GIVE US WHAT WE WANT!!!

Comments

• pixeldriver Posts: 287Member

  September 2013

  I desperately want ext storage too, I really hope they don't change things to £'s as I love that I can pay £17 for a card and get $25 back.
• Nightmar3 Posts: 2Member

  September 2013 edited September 2013

  Hi Guys, thanks for the thread.

  
  

  I'd like to add a lot to this off the back of what you've both put down here also and to put forward what my expectations were for this console, that in my eyes, never ever came close to what was put out there initially.

  
  

  Before i start on my thoughts and feelings, i would just like to say that i can understand that this is a new company, with a new model, product, staff and everything else that encompasses this, including the challenges associated with it on a day to day basis, so thank you for the hard work and effort this far Ouya.

  
  

  Let me begin though, by saying that i am not impressed with the speed which issues are addressed from a technical consumer point of view and that these areas of focus, from my point of view, are seriously lacking/borderline non-existent. I feel that Ouya are not doing enough or have enough resources committed to addressing them.

  
  

  I was looking forward to getting this little Tegra 3 Unit and getting to play around with it. I understood from how things were developing that this was going to be a closed eco-system (comparable to the openness of Android with the restrictions of Apple on the store and purchases) but it never crossed my mind that things would develop to the stage that, almost a year on, i feel literally no further forward in my experience than i did when i first received it. My Ouya is sitting gathering dust and i only switch it on periodically hoping to receive an update which is going to address the issues that i have, but this never comes.

  
  

  Starting with the console, i love the compact size an design, it looks great sitting next to my TV and anyone that comes to my house asks what it is, it pulls curiosity out of people. Apart from that, the rest of it is seriously at fault. Due to cost of the device, we can appreciate this this is not going to be the best components available on the market, i feel this point lets it down. The very simplistic way that i look at it is that this console should feel as quick and fluent as the cheapest Tegra 3 handset/tablet available on the market, minimum. This however is so far from that, its completely laughable and I'm sure that almost anyone who's purchased this would agree. If you take the original Nexus 7 (2012) just basing that on a similar platform, this has only 80 Euro of a difference in cost, but the original Nexus 7 has been optimized well on a software level and has compromised on some good components and some average components. I expected, and that's probably my fault, that the Ouya would perform 'Similarly'. So that's the first point covered.

  
  

  The next point, which goes hand in hand is heat. Now, I've stripped my device to the PCB. It was the first thing i did before i even switched it on to look at the components and the build quality, i guess i was looking to justify to myself that for 120 Euro or so it might not be perfect, but something that small and powerful in a small enclosed space is going to create some heat. I thought that Thermal Throttling wouldn't be that much of a problem as the device can breathe but even the condition of the internals was below what i expected. The PCB sits on its side, which means that the heat should be able to vent from the top and this then forces the cooler air to be drawn in from the bottom. This would work brilliantly if the device was passively cooled as the escaping warmer air would pull in the cooler air at a similarly equated rate however the big flaw to this was that the heatsink was positioned the wrong way for a start. Now, anyone who's looked at this, will see that the fins on the heatsink run longer in one direction than the other, the fins run horizontal rather than vertical. This isn't a major issue but i think that it would have made more sense to have as much open space available in the direction that the heat would escape and also be drawn in but to make things worse, the small fan attached to the heatsink is taking in a combination of cooler air from the bottom and warm air from the top and throwing this back onto an already warm heatsink. The air being expelled from the edge of the heatsink closest to the bottom of the chassis is essentially blowing out the bottom vents (If the weights aren't blocking most of that) so how are you supposed to get cool air into the chassis by means of natural convection when a greater more opposing force is fighting against whatever is managing to escape from the top of the console. I think it was a very poor design choice even with the constraints of the budget. Simply removing the lid from my Ouya makes a larger difference but natural convection is still out of the equation.

