Hey all,
I've just got hold of a HTC Alpine and was looking to get either WM5 or WM6 working on it. (Don't stop reading this isn't a "is there a rom update available? question").
I've noticed that people have sucessfully developed new osroms for others like the Blue Angel (I used to have one , but obviously nobody has for the Alpine, so I thought I'd try to knock one up myself.
However, I've fallen quite out of my depth. Can anybody provide some bullets about how the Blue Angel osroms were produced, in fact any guidance or "don't even bother" flames are appreciated.
So far I have done this:
1) I've run up my own extrom and upgraded the radio so I now have a feel for flashing it and such.
2) I've got the old osrom and tried to extract it (hoping for salvagable drivers from wince 4 that might port across) - unfortunatly I can't figure out how to pull the thing apart. I've seen some perl scripts floating about, but if anybody could point me to the latest version of the right one it would be appreciated.
3) I've got my hands on a copy of the platfrom builder for wince 5 (I know both WM5/WM6 are based upon it) - however have now discovered that windows mobile itself isn't included :-(.
I'm probably not even going through the right motions, or it might be plain impossible, but at least I'll know.
Thanks in advance,
Josh
As far as I know they got the rom from another phone with a newer os, transfered the drivers and removed some things that would not work with the ba.
I'm pretty sure that isn't this simple but is something like this
Unfortunately this is a "don't even bother" post.
ROMs are cooked for devices that either:
a) Have a brother with almost identical hardware that got a newer OS. (like prophet / wizard duo)
b) Have a test version of newer OS leaked but never released.
Because driver architecture is different between WM 2003 and WM 5 even if you could take the ROM apart you could not just take the WM 2003 drivers and use them with WM 5 OS .
As for Platform Builder - nothing there. To build a ROM for a device you need its BSP (Board Support Package) which is what lets you compile a ROM for specific hardware. As far as I know one of those has never ever been leaked from HTC (or other OEM).
Plus, to get your hands on a Windows Mobile version of PB (yes it is actually a different version) you need to be an OEM or a "MS partner" company.
Right, well if the driver architecture has changed then I'm pretty much buggered for plan a.
The blue angel is pretty similar driver wise, isn't it? As far as I can tell the only differences are the camera and the lack of a keyboard (obviously ram/proc too). But I suppose the ASICs/CPLDs are nothing like each other. So that plan's probably out of the window too.
It's not looking too hopeful at the moment....
Josh
jleahy said:
Right, well if the driver architecture has changed then I'm pretty much buggered for plan a.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The drivers are completely different between the two devices. While you probably would be able to extract a number of drivers from the Alpine WM2003 ROM, and while (with luck) they could/should work in the (ported) WM5 OS ROM, there is another MAJOR hurdle which would need to be overcome ...
jleahy said:
The blue angel is pretty similar driver wise, isn't it? As far as I can tell the only differences are the camera and the lack of a keyboard (obviously ram/proc too). But I suppose the ASICs/CPLDs are nothing like each other. So that plan's probably out of the window too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's exactly the issue - the Alpine, while being VERY similar to the Blue Angel is different enough in the hardware to not be able to use the same code. In every ROM there is a Boot portion which is device specific (XIP section), which initializes the hardware before the OS starts - very similar to the BIOS in your PC. There has been (very) limited success in getting the Alpine to boot using a Blue Angel based ROM, but it HAS been done.
The largest problem is that there is no support for initializing the Radio ROM - i.e. phone support. So, while we MIGHT be able to make a ROM which can boot on the Alpine, we would only be able to make one which (MOSTLY) worked, and would NOT have any Phone/Radio/BT/etc. capabilities. Basically, your Alpine would become a glorified PDA ... only.
jleahy said:
It's not looking too hopeful at the moment....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope ... as said before - without the BSP, and hardware initialization ... it'd be like trying to boot your Mac using a PC BIOS. (Although, scarily - that's getting closer and closer to be the truth ... !!!)
Seems to be that the big problem with getting Android ported to interesting hardware is the lack of drivers.
This is the same problem that existed(still does exist) with Linux and some networking hardware. Linux has ndiswrapper which is a Linux device driver that wraps windows drivers, and thus lets you use your otherwise unsupported hardware.
Would the same thing be possible with Android?
Obviously it would have to do more than ndiswrapper. Like Comms, Wifi, GPS, etc..
I've done a little Linux device driver development but know nothing about windows, Android or mobile comms.
DengueFever said:
Seems to be that the big problem with getting Android ported to interesting hardware is the lack of drivers.
This is the same problem that existed(still does exist) with Linux and some networking hardware. Linux has ndiswrapper which is a Linux device driver that wraps windows drivers, and thus lets you use your otherwise unsupported hardware.
