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Ask Slashdot: Best Software To Revive PocketPCs With Windows Mobile 5-6?
An anonymous reader writes I recently got my hands on some amazing (at their time) pieces of technology, PocketPCs from the 2005-2007 era. All run with Windows Mobile 5 or 6, have storage SD cards (up to 4GB), 300 to 600 MHz ARM CPUs and 64-124MB of RAM/ROM. GPS chip is Sirf STAR III. I want to know what software you would install on them. Maybe a good Linux with GUI - if anyone can point on how to make it work. Creating some apps myself would be nice, but dunno where to start for WM5. One of my ideas was to use them as daily organizer / shopping list / memory games for people that don't own smartphones. So if anyone remembers such apps, I'd appreciate a reference. Tips or ideas for memory training or smart games are also highly welcomed. The power within these toys is simply unused and it's a shame!
A device from 8 years ago is ancient. Just let it go. If you want to play with it for a sense of nostalgia, don't let me stop you, but don't foist that trash on anyone else.
There were some community ports of linux to compaq ipaq series pocketpcs of that era, one of which is "Familiar linux".
http://www.smartphonemag.com/c...
There were also some efforts to port early android builds in the Froyo family, but i cant seem to dredge any up at the moment.
These devices are a tad dated, but I could see them being used as a fancy IR remote control, and a few other things.
I've coded for those WM5/6 mobile devices using .NET Compact Framework, using C#. You might think these things are beyond use, but they're suprisingly capable. We still use ruggedised WM6 devices in warehouses as there still isn't a good cheap alternative.
So coding for them is simple enough, but the underlying OS has a pretty horrible UI by today's standards.
You should have used the wayback machine.
I found familiar-linux's git repository in there, circa 2008.
https://web.archive.org/web/20...
They also have the prebuilt packages in there (wayback machine), but you have to dig those out yourself.
i had 9 of those smartphone / pocket-pc style devices back at the time: the absolute best one was the HTC Universal, as it was more like a hand-held clamshell laptop with built-in 3G. you _used_ to be able to get information about them on handhelds.org but we coordinated through #htc-linux (since taken over by android dummies) and used wiki.xda-developers.com (since taken over by android wannabe modders). [note to xda-developer forum users: i may be being slightly unfair though about the android dummies and wannabes: i apologise in advance to any of you that aren't so stupid as to be able to find and pay attention long enough to read slashdot :) ]
so you're going to have to dig... and you'll almost certainly need to begin with the 2.6 era linux kernel tree, which should give you a very very big hint about what you face, here. to give you an example: the fastest i've ever been able to reverse-engineer linux onto a device was 3 weeks and that was because it already had a [GPL-violating] linux kernel on it, where they had left some clues around and it was possible to poke around in /proc.
beyond that, the fastest i managed - and i could not get PM/wakeup to work because i could not locate the correct RAM/device re-initialisation parameters - was six to eight weeks on the HTC/Compaq Ipaq, i believe it was called the hw6915.
beyond _that_, the _longest_ i ever heard someone taking (and this was because it was worth it) to get full driver functionality was THREE YEARS, and that was for the HTC Universal (aka O2 "XDA III").
please please DO NOT underestimate how much work it takes to do reverse-engineering. these handhelds are actually far more complex pieces of kit, in engineering and in software terms, than any laptop or desktop PC you've ever encountered. the HTC Universal had SEVEN audio output paths for example, and over four audio input paths. there were over 110 GPIO pins on its Intel PXA ARM processor, but these were nowhere near enough, so they had to use an external GPIO IC (we called it ASIC3). but... they actually ran out of GPIO pins on that *as well*, so they ended up utilising the 16 pins of GPIO on the Ericsson 3G GSM modem (only contactable over USB!) in order to control some of the functions such as camera light.
so in many ways you are actually better off designing (and paying to have made) your own device. that is not a joke, in the slightest bit. it will take you less time and will cost you less in lost earnings from having to work full-time on the reverse-engineering. and before you splutter in disbelief, there are people who have done exactly that: Dr Schaeller did the GTA04 fairly recently (fits into a Neo FreeRunner case), and in that way he at least got to pick a) a modern-ish processor b) the best components that were available c) he got CONTROL OVER THE DEVICE DRIVERs, and he didn't have to _guess_ what the GPIO maps and memory maps are.
basically, what i'm trying to say is that if you cannot find a pre-existing project (you didn't mention what devices you actually have) that has done the reverse-engineering, unless you are actually thinking of learning reverse-engineering as a useful specialist marketable skill, either throw those devices into landfill, give them to someone who doesn't mind winceouch, or break them down for parts and sell the components on ebay. check beforehand to make sure that they're desirable parts of course.
of course... i say "throw them into landfill", which is directly and vehemently against our social responsibility, but unfortunately when actually buying these devices we make selfish decisions, not socially responsible ones, not least because they *aren't any alternatives*. now http://phonebloks.com/ is looking to change that in the smartphone space, and i'm looking to change that in the everything-else-device arena (starting here https://www.crowdsupply.com/eo...)
