HTC Touch GSM – Windows Mobile 6.5 Reflash Again

From my last post about my new HTC Touch GSM. I have upgraded it again into a new Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional (Build Version 21921.5.0.40). Get the cooked ROM from here.

Here are some pictures while I was doing the upgrade ..

		don’t forget to remove the SIM and microSD card.

and videos after the upgrade..

Update – August 25, 2009

Man, lot of guys keep sending me an email asking how to upgrade. Anyway, I’ll just update this post for you and HERE’S HOW:

Preparation!! – with exclamation marks

1. Make sure you fully charged your phone!!
2. Shut it down! – turn it off, in case you didn’t understand.
3. REMOVE the SIM and MiniSD card!!
4. Boot it up! – turn it on.

Upgrading

1. Make sure you have Active Sync installed in your Windows OS. Am using Windows 7, so I got my Windows Mobile Device Center installed here and hey, make sure you connected your HTC Touch
2. Goto to this thread and look for ELFIN WWE 6504 BLACK LIGHT and download it and so with the attached file ElfinCustomRUU.zip.
   1. Extract ElfinCustomRUU.zip and EW6504BL.rar
   2. Copy EW6504BL.NBH in, where ever you extracted the files from ElfinCustomRUU.zip.
   3. Test run it, by running ElfinCustomRUU.exe
      1. Follow the instructions
   4. "IF" the upgrading STOPS at 3% and telling you this cryptic message:
      ERROR 270 (Update Error - The image file is corrupted):
      
      1. Go download CID Unlocker, and follow the instructions provided in this thread.
      2. MAKE SURE you done it the same as what the guy said and on the preview!.
      3. If successfull. Do: 2.3.

Please take NOTE!
Elfin Custom Rom might update their ROMS anytime so their download file will change too.

Version Check as of August 26, 2009
ELFIN WWE 6504 M2D

Download File: EM6504BL.RAR

And Another NOTE!
If you got any erros while upgrading your WM, refer here. If you encountered any error message other than “ERROR 270” am sorry, I can not give any information with that anymore.

Please visit http://forum.xda-developers.com for more information.

These steps are proven already and 100% working. Don’t blame me if you BRICKED your phone.

If something went wrong on your Elf/in after reflashing or locked up in "Smart Mobility"

1. Remove the battery and put it back
2. Press the Camera Button
3. Press the Power Button (while still pressing the Camera Button)
4. Wait for the Bootloader to show up (the 3 colors ..)
5. Connect the USB connection
6. and try to reflash again using the procedures I gave about "Upgrading" and try using different cooked ROM!

HTC Touch a.k.a Elf with Windows Mobile 6.5

I just got my new HTC Touch. Greatest way to get away with Symbian OS + great way to develop mobile applications. :) hey! am a .NET guy ..

I got the black one	This is the default screen

Anyway, the problem is .. Memory is a bit LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW … Camera .. argh .. very low pain-in-the-neck FPS.. anyway, am upgrading it to a new HTC phone .. but not now .. I just got this phone.

Well, my curiosity comes into play again, and I was thinking may be I could do something here like UPGRADING THE OPERATING SYSTEM TO WINDOWS MOBILE 6.5!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Need a story? nah … 2 days of research, test, failure, and success .. Finally my Elf is running with Windows Mobile 6.5, memory is amazingly optimized, bit slow at start up, running, and ending a program, *whispers* “Windows Mobile 6.1 is faster” but hey, I like this and I want this.

Upgrading tip: Unlock the CID first before flashing a new cooked ROM. Download the files here.

So if everything is ready, get the cooked ROM from dsixda, Windows Mobile 6.1 and Windows Mobile 6.5, here.

Goodluck! Cheers!

Gmail is not working today

What on earth are they doing today? Gmail is not working since last night .. I even asked a friend if it’s working on his end .. well, it is .. Thought it was just a browser problem, but heck, I used Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, and Firefox! NOT WORKING!! hmmm.. guess I’ll just wait ..

Access Friendster in your Gmail

Want to access your Friendster in your Gmail? Here’s how ..

Just playing around with Google Gadget. I created a way to access Friendster (in mobile view) inside the Gmail Inbox.
Just make sure you Enabled this gadget (from Gmail Labs)


And click Save Changes button.

