Will This Work

[steele]

First of all its been sometime since I posted on this forum and my god I hardly reconize xlobby now!!! It looking brill!!

Ok thinking of the following setup, htpc in spare room connected to hi-fi in living room by cable and also connected by pocket pc kept in living room via bluetooth (for now) so can be used as remote for all my music files.

q1 The htpc would be on 24/7 just about anyway, but can the pocket pc access music files through xlobby without xlobby being open on the htpc?

q2 How slow would the bluetooth connection be, how long to access a track and start playing roughly?

q3 pocket pc requirements, have a limited budget and would be looking to keep on pretty much most of the time.


Keep up the good work steve it will all pay-off eventaully I am sure

steele

[chadwolcott]

Let me be the first to say welcome back to xlobby, I'm sure you'll be impressed with the progress Steven has made. I'll take a stab at answering some of your questions:

1. If I understand your question correctly, you would need to have xlobby running on the HTPC to access the files. That's the only way you can get the xlobby client to work.

2. I don't have any experience yet with bluetooth but from my understanding of the technology I don't think you'll see much of a difference compared to 802.11b.

3. I think you'll find the only requirements would be windows mobile 2002/2003 and some sort of connection (bluetooth/WiFi). Microsoft put some HW requirements PPC2002 certified systems that should more than cover your xlobby needs.

[stevenhanna6]

I would recommend against using bluetooth, its not meant for long range or high speed data transfers. I think I remember someone on the forum having mixed results with bluetooth and xlobby....just in terms of slow speeds

bluetooh - 60 foot range, 800 KB per second?
802.11b - 284 feet , 11 MB per second (10X faster than bluetooh)

point is the range and speed (most important) is better on 802.11b....and if you really had the money I would use 802.11g.....one of the bottle necks on the xlobby client is the transfer speed since everything is server side....so when 802.11b is 10X faster you get a huge benefit from using it.

I use a dell axim X5 with a 400mhz processor.....I think you might be able to get away with a 300mhz version processor (pretty sure you could)...I would love to hear if someone is using a 300mhz pocket pc with xlobby. And get a 802.11b wifi card for it if it doesnt have one built in.

[steele]

Thanks for your answers but this has got me thinking.

q1 Can you have XLobby open on the client pc but minimalised so I can run other programes

q2 Wi-fi seems to be the sensible option but can you getaway with out having a router, just have the two computers talking to each other through their respective wi-fi cards? Actually just answered this myself by abit of research. Any suggestions to specs or makes that I should go for?

q3 Does the processor speed really matter that much for just running Xlobby on a pocket pc? Thinking I would just buy an older model and do with that.


Steele

[stevenhanna6]

q1 Can you have XLobby open on the client pc but minimalised so I can run other programes

i dont think you can minimize a client "yet"....its just something I didn't think of. But you can always just exit and reconnect to the server.

Any suggestions to specs or makes that I should go for?

I don't think it really matters to much since its a "standard"...some cards are better than others.....I use a linksys wifi router and a ambicom compact flash wifi card on my pda.

q3 Does the processor speed really matter that much for just running Xlobby on a pocket pc? Thinking I would just buy an older model and do with that.

xlobby client really doesn't use much cpu...I've seen it run on some pretty old machines....everything is done on the server. The main bottleneck I find is not the cpu but the transfer speed...thats why I suggest using 802.11b or 802.11g. But be careful what kind of pocket pc you buy it has to be able to load the .NET compact framework.

Feel free to post the PDA's you are looking at buying.

[steele]

oops my first question meant to say can you minimalize the server not the client.

I was looking at a jornada 568 or the ipaq h2210 as the top end I would really what to buy (have a mortgage to pay).

How can I find out which ppc's work with the .NET framework, is it the OS your're cautioning me on or is it the hardware specs that I have to be careful of and if so what is required

Kind regards

jjsteele

thanks for all your replies

[Hiller]

Steele,
I would suggest hopping on the IRC channel and speaking with Smurgle. He is VERY knowledgable with PPC's and is usually idling in there. #xlobby on EFNET.

Steve

[smurgle]

steele

It is the OS that is the sticky point -- you really want to stick with Pocket PC WinCE 2002 and 2003, which means both of your choices would work. However the Jornada 568 is a couple years old and a much more primitive device than newer models (relatively poor screen, slow CPU). Further it is no longer made so support may not be so good.

The 2210 is a great PocketPC but you'd have to buy a WiFi card, driving the price up to that of the 4150 which would be a better choice (sleeker, plus the built in wifi).

For those keeping costs down as much as possible, the Dell Axim x3i would also be one of the better ones for XLobby/Wifi. It is a little cheaper but a little less sleek and stylish than the hp 4150. Finally on the high end of the scale you have the hp 5000 series and toshiba 800 series.

