The efika project looks very promosing to me. The only thing holding my back a little is the fact that is motherboard only. I could use some instruction on what to get else to get a complete system. Here are the things i thought of:

1. Power Suply Unit (but what kind, and what kind of connector do i need to connect it to the efika)
2. Graphics Card (An XGI V3XE to be future compatible, but where can i buy one?)
3. Harddisk or HardDiskFlashCard or/and SD Card or/and dvdrom drive. How many ide devices can be connected to the efika at once? Is there an internal usb connector?
4. Case?

Do i need more? And can i can i all this in the Netherlands or at least in Europe?

Thanks for your answers in advance.

My goal for using the efika is a homebrew game console. I know it won't be the fastest but it will be legal to use and have opengl acceleration.

hi mvdhoning, and welcome here !

i'll try to answer your questions, please folks correct me when i'm wrong

1 - the Efika power connector is ATX, you can use any standard ATX power supply. If you want something tiny, why not a PicoPSU ?

2 - XGI graphic cards will be available from Genesi, i can't tell you when. In the meanwhile, 3.3V AGP Radeon cards work great (radeon 9200SE, 9250 etc.)A low profile (half size bracket) card is recommended.

3 - There's a 2,5" IDE connector on the Efika, you can plug a 2,5"/laptop hard drive or any 2,5" IDE device such as compact flash adaptors with a CF card on it for example. Some are trying to plug a second IDE device through adaptators (live a cd/dvd drive), we'll know more about it soon.
There are 2 USB 1.1 connectors on the Efika board, you can boot from them (from a USB stick for example or USB CD drive)

4 - do it yourself ! or be patient, some Efika cases projects are on the go.

1,2 and 3 are available in the Netherlands of course as they are standard PC components.

welcome to the team, im planning something similar (games console) but as far as i can tell is that with the xorg radeon driver opengl isnt enabled, but it will be when the drivers for XGI cards are released into the wild.

where do i buy the efika itself, the only place i found is that of the builder: http://www.pegasosppc.com/ in their shop. Can it also be ordered in europe? Or does it need to be ordered in the us?

The only drivers that are capable of 3d (opengl) in the future are xgi cards? I forgot nvidia and ati only release x86 binary drivers :( .
What is the secondhand price of an xgi v3 card (if i can find one secondhand that is).

Only one ide device. Hm that means i have to do some concesions, but that will be good for power useage.

New setup and new questions:
0. Efika Board (where to buy)
2. XGI V3 Graphics Card
3a. IDE Flash Disk
3b. SD Card Reader connected to usb (pitty that there is no internal connector)
1. PSU (will an picoPSU be enough for this setup? E.g. what is the max power usage for the graphics card at maximum usage?)
4. Will it be dangerous for the board to run without an case?

Looks like it's available in Germany: http://www.vesalia.de/d_efika.htm

picopsu's are available for outputs of 60, 80 and 120 Watt. All are overkill with regards to power output for the efika. Unless you use a gfx card that needs quite large amounts of power.

The board can run fine without a case.

thanks for all the answers so far. Seems that i even can get the evika board from within europe!

For point 3 i found the following device:
http://www.synchrotech.com/products/card-rw_32.html
It states that it is capable of simultations reading and writing from 2 slots (1cf and 1sd) that is. Are there ppc drivers for this kind of device or am i left with the useage of only one slot. So far i have not found a similar product in europe, must be there i think. And smaller i hope.

As to the graphics card (point 2) i found an ati9250 but i am uncertain if i should buy as i will not be able to use 3d with it. An xgi v3xt is unfindeable. When will it be released again?

Why can't you use 3d with it? Are you going to use an OS other than linux? The open source driver provided by the xorg project works quite well.

it's very slow though.

Compared to no support (on ppc) it's quite fast actually.
And good enough for eye candy like aiglx+compiz

Reading the post by ronin lead my to believe that there are no 3d accelerated drivers for ppc linunx. Knowing that ati and nvidia only release x86 binary drivers i assumed that there was no useable opengl 3d solution for ppc linux.

What framerates am i to expect with efika, ati9250 and ppclinux? What are the opengl capacities of the opensource ati drivers?

Well, we can argue back and forth over alleged (missing) features and performance, but maybe a couple of links are more useful for making up ones mind.
Here are two for the radeon driver:
http://wiki.x.org/wiki/radeon
http://www.free3d.org/

For point 2 the ati9250 seems to be able to do more then i granted it for at first. The opensource xorg driver seems to bring some good ratings on x86. I have a look at finding and downloading the sources for it.

For point 3, the synchrotech device is exit again is it not bootable. That brings me back to using usb for the sd card reader. That leaves me with one joystick port or i should use an unpowered usb hub for that. (hmm not so bad afterall)

I think i do some shopping this weekend. :D

For power supplies the 60W picopsu is ideal over the other variants because it has wide input (6-26V if im not mistaken), and can be used with easily obtainable batterys