Goto Gmail Settings and open Gadgets Tab and add this link:
http://jaysonragasa.110mb.com/GoogleGadgets/Friendster/friendster_gadget.xml

Or here’s the entire code so you can host your own gadget

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<Module>
    <ModulePrefs
        title="Friendster for Gmail"
        directory_title="Friendster for Gmail"
        author="Jayson Ragasa"
        author_location="Baguio City, Philippines"
        author_affiliation="ASD Philippines"
        author_email="jaysonr@gmail.com"
        screenshot="http://jaysonragasa.110mb.com/GoogleGadgets/Friendster/friendster_tn.jpg"
        thumbnail="http://jaysonragasa.110mb.com/GoogleGadgets/Friendster/friendster_tn.jpg"
        render_inline="optional" width="280" height="270"
        description="Browse on your Friendster profile, accept comments or message from your friends.">
        <Locale lang="en" country="us" />
    </ModulePrefs>
    <Content type="url" href="http://m.friendster.com" />
</Module>

and that’s it. I already log-in from that preview..
 

You have your Friendster na!

Cool thing too is you can upload photos directly inside that box! :D

Cheers!

Ping.fm for iGoogle + workaround for GMail

I just setup my Facebook and Twitter gadgets for Gmail and loving it .. one missing though Ping.fm!! I found a gadget, though works only for iGoogle that’s because you have to setup of course your Application Key which cannot be done using that gadget below in Gmail Labs:

Now if you want to make this thing work in GMail, you have to do some stuff first. One important thing is to (syempre …) host your Google Gadget. An example would be, hosting your XML file in your website or in Google Gadgets Editor.. Don’t ask me where I put it (x.x) d’oh!

Now let’s start:

1. 1. Go get your Ping.fm Application Key, copy&paste it somewhere .. I don’t recommend writing it down ..
2. 2. open any web browser (I don’t recommend using gChrome for this one) and paste this http://ping.fm/google/ping.xml
3. 3. copy the entire XML and we’ll modify that later in this part.
4. 4. hope you have a good XML editor (use Notepad++) and paste the XML you copied.
5. 5. now look for this line “<Content type="url" href="http://ping.fm/google/" />“
6. 6. and to add your application key
       “<Content type="url" href=http://ping.fm/google/?app_key=YOURAPPLICATIONKEYHERE />“
7. 7. Save it: any_filename_you_want.XML (MAKE SURE THE EXTENSION IS XML!)
8. 8. then upload it!
9. 9. Enable Add any gadget by URL by Dan P and Dong C in Gmail Labs (hope you know where it is ..)
      
   
10. 10. In Gmail Settings, goto Gadgets Tab
11. 11. and paste the address where you uploaded the XML (gadget)
      

And here’s the final result .. Ping.fm Gadget for iGoogle, now works for Gmail too!
 

Cheers! Ingat!

Bit.Ly: Safety First, before clicking the bit.ly link

From my previous post; I wrote a simple article about how to be safe on TinyURL.

Bit.ly offers the same thing.

Here's how to be safe:
Am pretty sure already know how Bit.ly works.
1. If you have the shortened link (eg: http://bit.ly/Is3ZG > This is a link to Three Ways Twitter Security Fails)
2. Copy the randomize character and numbers at the end "Is3ZG"
3. and goto http://bit.ly/info/<the randomize chars and nums> (eg: http://bit.ly/info/Is3ZG)

Preview:

Now, go ahead, and try it your self. :)

TinyURL: Safety First, before clicking the TinyURL link

I just got a twit from @frostfire about Three Ways Twitter Security Fails .. and one of the issue there is our friendly TinyURL.

Mike Murray said:
"Twitter "Tweets" have a character limit of 141 characters. Many users enter urls that are too long and which are automatically truncated with a shortening service, such as TinyURL. Users can't tell where the link is going when they scroll over to it.

This makes it much easier for hackers to send out faulty or malicious links."

Well TinyURL.com does provide us to preview the exact shortened link. So If you want safety first, then I guess you have to do something first.

Here's how to be safe:
Am pretty sure already know how TinyURL works.
1. If you have the shortened link (eg: http://www.tinyurl.com/az9pbj > This is a link to Three Ways Twitter Security Fails)
2. Copy the randomize character and numbers at the end "az9pbj"
3. and goto http://preview.tinyurl.com/<the randomize chars and nums> (eg: http://preview.tinyurl.com/az8pbj)

Preview:

Now, go ahead and try it your self.