Would the same thing be possible with Android?
Obviously it would have to do more than ndiswrapper. Like Comms, Wifi, GPS, etc..
I've done a little Linux device driver development but know nothing about windows, Android or mobile comms.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, there are WELL lot more than u can think of........even if u port all the drivers in, it may still not work! Even a company like Huawei, their smartphone team need to spend a quarter to make Andriod 1.5 work on their Hisilicon platform; yet, need to work again for 1.6 again.........Andriod is not developer-friendly!
I know this is an incredibly newbish question, but I'd flipped through forums and articles and googled it and still don't quite seem to understand it.
My question is why is android dependent upon manufacturer's release?
Take for example, a desktop computer.
OS
This is the core of the device and the UI between the user and the hardware.
Applications talk to the OS to instruct the hardware to do stuff.
Microsoft and Apple makes the OS.
ex. Windows 7, Mac OS, Linux.
Hardware
Asus, Nvidia, Realtek, marvell make the hardware.
ex. video, LAN, sound etc.
Hardware Bundler
Dell, Alienware, Gateway, Acer
They take commercial hardware and some OEM hardware and assemble it in a way that many consumers will buy their bundle.
For 99.9% of us, not counting Synapse, this is the only way the hardware is packaged together.
Device Standards
Collectively, the manufactures work together to determine certain industry standards ex. ATX, PCI-E, SATA 3, USB 3.0 etc...
Drivers
The manufacturers also make drivers so the OS can make use of their hardware.
Compatibility Is Determined by Driver Support
If the driver exists to talk to a given OS, then the hardware will work.
Not all hardware manufacturers will code for every OS out there.
ex. USB works on all OS because it's more established, but not every sound card will work on a Linux system.
Bringing it home...
So if Microsoft releases Windows 8, and as long as Nvidia releases a driver that works with that OS, then the video card will work.
Can you help me understand how the android phone architecture is so different that it's no longer
OS <-> Driver <-> Hardware?
Sorry for not getting it.
oops, sorry.
My bad, I must have clicked the wrong section.
Can somebody move this thread?
Reposted in android section.
Please delete.
You will have to excuse me if this has already been asked and answered somewhere. But I'm really pissed off at the moment and could easily kill all the developers who worked on Windows 8. To cut long story short, Win8 has caused me a lot of problems and I wish to downgrade to win7. So here's my question. I have an Asus laptop which has drivers only for Windows 8 (I realized this too late). I'm wondering if I can run Win7 normally with generic drivers that are not laptop-specific?
Any helpful answer is greatly appreciated.
Sent from my cracksperia Arc
While I'm curious about these problems you mention, in actual answer to your question, it entirely depends on the hardware in your laptop. Stuff that Win7 supports natively with generic drivers, such as USB2, typical mice and keyboards, SATA HDDs and SSDs, and so on will work out of the box. Some components, such as the video card, will partially work with generic drivers but you'll want to download Win7 drivers for that hardware to get full features. Other hardware, such as USB3 ports, WiFi, and any sort of touchscreen, will almost certainly have Win7 drivers available but may not work at all until those drivers are installed (as the drivers probably won't be included in a standard Win7 install image). It's pretty unlikely that any of the hardware in the laptop will *only* have Win8 drivers, but you may have to go hunt down the correct drivers from non-Asus sites, or find older Asus laptops that have the same hardware but were supported with Win7.
Thank you for your answer. And about my problem. The instant I log in, windows automatically logs me out, as if it cannot start explorer.exe and userinit.exe. I tried EVERYTHING, check disk, reset, repair, I cannot enter safe mode as I need to log in to enable that (why oh why did they have to remove F8 on boot?). The only thing that's left is clean install. I never had such problems with Win7 and earlier versions.
Edit:
I'm curious about the difference between drivers for graphic card from asus' website and nvidia's website. Does Asus alter drivers in any way?
Sent from my cracksperia Arc
The drivers from NVidia will actually be BETTER than the ones from ASUS. The ASUS ones wont be updated as frequently. Otherwise the ones from ASUS are just NVidia's ones repackaged
I have never heard of your issue before though.
Actually, that depends... if the machine supports switchable graphics (say, Intel integrated as well as NVidia), you'll need the correct drivers to support that switching. Just installing the NVidia drivers will work, though, and it's true that they'll likely be more up to date.
NVidia's reference drivers for mobile devices also tend to be really buggy in my experience, though - things like preventing the computer from entering sleep or hibernate, or running the fan too much (even when not needed) and wasting battery life. They seem to be un-optimized for mobile machines, which OEMs sometimes fix for their specific models.
