Related
Why a Windows 7 article in a forum dedicated to mobile devices? you may ask. Because I also elaborate on strictly mobility-related questions as well - something you'll unlikely find in any other Windows 7 article. In addition, you'll find a lot of tips and hacks never before published - that is, this article is definitely worth getting as much exposure as possible.
Guys, I’ve written an article on my experience. Hope you’ll like it.
I've been playing with the brand new Windows 7 beta (build 7000) since it's been made public. I've installed it on my three notebooks:
IBM Thinkpad a31p (2 GHz P4-M, 2100b, 1GB RAM, 120 GB 5400 rpm HDD, UXGA with FireGL 64M VGA)
IBM Thinkpad t42p (2 GHz Dothan, 2200gb, 2GB RAM, 250 GB 5400 rpm HDD, UXGA with FireGL2 128M VGA)
HP TC1100 Tablet (1 GHz ULV Banias, 2200gb, 1.5GB RAM, 160 GB 5400 rpm HDD, XGA with Geforce 4 Go 32M VGA)
(My three notebooks running Windows 7; click the picture for the larger version)
So far, I'm absolutely happy with it and have completely switched to it on both the t42p and the TC1100. (On the latter, I don't really watch videos so the sub-par video performance isn't an issue with me.) It's, speed- and compatibility-wise, way superior to Vista, even as of SP1. While the speed of Vista was more like of a snail on both my a31p and TC1100 and was incomparably slower than XP SP3 running on the same hardware, Windows 7 (W7 for short) is at least equally fast than XP – or, I should say, even faster. On my a31p (which I mostly use for watching DVD's and as a back-up notebook), I think I'll stay with XP before I manage to "hack" a video accelerated driver to the system.
Of course, Windows 7 has all the goodies of Vista. This will definitely be appreciated by the Tablet PC (PC's that can also use pens as input devices, just like Pocket PCs) folks: it's Tablet PC's that have gained the most by the version switch. Vista, as with W7, has much better tablet PC support: trainable (!!!) handwriting recognition, much better multiple list selection capabilities; visual feedback of the activated "right" mouseclick etc. (See THIS for more info.) However, there are a lot of goodies for non-tablet users as well; for example, running the system on a non-native resolution looks far better on LCD's because of the new and better smoothing algorithms. This is a definite plus if you plan to use your operating system on a monitor that has higher native resolution than the currently used one.
Also, using larger (125/150% pre-set; of course, this can also be fine-tuned) characters are, generally, better handled than under XP. This is of extreme importance if you have an extra high resolution, but, comparatively, small (15 or 15.4") screen (UXGA (1600*1200), WUXGA (1920*1200) or even QXGA (2048×1536)) like on high-end IBM / Lenovo Thinkpads. Of course, you will run into problems of hidden buttons or clipped titles, even with Microsoft's own (!) programs, if you raise the magnification, but, in general, I've still found Vista / W7's approach better than that of XP. Some examples of it not working:
Two shots of Microsoft's own Windows Mobile Device Center misbehaving when using 150% magnification are shown in the following two shots:
(Click the images for the original-sized versions. Note that many other images in this article are also linked via a resized, "small" thumbnail. You can easily spot them by not only the changed mouse cursor [hand instead of the pointer], but also the lowish JPG quality of the thumbnails - while native screenshots are all high-quality PNG files.) Clipped titles, misplaced labels and, what is worse, completely hidden buttons. Adding even more insult to injury, you can't even resize the window and, therefore, in no way can make the hidden buttons visible in the second GUI. Hope this will be fixed.)
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Total Commander's plug-in window – several buttons [on the right] are missing. It should look like the following:
(a shot without any default zoom)
1.1 Drivers; common problems
As a rule of thumb, W7 has a far wider choice of both built-in (offline, coming on the DVD and, therefore, installed at install time) and online (accessible via automatic (!) driver search) drivers than Vista. Just an example: while I was in no way able to make the Wi-Fi card work in either my a31p or TC1100, it worked (almost) out of the box under Windows 7.
You can even use most of your XP drivers, keeping in mind you always run them in XP SP2 compatibility mode and as an administrator. I've encountered far fewer driver problems under W7 than under Vista.
1.1.1 The video acceleration problem
Currently, the biggest W7 problem you may also face is that of the video acceleration. On many notebooks (more precisely, built-in video hardware), trying to make use of the video acceleration features results in an immediate Blue Screen Of Death (BSOD) crash or just a system hang. This not only happens when you try to run 3D games, but also when playing back videos in most video players, even including the built-in Windows Media Player – they also use acceleration features of the video card.
If you do encounter these kinds of problems, you'll want to go to Display / Change Display Settings / Advanced Settings / Troubleshoot / Change Settings and, there, just set the slider to the second position:
Note that this will severely degrade not only gaming, but also 2D and video rendering speed. This also means you won't be able to enjoy the really cool visual effects of W7 – which are automatically enabled when W7 notices it runs on a sufficiently quick and capable machine. To do this (and to get a performance estimation), go to Control Panel / Performance Information and Tools (it's under System and Security / System / Check your computer's Windows Experience Index base score if you don't use the "All Control Panel Items" feature of Control Panel) and run the test. For example, on my t42p, I got (for a 2004 model) pretty nice results; this is why animation was enabled after finishing the test:
On a device with a non-acceleration-capable card (in this case, my TC1100), you'll always get 1.0 for the 3D acceleration index:
Theoretically, it could be possible to "hack" the so-called "reference" drivers of both ATI and Nvidia (the two major players on the accelerated video hardware field) with "Mobility Modder". You might want to check out THIS for ATI [like the FireGL GPU's in the p-series Thinkpads] and THIS for Nvidia [like the GPU in the TC1100] hacks. Nevertheless, neither of them worked on my ATI-based a31p or Nvidia-based TC1100; see my a machine-specific reports in Chapter 2 for more info. You, however, may have better luck.
1.2 Generic software compatibility issues
In general, most of the (legacy) software titles I've thrown at W7 worked. Some of the most notable exceptions are as follows:
1.2.1 Virtual CD/DVD software
Most of the virtual CD/DVD mounter software titles (which are realy useful, should you want to for example install an application in a disk image – for example, .ISO – file without burning it on a real CD / DVD) refuse to work. For example, both Alcohol 52% Free Edition 1.9.8.7117 FE (also admitted by the Alcohol folks themselves) and DAEMON Tools Lite v4.30.3 32/64 Bits (with SPTD 1.56) have major issues. In my tests, however, PowerISO 4.3 turned out to be working just fine. Too bad it has no free versions to just mount a disk image, unlike Alcohol's 52%...
Some folks at the thinkpads.com forums also stated VirtualCD v9 is compatible with W7; I haven't tested this myself.
1.2.2 WinPcap
Unfortunately, WinPcap (The Windows Packet Capture Library) doesn't work either, not even the latest 4.1 Beta 5. This means software titles depending on this driver won't really work either. The most prominent example of them is WMRecorder, the, in my very thorough streaming media saving tests, best title of all (version 12.3 was really able to capture everything I've thrown it at) – you won't be able to use it in ADA mode, only in PRO, which is far from being the best.
That is, for the time being, you'll need to switch back to XP (or Vista) to back up your multimedia strems.
1.3 Installation on top of older (Windows) operating systems
1.3.1 Activation, serial numbers
Currently, it seems, every beta tester is eligible to get five different serial numbers for testing. Should you need all of them (if you for example are afraid of running out of the 2.5 million requests before realizing you need to install W7 on another PC), just make sure you refresh (F5) the W7 beta download page where the first serial number is displayed.
1.3.2 Multiboot
If you install W7 on another partition (or hard disk), the old operating system will still be accessible and listed in the new boot loader W7 installs.
A notable exception is Linux, including "hacked" OS X versions (see THIS for more info on setting up the latter on ordinary WinTel PC's). If you install W7 on a PC with, for example, the OS X boot loader being the active, it will no longer be visible.
Fortunately, there is a very easy way of fixing this: the free EasyBCD. Just make sure you follow THIS guide. A screenshot showing it configured to access my OS X setup:
1.4 Security and its implications; loosening security restrictions
1.4.1 File system
If you're a newcomer to Vista / W7, you'll notice it uses an entirely new file system security approach.
In XP, it's just the subfolders of Documents and Settings that were protected (by default) so that other users couldn't just step into them to examine the contents of other users. In Vista / W7, this has been taken further – now, among other things, c:\Program Files is entirely write protected.
There are some implications of this. For example, if you run some "hacker" tools (like Driver Heaven's "Mobility Modder" hack) needing to have full write access to the given (sub)directory so that they can patch / copy files, they'll fail. Also, if you need direct write access to a subdirectory of c:\Program Files, you may run into problems.
An example of this is running Apache Tomcat (or any other Web server) from inside c:\Program Files. If you develop Web pages (JSP's etc.) in its webapps/ROOT directory, you will run into problems when you try to edit the individual files. Sure, if you use the plain Notepad to do this, all you'll need to do is either creating it or saving under a different name so that, later, you can re-edit it. Third-party tools like JCreator (even as of the latest, 4.5 version), however, may run into severe problems doing the same. In my practice, they reported my files having been saved; however, they were nowhere to be seen. That is, JCreator was simply unusuable to edit my Java files under c:\Program Files.
Fortunately, it's pretty easy to fix problems like this. Right-click the directory where you keep your files (for example, ROOT under webapps), select Properties and, then, the Security tab:
There, select "Users" in the upper "Group or user names" list as is depicted in the above screenshot. Now, click Edit under the "Group or user names" list and, again, select "Users":
Finally, tick in the "Allow" checkbox in the "Full control" row (it's selected in the next screenshot):
Now, click Apply and two times OK.
Note that you'll only want to do this when you're absolutely sure you must write into a given directory a lot of times. Otherwise, being read-only is part of the tighter security model. That is, always make sure you only allow free writing to a the bottom-most directory, not a more generic one closer to the root directory.
1.4.2 User Account Control (UCA)
You may also want to hide the User Account Control prompts, which can be quite a nuisance, particularly if you install a lot of software. For this, you'll need the free TweakUAC tool. Please consult the online documentation for more info.
