest iPhones and high-end Samsungs, but the question really is: is the performance provided by the Gemini adequate/reasonable for the sort of device it is, in today’s market? In terms of my short experience with it, I feel that it probably is… but for those who want the Geekbench 4 benchmarks for comparison with other products, here they are.

I would have liked there to be a mute switch and volume up/down buttons on the edge of the case somewhere, but there are no such controls.

Does it have a jack for hands free headset?

It has a headphone jack, but whether that supports other controls beyond the audio output isn’t clear. Again, unfortunately, Planet’s tech specs say nothing beyond “3.5mm jack”.

The USB arrangement sounds incredibly obtuse, and the inability to use the expander and charge is downright stupid.

Yes; this to me is the most disappointing aspect of the whole machine.

Does it not even support Qi wireless charging?

No.

at half price as a backer…

That’s the thing though. At three hundred and something, it might be a device to consider saving up for (even with its shortcomings). At twice that, forget it – I simply cannot justify that sort of outlay on a piece of shiny-shiny.

Yes, but you’re stating a personal opinion here; you can’t make that kind of judgement for others. Clearly you wouldn’t shell out for an iPhone X either, but lots of people are doing so!

It boils down to what you want, and if the Gemini is a product that really appeals, despite the odd minor negative, who’s to say that its price is too much? I personally don’t think it is, given that Gemini is a relatively niche product. It’s the same argument we used to have in the days when Acorn was around. Acorn machines had to cost more because they weren’t mass-market in the same way as their cheaper PC rivals, and we bought them anyway because we had reasons for wanting them.

Personally, I think £500 is a very reasonable price for the standard Gemini. If I were buying one now myself, at market price, I’d go for the cheaper £500 model and save myself the extra £100 for the 4G version because I already have an iPhone and I don’t need phone functionality on the Gemini, personally.

It remains to be seen, of course, how well it does sell in the real world. Over 3,500 backers were sufficiently interested in it to bring it to life in the first place, but of course they didn’t have to pay full price, so it remains to be seen whether it will sink or swim out in the real world. But I really hope it swims, because it’s a nice device and recalls a very useful form factor from the 1990s that a lot of people liked back then, but which has fallen by the wayside almost by accident. As I said in the review, I think it should be seen as a PDA with optional phone features rather than as a phone with a built-in keyboard. Whether people in general are still interested in that kind of device remains to be seen. I am, but I’m not typical. If a lot of former Psion users have been missing their old Psions, it could prove to be a hit.

Anyway, given the nature of what this is, and the probably small size of its potential market, I think £500 is actually a very fair price for the quality and power of the device you get. And if it runs RISC OS, well, there may be a few hundred more people who suddenly want one (with good reason).

It’s an Allwinner X27 isn’t it?

Yes. Though actually, the very first few production models (not sure how many) used the X25. It was soon switched to the X27, and the current and future models are X27. (Mine came from the second production run and is an X27.)

The usual obstacle is the documentation, I note that Linux support isn’t mainstream which raises a question mark.

Not sure what you’re referring to there. The machine has a custom bootloader, but then apparently five different Linux flavours have been installed and tested, including both Ubuntu and Debian. Planet currently supplies Debian as a preconfigured download for easy installation.

Another question mark is the connectivity. RISC OS doesn’t currently do WiFi, which would mean a USB network adaptor, in a device that can’t charge while the USB hub is connected…

Indeed, the whole USB thing is rather a pain. But I don’t see it as a complete show-stopper. I mean, the battery life’s very good, and some user feedback I’ve read suggests that if you connect USB to the power on the USB hub, it maintains the current level even though the battery doesn’t charge further. I haven’t tried that myself, but if it’s true, it means there isn’t really a significant problem as long as your battery’s not absolutely at the last gasp.

As noted, the USB hub does at least come with a builtin Ethernet port, so hopefully that’s a solution even if WiFi’s a no-go.

Consider: the WiFi-only model costs £500

And the Pi-Top costs?

Yeah, but look at what you’re getting…

No disrespect to the people who’ve done good work on getting a RISC OS version running, but the thing just doesn’t pass muster for me as something I’d actually want to use. Yes, I’ve always wanted a RISC OS laptop, but the Pi-Top 1 barely qualifies. Apart from the ugly, clunky design, the screen’s pretty hopeless (I refer you back to your previous comment about awful LCDs… and this one’s too low-res to be worth considering for serious use).