SixSixSevenSeven said:
The drivers from NVidia will actually be BETTER than the ones from ASUS. The ASUS ones wont be updated as frequently. Otherwise the ones from ASUS are just NVidia's ones repackaged
I have never heard of your issue before though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you google a bit, you'll see quite a number of people having similar or same issues, as a matter of fact. And no solution for the problem except a fresh install.
GoodDayToDie said:
Actually, that depends... if the machine supports switchable graphics (say, Intel integrated as well as NVidia), you'll need the correct drivers to support that switching. Just installing the NVidia drivers will work, though, and it's true that they'll likely be more up to date.
NVidia's reference drivers for mobile devices also tend to be really buggy in my experience, though - things like preventing the computer from entering sleep or hibernate, or running the fan too much (even when not needed) and wasting battery life. They seem to be un-optimized for mobile machines, which OEMs sometimes fix for their specific models.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, that's my case. I have both Intel and NVidia. As far as I'm concerned, I don't mind not having regular updates, or updates whatsoever if the drivers are stable and working.
By the way, thanks to you I searched for older Asus' laptops with the same hardware with Win7 drivers and found one. So now I have pretty much everything of importance working (ethernet, wifi, graphics card, etc.), though most of the Asus' software doesn't work as it claims my laptop is not made by them. Silly laptop specific OS restrictions.
Sent from my cracksperia Arc
Hello everyone!!
This argument has been discussed a couple times in this forum, but i wanted to address it once more since i believe it's one of the most interesting.
So, i am looking to install natively Windows 10 (desktop version, not mobile) and Android in dualboot on the ZF2.
In theory, as specified many times by other users, is possible. Since the soc of the ZF2 is Intel x86/64.
Let's proceed with order.
1) The main issue, is to find out how to run the windows installer, completely outside the Android environment. Now i know Asus released an official Bootloader for the ZF2, but we have to figure out if it's loaded outside of the Android environment or not. If it is, that would be a great kickstart.
2) The drivers then would be another issue, even though, the Z3580 is an Atom and should share a lot of with its bigger brothers for tablets that already run Windows 10.
3) FIgure out how to dualboot it. Windows 10 Desktop version is not currently equipped with dialing functions and even though there are some third party software, it would not be very comfortable to use as main OS on such a small screen. So Android is a must here.
4) Last but not least, figure out a way (not wirelessly, just because it does not work very well) to cast the screen of the Windows 10 Asus ZEnfone2, to a larger monitor.
I own a Lumia 950 and as many of you know, it comes with the Continuum feature. It is a pretty interesting function even though in the current state is very limited. (can run only UWPs and nothing more, with limited functionalities).
For those of you guys wondering if it's even possible to solve the problem n.1 i can tell you it definitely is. A couple years ago, Elephone was working on a Dual Boot Phone, called vowney Pro with the exact same soc of the ZF2, capable of running both Windows 10 (desktop, even though some blogs mistakenly reported windows 10 mobile. It was the desktop version, i spoke with the company) and Android.
That project never came to life, the company would not share with me the reason why.
Just think about how cool would be to have a 2 in 1 device capable of running full Windows 10 natively. It would really be the first of its kind and turn out to be super useful in a lot of situations.
Any of you ever tried ?
Thanks in advance to all of you guys!!
No one ?
steinwayer said:
Hello everyone!!
This argument has been discussed a couple times in this forum, but i wanted to address it once more since i believe it's one of the most interesting.
So, i am looking to install natively Windows 10 (desktop version, not mobile) and Android in dualboot on the ZF2.
In theory, as specified many times by other users, is possible. Since the soc of the ZF2 is Intel x86/64.
Let's proceed with order.
1) The main issue, is to find out how to run the windows installer, completely outside the Android environment. Now i know Asus released an official Bootloader for the ZF2, but we have to figure out if it's loaded outside of the Android environment or not. If it is, that would be a great kickstart.
2) The drivers then would be another issue, even though, the Z3580 is an Atom and should share a lot of with its bigger brothers for tablets that already run Windows 10.
3) FIgure out how to dualboot it. Windows 10 Desktop version is not currently equipped with dialing functions and even though there are some third party software, it would not be very comfortable to use as main OS on such a small screen. So Android is a must here.
4) Last but not least, figure out a way (not wirelessly, just because it does not work very well) to cast the screen of the Windows 10 Asus ZEnfone2, to a larger monitor.
I own a Lumia 950 and as many of you know, it comes with the Continuum feature. It is a pretty interesting function even though in the current state is very limited. (can run only UWPs and nothing more, with limited functionalities).
