I'm honestly surprised anyone even backed the Pandora. It was so ridiculously overpriced, and it's even more ridiculously overpriced now. Gamepark and Dingoo were making comparable systems for 1/3 the price.
Still ridiculous that some people are still waiting for their preorder after waiting almost 5 years, but man putting up what was it $330 upfront for that?
$330 in 2008 was a steal for what you got, Dingoo and GPH were in no way comparable, OP's speed, form factor, and features blew away what any other open handheld was doing. It blew away the specs of the Dingoo, GP2X, Wiz, even the PSP, and would have been about as or more powerful than then-current smartphones. It wasn't until around late 2009 saw the rise of snapdragons and GHz-class smartphones that they were more powerful. Unfortunately with all the delays, the price was pushed up higher for retail units and the 1GHz units started at $700, and by that time smartphones easily outclassed it in terms of raw power. It's still unbeatable when you consider the form-factor and entire-value proposition, but it's a very niche device and for most the price is a turn off. It's really a shame what happened there.
It's borderline insulting to be told that my only hope to get anything for giving them $400 years ago is to give them a sum total of MORE money than someone who just orders the exact same thing from the webstore today. Why am I being penalized for preordering and helping to get that project off the ground?
I know how you feel though. I hate the order limbo but at this point there's no money for a refund, either, so short of paying double I have to sit and wait until hell freezes over for the original order to ship, too. I've given up being angry at this point, though, and one day maybe it'll arrive at my doorstep, maybe it won't.
Don't wanna derail this thread any longer with OP stuff though so I'll bow out. Good luck to all the GCW backers, I hope there's some good news in your future about all this. :/