1.5 Mobility: iPhone, Windows Mobile, Symbian, BlackBerry
Now, let's have a look at how W7 supports the (outside the U.S. – sorry, I still don't have a real, genuine Android machine – I don't want to use Android hacks on WinMo ones – so I can't comment on Android yet) four major mobile operating systems.
1.5.1 Apple iPhone
I haven't really run into problems accessing or synchronizing my iPhone (firmware version 2.2, yellowsn0w-unlocked and jailbroken) under W7. Even T-PoT worked (please see THIS and THIS for more info), which is great news for all iPhone freaks wanting to access the file system right from Total Commander on the desktop, without having to run an SSH server on the phone (and having to stick to an SSH / SFTP client under Windows.)
1.5.2 Windows Mobile
Accessing (and synchronizing) Windows Mobile (WinMo for short), on the other hand, have turned out to be a little more cumbersome. It hasn't always managed to recognize my WM5+ Windows Mobile models easily. In some, I had to switch to the other USB connection approach.
The following screenshot shows what happened when I tried to make it recognize my HP iPAQ 210, HTC Universal and HTC Wizard, in this order. For example, as can clearly be seen, I could only connect my iPAQ 210 in non-RNDIS (that is, the "traditional" serial) mode. You may also run into the same problem; just remember to set the USB connection type to the other mode.
Fortunately, the WinCE file system plug-in worked flawlessly. (Note: you must install it after you've successfully made W7 recognize at least one of your WinMo phones. This will make sure WDMC is installed and the DLL used by the plug-in is made available. Otherwise, you'll get an install-time error telling you a DLL is missing.) That is, you'll have easy access to the full file system of your phone (or PDA) if you plan to stick with Total Commander – just as with the iPhone plug-in.
1.5.3 Nokia Symbian S60
Nokia's Ovi Suite 1.1 (current version as of 01/15/2009): seems to only partially work:
File explorer: works OK
Nokia Map Loader (updated itself to 2.0.2): has continuously kept displaying "Waiting for device" in both PC Suite and Data Transfer modes when started from outside Ovi Suite already having recognized my phone. Started from inside the latter, the same happened.
Content copier: seems to work OK
Nokia Software Updater: isn't compatible:
Nokia Application Installer: a no-go either, it isn't able to read the installed apps:
Note that there is another report on Ovi Suite HERE. He seems to only use it for PIM synching, which also worked on my configuration. However, he doesn't mention whether he had any success with running the failing submodules I've listed above.
Also note that there's a report on installing the standard PC Suite HERE. You might want to prefer it to the Ovi Suite for the time being.
Note that S60 phones are perfectly accessible in mass storage mode.
1.5.3.1 BT dial-up via the N95
BT dial-up networking (via my N95) worked flawlessly on all my three notebooks. Note that even if you install Nokia's suite, it'll list your device as an unknown one:
Nevertheless, BT DUN will still work OK.
1.5.4 BlackBerry
RIM's official desktop synchronization tool, Desktop Manager 4.7.0 B50 US English - Without Media Manager, works just great, I've experienced no problems at all so far. (Tested backing up, application deployment etc.)
I had no problems with recognizing the phone after installing Desktop Manager either (unlike with Windows Mobile in certain USB configurations):
1.6 Battery runtime
I've very thoroughly tested (running multi-hour tests in a controlled environment: 0% CPU usage, lowest backlight level) the impact on the battery life of switching from XP to W7 on both my Thinkpad t42p and HP TC1100. The results are stellar: W7 in no way consumes more battery than XP under exactly the same circumstances (again, assuming 0% CPU load – active usage of Aero and, consequently, the graphic processor, may have had an adverse effect on battery life). The battery meter and the "remaining time" are pretty dependable. The real runtime I've measured on the TC1100 was somewhat (about 9%) lower than predicted with hight charge levels; however, this may have been a result of using a third-party, comparatively cheap battery (with the wear level of about 15%) in the TC1100, while I run a brand new (wear level 0%), factory battery in my t42p.
Note that if you have a notebook with a touchpad, it's possible you'll see two EXE files starting by SynTP (one of them is SynTPenh.exe) in the process list of Windows, consuming 1-2% CPU time (measured at 600 MHz) all the time. You can safely kill these processes; unlike what's stated HERE, the touchpad (and the pointing stick / USB mice) will still work.
That is, while some people state Vista has worse battery consumption than XP (see for example Finnish Tietokone's 1/2009 article in the printed mag), this certainly doesn't seem to be the case. (Also note that other people state the opposite – see THIS.) I also recommend THIS article on the additional power usage of Aero and THIS on Microsoft's promising 11-15% better battery life under W7 than under XP.
2. A thorough report on installing W7 on my notebooks
In the following sections, I explain how I installed W7 on my notebooks, what my experience is and what you should pay attention to. Note that while I "only" discuss three models, most of the stuff I state can be generalized. For example, you'll need to use exactly the same apps and drivers (Hotkey fix etc.) on most other Thinkpads and the same Wacom driver on your Tablet PC if it has Wacom hardware but the factory driver doesn't support pressure sensitivity (as is the case with the TC1100).
2.1 HP TC1100 Tablet PC
This was a pretty hard nut to crack. First, the VGA support. By default, a generic VGA driver is installed, which doesn't even support screen rotation (orientation change). That is, the first thing you do should be installing the video driver (THIS file [linked from HERE]) and disabling D3D to avoid crashes.
After connecting to the Net and right-clicking all the unknwon devices and letting them to automatically update, the only "Unknown device" remains will be the buttons – everything else will be found online after install. This means you'll only need to install the video driver (again, don't forget to disable acceleration to at least D3D levels!), Q Menu (THIS file) and the button drivers (THIS file) of the official HP drivers – nothing else. And, of course, the Wacom driver from the Wacom folks (and NOT the HP ones – the one automatically installed), should you need pressure sensitivity.
You might also want to check out THIS for an excellent writeup on the TC1100. BTW, speaking of the same thread, you might also want to have a look at THIS
Some additional remarks:
2.1.1 SD card support
In a nuthsell, it doesn't work – at least for the time being.
2.1.1.1 Auto-installed driver
If you let it auto-install the driver when you insert a <= (smaller or equal than) 1 GB card, it'll only work until you reboot your machine. After you do reboot the TC1100, it won't work even with <=1 GB cards – inserting them will result in an immediate crash. The same will happen if you insert >1GB card in the slot even before the first reboot – they'll freeze the TC1100 for the time the cards are in (but not later – unlike after reboots).
I've played quite a bit with trying to find and remove the driver, TI UltraMedia_sd, from the system – in vain. There's no such driver in Device Manager; removing the similar-named System Devices / TI UltraMedia Firmware Loader Device didn't help; neither did PCMCIA Adapters/Texas Instruments PCI-1620…. I've even run some very thorough searches in the file system under \Windows to find the driver that is installed and needs to be removed so that the subsequent card insertion can trigger the automatic reinstall (and working of the card until the next reboot) but in vain. I've even run searches for .inf files with ‘UltraMedia' – no success. All I've found was references to the above-mentioned System Devices / TI UltraMedia Firmware Loader Device. Removing the instance that could be removed (that is, not the one in the driver repository) didn't help.
2.1.1.2 The XP SD driver
The XP SD driver (sp29116.exe) doesn't help – the card remains invisible if you install it, unlike with the driver that is auto-installed first time you insert a compatible card.
2.1.2 Wacom pressure sensitivity support
As with XP, the factory driver available at the official HP download page doesn't support pressure sensitivity. You must download the XP driver from HERE (if the link doesn't work, go HERE and select Tablet PC from the left and Windows XP from the right list). (I've used XP SP2 compatibility mode and installed it as an administrator.) It's the driver that is automatically installed when you right-click the unknown devices in the device manager after installing W7 and force a driver update.
I've tested it work with Corel Painter X, in Edit / Preferences / Bush Tracking. With a non- pressure sensitive (HP) driver, the lowermost two sliders will remain the same, no matter how much hard you press the pen on the screen on the scrap field; with the Wacom driver, they'll move just like the uppermost sliders. (Photoshop users should take a look at THIS, should they not know how pressure sensitivity can be utilized. A not that interesting video is HERE)
2.1.3 I've tried to hack the following video drivers…
I present you a detailed explanation of what video drivers I've tried to hack to gain both orientation change support (which, again, is supported by the stock HP driver when manually installed) and full video acceleration. So far, I had absolutely no success. Hope the TC1100 folks I've posted my premilinary results to (see THIS and THIS threads) will have more success than me.
2.1.3.1 The laptopvideo2go driver hack
I've thoroughly tested the laptopvideo2go driver hack mentioned at http://www.tabletpcbuzz.com/showthread.php?t=36154&page=2 and explained at http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=9547 . I've downloaded 84.43 from http://www.driverheavendownloads.ne...ile=84.xx/84.43_forceware_winxp2k_english.zip ( linked from http://www.driverheavendownloads.net/nvidia.htm ) and let it decompress itself to under c:\NVIDIA (of course, it couldn't install as it's incompatible with the system). I've replaced the INF file (after changing the two (!) occurrences of Rotateflag in the file from 4 to 0x40) and, after renaming, I've copied the DLL file to the same directory. After this, I've run setup.exe in the same c:\NVIDIA\some subdirectory as an administrator.
It didn't really work – I couldn't find any difference from the stock HP driver (also installed as Administrator, in XP SP2 compatibility mode). While it does support rotation (unlike the standard, stock driver installed by Win7 by default), it also crashes on D3D / movie playback with a nv4_mini.sys BSOD (page fault in nonpaged area).
2.1.3.2 Mobility Modder hack attempts
Also tested with the latest Vista driver (178.24_geforce_winvista_32bit_english_whql.zip) with the driverheaven.net "Mobility Modder" hack. A no go - not even orientation changing is supported.
I've done the same to ForceWare 93.71 WHQL as it's the last driver to support the GeForce 4 MX series, according to the page HERE) – a no-go either.
Note that I haven't tested GeForce Release 179 for Notebooks (see THIS). Dunno if they would work.
2.1.4 Sleep problems
W7 seems to have major sleep problems (note that hibernation is working just great). In many cases, when you resume the notebook from sleeping, it just won't display anything and you'll end up having to restart the entire device by long-holding the Power slider.
