Windows Ce

[laos]

Hey,

I was merely wondering about Windows CE, considering the Hardware this baby has (touchscreen, Dedicated GPU and CPU, USB, SD, etc.). and could CE stand up in this Environment, and if so, is it worth it? Personally, I'd love to someone develop a CE emulation/boot for it. Just toss in a USB GPS and you have TomTom support

Thoughts?

P.S. what are the capabilities of this device getting a dual boot, like the Exeda.

 

[hardyx]

The problem with windows ce is that you need to implement drivers for all the devices. Besides, you need to pay a license to Microsoft for put Windows on the Wiz. And Windows ce + tomtom needs many memory.

 

[Enverex]

The problem with windows ce is that you need to implement drivers for all the devices. Besides, you need to pay a license to Microsoft for put Windows on the Wiz. And Windows ce + tomtom needs many memory.

Memory usage wont be an issue as the Pandora has 256MB but the idea in general does seem like a monumental waste of time and pretty much defeats the "open" aspect of the device.

 

[Orkie]

Memory usage wont be an issue as the Pandora has 256MB but the idea in general does seem like a monumental waste of time and pretty much defeats the "open" aspect of the device.

Sorry, Pand-what?

 

[sam fisher]

Enverex, this is the Wiz Developers' Corner and nothing to do with the Pandora. Please think before you post.

 

[Enverex]

Its not really about thinking, I must have just followed someone elses post to this forum and thought I was still in the Pandora forum. Calm down Peter, easy mistake to make.

 

[EvilDragon]

... though you could've both said it in a nicer way, mistakes do happen on such big boards.

Well, when it comes to WinCE, I doubt it will be released, neither for the Pandora nor for the WIZ.
It needs a lot of memory (okay, would work on the Pandora), but it does need a lot of licensing fees first AND you need to code the drivers...

 

[Exophase]

I think MES likes to make their SoCs WinCE capable so maybe they will have drivers made for it. Then not a lot of drivers would have to be written specifically for the Wiz. I think the only peripherals external to the Wiz that need to be programmed are the OLED controller, audio codec, and maybe a power supply chip (there's also DDR SDRAM and NAND chips but I expect WinCE to already have support for both). The OLED controller and audio codec connect to the Pollux's display controller/SPI and I2S controller respectively, so if these components have flexible enough drivers then maybe it would be possible to fit them to the Wiz. Now, even if such a thing gets made, how to get a license for it is beyond me.

Someone will probably make WinCE for an OMAP3530 platform too, sooner or later. Most of the things I said concerning it on Wiz would apply to this too.

 

[Squidge]

As a rule, Magiceyes seem to produce a WinCE OS for there chipset first, and then sub-contract the Linux stuff out, giving there WinCE source as a base.

If you have a developer login, you can download the complete WinCE OS, build environment, the lot from ME's website.

(If you don't have a developer login, don't try and get one. You need NDAs, product forecasts, and much other crap before they'll even talk to you.)

 

[Exophase]

That's interesting to know.

So in other words, if for some reason GPH wanted to make WinCE available for Wiz they could, assuming that they had an available software engineer to iron out the Wiz specific issues. I don't know what they'd be allowed to do with it. Maybe they'd have to buy a license per distribution? Then I suppose they could sell it for Wiz users who would want it.

Of course the demand would be next to nothing so I find it very unlikely that this would happen.

Nonetheless, I'm going to guess that 64MB is "enough" for it, I don't think WinCE must be THAT demanding.

 

[Squidge]

We had WinCE for the GP32, so no, it's not that demanding

 

[notaz]

As a rule, Magiceyes seem to produce a WinCE OS for there chipset first, and then sub-contract the Linux stuff out, giving there WinCE source as a base.

True, it seems they even have some files copied from WinCE to linux, they are still tagged "MagicEyes Digital Co. Proprietary & Confidential" (instead of standard GPL text).

 

[Orkie]

That is also standard practice for them - they like to steal at least the register definitions, and often they will take chunks of code and wrap it into Linux. We had the same on the GP2X, I have sometimes wondered if they realise it would probably be easier to just redo them from scratch .