gaming on dell axim x5

[ProEnginePower]

Hey. Im in the market for a pocket pc, and i was seriously considering purchasing the axim 400mhz model. Id just like to know your personal opinions on this machines gaming and multimedia capabilities in comparison to other similair pocket pc's. Any help is appreciated, thanks!

[Xyress]

There are a few things to consider with the Dell in regards to Gaming. In order of importance (IMHO):

1) Quality of the directional pad & buttons
2) Speed of the unit
3) Button placement
4) Screen Quality
5) Battery life

Dell is pretty much top dog in numbers 2, 4, & 5 (if not the best, then it's close enough not to make enough difference as far as gaming goes).

The directional pad appears to be hit or miss right now. My first unit I received in mid December and the directional pad was not quite perfect. It was perfectly usable (works in all directions), but the up direction was not as easy to press as the others.

I *just* received my replacement today and it is completely fixed - I can honestly say that the directional pad is very worthy for gaming *if* you get a good unit.

Now, the proximity of the directional pad with the action buttons is a little close for comfort ... but once you get used to it (unless you have really large fingers), I don't consider it a problem. I don't know if we'll ever get a nice layout like the old Casios again. I can say, however, that the "B" and "A" buttons are the best I've used as far as the ability to press them both at the same time with the same thumb goes (crucial for running and jumping in Mario games).

Right now I'd say it is about as good as you're going to get with the present models. It can play NES/Game Boy/Game Gear era games 100%, so that's really all you need as far as speed goes. Consider that in order to play SNES era games, you would also need 6 nicely positioned buttons.

I say you can't lose with the Dell (especially at this price) - if you get a bad D-pad, you can get free replacements until you get a working model.

[PetiteFlower]

Ok that cinches it for me. I'm calling for a replacement unit--I'm really unhappy with the game play with my d-pad. If you got a working one, then dag-nab-it I want one too!

[Polly]

My D-pad came in perfect working order other than having to install the patch to get it to "select" when depressed. It is definitely worth having a functional one!

[QYV]

I just got my Axim last week, and it is a joy to play emulated NES games on it. I'm a pretty serious console gamer (I work in the games industry) so I'd like to think my standards in this area are pretty high, but take this for what it's worth. :wink:

The Dpad definitely has a "loose" feeling to it and has a wider range of movement than I would prefer - it's no Game Boy in terms of responsiveness - but I've been playing Super Mario Bros. for days now and have literally no complaints. I'm pretty picky about that game because the control is so well-designed, and I can't think of even one time where I died and thought "man, if the Dpad wasn't so loose, I'd have made that jump". All the buttons feel very well placed, and as mentioned by someone else it's easy to hold B and then hit A to get 5000 from the flagpole at end of level.

There have certainly been many complaints from folks with Axims that their Dpads actually wouldn't function in one or more directions. I haven't experienced that, but like I say, I just got mine. It seemed like there was a point in mid-January where Dell wasn't shipping any units for several weeks (this is when the wait time went out to Feb all of a sudden) and I'm wondering if they tweaked the hardware to fix the Dpad problems that were present in the "first run".

Note also that I haven't installed the Dpad 5th button fix either. I've heard that improves responsiveness in addition to adding the 5th button function, but I'm a little skeptical since the responsivenesss seems like a hardware issue.

BTW, if you're looking for a NES emulator, go with Pocket Nester. Better performance than Pocket NES by quite a good margin on the Axim, plus it has turbo functions for A and B! Only downside is many of the ROMs I tried won't work properly with the Save/Load State options.

[PetiteFlower]

I dl'd the patch and noticed no performance difference in the button. It still doesn't go left or up reliably. But the patch is still cool because it lets you "enter" by pressing the dpad. I plan on installing it again when I get my new unit. You may have some trouble finding it though since dell took it off their site. A link to it was posted on a thread last week or so in here though.