  The pins holding the heatsink to the PCB are not even straight or equal. Only 3 pins are holding this on so i have a gap at the corner of the heatsink where nothing is holding it down because the soldered pin on the opposite corner, has too much pressure applied when it was soldered in, which means that my device gets warm very quickly and its probably throttling at points very early to stop the chip becoming unstable. Other components that are covered with the heatsink like the memory modules and again, these have no direct contact with the heatskink. I will need to remove it and re-solder it correctly myself to make sure that equal force and coverage is spread across the heatsink. I know that i will need to go in there with some other kind of thermal compound but it is a complete Cowboy job. There are various other points hardware wise, but these are easy to work around, the controller button or stick issues but i'll go on to the software side of things now.

  
  

  Android 4.1 is ok, its fairly recent and there are a lot of devices still out there that run substantially older versions but i think the way that this has also been looked at, is in comparison as to how thoroughly they were with the thoughts and design process for the hardware. At no point since getting the Ouya have i thought that the software was polished, great, good and even marginally average, it really REALLY struggles to work without lag. Every option, application and game you go into or choose lags. if i were Google, i would be furious in the way that their OS has been used to 'showcase' the Ouya, it just isn't ready and its the worse Android Device i have ever used. I recently took out my G1, charged it and played around with it. Now i love that handset, it was the first of the first and the slide out keyboard is still a joy to use, but that's another story. Taking away the completely incomparable hardware specs from my G1 handset and the Ouya console, i would rate the Ouya variation of Android OS (dated today 24/8/2013) at the same level of a handset that came out in 2008, but i got it in 2009. Some of you might be thinking that I'm being overly harsh but that's how i feel and getting to certain areas of the android OS on both devices is actually very similar in time taken to perform the function, the G1 is obviously the slowest of the two but its negligible. There are obviously shed loads of factors that need to be taken into account here, but the only point i am making is that my Ouya performs very similarly to a handset and version of android which is 4-5 years old. The guys at Ouya should be disgusted and ashamed with themselves for putting out a device to market in that condition. Why don't you have a look at the various customized versions of android and launchers of Android and decide which one is worse than yours. You wont find any that are as bad as Ouys's, even the free ones so play around with some and see how smooth and informative they are.  As simple as that. 

  
  

  Updates... you knew i was coming to that didn't you? ;) The speed at when the updates come out is great, better than any carrier that's customizing android (Apart from CM obviously) i just haven't seen anything in any of them that actually improves the experience and performance of the device for general users. I see the odd entry here and there saying 'Improved Performance', now I'm not being funny but where and how did the 'performance' issues get addressed?. How does that 'performance improvement' translate into something that someone can understand so they know where to see this performance increase? The recent entry had me in stitches: "Our intern has hidden an “Easter Eggs” menu somewhere on the OUYA… can you find it?" Now i don't like to poke holes in stuff, but PLEASE can you stop getting your Interns to fill the console with eggs and get them working along side the guy/s that are in control of optimizing the performance of the console rather than filling it with more nonsense? Please? If its a Root Option, then i take that back. 

  
  

  So If Ouya staff happen to have a read at this, i would recommend the following below, taking the above statements into account:

  
  