A Pi-Top 2 I would definitely consider. It’s still a hacky ‘Lego Laptop’ concept, but at least it has a usable laptop-like case and trackpad, and the screen is HD resolution, which is a nice size for RISC OS (I wouldn’t want anything much smaller these days). But, of course, the software support isn’t there yet, and perhaps never will be. Besides, even if it were, the Pi-Top 2 is still bright green, chunky plastic, probably fairly fragile, and looks like a toy. And you can’t put it in your pocket unless you’re a kangaroo. For me personally, a Gemini has a GREAT deal more appeal – and who cares if it’s a bit more expensive? (Some people clearly would… but I don’t. I think the price is fair, so I’d be happy to pay it.)

recall that the Psion Series 5 cost £500 at launch;

It’s not really valid to point out the price compared to the S5 at launch, for this is a different era.

I disagree. I think it’s perfectly valid. After all, this machine is the follow-up Psion in the Series 3-/5-style form factor, designed for exactly the sort of people who bought Psions in the 1990s. The fact that you can also buy cheap netbooks and other alternative devices is irrelevant. If you want something that’s Psion-style, this is it, and it’s more than reasonable to point out its price in relation to its spiritual predecessor. People can compare it with alternative options and decide what they want for themselves, but I consider it useful to know that the price point has been set to be essentially equivalent to the Series 5.

hopefully with more visibility than happened on the Raspberry Pi.

Hehe, no. What made the Pi visible on a way that nothing has matched is the fact that at the time it was a complete little ARM board only marginally below the spec of a Beagle for ~€35, and now it’s a device with a better spec for the same ~€35.

Actually, that isn’t what I meant. I agree with what you say here, but what I was thinking when I wrote the above was that the exposure for RISC OS Pi was actually relatively disappointing. There was a lot of development activity at ROOL in the run-up to launching RISC OS 5.2 on the Pi at a big Pi Foundation event, and my understanding at the time was that the hope/expectation was that the Pi Foundation was going to make a big splash of getting RISC OS on the Pi, and promoting it fairly heavily (given the former schools connection etc.). In the end, for whatever reason, that didn’t happen. Yes, RISC OS Pi got launched, and it works and everything… but it never got more coverage than a bit of dutiful “oh, and by the way…” editorial for completeness in the odd magazine. No effort was made to actually introduce it to the Pi-using public as a worthwhile and viable OS on which good things could be done through a mature environment with great software. It was, comparatively, a bit of a damp squib, especially after all the effort that had been put into developing RISC OS for the Pi prior to launch.

Clearly the Gemini isn’t mass-market like the Pi, but maybe Planet could put a bit more emphasis on the ability of the Gemini to run a desktop OS with a lot of good quality mature software available for it – if the work were done to make it possible.

It would be great to have a complete integrated RISC OS “netbook”, certainly. I’m just not convinced that this is “it”.

Maybe not, but I think it’s the closest thing we’re likely to see in the foreseeable future, and in itself a highly desirable target.

No machine is ever going to be ideal, especially while RISC OS lacks basic things like WiFi support. But it seems to me that there’s an awful lot of pretty compelling reasons why the Gemini would make a great choice for a device to run RISC OS, and I’d much rather see RISC OS appear on a quality ‘complete’ device like this than on yet another development board that no-one other than developers has ever heard of. The Gemini is a finished system that you can carry in your pocket and actually use. And besides, lots of former Acorn owners are also former Psion users/enthusiasts (like me!), so I’d hope there’d be a fair bit of interest in the RISC OS community (potentially both past and present).

What’s the guarantee, by the way?

Irrelevant, that’s what.

Under the Sale Of Goods Act in the UK, products must last for “a reasonable amount of time”, and you have up to six years from purchase to make a claim. I doubt anyone, manufacturer included, could argue that it is reasonable to expect a £500 PDA or mobile phone to break within that time, despite being cared for.

So, six years. And I’ll see you in court.

BTW, whatever happened to the Pandora thing?

Excellent for gaming, poor for typing. The successor, the Pyra, looks like it’s going to have a better keyboard, but it’s still likely to be inferior to a Psion-like one.

So, six years. And I’ll see you in court.

Sadly, most of these things tend to be a case of cutting your losses if the fault is common and the limited company goes bust. There might of course be a half reliable “ambulance chaser” that would take on the legal chasing. Remember Microdigital were actually an established setup and people still got burned?

Sadly, most of these things tend to be a case of cutting your losses if the fault is common and the limited company goes bust.