For those of you guys wondering if it's even possible to solve the problem n.1 i can tell you it definitely is. A couple years ago, Elephone was working on a Dual Boot Phone, called vowney Pro with the exact same soc of the ZF2, capable of running both Windows 10 (desktop, even though some blogs mistakenly reported windows 10 mobile. It was the desktop version, i spoke with the company) and Android.
That project never came to life, the company would not share with me the reason why.
Just think about how cool would be to have a 2 in 1 device capable of running full Windows 10 natively. It would really be the first of its kind and turn out to be super useful in a lot of situations.
Any of you ever tried ?
Thanks in advance to all of you guys!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
please follow this topic
https://forum.xda-developers.com/zenfone2/general/zf2-running-windows-7-using-kvm-t3153299
sukhwant717 said:
please follow this topic
https://forum.xda-developers.com/zenfone2/general/zf2-running-windows-7-using-kvm-t3153299
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello Sukhwant717
Yes i know of the post and read through all of it, even though there are a couple of persons that asked for the native installation, that post is focused mainly on the installation through KVM, or any other Virtual Machine solution.
Just wanted to have a post focused on the native installation here
@steinwayer
This has been done and deemed not worth the time and effort.
1. No drivers for Mali.
3. Win OS has no phone support until late 2017.
If you have the technical skills please do try yourself, but don't expect others to do the work.
I recommend waiting until fall 2017 when x86 emulation on Snapdragon launches. A plethora of new handsets with desktop Win OS and phone support will be launched. And this project will be redundant.
@sweetsour
I didn't know that people tried here. I tried searching in the whole forum but sadly i didn't find anything.
Yes i know that Windows on Arm will launch sometime this year, but i don't think this will be redundant. Windows on Arm will let you have a windows handset capable of running x86 apps. No Android.
This on the other hand would let you enjoy both worlds, and on top of that, is the ability to dual boot two different operating systems on a smartphone that intrigues me (not linux based ofc)
I don't expect the others to do it for me, i am stuck sadly on the first issue with having a bootloader capable of booting an OTG image of Windows.
But if anyone found a way to do that and got stuck on the next step, i would be more than happy to try myself
Do you happen to have any threads to address me to?
Thanks in advance
@steinwayer Windows on ARM will never ever be the same as on X86. Apps are just not compatible. It is a shame that the surface phone ditched the Intel Atom CPU.
Anyway ontopic.
I will skip 1 till the last since this is the main issue and start off with 2
2 The drivers are not an issue YET. The intel HD series GPU's have used the specific model of powerVR GPU that is in use so it is a problem that can be fixed. Most of the rest of the drivers are not directly a problem as the first problem is to get windows running natively.
3 Dualboot. In first place this is not neccisary, however this is possible but will require the work from 1 listed bellow first. Let me say from the start that you can forget hotswitching to android... That will be a full reboot and I dont know about your zenfone 2 but mine takes a while to boot...
4 As long as the wifi is running lots of options there...
Now the culprit 1
You can not run the windows installer in the current bootloader, however happy news for you this specific CPU supports UEFI. For this purpose I was reverse engineering the bootloader on my pc and altering the UEFI of that of a tabled with a similair CPU of the same series. However my screen got broken, so I lost motivation, had it repaired after which half my phone died again (there is another topic floating around where I tried to flash the ori bootloaders as I thought that may had something to do with the issues of my phone dieing) so I bought a lumia 950 aswell, and now I just have it back again.
This project is stalled. One of the reasons is stated here, the other one is that I don't have the knowledge to continue right now. Reading in and learning takes a lot of time and I don't have time at the moment and as said before I am for the moment not very happy with the amount of times the zenfone just without damage just died on me...
I am happy to share all I have found on the internet to someone who knows how to do it, but if you need to learn in as I do this will take years...
Thinking about you MIGHT have a shot just flashing one of the tablets UEFI bioses, but this very well may be a one shot chance after which a perma brick can occur...
@Don_prince
I was talking about the recent Windows on ARM, not Windows 10 Mobile. For instance, this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_GlGglbu1U
Even though there is no single definitive proof that they ditched Intel for the Surface Phone project, the video I shared seems to be a pretty clear statement eheh, and yes, i totally agree with you, it will be a shame.
Thank you so much for the infos you gave me! That's super helpful! I suspected the stock bootloader would have not been capable of doing that, so i was looking (like i guess you did long before me) for answers about the chances of flashing UEFI on it.
Dualboot, at least for the beginning would be necessary, if used as the primary phone, Android would be needed for all phone-related tasks.