  • Go out to a shop, get yourself the cheapest Tegra 3 Phone or Tablet and use that as the benchmark to bring your console up to (Yes, i said up to), its the least that you can do for everyone who backed you, threw money at you for months and months before anything materialized and especially for the guys that backed you or pre-ordered and got their console AFTER you got it to retail. I don't want to see videos of any guys sitting in the office playing games on your Social Pages when there clearly should be a team of guys, in a room, working on 2D and 3D and caching performance, and I'm talking 1080p 30FPS Minimum as one of them, with a pack of 10 starved, crazed dogs trying to get in for a snack. 
  • We all understand that the Ouya Market needs to be there, which is fine for Indie stuff, but please strike a deal with Google and get their services integrated back into your console as i miss the integration with all Google services, including the Play Store. I simply refuse to pay for a game (Sine Mora as an example) through Google Play, to then have to pay for this again to download it back onto an android device that should have the Google Play Store anyway and i certainly wont pay for it, it the console CANNOT play this at 1080p at 30fps, clean, crisp and vibrant like i have on my Nexus 4. Give that some serious thought, it would make everyone's day. If you cant get the console to run smoothly at 1080p, which lets be honest is tne only options you've really given, please at least allow for Resolution Switching from 1080p to 720p.
  • Please also consider that there are a lot of improvements with newer versions of Android OS, oh yeah AND SECURITY RELATED PATCHES that we would also love to receive if and when they become available. We cant stay on 4.1.X for the rest of the year and we certainly cant keep holding off for more Release Change logs with Easter Eggs in them
  • Release Notes: These are for techies, please make them specific and technical so that we all know what changes are being made. Little 5-Year old Charley from Some Street doesn't want to read them, but he probably could if someone gave him the URL, and he probably loves Easter Eggs, but he doesn't know the difference.

  I could keep going on and on and on and I'm just tired from typing now. No one is taking Ouya or anyone from Ouya serious any more, because....

  
  

  THEY AREN'T TAKING THEMSELVES, THEIR PRODUCT, THEIR CUSTOMERS OR FEEDBACK SERIOUSLY.

  
  

  "Enough time's been had, Pull yer finger out lads"

  Post edited by Nightmar3 on September 2013
• giantpune Posts: 33Member

  September 2013

  
  

  • We all understand that the Ouya Market needs to be there, which is fine for Indie stuff, but please strike a deal with Google and get their services integrated back into your console as i miss the integration with all Google services, including the Play Store. 

  I'm pretty sure this one isn't even an option.  If Ouya wants to be able to ship with the play store, or any other Gapps, they must get permission from Google.  One of Google's requirements for getting licensed to sell a device with all the Google apps is that the device passes the CTS.  However, a core requirement of passing CTS is that the device cannot be rooted.  Ouya ships with the su binary installed, and every update they've put out since release has included it.  As long as they continue to do so, they will not be meeting the requirements from Google to be able to ship with the play store, or any other of the Gapps.
• Piers Posts: 680Member

  September 2013

  @rworoch per our blog update accompanying the last release, "We understand everyone wants this feature (we do too!), so I just want to let y’all know that we are currently working on it. It’s not a simple feature to do right, so know that we hear your feedback and are working on it as our top priority. It’s coming =) "
  
  It's coming along and I don't think will be terribly much longer as compared to how long everyone has waiting.  It isn't easy to do, and not everyone can work on it given the skillset requirement.  The fact that multiple language comes out, for example, does not mean that those who worked on that would have been able to put much into external storage. 
  
  
  
• Nightmar3 Posts: 2Member

  September 2013

  giantpune said:

  
  

  • We all understand that the Ouya Market needs to be there, which is fine for Indie stuff, but please strike a deal with Google and get their services integrated back into your console as i miss the integration with all Google services, including the Play Store. 

  I'm pretty sure this one isn't even an option.  If Ouya wants to be able to ship with the play store, or any other Gapps, they must get permission from Google.  One of Google's requirements for getting licensed to sell a device with all the Google apps is that the device passes the CTS.  However, a core requirement of passing CTS is that the device cannot be rooted.  Ouya ships with the su binary installed, and every update they've put out since release has included it.  As long as they continue to do so, they will not be meeting the requirements from Google to be able to ship with the play store, or any other of the Gapps.

  Its very possible that the Play Store and/or Google Services Integration may never come into effect but I'm wondering if the requirements that you're speaking of, which admittedly i know nothing about, are being weighed properly. Again, taking a simplistic view point, would it be more important to Ouya as a whole and the community to have the SU Binary or Root capabilities or have access to Google services and one of the, If not the largest, gaming markets available on Android/World. I know which i would prefer. 