That is, don't use Sleep mode for the time being. Also make sure you disable automatic sleep timeouts. Always use hibernation instead.
2.2 IBM ThinkPad t42p
Unlike with the TC1100, I had absolutely no problems with the t42p (and don't have since then, except for some file integration problems. I will keep my eyes open to
The Windows Experience Index (WEI) isn't at all bad, given that it's a 2004 model:
Everything is working (including the volume / ThinkLight / backlight buttons and hibernation / sleeping), except for the additional, IBM-specific functionality like Fn +Space (to quickly switch between the UXGA (1600*1200) and SVGA (800*600) resolution) or Fn + F3 (to dim the screen). There're no on-screen controls for the volume / backlight buttons either.
(Note that the situation is exactly the same on the a31p.)
2.2.1 Emulating the Windows key
As you probably know, Windows 7 uses a lot of keyboard shortcuts to access some advanced functionality. With Windows Aero, one of them is Flip 3D, requiring you to use Win+Tab.
To map an existing button to the Windows button, use THIS utility. It worked flawlessly on my t42p (as usual, installed in XP SP2 compatibility mode and as an administrator). After installing and restarting your PC, go to All Programs / ThinkVantage / Keyboard Customizer Utility, check the Enable key assignments checkbox and select a button to map to the Windows key (uppermost drop-down list):
After this, among other things, Flip 3D will work just fine:
(click the image for a full-sized version)
(Incidentally, if you have a PC with a comparatively good video card but Aero still isn't enabled, you can give a try to the Aero-enabling hack described in the article Hack to Force Enable Aero in Windows 7)
2.2.2 Other stuff to install
You'll want to install the two files (Hotkey Driver and System Interface Driver) also linked from the first post HERE. Note that, as has also been explained in the post, you'll need to execute c:\DRIVERS\WIN\HOTKEY\SETUP.exe and c:\DRIVERS\WIN\SMIIF\SETUP.EXE – that is, simply downloading and executing the two installers won't suffice as all they do is decompressing their content. After this, not only the standard (sleep / hibernation / backlight / volume / Fn + F7 [switching between internal and external monitors]) hotkeys will work (or, on the A3x-series like the a31p, the app buttons on the left), but also for example zooming (Fn – Space; it's also used as sending the current window to the other desktop.) Also note that, during install, Hotkey Driver may display an error message. (This happened on my t42p but, interestingly, it didn't do the same on my a31p.
Incidentally, external monitors will work just fine. I've tested this with an external Viewsonic monitor with the native resolution of 1680*1050 (WSXGA+). When duplicating the built-in display's content, UXGA was used on both (the built-in and external) monitors (meaning a bit suboptimal, but still pretty good rendition on the external one); when extending the desktop, both LCD's were driven at their native resolution (UXGA for the built-in and WSXGA+ for the external one):
You'll also want to download and install ThinkVantage Active Protection so that your hard disk will be protected.
Also, you may also want to install ThinkVantage System Update. It will install the following recommended updates:
Note that it doesn't install for example the Hotkey Driver needed for additional hotkeys. The most interesting app it installed was Lenovo Services' Lenovo System Toolbox (also available as a separate download HERE; see for example THIS for more info), which is pretty nice:
Note that it can also be installed on the a31p; a screenshot showing it running on mine:
Finally, if you have an IBM Thinkpad notebook, don't forget there's a dedicated forum to them at Thinkpads.com - make sure you check it out!
2.3 IBM Thinkpad a31p
I've also installed W7 on my aging, but, because of the UXGA IPS screen, still pretty cool a31p. It works OK, except for the lack of D3D.
I've tried to hack the driver with Mobility Modder (see my dedicated thread HERE); so far, without any success.
For some reason, it's not possible to run WEI on the a31p, unlike on my TC1100 or t42p. At the end, it always reports an error (note that D3D is disabled):
Note that, while the Hotkey driver (one of the two apps needed to be able to see the on-screen feedback of the volume / backlight etc. messages; the other is the System Interface Driver) isn't stated to be compatible with the a31p, it's working just great on the a31p.
Also note that you won't want to install ThinkVantage System Update as, unlike with newer models, it won't offer to install anything.
3. Verdict - is it worth giving it a try?
Definitely. If you wanted the niceties of Vista, particularly if you're a Tablet PC user, but without the snail-alike speed and major compatibility problems, installing Windows 7 is a must. You won't be disappointed, particularly not if you don't have any kind of driver compatibility issues (most importantly, graphics acceleration problems.) Believe me: Windows 7 is orders of magnitude cleaner, better and faster than Vista.
Loving Windows 7 so far - vast improvement over Vista - even in Beta!
BUT when I try to start WMDC it stops working straight away then the green screen comes up and it says 'connecting' even when no device is connecting - and there it remains....
Thanks a lot!
Great and complete review mate!
Cheers,
With Nokia PC Suite, you have to take MSI installer or right click on installer program and set as Windows XP SP2 compatibility, i have Windows Server 2008 and is the same issue
btw,Nokia PC Suite works flawlessly!!
UPDATE (Jun/05/2009): Windows 7 RC1 on the HP TC1100 and the IBM Thinkpad t42p
HP TC 1100
I've played quite a bit with the current (RC1, build 7100) version of Windows 7 on the HP TC1100 tablet. I'm pretty much impressed - the new version works quite a bit better than the old one.
Drivers
I installed (from the local filesystem) the same three drivers as with the previous (7000) build: the video, the Q menu and the button drivers. Note that at least the Q Menu installation must be run in SP2 mode / as an admin; otherwise, it'll display loading CPQ32.dll failed. (Please see section "2.1 HP TC1100 Tablet PC" in my previous article for more info.)
So far, I'm impressed:
- there's no need to disable D3D (video acceleration) any more. Video playback performance is approximately as good as under XP.
- multiple thumbnails are correctly displayed, even in Portrait mode. Sure, there certainly isn't any real visual effects - for example, dynamically showing the window of the thumbnail which the cursor is hovering over or dynamically showing on the thumbnail itself a miniaturized, scaled-down version of it.
- now, it sees the Windows XP partition previously invisible for build 7000. I keep XP on the first and W7 on the second partition. In build 7000, it remained invisible; in RC1, it's correctly mounted as D:
- there doesn't seem to be excess CPU usage when operating in battery mode. When doing the same on AC power, however, the CPU seems to be running at a higher speed, which results in considerable warming up.
- the headphones port works out of the box, without the need to install any driver - as opposed to past W7 versions. It works
- as far as mobile devices are concerned, I've encountered no problems accessing Windows Mobile (including running Pocket Controller Pro 6.02) and iPhone (including running iTunes 8.1.1) devices. With iPhone, the PdaNet USB server, QuickPwn 2.25 and T-Pot 1.1 works OK. Note: you should stay away from flashing new ROM's onto WinMo devices. Note I haven't tested the tips published HERE - they may work just fine. Also note firmware update and jailbreaking work just fine with the iPhone.
Problems:
- Recovering from sleep (suspend) still doesn't work reliably. Hibernation works flawlessly. That is, if you absolutely must use suspending, stay away. If, on the other hand the additional shutdown / bootup time of hibernation isn't a problem, this isn't that big an issue.
- the three hardware icons (rotate screen etc.) are not usable (albeit they certainly are visible to the button handler app - see Hardware and Sound / Set tablet buttons to perform certain tasks)
- rotate screen doesn't work when invoked through, for example, mapping it onto a hardware button. You must always go to Appearance and Personalization / Display / Adjust Screen Resolution and change the screen orientation there; I know of no shortcuts of doing this. Note: if you (un)dock the TC1100, the screen orientation changes accordingly.
- still no SD card reader support (PCMCIA card adapters and USB readers work, of course).
Note that one of my readers, Kieslar, in a comment under my initial article stated the following: "I was able to get rotation and D3D accelleration working on my TC1100 in Windows 7. After some searching online, I noticed that when the 84.43 drivers were first released, someone was having nv4_mini.sys related BSODs. Downgrading to version 82.12 fixed the BSOD for him, so I thought I'd give it a try.
I completely uninstalled 84.43. Then I downloaded 82.12 from http://www.driverheavendownloads.net/nvidia.htm and copied hpqvdisp.dll and the modified nv4_disp.inf (with Rotateflag instances changed to 0x40) to the same directory. After installing, it no longer crashed on D3D or movie playback! "
I don't know whether you can get better graphics acceleration performance (for example, to enable dynamic window thumbnails) using this driver than the one, sp27014.exe (HP's own driver), I recommended in my initial article. I certainly welcome any reader feedback on this.
On the IBM Thinkpad t42p, basically everything is OK. However, I've encountered problems with recovering from suspension (sleep) sometime - albeit in no way as often as on the TC1100. In about every twentieth reboot, I also run into the blue screen of death when trying to read the hibernated notebook state. This means if you do hibernate (or, suspend) your notebook, make sure you've saved everything before that, in case you don't manage to restart it. Nevertheless, I like Windows 7 on my t42p a lot, mostly because of the highly useful, graphics accelerated dynamic thumbnails.
UPDATE (somewhat later, the same day):
1.) in the meantime, I've found out there is also an excellent Wiki article dedicated to setting up Windows 7 on the HP TC1100 HERE. It should be the most important guide you follow when updating.
So far, I've tested the following (and found them all working):
a. video driver. By getting the 82.12 installer and, after executing it, it decompressed itself to a directory. I've copied the two hacked files, as is explained, into the directory where the 82.12 installer decompressed itself. After the installation, resuming from sleep started to work. Excellent!
b. the "Mail" button hack. After the recommended Registry hack, it indeed started working; both short- and long presses are registered.
c. the screen rotation hack via the Hardware and Sounds / Tablet PC Settings / Go to Orientation link (it's a link, not a button BTW). After the hack, screen rotation started to work when assigned to a hardware button. (I still need to find out how to make the three "soft" buttons work on the front.)
2.) I keep you posted when I learn something / test stuff. Currently, I'm installing Windows 7 on my IBM Thinkpad a31p to see whether the D3D problems are gone on it too and running the CPU voltage decrease tests on the TC1100 to reduce heat / ventilation.
