Database Users

NEW! [MAGICIAN ONLY] VJLumos - Superbright screen! RTFM

[Update Nov 7: Universal too! Use VJLumosLite]
All,
If you follow this thread you’ll see discussion of the bizarre behaviour of the Magician’s screen when you start the camera; the screen momentarily goes whiter than white, nay, SuperBright. However, this level of brightness has been hidden from us in normal use.
I have developed a technique for using this SuperBright mode. I’m not too proud of it, because it’s an “ugly hack”, meaning a bit of a cheat. The ideal way to do this would be to reverse engineer the camera program, camera driver or screen driver and find out how it does this. I didn’t do this. I basically trick the system into thinking the camera is always running, hence always SuperBright.
Now, it basically works. However, and I cannot stress this enough, IT IS DANGEROUS.
Initially, I accept no responsibility for use of this program on your hardware.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don’t know the effect of running your screen so bright for prolonged periods. However, it’s basically just enabling the camera, so if the camera works SuperBright safely, I guess this should too.
The SuperBright mode can ONLY be achieved once per soft reset. So that means, use it once, and then when you power off the Magician it will go back to normal brightness again. If you try to run your camera again, it WILL HARD RESET the Magician. Let me say that again. Hard Reset. Not soft. So take a backup before use, and use wisely, and say no to drugs. To reenable SuperBright you will have to soft reset again.
VJLumos cannot (hopefully) be shut down after it’s been run, to remind you that you’ve run it once so don’t be a fool and run the camera again. Or it will hard reset your phone. Did I mention this?
VJLumos will show you a warning on startup. This can be optionally overridden by starting the program with a command line “silent”, eg
Code:
“vjlumos.exe silent”
I reiterate. I did not want to release this program because it is an ugly hack, works only once per soft reset and can hard reset your Magician. But I’ve been asked to release it, so caveat emptor.
This program took quite a while to develop and release, so if you want to express thanks or monetary vengefulness, please feel free to send a donation to my “Buy Vijay a WM5 device so he can keep pumping out the goods” campaign.
I need to buy a WM5 device to finish developing a ton of good stuff I can’t share with you guys yet. However, my Magician’s only a few months old and my better half won’t let me spend more cash now, so if I save up, you guys will reap the rewards. My stuff will generally be free or nearly free, particularly for XDA forum users. Stay tuned for more goodies on show shortly.
Click here to make a donation. :wink:
Guys, if you use this, successfully or not, please post. I need to keep track of how it works.
Download VJLumos.exe
Update - Lite version
If the automatic version (above) doesn't work for you, please try the "lite" version. To use this one:
1. Place a shortcut to VJLumosLite in your startmenu (no installer included for now).
2. Start the camera.
3. Click the tools option (second icon in the bottom right corner).
4. Click the tools menu.
5. Choose Adjust...
6. Now go to your startmenu and run VJLumosLite.
7. Hopefully after a few seconds you'll return to the today screen in SuperBright mode.
8. If you get an error message, please PM me with details of your setup.
Download VJLumosLite.exe
Further update, camera.exe
It appears that there are different versions of the camera.exe program on our phones. I'm using ROM 1.12. If you have incompatibilies, you can download the camera.exe from my ROM here. Install it in your \windows\ folder. If there are any copyright issues I'll take it down.
V
PS Did I mention the hard reset? Don’t run the camera again after VJLumos. And backup BEFORE first use in case you forget.
PPS Oh, and if you find yourself in a strange screen with a cross on it, press hangup (the red key) or somehow go back to Today screen.
PPPS I don't recommend putting this in your startup folder. It needs to play around with the camera, and your startup may be slow, causing problems with interacting with it.

Congrats for achieving what you've done so far

Chatty, did it work with your amputated camera?
V

Well, no. It says "Couldn't start adjust dialog". That's a big hint towards how you did it ;-)
Now I'm gonna soft reset and pray I won't face an unwanted hard reset regardless what I'm doing.

I've left all debug messages in, and of course, as discussed in the other thread, that's exactly how I did it!
The camera program will obviously not start up when it doesn't find a camera then. I can't think of any other way to make it work for you.
Any chance you could have just changed the faceplate on your phone, rather than remove the camera? At work we've got some great adhesive silver foil, which I've used to cover the back of my magician (and ipod) with. It looks ok, and prevents scratching when throwing it down on the desk. It would cover the camera part well I think, and not look too poo.
Did it hardreset?
V

Luckily it didn't hard reset yet... but with Radio 1.13 I have the strange problem, that after a soft reset I get a msg like there's no driver for my BT hardware and I shall enter a name for the driver?! After a few power off/on it works again.
Changing the faceplate only would violate firm's policy I guess because you could always take away the plate, shoot photos and send them away immediately via MMS. I can faithfully admit I've got no "PDA with camera", I only got an allowed "PDA without camera". Another thing is, it's easily undoable. I needed this already for using my warranty.

