Would an Homebrew Console Be a Realistic Venture and What Would you Need ?

[IndianCheese]

At least 750mhz

DEFINATELY CD/DVD drive/playback

Universal media card slots (SD/MMC/MS/CF)

That's all I would demand. Of course, it would have other specs, but I can see those as most important. It would also be crazy good if it ran off of a sort of Windows engine (even though Apple pwnz Microsoft) so we could port our favorite emulators to play all of our old games, in addition to the emulators that even played off of a disc, like ePSXe, so it would be an all-in-one console. I would love to be able to pop in a PlayStation disc, play for a while, swap it with a Dreamcast disc (like you can do on any PC with the right emulators), and jump right back into the game. The name of the console?

Tehbrew.

[jaycee900]

I think the best example for the people saying use a pc is using the pocket pc and gp2x as examples, people like to program and get the most out of hardware, i dont like the fact in some ways pc's are so upgradable that the developers hardly ever get the most out of hardware as in the same way as say the Amiga 500 was pushed to the max, the idea of a seperate console is the same as the gp2x, to have a community of people on a set standard of hardware, i mean there are faster open source platforms in pocket pc and palm units some of the new ones are using 1ghz xscale processors, the gp2x has dual 240mhz processors yet it has sold 30,000 units, people like developing for seperate machines more than pc orientated ones.

btw the name i would have would be : coshc (completely open source homebrew console)
yeah its crap but imagine how good the name could be if we took longer than 30 seconds to think of one!)

Other idea about this console is what emulators it would be able to run;
Obviously all the 8 bit and 16 bits machines, neo-geo, n64, ps1, cps2 etc but i know my comp struggles when trying to run some of the 3d intense mame games ridge racer onwards, if it was to be marketed then 3d would have to stick out to make people want to buy one.

[10shu]

the origami or umpc would be a good alternative...
pentium 1Ghz, 1go of ram, hd 60Go, touche screen, tv out, camera, etc...etc... just no gamepad!!!

Ive tested one...it run great with game like metalgearsolid, trackmania, midtownmadness, or emulator like mame, winuae, project64, etc...
you just need to have a usb game controler

[drewganov]

The homebrew console idea is fairly decent, and possibly you're looking at it from the wrong angle. Instead of just a high end CPU, why not take the "best of" chips from highly emulated systems, and set the architecture up to use the proper chip depending on the game to be played? A good example of this is in the DS. It has the GBA chip inside it to run GBA games. That would also contribute to higher success rates in emulation. I would include a decent CPU for more current applications as well. Just an idea.