Old Hardware Emulated - Windows CE.net

Windows CE continued its evolution into different directions. While Windows CE and WinMobile are the same OS, they are package with different user interfaces for their respective markets. Windows Mobile was tailored for PDA's and smartphones while CE "classic" was still tailored for clamshell devices, which were still apparently a thing in 2003. However, their really wasn't much of a clamshell handheld market by this point. As such, most devices that CE 4.2 were destined for served a dedicated, niche role.

Microsoft continued to support the clamshell form-factor handhelds with WinCE 4.0, released on January 7, 2002. This latest incarnation of WinCE featured the compact version of the .NET Framework. Also, like most new released, Microsoft released a updated SDK to developers. The SDK, like previous ones, included a device emulator along with various libraries, documentation, and developer tools so that one would become familiar with the platform. The applications were coded in Visual Studio and tested on the device emulator.

CE 4.2, released on April 2003, became the most widespread version of CE 4.x. This is the OS that Windows Mobile 2003 is based on. The user interface, like the previous versions of CE, were made to mimicked Windows Explorer, and Windows XP in particular, with similar icons and color scheme. It came with a various assortment of applications. The actual devices usually shipped with Pocket Word and Excel. The SDK didn't have them, but included Internet Explorer, Windows Media Player, and MSN Messenger. WMP for CE 4.2 is based on version 9.

I couldn't get anywhere with Internet Explorer. Even with a connection, I wasn't able to visit any website using IE for CE 4.2. Despite it including WMP, it didn't come with any audio/video codecs. As such, MP3 and video playback wasn't possible under the emulated environment. One would have been surprised considering that both MP3 and video playback would have been considered standard, and WMP typically supported the WMV codec by default, which has been used in other device emulators, but not in the CE 4.2 SDK. 

Their isn't really that much to say about 4.2 actually. On one hand, Microsoft faithfully replicated the desktop experience on a clamshell device. On the other hand, nobody was really asking for a clamshell device in 2003, and even back in the day, with smartphones taking over, the clamshell seemed like a throwback to a earlier design that was stuck in time. 


The SDK for CE 4.2 contains a true device emulator. However, the emulator and OS uses x86 virtualization for performance reasons. As such, their is practically no third-party applications to test as the vast majority of WinCE programs were compiled for the ARM processor. CE 4.2 was just a very minor footnote in the epic history of PDA's and Smartphones that would include Palm, RIM, and later on, Apple's iPhone and Google's Android. 

Microsoft Windows CE 4.20 - McKendric (HPC: Factor) - https://www.hpcfactor.com/support/windowsce/wince420/

Windows Embedded Compact (Wikipedia) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Embedded_Compact

Windows Mobile 5.0 (Wikipedia) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Mobile_5.0

Windows Mobile (Wikipedia) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Mobile

Windows Mobile 2003 (Wikipedia) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Mobile_2003



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