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CE 6.0 supports four processor architectures, ARM, MIPS, x86, and SH4 - Windows XP Embedded supports x86 and PC architecture hardware - since XP Embedded is based on the same unmodified Windows XP Pro binaries (but componentized) the same underlying hardware and processor technologies must be used in your devices.

Processor support is just one of the areas that developers look at to determine the choice of operating system - operating system size can be another (300kb kernel build for CE 6.0, 40MB XPE min build size), power management, real-time support, driver support etc...

- Mike

staceyw - yes, you can build and deploy Windows XP Embedded onto PC hardware such as a shuttle box - Windows XP Embedded can be thought of as a componentized version of Windows XP Professional - 9000 drivers, 3000 o/s components, and some embedded specific technologies such as File Based Write Filter, USB Boot and others.

We have some Virtual Labs over on MSDN that will walk you through the process of building and booting a custom Windows XP Embedded operating system image - here's a link - http://msdn.microsoft.com/virtuallabs/winxpembed/

Since Windows XP Embedded is based on Windows XP Pro this means that any existing XP application/driver should work, unmodified on Windows XP Embedded.

- Mike

and it's great to be back on C9 - I'm hoping to grab Rory to record a series of embedded videos, a look at microFramework, CE 6.0, XPE, and WEPOS.

- Mike

Don came over to the building I work in which houses some of the Mobile and Embedded devices group (MED) - My office was full of embedded hardware, so there wasn't much room to film the video, so we ended up filming the interview in one of our conference rooms which has a display of mobile and embedded devices.

Let me know if you want to get a walkthrough of the breadth of Windows Mobile devices that are shipping these days!

- Mike

yes - the WEPOS bits are available world-wide.

There are two ways the WEPOS product can be used.

1. Install the WEPOS operating system onto your POS hardware - the operating system installs in much the same way as Windows XP Professional - you can also install the WEPOS SDK on your development PC and write code in Visual Studio 2003 or 2005. The WEPOS Evaluation kit can be ordered from http://www.windowsembeddedkit.com

2. Download the WEPOS SDK from MSDN (link on my blog) - http://blogs.msdn.com/mikehall/archive/2006/03/09/547327.aspx - you can code and test on your development PC and deploy either to a WEPOS O/S Install or to a Windows XP machine.

- Mike

Yes, one of the changes with the WEPOS 1.1 release is that you can install the .NET POS bits on a Windows XP machine.

More information available on my blog - http://blogs.msdn.com/mikehall/archive/2006/03/09/547327.aspx 

- Mike

I really like *simple* demos, the Bluetooth video I recorded with Anil Dhawan was like 20 lines of code on the device side, and about the same on the PC side - it's a simple demo, that shows how to do something - once you get the concept you can 'extend and embrace'... We've all been new to coding with a new language, another application development framework, or a set of tools at some point, heck, I didn't start playing with managed code until a couple of years ago, what was the first application... "Hello World" or something similar...

- Mike

Windows CE 5.0 and tools can be downloaded from the following site - http://www.windowsembeddedkit.com - this is a 120 day evaluation edition of Windows CE 5.0, this gives you the ability to configure, build, download, and debug the Windows CE 5.0 operating system. The evaluation kit ships with a Windows CE Emulator, 2.5 Million lines of shared source code, remote debug tools etc...

- Mike

I was thinking exactly the same thing when recording the video - I wonder if that's where the project idea came from ;O)

- Mike

sorry about the lighting chaps, there are some other MSR Cambridge vidoes on the way which are also a little on the dark side :O(

I got a slap from the Scoble for this, since all the MSR videos were recorded on the same day I didn't have any chance to go back and re-record, the good news is that I'm recording some new video this week and will certainly make sure I get the lighting right this time round...

- Mike