UPDATE (Jun/7/2009) : I've played a lot with undervoltaging my HP TC1100 and IBM Thinkpad t42p as is explained at http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=235824 (and recommended in the above-linked TC1100 Wiki).
I have GREAT results. I've managed to decrease the voltage with more than 0.2V on the Pentium M Dothan-based t42p and slightly less on the Pentium M Banias-based TC1100.
On the TC1100, the cooldown advantage I've managed to get is about 2C degree at full CPU usage. (The TC1100 uses the Pentium M ULV CPU, which already is, as you may have guessed, running on lower voltages.) Nevertheless, this already means the fan "kicks in" far less often. With a protective case on (which doesn't let the TC1100 cool down, except for the two fan openings) and only browsing Web pages with Opera, without the Flash plug-in (which is a real CPU hog, even when running in the background; this is why I don't let Opera install the Flash plug-in but just copy the URL of a page I want to see its Flash content into IE) installed, it only started after about 30 minutes. Without the case, the fan has never kicked in.
I've got even better results with the t42p. The CPU running at 2 GHz and 1.32V, the maximum temperature I recorded was 82C and the average 77-79C. The CPU undervolted to 1.1160V (which is two selectable values more than the already-unstable [Orthos displays a computation error] 1.0840V; 1.1000 would have resulted in 60C), I got the maximum of 61C. That is, about 20C less than in the default case!
I was pretty lucky with decreasing the minimum voltage (at 600 MHz). Instead of the default ~0.98V, I've found out 0.7320V is still sufficient. (Going even lower, 0.7160V, has resulted in Orthos displaying a computation error.) VERY impressive!
Note that, under Windows 7, when returning from hibernation, it will auto-start in the background. It also displays an icon in the lower right corner of the screen (hidden by default in Windows 7). It might be useful to disable it (right-click and Hide) to further reduce CPU usage.
I can only recommend the RightMark overclock app - it will REALLY cool down your notebook. The CPU consuming considerably less power (and dissipating far less heat) will not only resulting in major battery life savings, but also a much more silent notebook. And, of course, it's easier to work with a notebook that doesn't overheat - even if fan noise or higher power consumption isn't an issue with you. For example, the IBM Thinkpad t42p has the fan in the lower right edge of the notebook (unlike, for example, the, in this regard, better-designed IBM Thinkpad a31p, which has the same in the upper right edge). The notebook running a CPU-intensive task makes working pretty hard: everytime you let at least part of your hand drop from the notebook, you'll almost burn it in the stream of the hot air. With undervoltaging in place, this effect is far less pronounced - after all, the stream of air itself is about 20 degrees cooler.
Three screenshots of my TC1100 and t42p undervoltaged. Note that, with the TC1100, I fine-tuned all the voltages - not only the highest and lowest (for 1 GHz and 600MHz, respectively). With the t42p, I used the automatic computation, based on the manually-set and checked highest and lowest frequency values, compute them. Of course, I've tested their stability (as on the TC1100) by disabling the highest-frequency checkboxes in turn, one after another.
TC1100
T42p
Still another remark: if yours isn't a Core (2) Duo CPU (but, say, a Pentium M Dothan or Banias), then, in the "Advanced CPU settings" tab, there will be almost nothing you can en/disable, unlike with later CPU editions.
All in all, I can only recommend undervoltaging. It's well worth the effort and time.
Some other benchmarks I've made, showing how the heat buildup depends on the voltage:
At 2 GHz:
1.2280V: 68C
1.1800V: 66C
1.1480V: 64c
1.1160V: 61c
1.1000V: 60c
At 600 MHz:
0.7800V: 43c
0.7640V: 42c
0.7480V: 41c
0.7320V: 40c
UPDATE (9/Jun/2009): I've installed W7 RC1 on the IBM Thinkpad a31p too. Works wonderfully: no video acceleration / suspend / hibernation problems.
It has detected all the drivers except for the video driver (which you'll want to change) and the wireless driver. That is, all I needed to do was getting and decompressing the Wi-Fi (1awc32ww.exe) and the video (1rd635ww.exe) driver and just navigate to the target directories under c:\drivers from the hardware manager, after clicking the traditional "Update driver".
Unfortunately, the old FireGL card in the a31p is unable to do any of the hardware acceleration niceties; that is, don't expect anything fancy. Nevertheless for example video playback works just great - unlike without video acceleration (the case with the a31p running the previous public beta).
UPDATE (12/Jun/2009): after reading a dedicated post of a msnews.microsoft.com member, I've also played a bit with external monitors and the usable resolutions.
Under XP, using HP's above-linked official driver, the maximal external resolution is 1600*1200 and there's no way of using 16:9 or 16:10 aspect ratios (only 4:3):
Under Windows 7, if you do use the hacked video driver (see the first update above on installing it), you can select anything up to 2048*1536, including 16:9 and 16:10 aspect ratios:
These high resolutions do work (I've tested them up to 1600*1024; my TFT monitor only being an SXGA (1280*1024) one, I couldn't test higher resolutions).
This is another advantage of switching to Windows 7, particularly if you have a non-4:3 monitor / projector or one with a resolution higher than 1600*1200 (UXGA). Nevertheless, it might be possible the new driver can be used under XP too, offering the same, additional resolutions and aspect rations. It's just that the official HP driver doesn't.
A caveat: sometimes I couldn't see these resolutions. I had to switch to Portrait (on the primary, built-in one) and remove / reinsert the VGA cable to be able to see them. That is, if you don't see them, don't despair: do the same as I've done.
Excellent thread Menneisyys. If I might add, I came across problems connecting my daxian x999+ to Windows 7 WMDC. Here's how I was able to resolve the problem:
http://www.jeedo.net/howto/windows-mobile-connection-error-on-windows-7/
Please note I'm using Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit retail.
Hi, I have a VGA phone ... which is very nice for web browsing indeed
Yet for some apps like GPS navigation software it is very unpleasant
-> The icons are really small
-> the app is slower as it has to display 4 times more data.
So is there a way to force a "VGA aware" app to "think" that my phone is QVGA ?
Thanks !
i'll give you the short version.
no
Thank you nir36 ... but I'd rather prefer the long version
I can't believe that ! I don't want to believe it
Some solution/hack must exist to do it !
I haven't found anything functional yet, but I really hope that some of the following parameters / tools should allow to do it ?
- HI_RES_AWARE resource : It seems that developers must add this resource in their app to make it VGA aware ... maybe there is a way to remove it from the program with a resource hacker ?
- .mui files : I don't have further details, but it seems that .mui files also allow to modify the vga awareness of the programs ?
- TrueVGA / ozVGA / WVGAFix3 : there are some programs that seems to fool WM or the installed apps and allow to use different resolutions ... so if it is possible to fool WM / apps about the real resolution, it should be possible to do what I am asking for ?
Please correct me if I'm wrong
The thing is, that you can't just throw in a magical script that would resize all images to QVGA.. your app reads the images and presents them on the screen. if they're VGA.. there's really nothing you can do about it.
There are many many projects in XDA-devs which are based around resizing interfaces of applications from QVGA to VGA and vice versa.. I trust that if it was possible to just write a script to do that automatically.. someone would've already done that.
But some programs already have both image pack VGA and QVGA. Because there is no different version of iGo for QVGA and VGA devices. It uses VGA images it device support it. So there must be a way to make iGo render in QVGA mode.
And, as you may know, Asus P750 has a VGA screen but it works like QVGA.
I confirm what Klael said... the GPS app is the same executable in VGA or QVGA ! So the only issue is to force it to believe that the app is running on a QVGA screen instead of VGA
Unfortunately, I tried to delete the HI_RES_AWARE resource with ResourceHacker but the app refuses to start after that
I also tried to change the value "HI_RES_AWARE CEUX {1}" to "HI_RES_AWARE CEUX {0}" but it doesn't work neither.
Can someone with programming/hacking experience answer to this topic please ?
I'm convinced that there is a way to do it !
UP
I'm pretty sure there is a way to do it ! I just hope that someone with some experience in developing/hacking could read the post
Witch version of IGO are you using? Because in mine all the images for the themes are located in archives and all the values etc can be edited via notepad so you just need to do all the stuff yourself . unfortunately i have QVGA device so I can't help you
1. How can i make WVGA application in visual studio? Largest screen option i can create is VGA (Windows Mobile 6 Professional VGA) and then there is blank area on bottom of application.
2. How can i make separate form for landscape/portait (so i can reorder elements when phone is in landscape)?
3. Is there any better emulator? Included one is slow and i cant set up anything that need soft reset (when i do soft reset, visual studio launch new emulator window, because old one "disconnected")
4. Is there any way to remove unsigned warning, when you test directly on PDA? Its annoying that i must confirm every time i want to test something.
Visual Studio Answers
1. Download the Windows Mobile 6.1.4 SDK it has a 400x800 device. Or download 6.5 for a device labeled WQVGA. The 6.5 Emulator is even slower than 6.1.
2. Don't bother with two forms, in the OnPaint (MFC..NET) or WM_PAINT (Win32) code read the size of the Client Area of the screen (GetClientRect() or Form.ClientSize) , then decide whether it is Landscape or Portrait and position the stuff on the screen exactly where you want it.
3. You are stuck with the stuff that MS releases, unless the phone manufacturers decide to release their own images. (Unlikely.)
4. If your EXE is unsigned the OS will turn its nose up at it, the first time it is run and ask you if you want to execute it. If it is recompiled the phone thinks it is a different program, and asks you again. Sign the image to stop it.
works just fine for me
in emulator options you can set the res to what you want
and in the size of your form you can set the size to what you want
if you're not up for altering the res yourself then you can dl the se x1 sdk it comes with a ready
wvga emulator
For # 1, you can download the complete developers toolkit here.
For # 2, if you mean how to change the emulator to landscape... go to File -> Configure -> display on the emulator and select the required angle in the Orientation field. Then you need to manually set the screen to landscape inside the emulator (Windows Mobile) by going to START->SETTINGS->SYSTEM->SCREEN and selecting LANDSCAPE. The emulator should change this automatically depending on the screen orientation, but it doesn't (?).