My dad, rest his soul, latterly did “damp-coursing” with a “lifetime guarantee”.

He is, of course, dead now!

Did you know that Vauxhall’s “lifetime guarantee” has a duration of five years!

Why bother going for the inspections and doing without your car for a day!

Sorry, I’m just bitter!

Your mileage may vary, but when my launch Playstation 3 succumbed to the lead-free-solder yellow-light-of-death it had lasted four and a half years, so I walked into HMV and demanded a replacement.

The assistant was incredulous.
The manager was incandescent.
He then rang “Head Office” so they could “explain it to me”.
“It is not company policy…” started the nice lady from Head Office.
“Is it company policy to flout British Law?” I asked, “Specifically the requirement in The Sale Of Goods Act that goods should last for a reasonable amount of time? Is it your policy to ignore that law?”
There was a long pause, then she asked to be put back to the manager.

I walked out with a brand new PS3. Thank you HMV.

Oh, I’m not averse to taking stuff back¹ and accompanied a flat mate to do the same to assist on the replacement or money back at the customers choice.
He was initially going for a replacement of the lowish level music playing item but:

1. I noted on the way down the high street that a local “hifi” vendor had much reduced price kit that matched the cost of the setup he had problems with
2. Mr. Supercilious in the offending store took a dislike to me assisting Mick with the request for replacement rather than repair and I get a bit “not nice” with people like that. He went to his manager etc. All had the metaphoric teeth marks in short order.

Mick ended up with cash to go and where he went was to the “hifi” vendor. Very pleased he was. So was I when he bought me a few drinks for my assistance.

¹ Took a DVD/Digital TV beastie back for replacement when it “just stopped working and no lights come on”² Replacement obtained when they confirmed the fuse was OK and “no lights come on”

to turn into yet another Fandroid vs Sheeple slanging match

That’s not my intention either – I’m simply pointing out the logic flaw in comparing a device as “good value” against what is possibly the most expensive consumer oriented phone in existence right now. The price looks a little less positive compared against other contemporary devices.

Also, the viewing angle is better than you’d get from an AMOLED display (that being that technology’s primary weakness),

?
Are you sure you’re not mixing up your display technologies? It’s LCD that often has viewing angle issues (due to the optical twisting thing). In AMOLED the pixels themselves give out light so there’s no real issue with viewing angle. My S7 has a slightly bluish tinge at extreme angles, I suspect this is the glass in front of the display. The S5 doesn’t do this. And tinge aside, I can read the screen (with the colours as expected) from every angle until it’s not physically possible to make sense of it (like 80 degrees or somesuch).

I didn’t know exactly what to expect.

Fair enough. I only know of the “Mali = old and clunky” because this has come up a number of times in stuff I’ve read.

Again, unfortunately, Planet’s tech specs say nothing beyond “3.5mm jack”.

Yes, that is a shame. If it’s a four-pole that can accept a hands-free kit, then there may be hope. Google have specified a way that Android devices are supposed to do it (because in the beginning it seemed like every manufacturer wired their handsfree differently).

Nobody has yet done a teardown, so the insides are still a mystery.

Yes, but you’re stating a personal opinion here;

As are you. :-)
That said: https://bigtechquestion.com/2018/02/01/review/gemini-pda-review/

Not sure what you’re referring to there.

Native support for the device in Linux, as opposed to “a version of Linux modified by the manufacturers”, which is what it seems to be at the moment, though it appears that work is underway to change this.

But, of course, the software support isn’t there yet, and perhaps never will be.

Maybe I’m missing something, but isn’t it basically just a keyboard and a battery charger? The display ought to “just work”, and the plastic box…won’t need drivers. ;-)

That being said, if there are issues with software support with a known device such as Pi-Top, then what hope the Gemini? It’s the same story – a sweaty dude shouted “DEVELOPERS!” a lot, and it’s true. Software doesn’t write itself.

It’s not really valid to point out the price compared to the S5 at launch, for this is a different era.

I disagree. I think it’s perfectly valid.

Then I should point out three glaring problems:
1, £500 today is worth about £385 in 1997. A price then and a price now are not the same thing.
2, The Psion family was pretty much the only game in town when it come to useful portable devices.
3, Technology in general was more expensive back then. I could write a long paragraph, but it’s simpler to just point out that a mere €50 can get you a basic Android tablet. Undoubtably somewhat rubbish, but if you’re talking about a device today it is necessary to compare with what is available today instead of saying “it’s the same sort of price that it’s ancestor was twenty one years ago!”.