  
  

  But all things aside, i'm trying to keep in mind about the age of the company, direction and i think the overall idea is great if executed well, personally i think that the concept is dead already and I'm also loosing interest in this as nothing is happening. By the time Ouya next product is available and release, it will already have been surpassed. I've had better better experiences on the RK3066/Mali 400 USB machines running through the TV and they cost around the same amount of money.
  

  
  

  Take for example two of the main Statements from Ouya's main website:

  
  

  MUCH MORE THAN JUST GAMING.
  

  IT’S WHAT’S INSIDE THAT MATTERS.

  All that 1080p goodness isn’t just for gaming. OUYA brings all your favorite apps to the big screen, streaming shows, movies, and music directly into the living room. We’ve already partnered withTwitch.tv, Crunchyroll, iheartradio, TuneIn, XBMC, Plex and Flixster and are adding more to our list daily.

  We’ve outfitted OUYA with NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage (expandable via USB). So don’t hold back. Whether you use WiFi or Ethernet, download games or stream your favorite videos or music apps in beautiful 1080p HD. And since OUYA is the first totally open video game console, we welcome you to unscrew it and have a look around.

  I've marked the sections where i think are questionable as sale points. First and foremost its a Game Console, its not an Media Center. I would have preferred Ouya just to stick to their initial ideas instead of trying to make a product into something else before they even reached the first step, i.e a Video Game Console. Once everything was there, running well at 1080p and happy with the performance then the Media Center would have been nice additional functionality. There are a couple of big names on Ouya, and i mean only a handfull at most that we all know and love from other areas like Google Play but the console struggles to play them at 1080p with either overheating on XMBC whilst idle and struggling to run Sine Mora at a reasonable frame rate. 

  When you check the release dates, games and apps are being pushed out 'sometimes' on a daily basis but these items usually dont have any screenshots or pictures as they are concepts. This is not a guaranteed list in my opinion so fail to see why that's mentioned.

  The specs and expandable storage mean nothing as the device is clearly under powered for 1080p or not configured and optimized to the best of the teams ability and the storage option is still being 'disputed' internally as its really... difficult... to implement?! I could take a quick look through XDA and see who agrees with that.

  I wont purchase anything further from Ouya in regards to consoles next year as they have proven an inability to deliver on just about everything they have promoted but i hope that my 125 Euro console get improved dramatically before the end of the year, or whenever they stop supporting the device or that's a complete waste as well.

  Anyway, I don't want this to snowball into a rant or flame war, I'm just extremely dissatisfied with the product, the hype, the promises, its progression and ultimately what my Ouya has become.
• JeffRand Posts: 23Member

  September 2013

  I don't think having the Google Play store available on the Ouya would be a good idea. Most Android games are not playable on the Ouya because they rely on touch for input rather than a controller. I installed the Amazon store and have downloaded dozens of titles only to find that very few are even usable.
• Magnesus Posts: 304Member

  September 2013

  @JeffRand - it doesn't matter. They could make an app that would feature all apps in Google Play that support controllers properly and linked them to Google Play.
  

  
  
• Knuckles Posts: 16Member

  September 2013

  This is the whole reason I don't really use my OUYA. I quite liked it and have been trying to correct everyone who's bashing it by letting them know that for the money, it really is quite good and is starting to get a pretty good collection of games.
  
  However, I can't have more than 20 or so games on there at a time due to the hard drive restriction. I have a 500Gb external plugged in that I can't use for anything because I can't install to it or move already installed apps to it. The system sees it, it is mounted and it tells me how much free space is sitting there doing nothing, it just won't use it for anything.
  
  And I am an avid game collector. I've got over 40 consoles and 1,300 games. So a console with such a limitation on the amount of games I can have has almost no draw for me. Until this issue is fixed and I can download and play more of the games I saw that looked interesting without having to download the ones I already played and liked, it will probably sit dormant and unused on my TV stand. I've got the fun party games on there for hanging with my friends, but I would play it way more if I could also fit the cool RPGs and fun single-player stuff. Please hurry up OUYA, I'm patient but I'm kinda losing faith here.