Don't bother with two forms, in the OnPaint (MFC..NET) or WM_PAINT (Win32) code read the size of the Client Area of the screen (GetClientRect() or Form.ClientSize) , then decide whether it is Landscape or Portrait and position the stuff on the screen exactly where you want it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you please explain how to work with that?
it's only relevant if you do c++ without .net
Sorry about that, I was rushed, and it was a bit vague.
In Win32 your application is sent a WM_PAINT message when the window requires redrawing. In this case trap the message and then use GetClientRect() to obtain the dimensions of the client area. Depending on whether the screen is wider than taller, or vice versa, it will tell you the orientation of the screen.
In MFC or .NET the OnPaint event of the form is triggered. Add code in this event to examine the form's ClientSize property to find the same details. This is a Size object which has Height and Width sub values. i.e the width is Form.ClientSize.Width and the height is Form.ClientSize.Height. By comparing these values you can figure out the orientation.
This event occurs before the individual elements of the screen are drawn, so you can change their Left and Top properties to move them around to where you require them on the form.
I downloaded WinMobile 6.5 Development kit, but there was not WVGA option under FormFactor, only new emulators appeared. I solved problem with manually increasing form height.
Anyway, thanks for all information!
I've got this problem ever since I switched to Windows Mobile 6.5 builds. Java applications executed by Jbed begin to resize themselves after some time. It's almost as WinMo is losing focus of this app - suddenly top and bottom bar of WinMo appears, screen is a little bit resized.
Anyone had an issue like this one?
Do u check all version from here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=407667
??
Yes. I already tried them all.
Here is my thoughts.
You indicate that the size reduces over time. which implies its fine at first.
I suspect that your running a java app that is setting the java parameters and hence reducing them in the process.
Try 1 new java app at a time, then see which one could be causing that!
I know that some apps are made for QVGA screens or smaller (like for Nokia phones) and those will always display small if its built for one of those devices specifically.
Alternatively check this thread and see if it helps with the settings.http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=439989
I am putting forward the following premise:
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"You can enjoy the joys and wonder of Android without spending a fortune...!"
I now intend to see if this is true!
Thread Purpose:
Provide a discussion area for those of us who are financially impaired, like myself, but want to experience the joys and wonders that tablets and android might hold...
At the moment the thread may also touch on android on mini-tablets (which might also make calls...) and larger tablets (with keyboards...hdds...lcd monitors etc) simply because on a shoestring budget you have to make do with what you have.
I hope to explore ways in which you can use Android it in new and interesting ways without paying out massive amounts on expensive hardware.
I'm not sure if it is totally achievable or not, but I'm sure it will be interesting to find out what you can do for less compared to the expensive options which are out there.
Idea's, comments, thoughts, discussions are all welcome.
The more unusual and interesting the better!
Thread Structure:
This first post will provide an index and links to the main discussion points/topics on the thread.
[Will see how this works!]
Periodically I shall post a new topic to discuss.
23March2011 - Topic One : Show Me The Droid
Method One: Using your existing laptop or PC
Method Two: Using the android emulator (also on your existing laptop or PC)
Method Three: Using your existing phone
29March2011 - Topic Two : A Low Cost Tablet
Part One: Justifying the purchase
Part Two: Android From The Box
Part Three: Passing the grade? (A-E)
Part Four: Passing the grade? (Continued...F-J)
12April2011 - Topic Three : Low Level Basics
Part One: Oh ADB Debugger!
Part Two: The Root Of It All
Part Three: Backups, ROMs and Flashbacks
Part Four: First Time Flasher! (added 1stAug11)
27June2011 - Topic Four: Low Level Interfacing
Part One: Android RS232 I/O
22Sept2011 - Topic Five: Development Tools & Tricks
Part One: Screenshots & Remote Control
Part Two: Scripts & Shortcuts
Side Topics
04May2011 - Side Topic: The Future! Quad core and beyond
02June2011 -Side Topic: Multi-Touch Technology - with No Touch Screen!
Q&A:
crevlthe: Are most apps up-sized to fit the resolution of tablets?
[I'll keep updating this thread every few days]
- please post comments, thoughts and ideas anyway, particularly if topic related.
I would love to hear about peoples thoughts and ideas
(simply reference Topic X:Method X/Step X etc if you want to comment on one item in particular).
Enjoy!
Small Print:
For the following posts I shall try to reference the source websites where possible, however apologies if I get this wrong, please feel free to pm me or post on the thread with any corrections and I'll amend the entry. Regarding images, where possible I shall try to use my own images, but at times this may not be possible. If you find I have used your image and you do not wish it to be used, then simply let me know and I'll change it. Where possible I shall state where the images have come from.
Clearly, the details in the thread are purely discussion and while I try to make them as accurate as possible I can not guarantee this. Damage or loss may occur by following some/all of the instructions, so if you do, do with care and at your own risk, I take no responsibility for your actions.
Topic One : Show Me The Droid
Before you can do anything with Android, you probably want to see it!
This topic will outline various ways you can "get at the driod" without spending anything.
Method One: Using your existing laptop or PC
This was the first way I got to play with Android (a long while ago), and that is using an Android live CD. I used something similar to the live CD from http://www.android-x86.org/ (images taken from site), which allows you to boot your computer with Android.
You can burn the image on to a CD/DVD and boot it cleanly or you can use a virtual machine and boot within that.
With a little bit of legwork, and a compatible computer you can boot from a USB key so you can carry your droid with you.
You can even install it, even dual boot, if you are brave!
While this is a simple and very cheap option (at most it should cost a CD/DVD to burn on), there is one slight problem...most computers don’t have touch, gravity sensors etc etc!
You have a number of options if you are seriously wanting to use this more:
1. You can continue to use the mouse (at least they seem to have a cursor now!)
2. You could probably make use of a large touch-pad (can be expensive, but cheaper ones are around)
3. If you have a small screen you could try adding a touch screen (8-10” touch screen overlay can be quite cheap but you will need to install it yourself and that can be tricky and will risk damage).
Perhaps this method could be interesting to try out as a low cost GoogleTV platform, but there would need to be some work done regarding the control method. Someday I may look into this option in more detail...
Microsoft Kinect not been plugged into to android yet???
Anwser: Yes it has! Ok, shame I don’t have one.
Topic One : Show Me The Droid
Method Two: Using the android emulator (also on your existing laptop or PC)
Of course for the developers out there, there is always the Android emulator which comes as part of the Android development package. Each time Android update the SDK (software development kit) for the latest release of Android, the emulator is updated to run the newest version of Android (this is often the source of early ROMs).
This does allow you to play with the latest Android version as soon as it is out, so you can get a feel for what features are improved etc and you can try out different versions to get an idea about the differences between them. You don't even need to install anything more than the Android emulator SDK if you don't want to write any code, as you can run the emulator separately to the development environment.
However, not only does this have similar control issues (except maybe that you get “soft-buttons”) but it is quite slow even on a fast machine.
(Click Image For Larger Version)
The advantage of course is it opens up a whole world of development options. The google developer site provides instructions for getting set up. Once you’ve jumped through the hoops, you can try it out by having a go at the various tutorial applications.
(Click Image For Larger Version)
Again this is something I may look at in more detail another time (such as getting setup, exploring what you can do with it and perhaps some simple development steps).
Topic One : Show Me The Droid
Method Three: Using your existing phone
You might just have that elusive Android device already, you just don't know it yet!
Clearly this option will vary wildly on the type of device you have and how in-depth you are willing to go. I’ve not managed to find a full list of devices which do support running android but it is safe to say that the “list” is growing all the time.
For me, my Phone is a Windows Mobile Phone, the HTC Blackstone, it’s quite an old device (in relative terms) but it has a good screen (3.8", 480 x 800) and modest processor (528 MHz ARM 11).
Fortunately for me, the XDAndroid group support this device, so I was able to make use of one of the many Android builds on the forums. I’m not quite sure what the current status is of this project, it seems although device specific threads have stopped, there are Android builds going up to 2.2.3...which I’ve had working on my device.
For the blackstone, running android is fairly pain free, since you install the files to your sd-card and if things don’t work out, you just delete them. One key component I required, was ditching (swapping) my class-6 SD card for a slower one (yes, slower!), once I’d switched to a class-2 one, android was up and running nicely.
(Click Image For Larger Version)
However, don’t get too excited yet, as many of the builds will have features which don’t work yet, such as Bluetooth support, camera and in-call voice (you can spend a long time getting the right mix of files for your device to get all these working) and many 3D accelerated games won't work. A lot of progress is being made here (I’ll go into this in more detail another time). Some issues you can live with and some you can’t. Also, if your device (like mine) is not a total powerhouse then you can expect things to run at less than optimal speed. Overall, don’t expect to be replacing your OS with an all singing all dancing Android one this way, unless you have decent device to start with.
All is not lost! By using one of the many dual-boot apps (they simply show a splash screen as soon as possible on power up) allow you to quickly select between your normal Windows Mobile OS and the Android one.
i.e. Gen.Y DualBoot by yozgatg
(Click Image For Larger Version)
This means you can keep a build of Android (or several if you wish) on your SD card and have a play with Android from time to time.
Personally I think this is an excellent option, even if the results aren’t perfect and it’ll probably cost you a fair bit of time experimenting, but the results are totally worth it.
I might revisit this in more detail if people would like me to. Hopefully I can learn a little more about the internals of how it fits together and provide a post on that.
For HD2 users (and some other phones), who are just too spoilt for choice, they can also install Android to their NAND (internal memory). This means they can totally replace the Windows Mobile OS on their system with Android, and because the device is fast, it apparently runs well enough to do so.
Topic Two : A Low Cost Tablet
Part One: Justifying the purchase
First off, the most important bit for this topic, how much does it cost?
I managed to get (buy) it for $90 (£56), including free shipping (limited time special offer).
Note:
I would not recommend this tablet at it's "normal" price of $130, since there are other tablets in that price range which are clearly better.
However, for me, the lower price was key here.
To put it in perspective, the Samsung Tab 7 Inch was £500 here - or $800!
