6 ms·

Penkesu Computer – A Homebrew Retro-style Laptop

110 points by sohkamyung 5y ago

pqb 5y ago
I am not sure if we should call it laptop but a handheld PC [0] instead. It is the name, which was often used to miniaturized computers back in the first decade of XXI century (e.g., HP Jornada 720/728 [1]). [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handheld_PC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handheld_PC [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jornada_(PDA)#Jornada_720 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jornada_(PDA)#Jornada_720
- Koshkin 5y ago
  Big hands, you need.
consumer451 5y ago
Oh dear, penkesu.computer-heroshot.jpg is over 7MB. I guess github is not getting death hugged, but that jpg took 20 seconds to load for me. Not at home with photoshop but here is a re-sized (500px x 335px) image I made with a random webapp that comes in at 22KB. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rbvRSDD7xErzxMSwj__fKFIjNYapHzB6/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rbvRSDD7xErzxMSwj__fKFIjNYa... If anyone is wondering why I took the 3 minutes to do this, think of the energy savings at scale. Also, super cool looking device!
- throwaheyy 5y ago
  Google drive link doesn’t load on iOS, getting a spinner.
  - consumer451 5y ago
    Interesting. Same thing happened to me at first, but now it is there. Maybe I posted the link too quickly, or does GDrive throttle? By the way, the Download link usually works right away in these cases with google drive. The spinner is just the image preview loading. Although I've only previously seen this behavior while processing a video preview.
- dontlaugh 5y ago
  The picture you provided looks much worse, though. Quite noisy and I can see pixels. I suppose the real problem is that it's too difficult to provide appropriately-sized images for different user agents.
  - consumer451 5y ago
    Yes, sorry I tried to use a random webapp and I thought optimization was set to no optimization. I was just thinking it would be nice to have a bot/api/webapp that I could give my URL to and it would give me a set of links to at least a bit optimized images. Maybe something built into all IDEs, or is this a platform responsibility. For example, the OP images were much larger in pixel size than necessary. When I look at them in their full size, it is also a noisy image. Certainly a 1/2 resize could be reasonable while not losing meaningful pixels. I know this is a game of trade-offs, but it would be nice to have a standard that had very low friction. I guess TinyPNG almost does this.
    - emteycz 5y ago
      Imgix
  - MarioMan 5y ago
    > I suppose the real problem is that it's too difficult to provide appropriately-sized images for different user agents. I use a <picture> element with multiple versions as a <source>. This allows the browser to choose which size and format is best automatically. Many site generators will set these up automatically, with the right plugin. See: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/picture https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/pi...
  - NovemberWhiskey 5y ago
    It's just a 12 megapixel image saved with unnecessarily high JPEG quality settings. Compare: https://imgur.com/a/axLxDBT https://imgur.com/a/axLxDBT Photoshop's "fair" JPEG settings result in something that's functionally indistinguishable and only 347KB.
- ksec 5y ago
  I noticed the image was extremely high quality but I never thought about checking its file size. It wasn't just that image either, the whole set of image are extremely large by web standard. Now I am convinced JPEG XL is definitely the choice for me as next gen image codec.
justusw 5y ago
Is this available for purchase?
- pja 5y ago
  Build it yourself by the looks of things. BOM seems to be ~$200 at retail prices. All those little AdaFruit PCBs add up!
LightG 5y ago
Looks great, and takes back a couple of decades to when laptop / handheld design was ... not perfect ... but interesting, and had so much more variety.
canbus 5y ago
I like the use of GBASP hinges.
- JKCalhoun 5y ago
  I think I learn something every time from these DIY projects. This sort of barrel hinge was new to me.
cehrlich 5y ago
Everytime I see one of these projects I get tempted to build one, but then quickly realize I would never actually use it. I would love to have a use case for it / excuse to build it though. People that have something like this: what do you do with it?
- rtpg 5y ago
  I have a Pomera DM200, I sometimes take just this device to places and type up random story ideas and other sketches into it. Ultimately modern laptops have nicer keyboards, but there's something fun about the constraints of devices (like just having no real formatting options, so you just type out stuff). I think if you can imagine uses for the device in an offline environment you can have fun. Trying to interface with the modern web is always tough though... like "good web browser experience" is a hard ask https://goodereaderstore.com/products/kingjim-digital-memo-pomera-dm200 https://goodereaderstore.com/products/kingjim-digital-memo-p...
  - em-bee 5y ago
    i like to have a small laptop that i can always carry around, ideally without needing an extra bag to carry it. it is used as a terminal to ssh into servers should i need to do work, and otherwise to take notes and keep a diary. browsing is optional, as my phone can do that too. for such a small device the difference in screensize is not that much better. on this device i carry the most important documents, like ssh keys, etc. i could carry those on a usb stick too, but then i'd have to use up a usb port when working, and that's not always convenient, especially on the road. for years this was an OLPC, followed by a GPD Pocket 1, and now a one mix 1s. my next device might be a pinephone with the keyboard add-on. before i discovered the pinephone keyboard i have been exploring raspberry pi builds as a better alternative, but none looked practical. the Pomera DM200 looks nice, but for for USD500 i expect more. at least a larger screen, and linux support. the pinephone has the same size screen and it costs a third of this. even the GPD or one mix are cheaper and they are fully capable computers. the Penkesu looks much better in that regard. at least the keyboard and screen size match and the cost should also be reasonable
  - brudgers 5y ago
junon 5y ago
(For those unfamiliar with Japanese pronunciation, this is pronounced like the English "pencase".)
- JKCalhoun 5y ago
  I get it now. Thank you, have a bi-ru.
agumonkey 5y ago
A perfect platform for python/textual like applications :D
0des 5y ago
This reminds me of the Cyberdecks people are building on cyberdeck reddit. Most of them have the same screen form factor.
yupyup54133 5y ago
Looks perfect for dedicated nethack mobile gaming.
timdeve 5y ago
I wish that the Clockwork Devterm was this form factor.
freemint 5y ago
I wish it came with the OS from the https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrainPad_TiPO https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrainPad_TiPO but it doesn't.
- hammyhavoc 5y ago
  I'll bite: what do you like about the OS? Looks interesting.
  - freemint 5y ago
    The OS is based on BTRON which is/was an obscure desktop OS which today is only used because of it's non unicode character set which has a better coverage of historic Asian characters. What makes it interesting: Fully windowed desktop OS which is somewhat touch friendly. Comes with something like Apples HyperCard and those applications are drag and drop compatible on desktop and the PDA. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual19.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual19.html Those HyperCard like apps are as integrated into the desktop experience as folders are. The programming language for those HyperCard like things is nicer than BASIC but less complicated than modern programming languages. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual.html One could also program on the PDA if one had to. OS quiet fully featured (in so far as the OS doesn't come with SSL as that wasn't a thing back then). The lineage of the OS comes from the embedded instead of the server world. This means that the OS is real-time (and multi tasking) capable and this is useful to make meager hardware seem more reactive instead server lineage OSes (Android/Linux) of being more optimized for throughput. I imagine on modern hardware it would be as fluid as iOS with the level of customisablity and approachability of old Apple desktops with HyperCards. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/tipogallery.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/tipogallery.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/btron.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/btron.html
    - hammyhavoc 5y ago
      Thank you very much for the thoughtful response! This has given me a ton of stuff to dig into. Now I wish the Penkesu ran BTRON too... I can't believe just how advanced it was for the time. Utterly surreal.
flobosg 5y ago
Reminds me of the Lisperati1000: https://www.lisperaticomputers.com/ https://www.lisperaticomputers.com/