Has anyone (else) tried this yet? I need to know if it works or needs deleting... please post either good or bad.
V

I can't test it because i don't know how to use the command line
If i start the file it shows me a warning message and after 3 seconds the screen return normal.

Andrea - when I said that if you don't know how to use a command line you shouldn't use it, I was just being careful. You don't need to use a command line.
Run the program. You'll get the warning. Then just click ok. What happens after that? On my system it goes through its actions for a couple of seconds, then returns to the Today screen with the new brighter screen.
V

On my magician it shows a warning message and after start camera and shows a message: "Couldn't find adjust dialog" then i press ok and there are 2 black windows open, i close them and the camera is on. I turn off camera and the screen returns to normal brightness

i'll hopefully release a simpler more compatible version tomorrow morning. Sorry you guys who are having troubles.
V

I'm waiting to test it! :lol:

Andrea, I've posted a lite version, please read the first post again and download.
All If the automatic version doesn't work for you, please PM me with your setup, eg startup programs, rom, or any special stuff you might be running. It runs perfectly on my 1.12 Magician, but I can't test it on any other. However, do try the new lite version, which requires you to manually go to the camera's Adjust... dialog, and then run VJLumosLite. It should return to the today screen in bright mode.
Oh, and I've updated the original version as well (updated version) to give it more time to find the windows it needs. Please try this version if it didn't work before, but you have had success with vjlumoslite which should work for everyone).
Please tell me if it works or not
V

Vijay, u've got a new pm!

@code72: He can see that for himself... why did you post here without any further information? This way it's useless for everyone.

Sorry Chatty i was excited.
I've sended him my configuration and the screen of error message.
(Vijay wrote: If the automatic version doesn't work for you, please PM me with your setup)
My screen capture is:

Guys, code72 got it working. It appears that we have different versions of the camera.exe program on our phones. Don't know how that happened. I'm using ROM 1.12.
If you have incompatibilies, you can download the camera.exe from my ROM here. Install it in your \windows\ folder. If there are any copyright issues I'll take it down.
Also, Code72 asked if I could update the program to prevent the Hard Reset. I'm afraid I can't, I wish I could. The hard reset happens because basically I'm forcing the camera to think it's on (even when it's off), to force the bright screen. However, then, if you try to start the camera again, it discovers that it thinks it's already on, conflicts with itself and crashes out badly. So, the only choice is not to run the camera twice... sorry guys. If I come up with a better solution, I'll post it.
V

Thanks Vijay, for me VjlumosLite works ok. The screen is very brightness wow!
I've put vijay's camera.exe file in Windows folder, i've put VjlumosLite on SD card, i've created a shortcut to VjlumosLite in start menu then:
start camera
press camera settings
press tools->adjiust
press start menu VjlumosLite and.....
Wow, u are in today screen with a very brightness screen!
has someone tried this?

Guys, I've just managed to get a Universal, and guess what? VJLumosLite works!?
V

O2 Mini Slooooooooow

Just getting to grips with my new mini after putting my XDA2i to one side - and it's slow as hell.
I've found some apps can take 20 secs or more to load - and I'm using the standard apps, with no tweaks at all. It’s completely unusable so I’m assuming something s wrong otherwise everybody would be talking about this.
I'm now resetting it to the basic install (Hard reset followed by a soft reset as the customisation is about to install) – I’ll post me results later…
Some other points:
- What an amazing box - better than opening a new Mac
- Why oh why do those f*ckers as MS STILL have to put us through a noob cut & paste exercise on every reset.
- Did anybody else get the basic/business/full O2 install options promised in the quick start manual? I never saw this option on startup.

