Smartphone Thoughts - Daily News, Views, Rants and Raves

"You try to synchronize content from Microsoft Windows Media Player 11 to a Microsoft Windows Mobile 5-based device with AKU 2.3 or a later AKU. When you do this, the phone connects. However, only the internal storage on the phone is available in Windows Media Player as a synchronization target. This issue occurs because the canonical name for Windows Mobile 5-based devices with AKU 2.3 and later AKUs is truncated in Microsoft Windows Media Device Manager. This hotfix eliminates a bug that causes this truncation to occur."

Windows Vista is claimed to be one of the most heavily tested software developed by Microsoft. It is sad to see that problems like this one went unnoticed. If you are having trouble with the Media Player in Windows Vista being unable to recognise the storage card on your smartphone, then you must apply this hot-fix.

There's a post over on the Windows Mobile Team Blog that is a must read for anyone thinking of using encryption on their storage card under Windows Mobile 6 device. One of the key limitations of Microsoft's implementation is that you cannot backup the keys. So if your device bombs and you replace it, your data is gone too.

I keep getting the feeling that we might be taking a giant step forward, but it's followed with a couple steps back. :? It's great that we can finally encrypt the storage card, but how many people will take advantage of it if there's no chance of recovering it when the device dies and needs to be replaced? :(

"Flash Format is a full featured memory card management utility for Windows Mobile powered Smartphone devices. It supports all SD and ATA and compliant storage cards, including SD cards, Mini SD, Micro SD, Compact Flash cards, Multimedia cards (MMC), MicroDrives, SmartMedia, MemorySticks, etc. With Flash Format you can get detailed information and statistics about your storage cards, including file system characteristics (FAT type, sectors, cluster, etc.) and analysis of file allocations (slack space). Flash Format lets you perform integrity checks, repair allocation errors, and re-format storage cards to original conditions, with the file system settings that best suit your needs, directly on your Smartphone, wherever and whenever you need."



Flash Format lets you manage your storage card from your mobile device. While Pocket PC users have had access to this tool since 2001, the Smartphone version has just recently been released. You can download a trial version or purchase a copy for $10.95 from our affiliate store.

There are so many programs out there for the Smartphone that I would love to test out and have not touched for the simple fact that they require .Net CF 2.0. On a clean install Microsoft's .Net Compact Framework took up nearly 9MB's of space! Now that we have the option to install the framework to our memory cards I can finally get around to playing with all those programs I have been missing out on. :)

"What people would really like to do is use their storage as RAM. "I may only have 32M of RAM, but I've got a 1 Gig SD card that's mostly empty. It would be cool if I could use that SD card to run more programs." At first blush, this can't work at all. The SD card is made of NAND flash and flash is just too slow to be used as RAM. But hard drives are also too slow to be used as RAM. Yet, the desktop system manages to extend its RAM with clever use of the hard drive. Why can't Windows Mobile do the same thing with the SD card?"

Mike Calligaro has posted another great article providing great insight into the world of Windows Mobile devices on the Windows Mobile Team Blog. This time, he explains why we can't use your storage card as RAM. Well worth the read, especially if the different types of memory don't confuse you! ;)

Do you surf the Internet a lot on your Smartphone's Pocket Internet Explorer browser? It is just a matter of time before you will run into the low storage memory alert. I know I did. Thanks to the sharp QVGA screen and EDGE speeds, I am browsing a lot. The first time I ran into the low storage memory error message, I thought that it was because of my overflowing Hotmail Inbox. But it turned out to be the Pocket Internet Explorer cache, which was holding about 4MB worth of temporary files.



The moment the pIE cache was cleared, my low memory problem was solved. Now I wanted to find out a way to put the pIE on a diet. Mike suggested a quick and simple registry tweak that limits the size of the pIE cache to a manageable level.
[code][HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\5.0\Cache\Content]
"CacheLimit"=dword:00001536[/code]

The default CacheLimit setting on my Cingular 2125 had a DWORD value 6126, which meant the maximum cache size was set to 6126KB, approximately 6MB. :? I lowered it to DWORD value 1536, which represents 1536KB (1.5MB). I would recommend a value between 1024KB (1MB) and 2048KB (2MB). Do not set a value lower than 512KB, because then the cache will not be effective. This tip works on both the Windows Mobile 2003 SE and the Windows Mobile 5.0 based devices. And is highly recommended to our readers who have recently enabled the keypad shortcuts in the pIE browser. ;-) Since this change involves editing the registry, I must warn our readers, please take care and backup the data if possible.

Do you have lots of email and lots of attachements? Are you feeling the pinch of limited memory? Well, the solution is here. With a couple quick and easy registery changes, you can have all your email and attachments stored on your storage card. This change is for Windows Mobile 5 devices. I'm not sure if it will work on prior versions or not. You should always backup and record the original settings before you make any changes to your registry.

Here's what you need to do; Grab you're registry editor and locate the following key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\MAPI. Create a new string value key called AttachPath and set the value to: \\Storage Card\\Mail\\Attachments Then, create another new string value key called PropertyPath and set its value to: \\Storage Card\\Mail

That's it, you're done! Restart your phone and everything should be good. :)

"The molecule cluster is 10,000 times thinner than a human hair, and marks another step forward in nanotechnology, the science of atoms and molecules that is set to transform medicines, technology and even food in years to come. They're currently no bigger than a pack of cards, but MP3 Latest News about MP3 players such as iPods could get much smaller, according to researchers at a Scottish university. Chemists at Glasgow University have engineered a tiny molecule which can store huge amounts of data in very small spaces, meaning the physical size of digital memory cards and hard drives could shrink dramatically in the next few years."

Now that's what I'm talking about! Forget these bumps from 1 GB to 2 GB - if this technology makes it to the implementation stage, it could completely define the way storage works in the technology world. There are a lot of remaining questions with this breakthrough, including the cost involved, but if it were possible to create affordable storage cards that held 200+ GB worth of space, imagine how radically that would change the world of consumer electronics! 8O

Kris Kumar has posted detailed information on how to store your email attachments on your storage card and free up some memory. This change requires a registry modification, so it's not for the faint of heart. Be sure to backup your phone or registry before you make any changes.

Please continue the discussion in the original thread.