HOWTO: Remove the Orange Home screen from a Nokia N70

Well, I just got my phone last saturday, I was so happy about it, I got my Nokia N70, but as soon as I looked at it, I got this feeling that am going to have some problems + I saw this ugly looking StandBy Interface, so I got this doubt that this phone might be a China Phone... I tried scanning and trying something to check if it's really a Nokia .. well at least yes.

Anyway about the problem ... After buying it, I got this very very irritating N70 performance .. tried researching on it and found a huge forum sites talking about Orange in N70, and man they were so MAD LIKE HELL!!

Problems in Orange in N70 is:
It slows down your phone processing
Often hung and lost.

So its really really not good having those problems on your mobile phone, because we demand Performance and Reliability. 

Well, what the hell am I talking about Orange in N70??
Here's a screen shot of Orange in N70 Stand By Interface

This is the horrible looking Orange Stand By Interface (took that on my webcam, sorry, can't find any reference on the Internet)	And this is what Standard N70 looks like or should I say Standard Symbian Interface looks like.

Saw the difference??

Now I want my phone to look like that!! The Standard Symbian Interface! I was actually planning to take it to the mall and reflash it there, and pay some ..... I don't know how much, but! ... before that, I thought of "I think I have to research more about the problem" and that's it! Keep on researching and found an article, done it, and walla!! everything is back to normal. :)

Now the question is ... How did I do this? I found this great article on the Internet from: Douglas Furus
It really helps me a lot! Thanks Douglas! and Thanks To Namesis

I didn't actually used any special device to re-flash my phone, I just used DKU-2 Cable as instructed from the article.
The trick there is changing the Product Code from NSS, and NSU thought my phone was N70 Music Edition, so it re-write the ROM, writing N70 Music Edition binaries.

NSU (Nokia Software Updater) is a Flashing Software!! LOL! I thought it was just somekind of Software Upgrade not Operating System Upgrade LOL.

Time Starts: 3:34am
Time Ends: 3:58am !!!! :D

Here's what my N70 "Music Edition" looks like right now

With my wife at the background and I'm using iPhone theme.
Cheers!!

To All Computer Cafe's providing games

While searching a way to Hide/UnHide my desktop icons in Group Policies. I noticed the Windows Components and tried to explore until I saw this functionality sitting there, waiting to be discovered ... and It's a way to disable/enable Windows+X key!!

Microsoft Windows Explained: Turn off Windows+X hotkeys.

Keyboards with a Windows key provide users with shortcuts to common shell features. For example, pressing the keyboard sequence Windows+R opens the Run dialog box; pressing Windows+E starts Windows Explorer. By using this setting, you can disable these Windows+X shortcut keys.

If you enable this setting, the Windows+X shortcut keys are unavailable.

If you disable or do not configure this setting, the Windows+X shortcut keys are available.

I know its so frustrating for gamers when they accidentally pressed the Window Key specially when they're playing on full screen mode. And some Computer Cafe's last resort is to pop out that key on the keyboard. But hey, there's a solution for this, Windows (at least 2000) provides a way to disable the Window Key.

Here's how to do it:

1. Open Group Policy: C:\WINDOWS\system32\gpedit.msc
(here's a screen shot)
 
2. Expand Adminstrative Templates Folder
3. Expand Windows Components Folder
4. Click Windows Explorer Folder
5. On the right panel, search for Turn off Windows+X hotkeys and double click on it
(here's a screen shot)

(after you doubled click on it)

6. Click Enabled and click OK Button
7. Log Off your computer session or Restart if needed.

and that's pretty much it.

GMail now has THEMES!!

I knew it! I knew it!!! :D lot of people saids Gmail is sooooooooooooooo pale!! I knew once Gmail implemented themes, the look and feel are gonna be awesome!!

GMail Saids:
Themes allow you to customize the look and feel of your Gmail account. To choose a theme, click a thumbnail on the Themes tab of your Settings page.

In some cases, you can also customize by location. Some themes change during the day, and we use the location information you provide to correctly time these changes with your local sunrise, sunset, and/or weather. If you select one of these themes, you'll see a Country/Region drop-down menu appear. Select the country you want, and then enter a city in the field provided. If you don't enter a city, or enter an invalid one, we'll set your location to the capital city of the country you selected. When you're done, click Save.

Note: Google developed most of the themes, but three were designed by external artists; Phantasea Renewal was designed by Matthew Ferreira, Summer Ocean by Jim Honeycutt, and Cherry Blossom by Vania Sofandi.