is there a way to change OS in a PDA?
 

so I got this bad ass pda, it is an HP, however here is my problem, it has windows CE Mobile... so far so good, except, it's in CHINESE!!!

is ther a way to load the english one? or change the language? I am willing to buy the OS if this is possible, it is a cool gadget


(got from a friend)

Depending on what kind of PDA and OS it's running, you might be able to purchase English ROM.

Well, if you can figure what everything says, you can probably go to options and change the language.
Or there is probably some "full reset" in the options that'll ask you for the language after it's done the reset.

^Yeah, I'd just find someone who can read enough Chinese to get you through to the language settings.

ok, my only chinese friend is cantonese, so she is almost no help with traditional chinese, at least she got me to the NAV software which updated right away, the thing connects to the net and all, problem is all the menus and everything else (including the NAV) is in chinese... it was rather interesting to hear what "turn right onto Park Avenue" sounded like in chinese, I was reading through a thread on HP devices and it said to grab an english flash rom from hp and then edit the header on the file to try to fool the device into thinking it is being flashed with the language it already has

2 bad things

1- this sounds too complicated
2- #@!! it also says that this could easily render the device as a brick

I am already thinking of installing a new nav software, I saw one online that uses the SD card, I have a 4gb card so it should be plenty, I must figure out how to do the english switcheroo, tomorrow when I get back home I will try the flash rom foolery thing, funny, windows finds it as a device but it wont load english updates to it

Where did you get it? Sounds like a grey market clone.

Try get your money back :P

I did not buy it, a friend's brother just came from Hong Kong and he had bought 2 of these, I am confident it is legit as it came sealed, all still in the box and I had to charge it for the first time, thing is the one he has is fine for him since you know he does speak chinese, this one has the "simplified chinese" or something while his has the cantonese... to me is all the same but to them is different I guess, he gave it to me because he thought I may be able to just get the english rom and get it going, came with tomtom navi bundle which I have already found a way to make into english with an update from tomtom, he did make sure it was for america and not hong kong so that is good, it is the OS I am having a problem

right now it is sitting here doing the flash rom thing from HP, I was told it would take a while so I am letting it run its course, I did manage to edit the file with a hex editor


----------------------------
UPDATE
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:twisted: the hex edit to the flash rom worked a charm :twisted:

windows mobile is now in english however I must now get driver updates from hp for the bluetooth and Wlan as well as install the tomtom language thing and gps receiver driver update

so I guess I will now have a navi in my RX7, so I will not have to wrestle with the wife for the old garmin (although that is always fun) :mrgreen:

thank you you evil hackers of the world:-P

now I know this is not a cell but rather a mini pc, but it is so cool, for cell I have my iphone 3g and hopefully I will not need another one for years to come

Sounds like a cloned pirate package from China.

They produce and sell complete clone items.

Glad you got it to wrok though.

^They don't sell the fake stuff in Hong Kong unless you try really really hard to find it. Which you wouldn't unless you were the police.

Good to know it's working in English.

They do. Hundreds of billions of dollars of losses are incurred by companies as fake, cloned and stolen engineering designs are made and sold by Chinese companies.

Just because you don't see fake items for sale on every street cornerin Honkers anymore, does not mean they do not exist and are not being produced on enormous scales and shipped out to the world.

^Fair enough, but fake stuff usually doesn't work well with real software, if at all. This PDA seems real enough so far.