110 points by sohkamyung 5y ago

pqb 5y ago

I am not sure if we should call it laptop but a handheld PC [0] instead. It is the name, which was often used to miniaturized computers back in the first decade of XXI century (e.g., HP Jornada 720/728 [1]). [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handheld_PC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handheld_PC [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jornada_(PDA)#Jornada_720 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jornada_(PDA)#Jornada_720

Koshkin 5y ago
Big hands, you need.

consumer451 5y ago

Oh dear, penkesu.computer-heroshot.jpg is over 7MB. I guess github is not getting death hugged, but that jpg took 20 seconds to load for me. Not at home with photoshop but here is a re-sized (500px x 335px) image I made with a random webapp that comes in at 22KB. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rbvRSDD7xErzxMSwj__fKFIjNYapHzB6/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rbvRSDD7xErzxMSwj__fKFIjNYa... If anyone is wondering why I took the 3 minutes to do this, think of the energy savings at scale. Also, super cool looking device!

throwaheyy 5y ago
Google drive link doesn’t load on iOS, getting a spinner.
- consumer451 5y ago
  Interesting. Same thing happened to me at first, but now it is there. Maybe I posted the link too quickly, or does GDrive throttle? By the way, the Download link usually works right away in these cases with google drive. The spinner is just the image preview loading. Although I've only previously seen this behavior while processing a video preview.
dontlaugh 5y ago
The picture you provided looks much worse, though. Quite noisy and I can see pixels. I suppose the real problem is that it's too difficult to provide appropriately-sized images for different user agents.
- consumer451 5y ago
  Yes, sorry I tried to use a random webapp and I thought optimization was set to no optimization. I was just thinking it would be nice to have a bot/api/webapp that I could give my URL to and it would give me a set of links to at least a bit optimized images. Maybe something built into all IDEs, or is this a platform responsibility. For example, the OP images were much larger in pixel size than necessary. When I look at them in their full size, it is also a noisy image. Certainly a 1/2 resize could be reasonable while not losing meaningful pixels. I know this is a game of trade-offs, but it would be nice to have a standard that had very low friction. I guess TinyPNG almost does this.
  - emteycz 5y ago
    Imgix
- MarioMan 5y ago
  > I suppose the real problem is that it's too difficult to provide appropriately-sized images for different user agents. I use a <picture> element with multiple versions as a <source>. This allows the browser to choose which size and format is best automatically. Many site generators will set these up automatically, with the right plugin. See: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/picture https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/pi...
- NovemberWhiskey 5y ago
  It's just a 12 megapixel image saved with unnecessarily high JPEG quality settings. Compare: https://imgur.com/a/axLxDBT https://imgur.com/a/axLxDBT Photoshop's "fair" JPEG settings result in something that's functionally indistinguishable and only 347KB.
ksec 5y ago
I noticed the image was extremely high quality but I never thought about checking its file size. It wasn't just that image either, the whole set of image are extremely large by web standard. Now I am convinced JPEG XL is definitely the choice for me as next gen image codec.

justusw 5y ago

Is this available for purchase?

pja 5y ago
Build it yourself by the looks of things. BOM seems to be ~$200 at retail prices. All those little AdaFruit PCBs add up!