Agreed. Maybe they can be recycled or used "for fun" but trying to make them useful for people without smartphones is probably going to take far more time and effort than it's worth. You can get off-contract Android or Windows Phone devices for $50 that are FAR more powerful and have a vast array of current software available. Trying to reinvent the wheel with a PDA from 2005 instead of a smartphone from 2011 is more of a hobby tinkering project that something that anyone else will find useful.
*Also remember battery issues -- these devices will have old batteries that may not charge well and finding replacements may not be easy.
-Ted http://www.freemathhelp.com/
The power within these toys is simply unused and it's a shame!
The power within those toys is pathetic, based on the fact that $30 will get you something newer which runs Android and which has more CPU and RAM. Throw those fucking things away. All of the environments for them are dead, Familiar linux is based on OpenEmbedded which is a goddamned nightmare to build, just drop them into the recycling at the landfill and buy something newer.
With that said, if you have an absolute shitload of them, the fact that they have a halfway decent (which I think adequately describes STAR III) GPS chip suggests that you should do something GPS-related with them. The problem is, the GPS isn't very good by modern standards (even cheap phones will use GLONASS as well now) and the battery life will be atrocious.
Those devices are dead, and all the software for them is dead or dying, you will waste a lot of time just dealing with their problems and if you don't manage to find another OS which will run on them, WINCE UGH WINCE.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Sorry few others here seem to see the value in finding a function for still-useful technology that you probably picked up for free.
Up until a couple years ago I used an old WM6 device as a streaming internet radio player. Perfect function for it, as it remained plugged in and so battery life was never a concern, and it meant rarely having to interface with the device (which was of course clonky and sluggish by today's standards).
Another possible use which I recently stumbled upon is using them as baby monitors. No idea if there are dedicated apps for this for WM, but it sounds like you might be willing to create one yourself, which is great (and if you do, I hope you share it). This is actually a brilliant use for old smartphones because:
1. many of the dedicated solutions on the market use analog transmission (which results in static) or, if digital, are quite expensive ($100+)
2. they can remain plugged in so battery life isn't an issue
3. it's not really an issue if the phone's screen is cracked
4. they can potentially interface with someone's current smartphone, which they probably have close-at-hand anyway
www.gaiageek.com
If you are going through all that trouble, just run DOS on it. The HP 200 LX was an XT PC in the size of a (very large) phone. I've seen them used on factory floors and for replacing old DOS PCs for SCADA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H...
Learn to love Alaska
The situation is really pretty dire. Even back when PocketPC devices were in their 'best case' period for hobbyist tinkering(ie. fairly current, available either new or nice and cheap used), the Linux ports were rough.
The onboard flash was usually eccentric enough that you could only run Linux from CF or SD, some devices you still had to boot to WinCE every time and use a program that did some clever memory twiddling to kick the device over to Linux(something like the DOS Linux loaders that had their uses back in the day, though I'm not nearly qualified to discuss the details; but the concept and use were similar).
Peripheral support(especially graphics) was also generally atrocious, makes today's proprietary-blobs-for-one-antique-android-version mobile GPU situation look like some kind of Stallman Valhalla. With the right witchcraft, some models could at least display stuff on screen, some 'ran linux' in the sense that a linux kernel running on the device could be made to chat over the USB dock or a serial header; but not much else.
Since that time, the sites, documentation, writeups, tools, and projects have substantially rotted. With the hardware supply dwindling and Android devices cheap and common(or expensive and fairly classy, if you prefer) virtually all the developer, tinkerer, power-user, and other useful people have moved on. At best, you might still be able to dig up copies of files and docs that aren't just broken links; but that's about it.
WinCE software (while that has its own limitations, like being WinCE software) is actually likely to be markedly less painful. It's not exactly still on the market; but the value of used/new-old-stock/not-yet-linkrotted/etc. WinCE software is close to zero, so you can probably score some with sufficient scrounging. Plus, while MS certainly doesn't give a damn about supporting you anymore, 2005-2007 wasn't all that long ago, so you can probably get a full WinCE dev environment, exactly as MS would have recommended, with nothing more than a bit of piracy and an XP VM with USB passthrough.
Lest this all seem doom-and-gloom; I do have one useful recommendation: Pocket Putty. Exactly what it sounds like. Everyone's favorite Windows SSH client; but for Pocket PC. There's also a VNC Viewer. Never could find any X11.