The specs:
Code:
Model: Haipad M701
CPU: Telechip Tcc8902, 800MHz (ARM11)
OS: Android 2.1
RAM: 256MB
ROM: 2GB
Screen: 7 Inch Resistive (800 x 480px)
Ext Ports:
9v Supply
3.5mm Audio
Mini Usb (OTG Host) - hopefully will support Mass Storage devices
HDMI
TF (MicroSDHC)
Size: 192 x 114 x 15mm
Weight: 330g
Extra Details:
Gravity Sensor
Android Market
Adobe Flash (not supported)
Camera 0.3Mp
Wifi 802.11 b/g
My thought process regarding the purchase is this:
1. I really want an Android tablet, I’ve been look at them for months (in fact probably just after the iPad came out). In all that time I’ve lusted after tablet after tablet, but each time it came down to the cost, and the fact that I simply did not have $200/$250/$300 laying around. Throughout that period the number of tablets available have ballooned, the capabilities and specs too. I found myself looking at the affordable tablets, and then looking at the next one up (hdmi), then the next one (10” screen) and then the next one (multi-touch), until I’d priced myself out of my purchase.
2. With the advent of the tegra chips and honeycomb, the price of admission has been bumped slightly (I’d say you are starting at $300 for a low end one (quality of the screen/touch is be compromised - Advent Vega)) - previous to that an A8 based tablet, such as the A81 for around $200-250 was a good deal. To be a serious contender for anything which comes after honeycomb (for the tablet branch), and gaming platform that is developing (of which Cordy is the thin end of the wedge), the power step provided by the Tegra family is a must.
3. Back when I first started looking at tablets, I was in fact considering a very similar device (the X10 and the G10, of which the Haipad M701 is fairly similar).
4. Aside from wanting to use the latest and greatest releases from Android and games etc, there is a need for more modest requirements to be met. Can a basic tablet do this, I intend to find out?
These "modest" potential uses would be:
A: Replace/supplement a poorly designed portable Toshiba DVD player for in-car use, which in my opinion was probably the worst product I’ve ever purchased (despite the quite promising spec sheet) - although obviously I may need to revise this status soon!
B: A Doodle pad, something which my phone gets commandeered for quite often by my off-spring. So a slightly larger screen would be useful for this.
C: Simple Web-browser, most of the time only a quick check on the web is needed, so this may be more helpful than firing up the laptop (which being a work one, dislikes my wifi and network most the time).
D: Music player, either from connected memory for in the car or perhaps from the network.
E: eReader, I’ve read a few books on the Blackstone’s 3.8" screen, so a larger screen would be helpful.
F: Require a device with camera and HDMI at minimum, since this will hopefully provide more options to experiment with (1st build of Android on the blackstone, didn’t have camera support which ruled out things like google goggles etc).
G: USB Host (mass storage), I am hoping that the device will allow me to use external storage devices via the usb, this would be very handy for dealing with camera pictures and videos etc.
H: USB Device keyboard support, I find it very annoying that the Blackstone has no h/w keys, this seriously limits what you can do with it (such as emulation programs etc) as there is no easy way to control things.
I: RS232 Support: Although I seriously doubt it, it would be really useful to get RS232 monitoring running on the device.
J: A development platform for writing android software on and to learn about android.
In Summary:
Overall, aside from the video/USB requirements, I hope that I am not being too ambitious for this device, but clearly I probably am. If/Once I get the device, I shall evaluate it against these requirements and also see what other uses I can put it to. I don’t expect the device to manage all of the uses above (particularly out-the-box), but hopefully it an fulfill at least some of them (even if it takes some custom firmware/modding or even some custom hardware to achieve this) I shall be happy.
For all I know, the tablet may well never turn up...and if it does it could be next to useless (i.e. next to that Toshiba DVD player...). As it happens, one review of a similar device was “expensive paper weight”, I’d estimate it about the weight of a medium sized cup of coffee (without the cup), so might be useful for when we get the fans out in the office this summer.
My purchase timeline:
Purchased tablet on 17th March (estimated delivery 10 working days).
Item shipped on 18th March (estimated shipping 15-20 days).
“Departure from outward office of exchange” 22nd March - Left the source country.
Received item 28th March!
Overall Delivery time: 11days (7 working days).
In return for the excellent shipping, I can say that the item was from PandaWill.
Out of the box review coming soon!
Thread has moved from "General" to it's new home in "Android Software and Hacking General". At first I didn't plan for it to be Android exclusive but as it turns out, it is, so hello to all on this thread.
I am very new to Android, so please be kind!
I hope this thread can be a beginners introduction of some kind, let me know if there are errors or if you would like more information on parts etc.
Regards.
Topic Two : A Low Cost Tablet
Part Two: Android From The Box
Packaged in a retail box:
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- Tablet (thankfully)
- 9volt 1.5Amp Output Power Supply (US plug)
- US to UK plug adaptor (a nice touch, clearly they take notice of the shipping address)
- 2x USB Cable (mini USB to USB male, short mini USB to USB female)
- Basic set of ear phones
- Product dimensions measure exactly as stated in the spec (I’d previously printed out picture of the screen to 1:1 scale based on the measurements).
Although I didn’t expect to get an HDMI cable, I didn’t expect the HDMI port to be a mini one, so it would have been helpful to have included one here (or at least an adaptor).
(Note: The USB car adaptor is not for it and did not come with it, but I thought it helps as a guide for size - it won’t charge by USB).
Charging:
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The first thing I did was to plug the tablet in for a charge, there are two reasons for this. Firstly to check that the power supply is functional and safe (i.e. does not over heat) and secondly for the battery.
If the battery is at a low level, you have to treat it carefully - particularly if was in storage (as it will gradually lose charge over time). Li-ion batteries if drained below their bottom limit, will “crash” their voltage, this causes a lot of damage to the battery and it may never recover fully (or in attempting to do so it may cause excess heat == bad news). You should always avoid switching any device on when the battery is in this state, so always charge just in case before trying to switch on (most electronics should refuse to turn on, but best not to count on it).
For this reason I was pleased to find that the battery was charged to approximately 60-80% (I guess) which is around the recommended storage/shipping level. Also the charger or tablet did not burst into flames, which was nice too!
Turned On:
Switching on the device, immediately the screen shows a colourful splash screen, then some linux penguin/mole, before displaying the normal android boot. Instantly I am pleased that the screen is working! I am also impressed that the screen quality, brightness and colour look quite good.
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60 Seconds later and Android has booted!
I would be interested to know if this is particularly fast or slow (my only comparison is booting the Blackstone Android from SD, which takes about 4 mins). For me, 1 min seems fast enough, certainly as fast as starting windows mobile. For normal use, the device can be put to sleep with the main ([]) button, which is instant on and off.
Screen was already calibrated, and the normal start-up wizard ran for Android.
Pre-Installed Software:
Aside from the standard stuff, you get ES File Explorer, Meridian Media Player, Skype (I’ve not tested that yet), SkyFire Browser, Aldiko eReader, QuickOffice, YouTube App and Android Market. The pre-installed Android Market worked fine, and I was downloading new apps in seconds. There are also some Chinese apps which I’ve not tried, but overall, there is everything to on there to get you started off and enough for you to use it directly out of the box.
Aside from some demo pictures and a video, there was also some video which I guess was taken when they tested the unit, it is a good sign that they appear to have taken the time to check the unit works, calibrate it, check things like the camera are functional etc (not sure if this was Pandawill or the manufacturer, but it was within an office so I suspect the former). At 0.3mp, the front facing camera clearly isn’t amazing, but in reasonable lighting it is good enough to see the subject in question quite clearly (one thing though is it is mirrored - guess for skype use (if that works)).
Out Of The Box Impression:
Overall initial impressions are, the screen appears to be pretty good for the money. Colours are slightly more washed out than a more expensive screen, but not overly so. The resistive touch screen does take a firm-ish touch to use, but again, not overly more than other resistive touch screens.
The size and weight of the unit appears to be nicely balanced, it is easy to hold in a single hand (for an adult) while using it with another (or thumb typing and holding either side). The outside bezel is just the right size that, if you need to, you can hold the edge with your thumb without touching the screen etc. The plastic housing, which is rigid and feels solid, makes the unit feel quite good quality. The piano black finish of the back (like a psp) does attract fingerprints however the screen itself doesn’t, which is great.
Although it was never going to be the fastest Android experience, however the unit does seem to keep up with the operating system fairly well, definitely fast enough to be usable.
The unit feels nice and appears to work well, so far excellent value for money.
Next time I shall evaluate the tablet against my requirements and see how it fares...
Topic Two : A Low Cost Tablet
Part Three: Passing the grade? (A-E)
Crunch time! How does the low cost tablet fare when lined up against my expectations and needs?
Meeting My Requirements:
A: Replacing A Portable DVD Player
Viewing photos, videos and listening to music from the pre-installed samples was easy and the units response was reasonable. There was good video playback of the 720p sample (I expect this was encoded to suit the device obviously), and the photo browser did a nice job of displaying and sorting through the photos. Sound was ok, by no means hi-fi standard but enough to listen to over moderate background noise (sound as good as the DVD player - but can’t really say this is hard). This will take a bit more investigation to determine what formats are supported and from where (local storage, microSD, flash stick, HDD, network, internet etc etc). However, even if videos need to specifically encoded as long as they can be played from a mass-storage device (or at a push the SD card), this should meet this requirement fine (did I mention the old DVD player is terrible...).
B: A Doodle Pad
It took no time at all for my offspring to try this, safe to say the unit passes this test with flying colours. One huge improvement is that the Blackstone touch sensitive call buttons etc were not in the way any more. Still to find the perfect app for this:
On Windows Mobile its My Note by MyLostBlog which is a good balance between clear interface and function (I still prefer 2.1 over 2.6).
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On the DS, Art Academy is favourite (although what it has in features, it lacks flexibility). Also Flip Note is worth a mention, I would love to find a similar app on Android.
Art Academy (art software) / Flipnote (animation program)
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At the moment the star for Android is AutoDesk’s SketchBook Mobile (perhaps a little complex for younger children to fully do everything but easy enough for them to use and enjoy most of the features, excellent for adult use too!). AutoDesk’s app shows the quality that is possible with Android (although at the expense of lag free response on this particular device), I’m still very impressed and the 7 inch screen makes it all the more enjoyable.
C: Simple Web-browser
First off the lack of flash is annoying, but there is at least “some” flash support (I assume flash lite) from the Skyfire Browser, and even the google browser when it came across an embedded YouTube video it directed it to the YouTube app to play.