LightG 5y ago

Looks great, and takes back a couple of decades to when laptop / handheld design was ... not perfect ... but interesting, and had so much more variety.

canbus 5y ago

I like the use of GBASP hinges.

JKCalhoun 5y ago
I think I learn something every time from these DIY projects. This sort of barrel hinge was new to me.

cehrlich 5y ago

Everytime I see one of these projects I get tempted to build one, but then quickly realize I would never actually use it. I would love to have a use case for it / excuse to build it though. People that have something like this: what do you do with it?

rtpg 5y ago
I have a Pomera DM200, I sometimes take just this device to places and type up random story ideas and other sketches into it. Ultimately modern laptops have nicer keyboards, but there's something fun about the constraints of devices (like just having no real formatting options, so you just type out stuff). I think if you can imagine uses for the device in an offline environment you can have fun. Trying to interface with the modern web is always tough though... like "good web browser experience" is a hard ask https://goodereaderstore.com/products/kingjim-digital-memo-pomera-dm200 https://goodereaderstore.com/products/kingjim-digital-memo-p...
- em-bee 5y ago
  i like to have a small laptop that i can always carry around, ideally without needing an extra bag to carry it. it is used as a terminal to ssh into servers should i need to do work, and otherwise to take notes and keep a diary. browsing is optional, as my phone can do that too. for such a small device the difference in screensize is not that much better. on this device i carry the most important documents, like ssh keys, etc. i could carry those on a usb stick too, but then i'd have to use up a usb port when working, and that's not always convenient, especially on the road. for years this was an OLPC, followed by a GPD Pocket 1, and now a one mix 1s. my next device might be a pinephone with the keyboard add-on. before i discovered the pinephone keyboard i have been exploring raspberry pi builds as a better alternative, but none looked practical. the Pomera DM200 looks nice, but for for USD500 i expect more. at least a larger screen, and linux support. the pinephone has the same size screen and it costs a third of this. even the GPD or one mix are cheaper and they are fully capable computers. the Penkesu looks much better in that regard. at least the keyboard and screen size match and the cost should also be reasonable
- brudgers 5y ago

junon 5y ago

(For those unfamiliar with Japanese pronunciation, this is pronounced like the English "pencase".)

JKCalhoun 5y ago
I get it now. Thank you, have a bi-ru.

agumonkey 5y ago

A perfect platform for python/textual like applications :D

0des 5y ago

This reminds me of the Cyberdecks people are building on cyberdeck reddit. Most of them have the same screen form factor.

yupyup54133 5y ago

Looks perfect for dedicated nethack mobile gaming.

timdeve 5y ago

I wish that the Clockwork Devterm was this form factor.

freemint 5y ago

I wish it came with the OS from the https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrainPad_TiPO https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrainPad_TiPO but it doesn't.

hammyhavoc 5y ago
I'll bite: what do you like about the OS? Looks interesting.
- freemint 5y ago
  The OS is based on BTRON which is/was an obscure desktop OS which today is only used because of it's non unicode character set which has a better coverage of historic Asian characters. What makes it interesting: Fully windowed desktop OS which is somewhat touch friendly. Comes with something like Apples HyperCard and those applications are drag and drop compatible on desktop and the PDA. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual19.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual19.html Those HyperCard like apps are as integrated into the desktop experience as folders are. The programming language for those HyperCard like things is nicer than BASIC but less complicated than modern programming languages. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/microscriptrefmanual.html One could also program on the PDA if one had to. OS quiet fully featured (in so far as the OS doesn't come with SSL as that wasn't a thing back then). The lineage of the OS comes from the embedded instead of the server world. This means that the OS is real-time (and multi tasking) capable and this is useful to make meager hardware seem more reactive instead server lineage OSes (Android/Linux) of being more optimized for throughput. I imagine on modern hardware it would be as fluid as iOS with the level of customisablity and approachability of old Apple desktops with HyperCards. http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/tipogallery.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/tipogallery.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/btron.html http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/btron.html
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    Thank you very much for the thoughtful response! This has given me a ton of stuff to dig into. Now I wish the Penkesu ran BTRON too... I can't believe just how advanced it was for the time. Utterly surreal.

flobosg 5y ago

Reminds me of the Lisperati1000: https://www.lisperaticomputers.com/ https://www.lisperaticomputers.com/