Skinning CE 4.2 on a SIMPAD

Do you guys want to take this outside ... or may be into a private room

I'm with cmonex, it's perfectly legal syntax.

ok, now that C:Amie has decided that i'm right after all, let's change the topic

with bootloader, im referring to the bootloader thats loaded in the simpads rom, which starts when you power on the device, prior to loading the windows CE OS. It is this program which serload communicates with.
And actually, all of the simpad images i have have an extension of .img, instead of .bin. And the problem is that the bin file i created with the platform builder simply did not start transfering when i tried to load it with serload.

But hey I only made two posts on this so far... at least give me one more...

Host provides services to clients.
Master has control over slave(s).

Technically the structures are quite different, so they used the different terminologies (analogies if you will). USB hosts give the clients what they requests, whenever possible; whereas an IDE master can ignore its slave all day long if it decides to.

Besides, this is abandon-thread

2 pts:

#2. Assuming you find a .bin image, connect your SL4 with the serial cable to PC. Run HyperTerminal (A terminal on drugs? ). Reset your SL4 while pressing the "keyboard quickaccess" button. HT should show:

=====================
Monitor:
=====================
Boot from Flash 'f'
Boot from Net 'n'
Power Off 'o'
Erase PSM+Registry'p'
Exit 'q'
Erase Registry 'r'
Erase Flash 'y'
Soft Reset 's'
Print Fab-String 'w'

http://opensimpad.org/wiki/index.php/Docs/SerialInstall <<-- Details how to load linux or windows CE images into SL4.

In my case, I would press 'y' to Erase Flash. After that reset and it will be *empty* of OS. discconect HT and run serload:

serload "S842-SI-INT-152 SL4"

S842-SI-INT-152 SL4 is the filename of the image I got for 4.1. Ok, it does not have a .bin extension! ... but I believe its a .bin file anyway. Platform Builder builds a nk.bin file by default, so I think this file is just named differently.

When you execute the above statement, you will read the file and then display a prompt, asking you to reset your SL4. Reset your SL4, and it should start loading your 4.1 image.

yes it is quite obvious what you wrote about the terminologies but thanks anyway, it might help someone else

hey Snappy, i'm sure NightLord will appreciate your help but this isn't any news to him. the problem is that the bootloader just doesn't want to accept his bin file... and it isn't a 4.1 bin, but a 4.2.

well, I'm not entirely sure what steps NightLord has taken, so I did not want to assume that he already got all the steps there.

NightLord, maybe you can post the exact steps you are doing, as I believe what I did with my SL4 is somewhat different from what you are doing or did. I merely use a ready-made (read: Siemens made (read: tested to work)) 4.1 image and it worked with the serload app (from the opensimpad site).

What you are doing seem to be trying out a custom build image using Platform builder. From my memory of using PB the last few days, it seemed to have the ability to load the image into the device itself. Not sure if it uses serload or not.

NightLord has already done flashing ce.net 4.0, 4.1, simlinux on the simpad, so the problem is not that..
are you sure it really had the ability or it just *seemed* to have it?

Sorry for not being clear enough.
The siemens factory-made images (and by the way, the opensimpad images also) can be transfered with serload to the simpad, no question about that.
And yes, the opensimpad images have an extension of .bin , but thats irrelevant, because i guess they are not created with the CE PB.
However, whats important is that the firist few bytes of both the siemens images, and the opensimpad images contain the word "ARNOLDBOOTBLOCK" and some empty bytes, whereas the .bin images built by the platform builder look different. This is why you cannot serload an image created by the PB to the simpad, you would have to modify it to be compatible with the siemens bootloader installed on the simpad. The question is how to modify it.
The other solution would be to build a new bootloader from scratch with the PB, because theoreticly it has the tools for it (and I guess this is what the guy who sells his 4.2 build did). With this new bootloader built by the PB you could easily transfer your own custom CE images onto the simpad using the PB.
My problem is that i dont have a JTAG device, and without that, Im not realy enthusiastic about fiddling with the bootloader.

hmmmm can't you ask the opensimpad developers how they achieved this, i mean getting the bootloader to accept their images.. ok i'm sure it isn't that simple, but... worth a try..

i guess it's good that the MP900 actually uses a .bin extension..

File extenstions are a moot point. A bin is just an unalined binary dump file, it has no executable or documentary purpose. File extensions are a just a convenience really.

you could call it a .cmonex and it wouldn't make and difference ... ok.. so in an 8.3 FAT system it would... stop being pedantic

yes i know they doesn't matter. i was just hoping that the 900 would accept a platform builder image easily
well a binary dump... like mine??

Having the boot loader stuck in the rom image will be a big problem on creating a new flash for the 900 series. As you just found out, it's not always easy to grab the nk executive.

But as this is a thread on the SL4. Moving along...