Browsing is reasonable, the wifi signal is probably below normal, but if you have a good signal, the browsing speed as comparable to my phone (for me the google browser appeared to be faster, but that might have been down to my wifi signal at the time). Here, multi-touch or at least the dual-touch of the later M701 models would be useful, as Pinch-to-zoom would be helpful. At least with the 7 inch screen the need to zoom in and out all the time is reduced (also I’m sure by experimenting with different browsers and settings the perfect balance will be achievable). It will never replace the desktop for web-browsing, but it is fine for quick searches etc.
Google Browser / Skyfire Browser
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D: Music player
I’ll hold judgement on this until I find a more flexible app, since I had problems navigating around my music and playing it by folder unless it was on the SD card (I was only using some files I had available, I’m sure it is a lot simpler with correctly tagged albums). Once playing the music though, it managed ok (although it did experience issues if you attempted to “multi-task” and load apps etc while music was in the background - although that may have been the app I was using and/or fiddling around with the usb connections). The quality isn’t the best I’ve heard, but it is sufficient. I think overall, with the right app, the unit will perform this task without issue.
E: eReader
Just by trying the pre-installed Aldiko application, it is clear to see that this unit is great for reading. The text was very clear and easy to read with plenty of text visible and even on the smallest font setting (point 10) you can easily read without issue. The g-sensor rotates the screen as required (hopefully there is an option to turn it off - for reading while laying down [Yes, there is a setting for android generally]). The screen is slightly shiny so would suffer in direct sunlight, however it is reasonable for reading in average lighting. I also tested with a pdf, which displayed ok using QuickOffice, but features such as re-flow (available with Adobe’s reader) would definitely help to fit things on the screen.
[Update: Once I've installed Adobe reader, pdf's are very easy to read, although the lack of resuming where you left off means you have to keep track of page numbers yourself (this is no different to the Windows Mobile version).]
CONTINUED BELOW...
Congrats!
Really great post
enotar said:
Congrats!
Really great post
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! I should be adding some more later on today.
I'm open for suggestions for topics etc.
Topic Two : A Low Cost Tablet
Part Four: Passing the grade? (Continued...F-J)
Meeting My Requirements (Continued...):
F: Camera & HDMI
As I previously mentioned the camera is not very good, but since it is front facing (it’s located to the right side of the ([]) button) it clearly is not suitable for taking snaps etc. Using google-goggles, the images are just about usable, but it appears the google-goggles app can’t take the pictures directly (you can import pictures which then allows you to take photos using the standard app and open them).
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[Android Logo taken with camera]
I’ve just tested the HDMI (I’ve managed to get a mini-HDMI cable) and after enabling the output via the settings page and restarting, the screen correctly displayed on the TV. Films and games do look good on the TV, although some adjustment to the alignment would be useful. Although you can output in either 1080p and 720p, the resolution is matched to the device 800x480 (although I might be wrong for direct video output), also from first impression, 1080p is lower colour depth than 720p output.
G: USB Host
Ideally the USB connection for host/OTG would be it’s own full size female usb socket (i.e. a normal USB socket) but instead you need to use the USB cable provided which converts the miniUSB to a USB socket. Tested with microSD card reader, flash memory stick (4Gb Kingston), the Blackstone (in mass-storage mode) and even 2.5 HDD which worked even without extra power (I was surprised at this as it is only a generic enclosure with a random laptop drive, however I did not try this with a low battery just in case that did damage). All of which appear under the /scsi/ directory. So far I’ve been unable to find how to “unmount” the drives (you can unmount the sd-card and the internal nand memory via the settings but not the OTG device), so when you disconnect you get “USB Device unexpectedly removed” message.
H: USB Device keyboard support
Using the same OTG cable, plugging in a keyboard was easy and seamless (it just works straight away). In fact, I tested this using a Logitech wireless Keyboard and Mouse and both worked perfectly (aside from the fact the keyboard is about 5 times the size of the tablet). I also tried another USB keyboard, which in the past I've noticed does not work when within DOS on a PC (where the Logitech does), this did not work, but I suspect this is simply the keyboard being slightly unusual. Keeping an eye out for a small and cheap keyboard now.
I: RS232 Support
I attempted this just out of interest but not really knowing what to look for can’t be sure it did anything. I don’t expect this to work without some serious work, but will see what can be achieved if anything. The reason for this is that many low level electronics projects can be controlled/monitored using RS232. In addition to this, I’ve also tried a bluetooth dongle (it has no bluetooth built in), and LAN adaptor, clearly they didn’t magically start working (no doubt the build does not have the correct drivers installed etc), but this is something I will look into.
J: A development platform
At a basic level, I can copy over built APK (android application) files and install them, even the ones which I had issues with on the Blackstone work fine on the device. Developing applications and working directly with the tablet is possible (will look at this in more detail another time), as a development device it is ideal.
The not so good...
Hardware Interfaces:
The single OTG mini usb port is annoying, it would be help to connect more than one device etc and not need to use an adaptor cable.
The mini HDMI, again would be good not to need a special cable for this (at least would have been useful to know ahead of time).
Buttons...no physical home or volume buttons, this does make things difficult sometimes (I believe there are software solutions for this, or options to re-map the keys).
Out-Of-Box mapping is: ([]) is power/screen key, right-side of rocker (with Home Icon) is the menu key, left-side of the rocker (with menu icon) is the back key! Once you get used it, it may be the best layout anyway, will need to experiment.
No Usb charging, from a pure ease of use point of view this would be very helpful, but most tablets don’t support this.
Sticking out of the SDHC card (puts the card at risk of snapping) - later version of this tablet this doesn’t stick out.
Obviously multitouch, bluetooth etc would be nice, but we know that.
The Grey Grey market:
This device “IS” a fake...Real Haipad vs. Fake
I can’t work out though if the unit functions any worse than a real one, all I know is, this one functions better than I was expecting and I’ve not found anything which the originals (if it is a fake) did which this doesn’t (so far).
I've now confirmed this with Pandawill, that the tablet is OEM, not a HaiPad original (at least they 'fessed up to it!). Considering it was sold as part of their own "Fight Against Internet Crime" promotion due to their recent DOS hack attack, it is a little naughty but as you can probably tell by now, I am still very happy with the device, no matter it's origin (but glad it was discounted). Also, the device does function as described by the specs, so other than the manufacturer the rest of the listing is accurate.
The only real issue is that new firmware will be a problem since I can't be sure if it will work or not.
Not all joy and perfection (I’d be mad to expect it):
Most applications appear to work, however, I’ve found that Angry Birds has issues with the surface texture graphics (the text which shows the menus/scores - a pain, but the rest of the game is playable). Apparently later versions such as Rio work fine, this just appears to be a feature of the telechip processor and does this for all HaiPad M701. Since I am not obsessed about Angry Birds (I can stop any-time I want, no really I can...) I can live with it. Also Raging Thunder 2 isn’t playable since I can’t see the menu blocks to select anything, I guess for the same issue.
Most games appear to work fine, such as Air Control, TurboFly 3D (lags sometimes, but not surprisingly since its full-on 3D graphics), Waveblaster (works very nicely, with G-sensor working), Pacific Wings (no g-sensor control). The G-Sensor doesn’t work on some games, but fortunately most have alternative options if that is the case.
It's a mixed bag for games, but fortunately I never intended games to be it's main use and I am quite happy with decent puzzle games etc anyway.
Overall - "A solution for now, but not the future":
The unit runs an ARM11 at 800MHz, with 256RAM, lets face it, it will never do all the graphical gymnastics that the Nvida Tegra 2 processors will perform and doing all but the very basics will probably leave it out-of-breath. Such a device is no laptop or even netbook replacement, but much like the iPod touch, it is a media player with many bonus features (& on a much better budget).
I’m sure as time passes (probably not long either) more and more applications will leave this type of low cost tablet behind, with the pace of processor development at the moment this should really be no surprise at all. But for now, the market is open and the apps are flowing, so I’ll sit back and enjoy them!
Topic Three: Low Level Basics
Part One: Oh ADB Debugger!
One of the first steps in getting properly connected to your devices innards is to ensure you are able to use the ADB (Android Debug Bridge).
The ADB is command-line terminal which allows you to directly control the device and file system of the device (or emulated device) from a PC or MAC.
On the face of it you might wonder why the ADB is of much use, the answer is that it allows a direct route to the entire file system as well as providing debug access directly on target as well as monitor log outputs as programs run. Overall it is similar to ActiveSync for windows mobile. Another reason to have this working is that if your device fails to boot, something messes up your system or say the touch-screen fails, you can use ADB to access everything on the device and also re-flash it. Also you will probably need ADB to root your device (more on that later).
There are a number of guides available for setting up ADB, so I won’t go into detail on them. Personally I followed Google’s own developers guide for setting up the Android SDK (Software Development Kit) since I also intend to write Android software and the ADB is part of that.
However, after a quick search, the following guide appears to cover most of the details.
The UnLocker - How To: SetUp ADB/USB Drivers for Android Devices.
For my device, the ADB driver needed some fiddling around with, since windows would not accept the driver was for my device [Editing the ini file and adding the VID and PID of the hardware didn't help me].
Eventually I found the following (following a tip from SlateDroid): The app PdaNet appears to supply suitable drivers.
I also recommend adding the location of ADB to your system path, so that you can call it from any command-line location.
Once the drivers are installed, check that when the device is connected (and debugging is enabled via settings) that typing “adb devices” from the command-line shows a device).
C:\> adb devices
List of devices attached
0123456789ABCDEF device
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you want to write software using Ecilpse you’ll also want to check that it can connect and deploy applications directly to the device for testing.
Within the Ecilpse, under the run menu select “Run Configurations...”, within the Target Tab, the “Deployment Target Selection Mode” must be set to “Manual”.
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This enables the “Android Device Chooser” to prompt when you attempt to run/debug from Ecilpse.
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Build and run your application or a test one and it should now run directly on your device.