In the end, for whatever reason, that didn’t happen.

Well, when most of the “competition” is flavours of Linux, it’s hard to compete. RISC OS is a system very heavily steeped in ‘80s home computer design methodology. As such, security is non-existent, memory protection is… too, pretty much. It’s a friendly and open system, but it takes some discipline to use it properly. Errant tasks can (and will) take the machine down (in varying degrees of severity).
This isn’t to say that RISC OS is unstable or poor, we’re all still using it. But a person expecting the sort of stuff one can do with Linux? No amount of hype is going to gloss over the bit where we can’t watch kittens on YouTube…

especially after all the effort that had been put into developing RISC OS for the Pi prior to launch.

I prefer to think of it as a slow burn. Sure, there are some nice RISC OS machines around, but only one is cheap enough that you feel it’s okay to mess with it – and if it blows up, okay, get another. Only one is cheap enough you can give it to children and not freak out if they do the sort of stuff that children think of “will it float?”.
How many people do you think have maybe tried RISC OS on a Pi?

What’s the guarantee, by the way?

Irrelevant, that’s what.

Many people are unlikely to know their rights and be willing to exercise them. That’s why the likes of Apple¹ still send out warranty information claiming a period of ONE year² despite them having been fined some ridiculous amount by the EU ages ago. Other outfits are even worse – I recall reading a generous warranty of six months being offered for the Pine64.

¹ Not a fanboi/sheeple thing – Apple is known for warranty issues – Google, or just ask the EU. ;-)

² That’s what it said in the leaflet in the box of my iPad Mini.

A really good review Richard and as I have just received my Gemini PDA (also WiFi and 4G) and had a couple of days to play with it, my impressions very much match yours. I am delighted with it, and believe it is well worth the price and I hope it will eventually take over from my Psions. (Yes I still use my 3mx daily and have a 5mx which I use occasionally too. They are still in good condition even after 20 years (careful) use, and I believe I have not suffered the hinge breaking problem as I have always kept them in cases and never strained the hinges.) Regarding the new Gemini, there is one point I think you missed. It has bluetooth as well as WiFi and I have a small bluetooth travel mouse which is now paired and works with the Gemini just fine – no need to use one of the USB ports.

I have resisted having any smart phone up to now, so I am not familiar with Android (or iOS) so even that will no doubt taken some learning, and I’m hoping to set up the dual boot and use it with one of the flavours of Linux – possibly this ‘Sailfish’ which I have not heard of before but if it means being able to use the phone whilst in Linux that sounds a good option. As I know nothing about Android, the one disappointment I have with the Gemini is not having a comprehensive manual or user guide for both the PDA and the OS. Even a pdf one that I could download would be OK. Maybe even smart phones do not have them these days (?), but since these operating systems change annually it would surely be useful to have something to be able to find out how to work them and get the best out of them. So far it certainly has not been intuitive and I’m struggling to some extent. Does anyone know of a good guide for people like me that are totally new to Android and smart phones? Thanks.

Maybe even smart phones do not have them these days (?)

I can’t speak for Android, but the iPhone user guide is almost 700 pages (admittedly there isn’t much content on each page as they’re designed for reading on the phone’s screen).

I’ve also received my Gemini, it’s wonderful! It was a long wait with scandinavian keyboards being delivered quite late in the process even though I ordered as one of the very early ones in feb 2017.
Anyway, I can recommend this little machine very much! It was well worth the wait.

I’m not aware of any official user guide for Android. It’s probably not helped by the fact that while the concepts are generally the same, Android changes from version to version and then there’s the issue of skinning (such as Samsung’s TouchWiz).

That asides, Android is pretty basic normally. It seems to take the idea of providing the minimal basics, with the user to install apps to extend functionality. Some manufacturers include better things (Samsung), but often these come off of a different appstore than the Google one.

So, yeah. Good luck finding a reasonable guide online that matches your device. ;-)

Thanks for the corroborating impressions, Roy and Jan-Jaap. I’m still intending to reply to some points from Rick Murray’s last long reply, but I just don’t have time right now as I’m absolutely snowed under with work.

Anyway, just to say, Roy: I didn’t really think about mentioning Bluetooth in the review because I had nothing in particular to say about it at the time, and Bluetooth is something you expect all smartphone-like devices to have these days. Specifically in terms of using a Bluetooth mouse, though: I was thinking in terms of the potential of using RISC OS on the Gemini, and since RISC OS doesn’t have Bluetooth support, unfortunately a wired USB mouse would still be necessary.

