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HPCFactor and NEC 900c flood

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EDSchulte
EDSchulte Page Icon Posted 2007-04-18 2:59 PM
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Reality is, the H/PC lines have faded from view as being unprofitable. Sad, really, that the core virtues of CE devices cannot win over the installed base of applications and support that PCs have. CE devices are still often positioned as either:
a PDA with PC-like attributes,
a thin client, or
an underpowered PC.
All of which I (and sure many others here and elsewhere) think are unfair labels.

I've been a huge fan of CE as a computing platform and deployment mechanism hearkening back to the HP 200LX and Jornada 820 (I still have my 820 ). Nevertheless, the people in charge of large scale purchasing decisions weigh in on full MS-Office use and/or other apps that simply don't run (or run with all the features of their desktop counterparts) in this platform. Thus, the platform is perceived as too much of a risk for obsolesence. Given early experiences, perhaps rightfully so.

HP had the right idea with a replaceable OS set on the 820, but never followed up on actually doing it.

I think NEC had the right idea, too, on enabling optional upgrades or boot capabilty, but again, failed to deliver on continuing to exploit the feature (CE.Net being the exception).

I personally >love< the form factor of the HP 72x and NEC 900 lines, and admired them from afar for quite awhile (cost, etc. was beyond my reach). I bit the bullet on a used 900C within the last couple months, picking it over the 72x mainly for:
it's CE 4.2 OS,
IE 6.0 compatibility,
slightly larger keyboard, and
somewhat "rugged" casing.

I've been extremely happy with it since. I expect many recent purchases of used ones are discovering it for the same reasons listed above, and more.

I must assert, though, that I desire to jump to the next device/CE version and will if the opportunity ever arrives. I'm finally in an IT position where I can dictate the device's use in an organization and help foster it's use in business. I've contacted Data Evolution to purchase evals of their devices, and am awaiting a contact from their sales (their CEO has indicated as such earlier today in an e-mail to me).

Nevertheless, I perceive the form factors of the mini-clamshell J820 as well as the half screens of the J72x and NEC 900 are past their heyday and unlikely to return.
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gjcoram Page Icon Posted 2007-04-19 4:33 AM
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Geared2003 - 2007-04-18 2:54 PM

I think it is not necessary to be a programmer to make useful contributions: there are many other ways to contribute and Cmonex is very good example.


Indeed, I'm amazed at the tinkering Cmonex has done; I don't know how that stuff is done.

I see three distinct sorts of "development":
1) DLL/app tinkering a la Cmonex, making PPC programs work on HPC
2) basic apps like "hello, world"; user has some code and just needs a simple WinCE GUI
3) actual porting of source code and development of "big" apps (a la nPOPuk)

Geared2003, you were bemoaning the quietness of the Developer's Arena; what of these are you looking for?
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cmonex Page Icon Posted 2007-04-19 10:16 AM
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gjcoram - 2007-04-19 10:33 AM

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Geared2003 - 2007-04-18 2:54 PM

I think it is not necessary to be a programmer to make useful contributions: there are many other ways to contribute and Cmonex is very good example.


Indeed, I'm amazed at the tinkering Cmonex has done; I don't know how that stuff is done.

I see three distinct sorts of "development":
1) DLL/app tinkering a la Cmonex, making PPC programs work on HPC
2) basic apps like "hello, world"; user has some code and just needs a simple WinCE GUI
3) actual porting of source code and development of "big" apps (a la nPOPuk)

Geared2003, you were bemoaning the quietness of the Developer's Arena; what of these are you looking for?



hehe, well, i don't know much programming yet (i'm determined to learn now). but, my recent dll and bootloader etc. hacks are achieved by learning arm assembly, which is actually a programming language, and it is certainly useful
and while i was learning it, i discovered how to edit roms, etc. there the normal editing doesn't require any such knowledge, but some advanced stuff (modules) does.
the earlier hacks never needed this knowledge, just some understanding on how dlls etc work. but that's not too hard to understand.
this might partially answer your question.
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cmonex Page Icon Posted 2007-04-19 10:20 AM
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Geared2003 - 2007-04-18 8:54 PM

Going back to the main topic, I made a few useful things for my WinCE PNA that I would really like to share with others: One major concern with PNAs is that they generally use a 320x240 screen, and that most Windows CE applications are made for bigger screens. So I modified a few japanese freewares like GSFinder+ in order to make them more "user friendly". But I was really wondering if it would be useful for someone else in this forum, due to the very rare contributions about PNAs. This is actually very strange because the GPS market is booming, unlike the PDA market: Yes, the PocketPC platform is slowly dying out and evolving into an expensive smartphone platform and the classical Windows CE platform is hitting the consumer market again... ! (PNAs are not really HPCs, but they are a "very close family member" nonetheless). Sure, there are some very large GPS forums like GPSpassion, but I find them quite boring due to their very basic WinCE knowledge ( and my interest in endless discussions about POIs is very limited). So, should I start a new topic about PNAs or go to Ebay and grab a 900c ?