So anyway, I've got an O2 clean machine, manually configured my connections, and surprise surprise, everything is (more or less) zipping along.
It’s noticeably more sluggish that the 2i, but that’s expected – now all I need is a third part app that will allow me to assign one of the hard buttons to the light so I have a handy torch on me – anybody got any ideas?
More great news – PocketTV is now available for WM5 – www.pockettv.com

You entertain me..... I don't know why, but you do
Oooo Pocket Tv for WM5

strongp said:
So anyway, I've got an O2 clean machine, manually configured my connections, and surprise surprise, everything is (more or less) zipping along.
It’s noticeably more sluggish that the 2i, but that’s expected – now all I need is a third part app that will allow me to assign one of the hard buttons to the light so I have a handy torch on me – anybody got any ideas?
More great news – PocketTV is now available for WM5 – www.pockettv.com
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agree.. please, hardware button to handy torch !!!!!!

strongp said:
Just getting to grips with my new mini after putting my XDA2i to one side - and it's slow as hell.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm having the same problem.
strongp said:
I'm now resetting it to the basic install (Hard reset followed by a soft reset as the customisation is about to install) – I’ll post me results later…
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is it you've done? Reinstalled the OS from a non O2 ROM or something?
I'll go have a look round, which will probably answer my question.
Rolo.

Rolo,
You need to do a hard reset (see the manual) – Once you’ve got the ‘press the send key to blatt everything’ message you need to press the green phone button, but don’t worry if you get it wrong as the other buttons don’t seem to do anything. (another triumph for the O2 technical authors). Then after going through the setting up process you will be told that the O2 extensions will be loaded in 5 seconds, - before it can do this do a quick soft reset (stylus in the hole, no keys pressed).
Then you will need to set up the network settings. In programs there is an application called O2, and in that you can ‘get settings’. This may do the settings for you – it’s worth a try, as you can always reset it again afterwards if you want.
Anybody know what this program does?

Thanks for the help. I'll give that a go . I found that disabling the MSN toolbar from the today screen made quite a difference to performance as well.
I find it hard to believe anyone could put up with it as it is. Bah.
Rolo.

strongp said:
You need to
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Cheers. Job done, and now it's so much faster. (Hard reset was different in manual to wiki so corrected).
Then you will need to set up the network settings. In programs there is an application called O2, and in that you can ‘get settings’. This may do the settings for you – it’s worth a try, as you can always reset it again afterwards if you want.
Anybody know what this program does?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've just tried it. Selected the only menu item which said "Get settings". A text message popped up at the bottom saying "SMS sent", but visibly it didn't do anything else. I've waited a couple of minutes to see if I'll maybe get a message back with the settings or something, but nothing yet. My network settings are blank.
I'll give it half an hour or something and have a look and see if I can find the settings. If it's simple enough for you to point me in the direction (UK 02) that'd be cool, otherwise no worries - I presume this is for GPRS type stuff?
Thanks again for you help.
Rolo.

I was also not given the different install options on first start up. However, i did a hard reset and not by the method in the manual which didn't work - there is a 'CLEAR STORAGE' option in system settings that works instead. Then on startup i chose BASIC install and the O2 UI was not installed. So much faster now - it was ridiculous before.
The key thing is that this way, you get the speed increase and you won't need to manually input all the settings. Much better

Dr Doom said:
I was also not given the different install options on first start up. However, i did a hard reset and not by the method in the manual which didn't work
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used what was in the PDF manual linked to in the Wiki which was comms+voice+reset. The Wiki originally said it was camera+voice+reset.

Comms + voice + reset didn't work for me. Tried it for ages. It's important people know this in case the hard reset doesn't work for them either

Dr Doom said:
Comms + voice + reset didn't work for me. Tried it for ages. It's important people know this in case the hard reset doesn't work for them either
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
its comms & voice (hold) + quick short press with the stylus reset.
Screen will then say press green key to reset.

MDA Compact II - Format.

Im new to all this WM5 stuff so sorry in advanced.
Basically i got my new MDA Compact II today (branded T-Mobile of course!) and since I'm using it with Vodafone i started to mess around (yes I'm silly!)
Basically i changed the dial pad theme/skin... decided i don't like it and have been searching around this forum for the last few hours trying to find the original WM5 dial pad theme/skin that came with my device.
I managed to get it to look like the WM5 pad with a few files on this forum but the numbers are out of line with the skin... so the number 1 will be just to the right of the first button.
It still works but doesn't look very pleasing.
If anyone could help?
I was going to format it back to the original but when i turn it off and back on its just the same, and when i press the pin hole button at the bottom of my device to reset it, its the same when it starts up.
I have my original T-Mobile CD with a label "Windows Mobile 5.0 PPC Phone Edition GSM w/Outlk 2002" but i cant seem to find out how to do a fresh install of the WM5 on my device.

