Windows Embedded Compact 7 tablet

They have to supply some power to read USB flash drives, or even to power the little USB receivers for wireless mice.

I continue to look for deals on these tablets on eBay, so I can continue to experiment. Another one is one the way as we speak.

Thank you Dr. Jekyll....er, I mean CEGeek...

I've gotten hold of a couple more 8650 tablets: one 7-inch and one 8-inch with SVGA (800x600) display. The UberCE7 ROM flashes fine on both, the latter in full 800x600 display as the UberCE7 package allows you to select the display size to copy to the TF card, with 8" at 800x600 as one of the options (others being 7" and 800x480, 9.7" and 1024x600, and 10.1" and 1024x768). Everything is working fine on the 7" one (sound, touchscreen, and WiFi), but the touchscreen doesn't work on the 8" device.

I've also noticed that, actually, some 8650s seem to retain databases after reboot each time, others seem to retain them some of the time, and others don't seem to retain them at all. (The 7" UberCE7 tablet without working WiFi seems to retain them each time, while the 7" tablet with working WiFi doesn't seem to retain them at all. At least one of my Sylvania WEC 7 netbooks seems to retain database changes some of the time, while another one doesn't.) Wish I could figure out what controls this. I have noticed that, occasionally, the Sylvania WEC 7 netbooks take several seconds longer than the usual three to shut down. If it's saving data then, I don't see why it doesn't do that every time there's a change.

Neither of the tablets with the properly working touchscreen will reflash either version of RTFM's CE 6 image for the 8650. Both keep restarting as soon as the "Loading Device Drivers" progress bar shows up.

Update on the 8" device: I copied the entire registry over to it from one of the 7" tablets with WEC 7 and a properly working touchscreen. Result: the touchscreen on the 8" tablet is now responding. But it's not usable yet, as the location of most taps is not where response is seen on the screen (eg, I tap one icon and another one above it or below it is highlighted). I checked the calibration coordinates in the registry value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Hardware\DeviceMap\Touch from the working 7" tablet, and the values surprised me a bit: 2139,2057 1221,3134 3015,3135 3052,960 1224,970. (Remember, this is from an 800x480 device with a properly working touchscreen.) I'm thinking maybe editing the vertical values may help correct the touch responses, but I'm not sure what to change them to. (I've already tried the calibration tool in the Control Panel [navigating to it using a mouse with the USB adapter], but it didn't appear to help.)

>but it didn't appear to help

What is your MaxCalError?

How about using Digitizercheck and see what values are returned?

I don't have access to the info as I'm at work right now, but as I recall this value was 10.

Correction: upon returning home and rechecking, I found that there is no current MaxCalError value on the 8" tablet. The reason attempting calibration doesn't help is because it just keeps cycling through the five calibration points. (I'm not certain but I may have seen the MaxCalError value given above prior to copying over the registry from the other tablet. The value is also absent on both the 7" WEC 7 tablets with properly working touchscreens; on the CE 6 tablet with the working touchscreen the MaxCalError value is 5.)

Can you manually enter the values and see if they are retained in the registry?

You mean the MaxCalError value? No, it won't. I tried entering it manually, but right after pressing OK it still isn't visible.

What do you mean under "isn't visible"? You cannot create DWORD value? Can you create some other value?

If you want to be able to calibrate everything you should set MaxCalError to 10000, for example.

Edited by Alt Bass 2014-09-04 5:59 PM

I open the dialog box to create the key, and enter a DWORD value (I tried 5 in this case), and then press OK, but there's still no MaxCalError entry in the HKLM\Hardware\DeviceMap\Touch subkey right after I press OK. What other value should I try to create instead of a DWORD value? Binary? Okay, I tried creating a binary value instead (I just tried 00 00 00 10, but I don't know if that means 0,0,0,16 or just 16). The value stayed put, but it had no effect. But then I tried deleting that and re-entering a DWORD value for MaxCalError. This time it stuck. Dunno why it didn't the first time. But there's still no effect. I'm still assuming that the only effect will come from changing the calibration coordinates.

I remember that I was not able to modify some parts registry on my CE6 notebook. Does regeditor show created value after exit?

As I said, yes, but it didn't change the touchscreen behavior in any noticeable way.

I've gotten hold of another no-name 8" and another no-name 7". On the latter I flashed the newer RTFM CE 6 ROM, and everything is working perfectly on it (touchscreen, WiFi, and sound). But I got the same result on the second 8" tablet as on the first one.

I'll also note here that I got hold of an Eken M001 (which has the 8505 processor), and was able to flash CE 6 on it, using another custom ROM called Windows CE Hopelessness Edition, from a member of the SlateDroid forums:

http://www.slatedroid.com/topic/2441-wince-hopelessness-edition-fin...

Touchscreen, WiFi, and sound all work perfectly, and there's a bonus: using the 30-pin USB direct sync cable that came with one of the 8" tablets, I was able to make an ActiveSync connection and sync PIM data. Nice thing about this device is that the 8505 devices all retain PIM data on reboot.

It seems that there is hope of making the WEC 7-flashed tablets synchronizable. Microsoft claims that WEC 7 supports synchronization with ActiveSync 4.5 on Windows XP PCs, and with Windows Mobile Device Center on Windows Vista and Windows 7 PCs. Indeed, even network sync is supposed to be possible in WEC 7, according to this page:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee487056%28v=winembedded.70...

Nice considering that CE 6 wouldn't support network sync.

In any event, though, the required components for synchronization, including repllog.exe, appear to be missing from the WEC 7 builds I've come across thus far, including the Sylvania SYNET7WIC and UberWinCE7 versions. Also, those builds' versions of cplmain.cpl don't include the "PC Connection" applet, so changing that setting will require plunging directly into the registry.

Nonetheless, connecting the 8" 8650 tablets by data cable to the PC at my desk at work, which runs Windows 7 and has WMDC installed, triggers installation of a sync driver on the PC - but of course they still won't make a data connection. Is there any way to get hold of the missing components to initiate a sync connection from a WEC 7 device?