07-26-2004, 04:00 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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SE_VGA: Get "Real VGA" On Your WM2003SE VGA Pocket PC
VGA Pocket PC owners who miss their ultra-high res First Edition setups, rejoice! You now have multiple "resolution choices" when using WM2003SE -- in fact, you're about to regain the functionality that we all had with ResFix or MyVGA. (Click on the picture for a full-resolution version.)
Here's the download link. Best of all, it's free... so what are you waiting for? 
For the rest of you, read on for a more thorough description of how Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition handles VGA screens, what's good and bad about it, and a quick look at how SE_VGA works around it.
On Friday, I excitedly flashed my Toshiba e805 with the US release of the Second Edition firmware. While it's very cool, there's one major limitation with how SE handles VGA out of the box: it's designed to essentially give you the same amount of useable screen space as First Edition running at 240x320, just with larger fonts and icons -- i.e., akin to "scaling" the resolution of picture up. Instead of something like the following (click any picture for a full version):
You get something like this:
While I've resized both images to 300x400, the effect should be clear: while the second image is much more detailed and representative of a much larger bitmap, you effectively get no more working space. There's a slider in the Control Panel to decrease the font size, but it only goes so far. In particular, it doesn't change the Start/Menu bars and it doesn't get around the fact that Pocket Internet Explorer doubles image sizes by design! Moreover, old non-SE-aware Pocket PC programs simply get pixel-doubled -- so programs like Acrobat Reader don't benefit from the additional VGA pixels (in fact, eReader looks terrible). Fortunately, a Pocket PC developer named Angel Garcia developed a solution: SE_VGA. If you run it, you get the following screen and choices:
Choosing the first option gives you "real VGA" -- that is, the 240x320 screen just increased in resolution without any font or UI size changes:
While that looks extremely small, it's quite useable. It might not be for the average person on a 3.5" screen, perhaps, but it's perfectly readable for the power user like me on my 4" Toshiba. In fact, the effect is almost identical to First Edition users using the ResFix or MyVGA hack on their e805s. Additionally, pixel doubling is turned off for all applications in this mode, so programs like eReader run flawlessly at the higher resolution, and PIE doesn't double image sizes. The only catch? You have to soft-reset when switching modes, and a few programs get slightly confused (for example, Pocket Plus always uses the large-size icons on the Today screen in both VGA modes). Apart from that, it's free and definitely worth a look if you have a WM2003SE VGA device. You can also run in 240x320 mode ("standard QVGA"), explicitly, if you want... although I'll probably switch between the two VGA modes. 
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07-26-2004, 04:04 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 37
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WOW - Small!
This final screen just looks unusable to me. Maybe its my 40 year old eyes, but what is the point of making things this small?
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07-26-2004, 04:10 PM
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Philosopher
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 498
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Re: WOW - Small!
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Originally Posted by damager
This final screen just looks unusable to me. Maybe its my 40 year old eyes, but what is the point of making things this small?
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Because they call it revolunationaly. I didn't see any point for a screen like that.
SE is the only way to go.
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07-26-2004, 04:16 PM
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5000+ Posts? I Should OWN This Site!
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 5,133
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I think the point is that it's true VGA. From there you can scale fonts UP to where you're comfortable. Scaling UP in VGA means that fonts stay looking nice in any program, Scaling DOWN fro QVGA means that you may still get pixel doubling when trying to use a small font (making it less readable).
At least, if I'm understanding this correctly.
Doesn't Tweaks2k2 do a similar thing now too? It's not free, but it has a lot of other...well... *tweaks*. 
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07-26-2004, 04:21 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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Re: WOW - Small!
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Originally Posted by damager
This final screen just looks unusable to me. Maybe its my 40 year old eyes, but what is the point of making things this small?
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Well, the screen is larger on the PDA itself, and is quite readable (I scaled it down). It's not for "casual" glances, but it's surprisingly usable. Update: I added full versions so you get a better idea of what they really look like.
Kati comes close to the point. By starting out with small font sizes, you can scale up as you want. In SE's mode, you benefit less from the high resolution except for the fact that everything is much crisper. Mind you, that's an amazing benefit, but there are those of us that want to quadruple the amount of information we have on the screen. Additionally, "old" programs don't benefit in SE mode, as they simply pixel-double. eReader is the perfect example: it's nearly useless in SE, as it's not SE-aware. In "real" VGA, you just pick a larger font in eReader, and you're set.
In any case, this remains a choice, something that a lot of First Edition e805 users have been clamoring for since the release of the SE update.
Anyway... I think it's probably worth writing up a detailed article on what exactly SE does and doesn't do, seeing as how there are now two VGA screens on the market. A few additional screenshots would be helpful. I'll see about releasing something like that towards the end of this week.
--janak
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07-26-2004, 04:28 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,329
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I really hope a slew of 3rd party apps show up for the 4705 that can do the same. I'm somewhat at a loss to understand why MS didn't at least have an option like this available? :confused totally: I mean leave it under the display settings on the control panel but leave it turned off.
*shrugs* Then again this is MS after all. Everything about the Pocket PC is left up to 3rd party developers. Which obviously can be seen as both a good thing and a bad thing all at once.
__________________
PDA History: Palm Pilot 5000 -> Apple Newton 2100 -> Casio E-11 -> iPaq 3650 (64MB Upgrade) -> iPaq 3700 -> Casio EM-500 -> HP Jornada 568 -> HP iPaq hx4705 www.spreadfirefox.com |
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07-26-2004, 04:29 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Jonathan1
I really hope a slew of 3rd party apps show up for the 4705 that can do the same. I'm somewhat at a loss to understand why MS didn't at least have an option like this available? :confused totally: I mean leave it under the display settings on the control panel but leave it turned off.
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I think this is designed for any SE VGA devices on the market. I've only been able to test it with the e805, though, for obvious reasons.
--janak
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07-26-2004, 04:55 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 185
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I think that the controls (icons, menus) can be somewhat smaller than what WM2003 SE offers, but not as small as you show here. You still have to tap on those things, and our styluses aren't that pointy after all.
Also, it's a strain in the eyes.
Well, the screens grew, the resolution too, so I'm guessing that we could get by with a 33% decrease in the scale factor so we could get more real estate.
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07-26-2004, 05:41 PM
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Oracle
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 980
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Kati Compton
Doesn't Tweaks2k2 do a similar thing now too? It's not free, but it has a lot of other...well... *tweaks*. |
Nope, Tweask2K2 just disable the double pixeling feature in individual programs.
This tools change the whole system to present you a real VGA mode.
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07-26-2004, 05:45 PM
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Oracle
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 980
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Janak Parekh
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Jonathan1
I really hope a slew of 3rd party apps show up for the 4705 that can do the same. I'm somewhat at a loss to understand why MS didn't at least have an option like this available? :confused totally: I mean leave it under the display settings on the control panel but leave it turned off.
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I think this is designed for any SE VGA devices on the market. I've only been able to test it with the e805, though, for obvious reasons.
--janak |
You are right, this tool changes the OS files no any customized by Toshiba file so it should work in any Pocket PC with VGA and SE.
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Linear Mode