I will try to see if i manage to flash UEFI on the ZF2. After that it should be a a lot simpler! And it would open a WHOLE NEW WORLD of possibilities with that phone
About the hotswitching, i know, it will be impossible. But the way i see it, the wait time for a full reboot would be worth it, especially in case after solving all the problems, we could manage also to solve the point 4
Will keep you posted!!
I don't seee why an x86 emulator for ARM Windows 10 seems so threatening.
Nobody ever said the x86 emulator is coming to phones. It's just Windows RT 10 with 3rd party Win32 app support. It's for larger devices like tablets and laptops.
From what I've seen, I think the Zenfone 2 (and 5) will be relevant for many years to come. Nobody is offering something that runs full Windows 10 on the phone's screen like the Zenfones with KVM. There is also no performance hit like an emulator.
If anything, MS MIGHT integrate it into W10M's Continuim but I doubt they will let you run Photoshop on the phone's screen.
There have been multiple devices in the past, and there are devices for sale now and there are devices that are in developent. Criteria below 6", pocketable and full X86.
XPphone, Eking m5 (also MI15), DOCOMO Fujitsu LOOX F-07c,
Non phone capable (or only via usb) Ockel Sirius, GPD WIN
In development: Graalphone, Palmputer
So yes there are devices...
No an emulator wont do the trick for me, No a KVM does not do the trick for me. I need DIRECT acess to the GPU for proprietary programs which I want to use the phone for.
Don_prince said:
There have been multiple devices in the past, and there are devices for sale now and there are devices that are in developent. Criteria below 6", pocketable and full X86.
XPphone, Eking m5 (also MI15), DOCOMO Fujitsu LOOX F-07c,
Non phone capable (or only via usb) Ockel Sirius, GPD WIN
In development: Graalphone, Palmputer
So yes there are devices...
No an emulator wont do the trick for me, No a KVM does not do the trick for me. I need DIRECT acess to the GPU for proprietary programs which I want to use the phone for.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well i always thinking the EASIEST way to enable 3D acceleration with acceptable performance.The only software that could enable 3D acceleration and runs windows software on android is Crossover from codeweavers.It's wine commercial version which compatibility layer that enables you to run windows software on linux.Maybe you're very familiar it if you playing around with linux for some time.The only problem is the compatibility.its still in alpha stage and still doesn't run much software perfectly.Considering it's opensource,it has the source code available on their site.If we have developers that expert at modifying .apk and port the qemu kvm,we'll be able to solve that.We have qemu on android name limbo pc emulator and it always up to date recently which now based on qemu 2.9.0.The only matter is how we modified the apk to sync with limbo pc emulator so that it has 3D virtual gpu available.How the virtual gpu works,is translate OPENGLES into directX,though its limited to 9.0.Maybe little tweak can make it work on limbo.Hope the source code containts that Vgpu code.I am noob for porting apks,etc.But i know some basic about it.Hope you guys can make it works.Once we make it work,we'll be able to launch CStrike 1.6 on our amazing ZF2
---------- Post added at 07:36 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:31 AM ----------
Crossover has it's virtual GPU into it,which makes 3D acceleration working.it's use OpenGLES and translate it to directX.if we can implemented it on limbo pc emulator,we'll be able to enable hardware acceleration into windows guest
Man I'm with you
Its unbelievable enough, that you can't install Linux on ARM.
Cant install on a x86 cpu device, it seems impossible !!!
2019... nothing yet ?
xdaxuser said:
Man I'm with you
Its unbelievable enough, that you can't install Linux on ARM.
Cant install on a x86 cpu device, it seems impossible !!!
2019... nothing yet ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Researching, +1
Well, its pretty much a one go try, no guaranties it works, and well who wants to donate his Zenfone 2 to try, when the odds of sucsess are less than 10%, chance of bricking it without recovery 90%. Get the bios from the Chuwi tablet and give it a try to flash it with the intel flash tool.
I was modifying that bios to increase the chances, but ran out of my expertise, lack time, and am using my zenfone as daily driver
I have a Zenfone 2 with the eMMC damaged, and thought about booting Android from the SD card (basically, using it like the eMMC which is damaged). I think replacing the BIOS could help me with booting from the SD, is this correct?
i've installed Windows 10 and Android 9 x86 with Limbo PC Emulator
O only have a Question :
The Intel atom z3530 CPU in my Z00AD is an ARM CPU?
Tnankx in avance for ur help!
Nope, it's x86_64
tronics182 said:
O only have a Question :
The Intel atom z3530 CPU in my Z00AD is an ARM CPU?
Tnankx in avance for ur help!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, it's an x86_64 (64-bit) SoC. Any Intel Atom processor is x86 or x86_64
No development anymore?