At this point, pretty close to useless as standalone devices(and yes, the batteries are probably shot in any case, Li-ion is born to die); but between Putty and VNC you might actually be able to get some nice little 'dashboard' style display screens tethered to a more capable computer(possibly even use them as 'heads' for the routers, NASes, etc. that run Linux properly and have USB ports; but don't have graphics output: even something with no physical graphics hardware can, if it has the RAM, run xvnc, which would allow you to use a pocket PC with VNC client as a 'monitor'. Not something you'd want to do video playback on; but a nice little bandwidth graph, or some alerts or something? Sounds fun.
(Also, you mentioned SIRFStar III GPS units: you didn't say if those were built in, CF/SDIO expansion, or some proprietary 'cradle' thing: in any case those are very, very, well supported by practically everything, common, reasonably well regarded, spit NEMA strings over something that looks like a serial port, sometimes 3.3v, sometimes 5v, sometimes actual RS-232, sometimes USBTTY. Assuming that you can crack them out of their packaging and get the pinout right before you fry something, you should be able to use SIRFStar IIIs with damned near anything, with at most a serial level converter or suitable USB/serial adapter. Even if you have to junk the Pocket PCs, those might be handy to have.)
3. now, you have a OS with a windowing system on a device with a tiny little screen. start trying out Android apps or write your own for what you want it to do.
The only wince devices with Android ports are later-era devices but before Microsoft got serious about preventing competing operating systems on the devices, so that's stuff from the end of the Wince 6 era, the wm2003 era, and that's about it. And these ports are pretty dirt. The port for HTC Raphael was not what you'd call reliable. A lot of common actions would commonly crash Apps or give you a free reboot, like trying to make or receive a call.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I had a pair of clients who were primate researchers. In late 2006 they went into the Tanzanian bush with a bunch of Dell Axim X5s, which we chose over the sleeker, more modern X50s because of the lower price and the availability at the time of a superb third party aluminum case. The differences between the X5 and X50 were mainly skin-deep; a chunkier PDA was actually a bit nicer to use in the field.
They carried the computers and PDAs along with a sophisticated solar-powered field biology lab to their research site via motorized canoe, then by native bearers -- just like in the old Tarzan movies. Then I didn't hear from for two and a half years, except for a message that bandits had stolen their stuff and could we send replacement hardware, which we did. I was very gratified to learn that the data backup procedures I recommended worked -- that the principal investigators always carry an SD card with an up-to-date backup of all the expedition data on their persons. Previous experience supporting field researchers in Africa suggested that anything not nailed down was bound to disappear over the course of two years.
When they returned in 2009, they were agog. They'd gone into the bush with the most advanced consumer technology available. When they came back nobody was carrying PDAs anymore, there were iPhones everywhere. The left before the iPhone was announced and returned after everybody had one, and when they saw the user interface, there were staggered. They were like Rip Van Winkle waking up in a strange new world.
As for the poster's question, as a geek I totally understand it, but from a perspective of someone who actually developed for the platform professionally, there's little attraction to working with these devices when you can get an 4.3 inch Android "tablet" for under fifty dollars, and its so much more easier and more enjoyable to develop for. There was some really nice hardware built to run pocketpc, but pocketpc itself was mediocre in the extreme. I certainly tried the Linux ports that were available, but there really wasn't a compelling reason to use them, however, other than the novelty of having Unix on the palmtop. But they didn't deliver a better handheld experience (as iOS and Android do).
I'd still consider old-school hardware for sending into the bush for several reasons. The first is a removable battery. You're in the middle of a series of observations that will make your career (this often happens in field research) and your battery goes dead. So you carry a spare, which is more convenient and cost effective. The second reason is the SD card. You finish those career-making observations and head back to camp, but you drop your device into a deep, rocky gorge. With an SD or microSD card you just pop the card with your data out and it's just a minor mishap. Third, something a little more bulky than a razor-thin smartphone is better when you're chasing a troop of chimps through the jungle, your device in hand ready to record an observation at any instant.
You can of course get android devices which have the virtues of old-school hardware, but they're not mainstream -- in other words they're pricey. Back when the X5 was being manufactured, it was being sold to people to keep their address books on. And it sold by the gazillions, which meant on a unit price basis it was a bargain. Scientists often have awesome tech, but it's because they absolutely need it. They don't have money to throw at inessentials. So it was really nice to be able to load our guys up with tons of bargain consumer tech. If they busted an X5 they could just grab a spare out of the crate. It was as close to my perfect world as I believe we'll ever be, where data is priceless but hardware is disposable.
I got boxes of tech like this in my attic: Apple Newtons, Dell Axim x5s and X51s, practically every generation of Palm Pilot, very early proto-smart phones that ran "Windows CE", a ruggedized Trimble pocket pc with high accuracy DGPS built in. They all work too. And if anyone
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The best software to revive old Hardware ? Linux.
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