if it works the same like with a magician, u should hard reset the device, then when it say's it will start installing extra software, just soft-reset the device before this starts.
then when u start up the device again, u should have a clean WM5 on your device, without all the t-mobile-crap. Then u can install everything you need to get your Vodafone-card working properly, like gprs-settings and mms-settings, then run a program which is placed in the ext_rom to hide the extended rom if u please, the program is called delete_vdisk_shortcut.cab or something like it.
good luck

Being new to the world of PDAin i thought pressing the pin-hole reset button did a hard reset and cleared everything... which didnt seem to be the case.
After a little playing around while bored on the train to work i found something called "Clear Storage" in the settings which did the trick, altho using clear storage on the way to work left me with non of my contact numbers all day which wasnt great :roll:
Cheers for the help.
Dave.

XDA Neo HomeZone app - can someone upload?

Hi,
I flashed my XDA Neo with the latest Dopod ROM but I lost my HomeZone app. Can someone upload it here? Thanks!

home zone o-2 de
Hi,
Did home zone application ever worked for you? I had my neo with german rom and home zone application never displayed home icon or any visual indication that I was in home zone, when in fact I was in the home zone area. And yes application was loaded.
It worked on my magician (xda mini), but not on prophet (neo).
As far as actual application cab. I've seen it somewhere on this forum an attachment with german ext rom folder. Try that.

home zone o-2 de
Hi,
Did home zone application ever worked for you? I had my neo with german rom and home zone application never displayed home icon or any visual indication that I was in home zone, when in fact I was in the home zone area. And yes application was loaded.
It worked on my magician (xda mini), but not on prophet (neo).
As far as actual application cab. I've seen it somewhere on this forum an attachment with german ext rom folder. Try that.
here we go, log in to see attachment.

Hi,
here you go. For me it works with the XDAneo. The icon only shows when I klick on the "Phone-Connection" Button. Not the best solution in my opinion, but it works.
Bye,
Sven

Very strange :?
Installed the app, works, says that HZ is running, but also "No coordinates received". And no little house anywhere

HZ problem
I've got the same problem.. I think there is something else you have to install from xda neo ext rom.. I've tried installing everything though, it didn't fix the problem. This issue accure after the rom upgrade to WWE from German. But to be honest, the HZ didn't work for me even before upgrade. I didn't have a problem with coordinates though. It just wouldn't display the home zone icon..

Yeah man, doesn't work for me either. What do you think, if I just wrote to O2 customer support and explained that I didn't install their crappy extended ROM, would they be so kind as to give me step by step instructions on how to get my home zone icon?

HZ and o2 tech reps
Not a chance! : ) At least not with O2 in Germany. Sorry for bursting your bubble, man. I’ve called them before, several times intact. I’ve spoken to a few different tech reps regarding this issue on few different occasions. Their only solution is a hard reset! They only go by the basic manual they have for this, where’s the only solution for fixing anything is hard reset. These guys there have no idea how to reset PPC without manual!
On one occasion I’ve asked them about “English WM” ( WWE Rom), since my previous phone (Magician) was in German, (that is when I was plain uneducated about flashing this phones and etc.) and guess what their answer was?! They’ve said that flashing the phone or putting any localizer third party software was going to kill the device without chance of restoration! I mean c’mon, how smart is that? So much for the tech support!
But any way, you try that, may be you’ll have more luck! May be they just wanted to prevent me from half flashing my phone or incurring any other errors to the point of no recovery on my own. But I have half flashed my prophet few times, had RUU stopping with all kinds of errors half way trough the process, leaving the phone with no rom Installed, and still, managed to restore the rom. It only cost me my fingers that I bit of in the process and tons of beer for the recovery : ) any way, good luck! Let me know if you find the solution.
By the way, you can ask them to enable voice indication of home zone. You’ll here Voice indicator “Home” when dialing from home zone. It’s kind of inconvenient, but it’s the only solution for me right now.

Unfortunately, aleksandr is absolutely right. The German O2 XDA support is not just poor - they disinform you! Come on, I know much more stuff about those devices yet than those guys, and I've had a PPC for only a couple of months. The "home" voice is the only solution for me too so far.

Awww, come on! I was kidding, that's why I put a smiley behind my post and used a somewhat sarcastic choice of words!
So for Home Zone voice confirmation I just call the hotline and ask them to enable it? That would work for me I guess. A simple icon would be better though... Sometimes I wish I was smart and could just write my own little programs!