There are also a number of GUI apps around which make use of ADB to provide easy ways to manage applications, transfer files etc all without needing to mount and unmount your sd cards to and from the device. At the moment I’ve started using DroidExplorer, even from initial impressions it is clear the features are quite extensive (you could probably write about 20 guides on how to use all of it correctly).
an excellent article overall.
question about the tablets: are most apps up-sized to fit the resolution, or are there a large variety of apps natively designed to run at the bigger resolution?
crevlthe said:
an excellent article overall.
question about the tablets: are most apps up-sized to fit the resolution, or are there a large variety of apps natively designed to run at the bigger resolution?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is an interesting question!
Although my tablet is WVGA which is the same as the blackstone (so I can't test this directly!).
You'd need a much higher resolution device to go beyond the officially supported resolutions, (obviously Android 3.0 supports more).
From what I've read and from doing some app development, apps should scale to fit the screen (if programmed correctly). I've read that some apps don't scale for some tablets, what the root reason is for this, I wouldn't know, since the support is there in the API.
Basically, the android sdk provides various ways to describe the layout of your screens, and they encourage you to use ones which describe them in terms of proportional amounts (for the Linear Layout) or in terms of position of items i.e. to the left of item A (for Relative Layout) etc. The other layouts all work along the same lines, i.e. you don't worry about the size of the screen and calculate each position by hand like you do with windows mobile etc, it is all determined by the API.
You can see the different layouts code here and if you find the ApiDemo APK (I'll post if you like) you can view them. However, you can break all the rules and still use the Absolute Layout, where you return to the good old days of x,y co-ordinates. Even then you can use a values which are relative to the screen size and pixel pitch (see Difference of px, dp, dip and sp in android..) so there really is no reason to hard-code it.
As for graphics, I've not done this yet, but I know this handled if you use "9-patch" png files...they describe them here.
The idea here is that the black pixels around the edge allow the designer to say which bits are fixed size and which bits can be stretched to fit etc. It is a really tidy way to do it I think. Imagine how you'd have to do it otherwise if you created a button image with an icon on which would need to be resized to fit!
Oh, there are also provisions to provide low-res, med-res and high-res versions of the graphical resources, so again everything should scale nicely and look good without the need to scale everything all the time. There shouldn't be any need as such for "large" versions of apps, unless the developer wants to change how the app works by making use of the extra space or if they want ensure the "small" version takes up less space. I'm not sure how it determines which resource to use etc or if they all get installed etc, I've not looked into it.
So as long as the designer of the app has done all this correctly then it "should" scale correctly to whatever resolution. Of course, to claim this is true, they would need to test all resolutions. Fortunately you can manually create high-resolution emulated devices so it can be done but that is not the default.
[Now you mention it though, I shall ensure I test any apps I create at least once in high-resolution, it sounds like a good idea!]
I think this might have been why the retina display didn't make it to the iPad2, it would have required app developers to produce yet more app versions to deal with it and re-do the graphics yet again. Unfortunately I don't know anything about how iOS deals with these things, but you don't get the standard sized app in the middle of the screen or a x2 type option as you do with iPads.
Thanks for posting the question, hopefully it answers it (in theory anyway).
Topic Three: Low Level Basics
Part Two: The Root Of It All
I looked and looked for this information but I couldn't find the clear answers I wanted regarding rooting, so here is the info I was after.
What is ROOT, do I need it?
Rooting your device is not essential, for most the things you do with a tablet you will not need root access. Rooting is the process by which you enable “Root” access to the system’s low level files and hardware, this is achieved by enabling “super user” [Linux term for the highest level access which has higher level permissions to files than a normal user (like an Administrator)] access.
In most cases, apps will access hardware and files through the Android API, but in some cases they may need better control of the hardware than the API allows or access to files which are normally locked.
For this reason these applications require “root” access, typically apps which take screenshots (I assume to allow access to the screen data) and backup programs (I expect to allow access to all your files) are such programs.
Am I Rooted?
One thing I had trouble working out was working out if the device was rooted already or not. The quickest way to find out is to try to use an app which requires root access, if you device isn’t rooted it will tell you.
A good way is to download “Terminal Emulator” from the market (or direct from the author) . Then type: su which stands for Super User! (if your device is correctly rooted the “$” will change to “#” (ideally it will also prompt you for permission to enter superuser mode first - see SuperUser.apk below)).
Other signs you are rooted is to look for the “su” file in /system/bin/ but this will not confirm if the file is set to be executable correctly or in some cases different names are used to make it harder for unwanted apps to locate it.
Can I break/brick my device by ROOTING?
Actually ROOTING the device shouldn’t really cause any problems (since all you are really doing is installing a file which allows you to grant “Superuser” access). However, since ROOTING (by definition) allows entering into “Superuser” mode, this mode does allow you make much more serious changes to the system than you would in a “Normal User” mode (which is the whole point!), so clearly there are some risks involved while in this mode (and you may want to consider how this fits with your warranty). If your device isn’t open, then I suspect the main risk is getting your device into an unlocked state so that you can perform the root process first (since my tablet was not locked in anyway, I don’t know about this aspect).
Once ROOTING is complete, you don’t remain as a “Superuser” but any application is able to use it if they require. For this reason, the Superuser.apk application is typically installed, which detects when a request for “superuser” permissions are made and allows you to accept or reject the request.
The ROOTING process itself is reversible, which you may wish to do if you need to return your device for repairs etc.
How to root?
There are many guides and methods, but I shall take one specific to my tablet (posted by OffWorld on androidtablets.net) and explain each step in detail, since none I found explain what it is you are doing.
First you need to get the latest su and superuser.apk files from here.
Now, connecting the device to your pc, open a command prompt and type:
adb devices
Adb will respond hopefully with your list of devices:
List of devices attached
0123456789ABCDEF device
This confirms your device is attached and adb is able to communicate correctly.
Command 1:
adb shell mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system
This runs adb (the terminal program to your device) and mounts the specified folders with read/write access.
Command 2:
adb push su /system/bin/
This sends the “su” program to the location on the device (note this assumes have the “su” in the same directory as you are running adb from). You can confirm this by navigating to the location on your tablet and see that the file has been transferred.
Command 3:
adb shell chmod 4755 /system/bin/su
This changes the permissions of the “su” file you’ve just transferred [details about chmod].
By using the command: adb shell ls -l /system/bin/su you can see the permissions.
We’ve changed the permissions from -rw-rw-rw- to -rwsr-xr-x, this allows the file to be executed.
Command 4:
adb push Superuser.apk /system/app/
This installs the Superuser.apk package on the device. This is important since this app allows you to control superuser access, rather than just allowing any program to obtain “superuser” rights.
Command 5:
adb shell reboot
Restarts the device.
Following this process, you will have the SuperUser application installed and applications will request Superuser access if they require it.
Note:
You may find for screen capture programs you need to allow permissions automatically or you may only end up with screenshots of the permission screen! Yes that's how I got the above one...
Excellent topic ! i've got the same pad and was wondering if you did find out a good way to completely backup the firmware. I've used Titanium but that's not a complete dump.
JiePieWie said:
Excellent topic ! i've got the same pad and was wondering if you did find out a good way to completely backup the firmware. I've used Titanium but that's not a complete dump.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Welcome to Xda!
That was going to be my next topic.
I've just been focusing on my WM development stuff at the moment (new RSSTab in the works), but will return to the tablet after I am done.
I'm not quite sure the best way to back it up yet, I was planning on trying out the ClockMod route, trouble is I'm quite new to it, so a little cautious about doing it before holidays.
I hope to try out some low level interfacing using the usb at some point too, as I've got a development board to play with.
Side Topic: The Future! Quad core and beyond
This time next year, Rodney...
Just saw this, and thought I would share here!
ASUS planning quad-core Tegra 3 tablet
See the two videos which are on the linked page...
Yes that is 2560x1600 resolution, hopefully to go into a 10" retina display.
Simply said, the future of these chips look rather interesting to say the least (no doubt are related to Sony's NGP).
Looking at the video, what we will be able to do with mobile devices will be rather impressive. Combine that with the new touch and perhaps kinect type control technologies as well as improvements with battery capacity/recharge tech, improved clear & colourful screens and things are shaping up nicely.
Boy are we going to have some fun hacking the innards out of them!
It is easy to see that for me, I've made the right choice by not spending lots of money on an impressive and expensive tablet at the moment. Since I'm happy to wait for a better tablet and until then I can have fun playing with my basic one.
Let just hope that the manufactures come up with a decent device, that is able to be hacked and perhaps might even be half decent out-of-the-box.
What is next? Who knows!
It's interesting really since I think that phones are quite close to the point where they have about as much processing power as they need** (perhaps with the exception of ones which include extra connectivity to HDMI/pico projector, keyboards etc). When they are subjected to the confines of a 3.8"/4" screen, you start to hit the limits of usability rather than processing power. Tablets have given the hardware room to stretch it's legs a little and show us what it can do!
**I'm not saying they won't need more in future, but I think perhaps an upgrade won't be as essential or spectacular, as it once was, until they evolve to the next form of course. I suppose the ultimate progression though is the usability of something like a tablet or pc but packaged in the form of a phone or smaller device in some form or another.
The software needs to catch up now though, we need better multi-core programming techniques, far far better privacy protection, and better stability overall. Thankfully hardware gives us the grunt to do this, it just needs to develop and improve to the point where coding can be done at the highest level of abstraction (which allows time to be spent on creative aspects rather than low level code details).
If you want to look even further, the prospect of re-programmable hardware is getting closer. This is where all the single purpose chips (such as video decoders) are replaced/supplemented by ones which can be re-programmed. Not only does this allow for codecs etc to be updated while still keeping the advantage of hardware decoding/coding (i.e. realtime without loading the main processor or drawing lots of power), but some applications could in-theory call in dedicated processing for specific tasks allowing for some amazing performance when performing complex and processor intensive tasks.
Fun times are a-coming!
Bright things are ahead for our fondle blocks, I don't even care too much if they are android or ipad or something else, as long as we can buy it (without selling a leg or two - ok, not iPad then!), program it, play with it and push it to it's limits and beyond!
Side Topic: Multi-Touch Technology - with No Touch Screen!
ZeroTouch 'optical multi-touch force field' makes a touchscreen out of just about anything
I wonder how much this costs to produce, quite a nice solution and ideal as a add-on to current screens. Depending of the cost of each infra-red and LED module it hopefully won't be too much. Imagine getting it fitted to your coffee table at home!