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View Full Version : Windows Mobile Device Name Problem

John Blasdell
05-05-2009, 06:56 PM
I recently purchased a new notebook; my first computer running Windows Vista. Setup went fine until I synced with my Windows Mobile Treo. I have synced twice with the same results -- my Treo was renamed both times! The first time to WINDOWSMOBILE77, the second time to WINDOWSMOBILE9. I'm very, very fortunate -- I saw what happened, renamed my Treo to its former name before I synced again with my old XP computer, and ActiveSync saw it as the device it is. All is well momentarily, but this will surely happen again when I sync to the new computer. Is this normal behavior for the Windows Mobile Device Center, or did some other program do this? Is there any way to lock down the device name to what I specify?
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This whole naming problem for Windows Mobile devices is inexcuseable. Why is it so hard to name or rename a Windows Mobile device? Even the old PalmOS had a better solution! What "naming" solution do iPhone and Android use, and how well does it work? I hope that this foolishness is solved in Windows Mobile 7!
Sven Johannsen
05-06-2009, 04:29 AM
Is this normal behavior for the Windows Mobile Device Center, or did some other program do this? Is there any way to lock down the device name to what I specify?
Yea, it's fairly normal. Has happened to me a number of times and is still irritating, but luckily easy to fix. As you found, just go on the PPC and change the name back to what you wanted. No idea why they couldn't (or didn't) bother to check if the device name was already set or not, or just used whatever it was, in any case. AS has never really used the name of the device to identify the thing anyway, it has always used a discrete ID that you never even see. That's why you can change the name whenever, and the device, the AS/WMDC name and even the sync'd files folder name will change. You can't give two devices the same name, not so the PC won't get confused, but the programmers are protecting you from getting confused. Thanks a bunch. :rolleyes: