The Tapwave "Zodiac" is available for pre-order
 

Got an email today from Tapwave that they're taking pre-orders for their new handheld PDA/gaming device. $299 for the 32 MB version, $399 for the 128 MB version. I'm due for a PDA upgrade and this is really tempting. PDA, MP3, gaming, video, with up to 1 GB in expansion memory.

Anybody managed to see one in person?

Think this platform is gonna have any lasting power?

Small company
 

Proprietary... no money to buy developers... produce their own games?

Sounds like a recipe for coaster material. Give it 6 months, then see if there are any games actually worth playing.

I've had a fair amount of hands on time with the Zodiac, actually. Spent about 90 minutes with it total at E3 and have since seen it and played it for about the same amount of time since then. I'm a HUGE fan of this device and plan to get one myself. It has a much, much better screen than the N-gage (of which I have two test units now) - wider and brighter. The graphics engine is very smooth. The button layout is very intuitive. And the sound is really nice.

As a Palm unit, it might even be better. All the functionality of a Palm, Wordsmith word processor, MP3 player, alarm clock functionality (for business travelers). All this with Bluetooth and rechargeable batteries.

Will it make a dent in the GBA market? Nah. But it's a really good device - and Palm owners like games, so I think it will survive. And it has some good first party games for launch, as well as being compatible with every Palm game currently on the market. Pretty good lineup, if ya ask me!