HZ working now!
Hey guys. The other day I had nothing better to do then taking apart Neo’s german extended rom content and tried the home zone application on my prophet (wwe, dopod 818 pro rom) I’ve installed Home Zone cab posted by Sauron1978de and then RilGSM patch from the O2 (can be found in german O2 extended rom content. And funny thing it worked! I tried it a hundred times before and it never worked up until now. Just make sure you install rilgsm patch last. It does the soft reset at the end. I have home icon now in my connections notification bubble. Let the pda run for a few minutes until it receives new sms with coordinates and you should be all set. Make sure you have home zone short cut in your start up folder.
Good luck!

Hi!
It works for me too! But I would like to see this icon on the top of the screen without pressing any buttons.

icon at the top bar
yeah, me too! no luck on that though..

do you know how to get rid of the sting "HZDisplayDataSMP" which appears on the top of the screen?

how to get rid of the sting "HZDisplayDataSMP"
No idea. never had this. may be by unchecking "Receive channel list" in Phone settings - More- Broadcast Channels- Settingds.
But by doing this, you also will no longer recieve new coordinates for HZ.
But again, this is MAY BE, as I don't really know what I'm talking about here I don't have this problem to play with.

i too have HZDisplayDataSMP popping up as the active app after waking up. most annoying, though pressing OK or red phone button gets rid of it. still, as i said, annoying. would like to know if there's some way to disable it being displayed, without turning off the "Broadcast Channels"-enabled option, as the HZ app seems to receive and use these broadcasts to enable the HZ display. well, that's my experience, anyways...
so, in short, anyone know how to hide an app from being displayed? or maybe forcing it to always run in the background?

Unlock Extended Rom

Hi there
I've just got my shiny new Touch HD. Wow - what an upgrade to my Orbit 1 (don't laugh). I loved my Orbit but this is so much better. It's not revolutionary, but everything has evolved so well i.e. the big screen, no horrible frame around the screen, USB 2 connection, love the Drive mode thingi when you plug it to your computer ect.
Only problem is I can't get TomTom to work - I'll sort that out later...
Now to the question - how do you unlock the extended rom (I think that what they call it)? I want to prevent the applications from installing i.e. TouchFlo Home Plugin after a hard reset. I find the combination of SPB Pocket Plus 4 Tabs, Today Agenda (and a few other apps.) a much better combination for me.
Hope someone can help.
Anis

Did you try a soft reset when the waiting screen pops up after a hard reset?

Why dont you just uncheck TouchFlo in Settings-Today?

Thanks for the replies.
Ideally I wouldn't want unwanted apps to install. I know it's a fast device but I like to have a clean system.
I could reset the device when it's about the install everything (don't even know how to reset) however I want to keep certain things like the Black HTC theme and a few other things.
Anis

Tried and failed - what did I do?
RacerII said:
Did you try a soft reset when the waiting screen pops up after a hard reset?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just tried this last night and tried at multiple stages... and no matter what it insisted on installing all the bloatware. Any idea what I might be doing incorrectly?
When you say "wait screen" - do you mean the initial WinMo v6.1 green-splash screen, or the same display with "Please wait while we [something] for first time use"? I also tried at the Home screen before the customization begins, and while it was running... all still ended up with the software being installed. :/
I've read some great posts (here and Howard Forums) about using Total Commander and entering "\Extended Rom\" but that doesnt open anything on my device. Does that area need to be unlocked?
Thanks for any tips!

I think you need a custom Rom without all of the applications. I had one on my Omnia.

hmm...
typing "\Extended_Rom\" in total commander does not work.
those registry which hide/unhide and lock/unlock extended rom are not there too.
check the wiki, nothing about extended rom or customed rom which is meant for Service Provider specific.
Or is it because the HD I am having is tied to 1 provider, but it is already SIM unlocked which can use other providers SIM.
The original rom is lag, very lag, lots of rubbish in "\windows\" directory beside M$ original files.
How are the cooked roms around in the forum?

drbf said:
I think you need a custom Rom without all of the applications. I had one on my Omnia.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 for this plan. I'm running a lighter custom 6.5 rom (NRG) with none of the startup ui's. I've loaded Mobile shell#3 and it works very well. Quickest combo I've found so far for snappy-ness and speed. Battery life is fine with it. Try diff light roms without the startup bloatware and you may find something that you like.