interesting analysis.. the ppc phones (and some ppc's with gps) are still popular, more than ever, check out xda-developers.com but you're right, the classic ppc is dead.. and PNA's are very popular, i don't know if more than the ppc phones or not? you should buy a 900c, PNA's are boring! they only have a qvga screen usually, a very basic core ce.net (ok, hackable) and no keyboard.
ok i admit i've never seen a PNA in real life - still i've dealt with their roms, as users like to accidentally erase them but other than the roms they are boring for me.
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Geared2003 Page Icon Posted 2007-04-19 2:51 PM
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cmonex - 2007-04-18 4:20 PM



you should buy a 900c, PNA's are boring! they only have a qvga screen usually, a very basic core ce.net (ok, hackable) and no keyboard.
ok i admit i've never seen a PNA in real life - still i've dealt with their roms, as users like to accidentally erase them but other than the roms they are boring for me.


I don't think you can really compare PNAs and HPCs: of course, the "official use" of PNAs is car navigation. In my case, I use it more as a pocketable Windows CE PDA. I agree that HPCs are certainly "more interesting", but the modern hardware of my Mio 268 has many advantages: a superb screen which is always visible outdoor, an incredible battery life. As a multimedia device (movies) it is definitely better than any HPC I have ever seen (including the Sigmarion 3 ). And yes, PNA screens are even better than PocketPC screens due to the fact that PNAs are often used in a bright sunlight.
Concerning applications, PNAs can use the same applications as HPCs. And PNA hacking is also fun.
The only reason why I don't buy a NEC900c is that I really love my Sigmarion 2: the HPC2000 OS may be outdated, but the screen and the hardware quality are really excellent. If I buy a 900c, I won't know what to do with those 2 devices - one of them will probably "collect dust"(that's what happened with my Jornada 710...)

Edited by Geared2003 2007-04-19 2:53 PM
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cmonex Page Icon Posted 2007-04-19 4:14 PM
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OK, right, PNA hacking must be fun (and quite an easy task after having dealt with hpc's), but i have no PNA's here, and remote hacking isn't that much fun
i do have a dotel dot 340, which is similar, just no PNA, so at least i can imagine what it is like:
but how is the battery so good? is it better than the jornada?
why is it better for movies with a qvga screen and no separate video chip?
i understand your dilemma about the 900c
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Geared2003 Page Icon Posted 2007-04-20 12:24 PM
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cmonex - 2007-04-18 10:14 PM

OK, right, PNA hacking must be fun (and quite an easy task after having dealt with hpc's), but i have no PNA's here, and remote hacking isn't that much fun
i do have a dotel dot 340, which is similar, just no PNA, so at least i can imagine what it is like:
but how is the battery so good? is it better than the jornada?
why is it better for movies with a qvga screen and no separate video chip?
i understand your dilemma about the 900c


The Mio268 battery life is incredible: yesterday, I watched a 2 hours long movie in the train, and I read an Ebook with Mobipocket (approx. 1 hour) and I had 60% capacity left...
A separate video chip is not required with a 240x320 screen and a 400 Mhz Xscale processor: it makes sense for bigger screens only.
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cmonex Page Icon Posted 2007-04-20 6:49 PM
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that means 7 hours of runtime? well i'm not impressed *spoiled by jornada 728 batteries*

i mean video is crap on qvga

...do not forget all this is my opinion!

back on topic!
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CE Geek Page Icon Posted 2007-04-20 6:53 PM
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Well, as you yourself have said, the power level drop is not linear. It doesn't take very long for my 728 battery to drop to 66% but, as you've said, it stays on 33% for a long time.
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cmonex Page Icon Posted 2007-04-20 7:50 PM
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that kind of discharge rate is true for only the jornada. most other devices are more linear, of course still not perfectly linear but usually they are the opposite of the jornada, they discharge "slow" first then faster. i.e. they stay between, say, 100% and 80% for longer than between 40% and 20%.

Edited by cmonex 2007-04-20 7:51 PM
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macmee Page Icon Posted 2007-04-22 7:01 AM
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I tried that tut and used this for Hello World:
 
/* Hello.c - Program for CE */ 

#include <windows.h>

int WINAPI WinMain (HINSTANCE hInstance, HINSTANCE hPrevInstance, LPWSTR lpCmdLine, int nCmdShow) {

MessageBox (NULL, TEXT ("Hello World!", TEXT ("Hello!", MB_OK);

return 0;

}


and when compiling hello.c I get this:
 
/* Hello.c - Program for CE */

#include <windows.h>

int WINAPI WinMain (HINSTANCE hInstance, HINSTANCE hPrevInstance, LPWSTR lpCmdLine, int nCmdShow) {

MessageBox (NULL, TEXT ("Hello World!", TEXT ("Hello!", MB_OK);

return 0;

}


probably a noob-ish question..

Edited by macmee 2007-04-22 7:02 AM
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gjcoram Page Icon Posted 2007-04-23 4:08 PM
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Macmee - you pasted the source code twice; I don't see the compiler error you were probably trying to post...
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