When I get chance, I may update the review slightly, as I now have a couple of things I’d like to add. But I don’t for one moment regret buying the Gemini, regardless of all Rick’s reservations. I love it and think it’s a great device, and good value for what it is – even if it never does run RISC OS. But if someone did indeed port RISC OS to it, I’d love it even more.

By the way, one footnote to the review: I’ve now made some phone calls on the Gemini, and the call quality is EXCELLENT – actually MUCH better than I’d expected. It’s comfortable to use as a phone, too, and the fact that it doesn’t have a big glass screen means that you don’t get sweat all over the screen on a hot day, which is a bonus!

and Bluetooth is something you expect all smartphone-like devices to have these days.

Indeed. Many of the combi radio chips do WiFi, Bluetooth, FM radio, and sometimes GPS – such as the BCM4325 (WiFi, BT, FM).
It makes sense in a mobile device to have everything in one IC because less space, less power, less complication. Also physical connectivity is often fairly restricted in mobile devices so having a protocol that supports file transfer, audio input and output, as well as keyboards and such is a real boon. It would be a very peculiar modern mobile device that didn’t offer Bluetooth…

Just to agree with others, especially Richard’s cracking “review”, my long-awaited WIFI-only version arrived today, and I blooming love it already! It is what the next-gen Psion ought to have been. I’ve tried so many things over the years to replace the Psion 5mx with various bits of hardware, but never felt so positive about anything being able to manage it – until now! I’m impressed that they tried to re-invent the Notes application for the next century, but by the same token, am a little disappointed that the Calendar application isn’t as good as the Psion one (although that would have been a mean feat!). I’ve never found a Calendar application as good as the Psion one.

I’m not sure RISC OS would be great, for me, on this without a lot of modification to make it operational without a mouse (that was one of the main selling points of EPOC for me – you didn’t NEED to use the touchscreen, and it was designed not to require it, so everything was doable with the keyboard). That said, I’d still love to see it!

I’ve never found a Calendar application as good as the Psion one.

I totally agree. However, at present, all you get on the Gemini is the Google calendar app, and obviously access to your choice of alternatives on the Google Play store. I’m pretty sure that Planet Computers has its own ‘Agenda’-like app on the way, and that it simply isn’t finished yet. There are early photos of the Gemini running something that looks VERY much like Psion Agenda, complete with that incomparably fantastic year planner-like whole-year view, which (inexplicably) no-one else has ever reimplemented since Psion. In fact, Agenda’s Year Planner is the single feature that I miss most from Psion days. I don’t have any official information on Planet’s Agenda software, but I’m sure it must be coming soon because it’s clear that there’s been a version in development for some time. In fact, here’s a five-month-old screenshot of it that I found recently:

Agenda-like Gemini app with Year Planner

As for RISC OS without a mouse… well, it’s been done, of course, in software, with the cursor keys controlling the pointer… and it’s every bit as clumsy and horrible to use in real life as it sounds. RISC OS was designed for a mouse (or similar pointing device), full stop. Running RISC OS on something like the Gemini would always be something of a compromise, but the need for a mouse is something I’d be more than happy to live with myself.

and it’s every bit as clumsy and horrible to use in real life as it sounds.

Yup. Used to use KeyRat with the Bush Box hacked to start up RISC OS’ Desktop. It was…tedious.
As for touch devices, RISC OS will suffer here as the UI is pretty dependent on a mouse of at least two buttons (preferably three). Not insurmountable, but not so easy either.

which (inexplicably) no-one else has ever reimplemented

Do they own a patent on it or something? Yes – the Google Calendar Year view is crap. It shows a list of days laid out month by month, with the current day highlighted. There’s no indication whatsoever of events on any particular day… From a company as big/important as Google, it’s unbelievably lame.
[that said, I guess we ought to be lucky they haven’t taken it out back and shot it in the head….yet….]

> RISC OS without a mouse… well, it’s been done, of course, in software, with the cursor keys

But the Gemini has a touch screen. Far too small to use directly as a touch screen, I’d guess, but couldn’t the centre of the screen be used as a trackpad, and the left and right edges as select/menu/adjust?

A bit ugly, but if there is no mouse available…

Perhaps this calls for a little ‘quiz’ – on the best way the Mouse could be handled with a touch screen.

I’m not sure about “best” way, but tap-and-hold seems to be the accepted way of opening a context menu on a touchscreen.