Win a K1 Reverse Engineered GBA!

[gibberoids]

The K1 is the first ever fully reverse engineered GBA hardware clone. It natively supports all GBA ROMs and homebrew. It also supports multiplayer link to other K1 and official GBA machines, TV Output, emulators, MP3 playback and more.

It's been in development a very long time (too long, really) but is finally at mass production stage. It's the ultimate collectible and a great handheld all around for GBA fans. I've had a prototype for a few months now and I love it very much.

For more info, and your chance to win one - please head on over to my blog. It only has a small reader base, so if you enter you will probably stand a semi-decent chance of winning.

http://obscurehandhelds.wordpress.com/2 ... -free-one/

Sorry if this is construed as spam, I'm just trying to spread the word to all the people who I think would be interested in something like this.

Cheers

[Lokkenjawnz]

So this is initially very interesting, a fully (more or less) compatible reverse engineered GBA! However upon viewing the site, FAQ, etc., I'm a bit less enthusiastic about it. I understand the whole "make it because you can" attitude, and I applaud the work that's gone into this, it's pretty amazing. However, I don't see any reason to buy it over an actual GBA SP and a flash card. It doesn't support GB/GBC, which is understandable, but there's other things, like why isn't there a proper headphone jack? I'd imagine it wouldn't be difficult to add, and it'd give it a leg up over the standard GBA SP. Also, why is it mono audio for the TV out? The system is capable of stereo sound, so why isn't it being piped to the TV? I hope this is some sort of a limitation on the hardware's part, because if it's just an oversight, it's a bit bizarre.

Now beyond these, admittedly fairly minor shortcomings, it's still pretty damn cool. But I still don't see the point. I think that the team should have taken some more chances with this, it's a pretty awesome to have an opportunity to, quite literally, build your own GBA, so why not go for broke? Maybe they could have tried a larger screen, sort of a GBA XL, maybe a different form factor (similar to the original GBA even). Hell, if they just released it as a standalone board, and left the housing, battery, screen, etc. up to the customer, I'd pay a pretty penny for that!

I apologize for the wall of text, but I love me some GBA action, and this thing has so much potential, that I feel it's not quite living up to.

Although, to be fair, I do think I still want one. Dammit!

[gibberoids]

Hi Lokkenjawnz

I agree with you completely about these short comings... the reason for most of them (headphone jack, screen size etc) is very simple though - cost. In China GBA SP cases cost less than $1 each, but to modify them like that would have bumped up the price significantly.

Secondly, the actual K1 SoC does support all of these things or so I've been told by the team, but it is up to individual manufacturers how they utilise them. The board is also capable of stereo output with VGA to the TV, but in this case the manufacturer that decided to produce them went with composite and mono output. Again, I guess this is down to cost.

Here in the UK, a backlit AGS-101 unit costs between £40-£70 second hand, and then you must add a flashcart as well. So if you already have one then I can see that it's a bit of a stretch to grab the K1... but for some people at least it is a much cheaper option and offers more than the AGS-101 would as well (except for GB/GBC compatibility). And on top of that, for hardcore GBA fans this is pretty much the ultimate collectors item. I have many GBAs (original, original with front-light fitted, official SP with frontlight, official SP with backlight, fake emulated original, fake emulated SP, two K1 prototypes) but I'll still be grabbing one of these. Do I have a problem?

All of that aside, MaxZhou88 is apparently working on one of these in a different shell. I haven't heard anything of it for a while but you can check an old blog post about it here.
http://obscurehandhelds.wordpress.com/2 ... have-here/

Cheers for showing an interest and good luck winning a free one if you enter

[Lokkenjawnz]

How much is this going to cost anyways? I'd imagine that'll be the big make or break factor. We here on Racketboy are about as niche as it gets, so I think our interest in this isn't a good indicator for the world at large. If this is at the right price though, maybe it'll cause a resurgence in GBA homebrew.

I just want to see a production model, and a review. I feel like I'm bitching about this a lot, and I haven't even seen the final product yet, so I feel a bit like I'm jumping the gun. If the SoC does support the things you say, hopefully they can leave it easily accessible for people to modify it to suit their own needs.

[gibberoids]

Last chance to enter today!

[gtmtnbiker]

Last chance to enter today!

Looks like you have to create a new site banner to enter the contest, right? Hmm, that's a non-trivial task.

[avrame]

Looking at their website, est. pricing on the launch units are $60-70 http://www.k1gba.com/gba-console-team-h ... -p-37.html

I'll be sure to pick one up, but the screen is my concern. Does the unit have a similar to the 101 series, or more so like the 001? Lastly, is it capable of playing actual GBA carts? I'd love to play my collection on this unit to avoid having to start over on some of my games

[gibberoids]

Looking at their website, est. pricing on the launch units are $60-70 http://www.k1gba.com/gba-console-team-h ... -p-37.html

I'll be sure to pick one up, but the screen is my concern. Does the unit have a similar to the 101 series, or more so like the 001? Lastly, is it capable of playing actual GBA carts? I'd love to play my collection on this unit to avoid having to start over on some of my games

The screen is backlit like the 101, it's bright and crisp and generally looks great. And yes, you can play normal GBA carts on it too.

[fastbilly1]

Does it support sleep on any titles?