[AML]

After looking at the web site (http://www.phantom.net/)
And at the Product Demo, It seems like this machine is going on to actual release.
There have been a lot of scheptics giving the companies CEO a lot of flak, but the machine itslef looks like its done, and its FREE!

Join up for 2 years and get the hardware free. To play games, you also buy them online so basicaly its a pay per play system.

Games wise they offer PC games as long as they are available on the Phantoms network. No instalation, only download and play.

Hardware wise it will have both keyboard/mouse and Controller conectivity. The keyboard mouse combo is unique and actually looks interesting.

The Phantom will conect to a digital amp via optical (5.1), and to an HD TV like a plasma or LCD TV. Im not sure if it will conect to a monitor via RGB or DVi so it may not offer the same resolutions you get on a PC.

Im still very scheptical about the whole companie but its unfair to judge the system itself before it comes out. It has some promise and it looks like it may bridge the gap between consoles and PCs.

Im not going to sign up for it straight away, but if it does well after a year or so of release it might be worth a look.
I dont think the CEO can do what he did with his other ventures. (ie steall all the money and run.)
Since the machine is free and you get what you pay for in terms of games, the only way this could fail is if the online content fails to materialize. Those who have the machine wont be loosing anything.

And since all you do is sign up for 2 years, you dont pay any actual money until the games become available to buy.

[Sinzer]

AMD® Athlon™ XP 2500+ central processing unit (CPU)
NVIDIA® GeForce™ FX 5700 Ultra graphics processing unit (GPU)
NVIDIA nForce™2 Ultra 400 platform processor
256 MB RAM
40 GB local content cache
Microsoft Windows XP® Embedded Operating System
Dynamic, personalized user interfaces customizable for age, gender or technical expertise
Lapboard, mouse and game pad included
HDTV and Dolby® Digital 5.1 compatible
Works with any consumer-standard broadband Internet Service Provider (ISP): DSL or faster

LOL, dead in the water IMO. Dependant on the costs of the hardware, but tbh I really don't see how this PC is going to play any of the current games decently..... You certainly won't be playing Doom3 on a Nvidia 5700.

I pity the fools that buy this machine. Better off going down to PC world and buying some budget Packard Hell.

[sleepyone]

I saw a 30min movie of the unit being demo'd to a couple of guys. They were playing the latest Unreal Tourney and it looked quite smooth.

And i'm currently playing doom3 on my FX5600 so there's no reason why the phantom can't play it. Yes, it and many other games might not be at the highest resolution but I woudl have though if your thinking of buying this chances are you not the sort of person who's concerned about running games at full resulotion with 8xAA.

Def looks aimed towards the family market and not the hardcore gamer, but then what console is?

[bluesteel]

wasnth this exposed as a scam designed to get a huge mailing list of people who are early adopters?
ie a list of people rich , techno obesessed and gullible
btw id be on that list somehow
haha

[t-force]

Infinium Labs themselves are in major financial trouble, as I read a couple of days ago on Gamespot.

Details here

Infinium Labs are now saying that the Phantom will not ship until 2005; by then of course the spec will be even more out of date, but it really depends as to whether they can stay afloat until launch date.

I have my doubts personally.

[CAS FAN]

Surely they are going about this in completely the wrong way. It seems to me that the service they are offering is the main thing not the console itself. Why they don't offer the service to existing PC owners instead is beyond me! If you are going to produce a PC based console then it should be like the X-Box and be a format all to itself, with it's own games catalogue.

As Sinzer mentioned, the machine mentioned won't play most current games that well and definately won't be able to keep up over the next year or two with PC games delevopment.

I'm all for pay to play gaming though, as I think if done right this could all but eliminate piracy, allow faster access to games & updates, get rid of the need to buy an annual update (ala EA Sports) as you subscribe to the game and it get's constantly updated and it should also be a lot cheaper (lower distribution costs & more sales due to eliminating piracy). MMORPG's are already marketed in this way very successfully (for example I downloaded Anarchy Online around a year ago & played it for around 6 months paying my subscription. I then cancelled my Subs and uninstalled the game when I became tired of it) and there is no reason why the industry can not go this way.

IMO though the Phantom is probably a joke (hence the name Phantom) but I guess time will tell.