Hi folks,
Glad to hear that some of us have managed to upgrade our unit -
congrats.
Few notes and responses to recent threads:
* Downloading licenses: After you download the file, you should
get a message that says, "download of (file)" completed (where
file is the name of the license file). Download this to none
folder of any storage device - flash disk, SD card, thumb drive,
etc. To install the license properly, make sure there is no hwi
file in the location where hwl file is - otherwise, the thing
that Sabahattin described will happen - in my case, I've
installed the license from a thumb drive and the ROM image from
an SD card.
* Temp folder: You do not really want to create a folder named
"temp" on Flash Dim, as it is used to hold ROM image files.
After the upgrade is done, these files along with the ROM image
file will be erased - and possibly the data in the temp folder
along with it.
* Upgrade installation changes: As stated earlier, you can use
any storage device of any capacity to install the hwi file - no
capacity limits, no dependence on a stpecific card, etc.
* Wireless connection: The best way to reconnect using 9.1 is
trying reconnect option from Wireless Ethernet Menu or via
Connectivity Menu/Connect using existing configuration.
* Internet changes: You will not see connection config message
every time you send or receive an email, when you sign in for
KeyChat or when selecting Internet from Main Menu.
The following is a response to Josh's query and the messages it
generated:
The product comparison is, in my opinion, on topic. Sometimes,
we need to look at what the others are doing so that we will be
informed about what's going on. The product comparisons comes up
around convention time - ACB/NFB convention, CSUN conference,
etc.
As for Braille Sense family and that of Apex, I'd say Apex wins
for now; however, when feature sets are compared, Braille Sense
Plus is "slightly" ahead.
As for CE 5.0 and CE 6.0, it is sort of hard to comprehend the
comparisons between those two unless if you know the history and
specifics of embedded systems, programming and how computer's
memory works. Windows CE 5.0, the basis for PAC Mate Omni and
Braille Sense family, was launched in 2004. Back then, there was
no tablet cell phones or mass potentials of using more RAM than
32 MB or 64 MB was not realized. By the time Windows Embedded CE
6.0 came out in late 2006, the tablet systems were starting to
receive attention and mass potentials of using more features and
more RAM were realized. A typical RAM capacity on emaedded
systems (at least consumer products) was between 64 MB and 128
MB. Nowadays, high-end devices reach 512 MB, or is projected to
reach a Gigabyte range before end of this year or next.
The biggest change between CE 5.0 and CE 6.0 is "updated" memory
and process management facilities. First, under CE 5.0 and
under, a program running on a Pocket PC was limited to using 32
MB of virtual memory (a memory type that allows more memory than
RAM to be usable). This placed one of the design challenges of
embedded devices - how can a programmer write feature-rich
software without using a lot of memory? As a consequence, even
with a device with 64 MB of RAM, one cannot utilize all RAM
resources (apart from partitioning some as RAM Disk). This is
the primary reason why I strongly advise using Eloquence on
mPower when browsing the web - and I wrote an tticle stating why
on my site. Similarly, on the Braille Sense, it cannot really
read a large document - typically above 2 MB or more - without
putting constraints on memory.
The second change was that more programs can run on CE 6.0 versus
CE 5.0. In the old days, a smartphone running Windows Mobile 6
(running on top of Windows CE 5.2, a version of 5.0 for consumer
products) would not allow more than a set number of programs to
run. If you do that, the program that was started the earliest -
perhaps the first user program will be closed. Quite a nasty
behavior - perhaps if you've used the first program to write
important documents without saving it. This is the reason why
Braille Sense family puts "seven programs" limit on multitasking.
From a computer's point of view, multitasking means running
unlimited number of programs, provided that it has sufficient Not
in the case of Braille Sense and PAC Mate series: you can run up
to 32 processes at once, including system software, which places
limits on number of things you can use.
However, with the advent of CE 6.0, these two "ugly" problems are
"gone." You can run almost unlimited number of programs - up to
32,768 processes are supported; this means that Apex can handle
different tasks using their own dedicated executables - chief
example is apexzip.exe, the program which handles file and folder
compression (which is stored as part of the 9.1 ROM image).
Second, you can work with large files thanks to the fact that it
support up to 2 GB of virtual memory per process. This is the
reason why you won't get "virtual memory is below certain
percent" on websites on Apex.
Along with these two fundamental things, CE 6.0 brings builar-in
support for WPA2 and AES, something CE 5.0 doesn't have (although
an update is availible), easier programmability through use of
Visual Studio and other things.
As for "stability" that Paul mentioned: When we (computer
scientists, software engineers and programming students) think of
stability, it means how stable a given software is. Hardware
counts - if we want to build critical hardware systems, disks and
memory chips, hardware stability (not losing information, giving
expected calculation results, etc.) would matter; but from
software perspective, we are looking for whether the program
works as advertised, any noticeable or unseen bugs and other
things.
One more: I'm writing a crucial version of PBWorks (set to be
released next week), detailing features in KeySoft 9.1, upgrade
procedures and vast modifications to existing content.
Cheers,
Joseph
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