To sum up, you will be happiest with one of the following, listed in order of lowest price to highest:

Dell Axim x3i
HP 4150
HP 5000 series (5455, 5550)
Toshiba 800 series (800, 805)

Generally you get more with the higher priced ones but the lower priced ones on this list are also good especially if you are looking mostly to control xlobby/girder with wifi.

You also might be surprised at how much you can get one of these for below list price since all have been out for at least a few months. Pricegrabber.com lists all of these (besides the Dell of course) for good prices.

Hope this helps

And hi Hiller

[confusedalready]

Hi guys

Don't mean to push in on somebody elses thread but it seemed like the right place to post this question! This is my first post so please be gentle and excuse my total lack of knowledge.... Continuing on the "which PDA is suitable line". I have an HP journada 525. I know it will be woefully inadequate but can sombody tell me if it is even possible to use it to start with (if I bought a Wifi card). Reading this thread and from what very little knowledge I have I don't think processing speed would be a problem. However, I am concerned about the operating system. I have had it for nearly 2 years and from what I can make out it runs on windows CE 3.1. Having browsed the web I have found screenshots that show it as "Pocket PC" - no year being quoted!! Does this mean that it doesn't have and can't have .NET framework and therefore will not work. Any clues would be much appreciated before I waste money on a wifi card..... Thanks. Steele, good luck.....

[smurgle]

Continuing on the "which PDA is suitable line". I have an HP journada 525. I know it will be woefully inadequate but can sombody tell me if it is even possible to use it to start with (if I bought a Wifi card).

You can supposedly install .net on a WinCE 3.0 PPC (which = Pocket PC 2000) like the 525 but I'm not sure how well it would work and can only vouch for 2002. (2003 has it built in)
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=78974b4d-1bc6-4f29-8bd5-5ad5a37c7408&DisplayLang=en

Another possible problem is the 525 has only 16MB of RAM and especially after installing .net you might not have enough left to run XLobby.

If you get the CF wifi card from someplace you know you can return it to opened, you could give it a try. But it's a bit of a longshot.

[confusedalready]

Smurgle

Thanks for such a prompt reply. I am tempted to give it a go on the basis of what have I got to lose!. Will try to track down a wifi card locally so I can return it if necessary and will post another reply to let people know whether it works.......

[steele]

Thanks for everyones advice, taken the plunge and brought myself a FS LOOX 600 not the most common brand of PDA but has had good reviews, looks cool (I think!!), has windows pc pocket 2003 (so got .NET already!), 64mb memory and 400mhz processor all for £120. Going to get a wi-fi card next maybe it could be an idea to have a hardware forum so people can ask and recommend stuff to use Xlobby on.
One question as a current win98 user, I am getting XP pro next week, does this have the .NET framework included or any of the service packs for XP or will I have to download from the internet again?

Kind Regards

Steele

PS to the guy with the Jornada 525 why not sell it and upgrade? You should get at least £50-£100 on ebay or if in the uk try selling at one of these could get even more;
http://www.loot.com
http://www.adtrader.co.uk
http://www.freeads.co.uk

[stevenhanna6]

FS LOOX 600

cool looking pda

I am getting XP pro next week, does this have the .NET framework included or any of the service packs for XP or will I have to download from the internet again?

good question ....I'm not sure....but you can always get it off the internet again through the windows update thingy.

[rhinoman]

Steele, .net is still a download even with xpsp1.

Any chance of a link to as where you bought your pda at £120.

Cheers

[confusedalready]

RE: HP Jornada 525

Just an update for everybody...... I ordered the CF WIFI card and downloaded the .net framework from the link given by Smurgle (thanks!). I can now confirm that the .net works fine on windows CE and Xlobby runs just fine!!. I have also got hold of a Dell Axim X5. Playing music the differences are definately there but the Jornada is perfectly adequate. I would estimate the screen refreshes after between 1 - 2 seconds following a button press whereas the Dell refreshes in a little under a second (I appreciate that distances etc are an issue here but this is meant as a comparison). Responses i.e. play/stop are virtually instant. So far so good!. Now the downside - screen resolution and colours. Whereas the Dell looks very pretty with cover art etc the Jornada can best be described as looking like a photograph on a mobile phone. Again perfectly usable just not as "slick".

For those who don't know the Jornada 525 has just a 133 processor, 16mb of built in memory and (I think) a 256 colour screen. It runs windows CE3.0. The Dell is the 400 processor version.

To conclude, had I not got the Dell for a bargain price (don't ask!) I would have lived with the Jornada. But as it happens.........