Expert: Werner "Menneisyys" Ruotsalainen

I often receive questions (example here) about the possibilities of installing the same application on more than one memory card to be used on the same computer. An example: you’d like to use, say, the excellent Resco Picture Viewer to review all your shots on your (several) memory cards you use in your digital camera but you wouldn’t like to install it in the main storage of your PDA to save memory (or to avoid for example filesys.exe compactions). You can safely install, in this case, Resco Picture Viewer on all your memory cards also used by your digicam. Whenever you insert any memory card that also has the viewer installed on it, you’ll be able to start it right from there.

This was only one, pretty trivial example of the usability of this trick.

In general, you can absolutely safely install your apps to any number of memory cards (assuming they have the same in-PDA name like "SD Card" or "Storage Card" - that is, you can't interchange CF and SD cards because they have different path names.)

To do this, you have two choices:

Read more!

UPDATE (06/06/2006): In the meantime, .NET Compact Framework Version 2.0 SP1 Beta has been released. It supports installation to storage cards; the main storage usage, then, remains at about 1M.

The standard installer is available at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=6548dd53-a418-42d9-a481-19ba3ceca1a6&displaylang=en . I've made the individual CAB files (so that you don't need to download he entire installation package) available at http://www.winmobiletech.com/sekalaiset/CF2SP1/ .

You should prefer using it to the standard, "old" CF2 so that you can avoid the laborous relocation.

For historical reasons, I still keep the original article, which is as follows:

One of the biggest complaints with Microsoft's Compact Framework 2 (CF2 for short) (and, consequently, with programs relying on it - Hitchhiker, SMS Notifier, Webby, IBE Mail etc.) has always been its storage needs, which, by default, is some 5.4 Mbytes. See for example this thread for users' opinions on the memory consumption on CF2 and their subsequent not wanting to install it.

I've always tried to reduce the main memory load on Pocket PC - with great success. Just search for the word-start "relocat" in the Pocket PC Magazine Expert Blog and on my old homepage for some examples of them. No wonder I've also decided to look into this, so far, unsolved problem to greatly help my fellow Pocket PC users. And, after a day's work and testing, I can present you a 100% working solution, which has been thoroughly tested on four of my WM2003+ PDA's, all with success. This IS a big thing, considering that internal memory is still precious, even with most Windows Mobile 5 (WM5) Pocket PC's. (For example, most WM5 PPC's are shipped with 128M of ROM, of which in general 40-45 Mbytes is free.) The situation is even worse with pre-WM5 Pocket PC's, where the available RAM is very rarely (only with devices shipped with 128 Mbytes of RAM) over 50 Mbytes, from which CF2 takes away 5.4 Mbytes.

Note that this will work on all Pocket PC and Pocket PC Phone Edition devices that are able to run CF2 (that is, all WM2003+ devices, including WM5).

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If you are looking for a really advanced audio recorder and want to make high-quality recording of mostly speech while saving as much storage as possible, then, Resco Audio Recorder (Resco for short) is probably the best choice for you. (Note that I've emphasized speech. Resco is not really suited for high-quality music recording – its MP3 encoder is of pretty bad quality and its Ogg encoder – the other high-quality format also meant for music recording – can't record in high-quality modes on recent PDA's. Please also see this roundup on all these questions.)

I've been trying to reduce the memory consumption of the applications on my PDA's and also played a bit with the files of Resco and found out the following:

- If you record/play MP3, RAF or WAV only (that is, not OGG or SPX files), then, you won't need the files RAudioOgg.dll and RAudioOggE.dll (they're both in the home directory of Resco; if you've installed Resco in the main RAM, it's at \Program Files\Resco); that is, you can free up 1.4 Mbytes.

- If you record/play OGG or SPX only (that is, not MP3, RAF or WAV files), then, you won't need the files RAudioMp3.dll and RAudioMp3E.dll; that is, you can free up 434 kbytes.

Also, if you have a WM2003SE (or later) device, then, you can also delete the contents of [vga_]default_land if you don't use your PDA in landscape mode at all. With VGA devices, then, you can free up even 180 kbytes; with QVGA ones, some 90 kbytes.

EDIT (Feb 2, 2006): you may also want to read this thread on some other tricks.

Ever wondered how you could make installing applications more configurable, particularly if you install CAB files right on your Pocket PC and not a desktop installer? In addition, ever wanted to access (for opening/writing) a file anywhere in the file system, not just under \My Documents (or from the entire storage cards) from already-installed programs? Have you ever been presented hundreds of files when you tried to access only one, resulting in wasting a lot of time in hunting for a particular file? The free File Dialog Changer for the rescue!

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Q: How do I install all my applications on my storage card? What if, in addition, I'd like to do this in a way so that they are stored in a specific subdirectory in there?

A: It's, unfortunately, impossible to automatically redirect all installs to your storage card, let alone a specific subdirectory on it.

1. ActiveSync-based redirection

If you use ActiveSync on the desktop to install your programs, a question dialog window will be presented, asking you whether you want to install the app in the default RAM (Yes) or would like to have the ability to choose an alternative medium (File Store/Storage card(s)):

click for image

(In the figure, I tried to install the Flash player. When you install other apps, the text will be different.)

If you click 'No', you'll be taken to another (Select Destination Media) dialog where you have to choose the destination from the drop-down list:

click for image

Just choose the file and it will be installed in the root directory of the card.

Note that this will only work if the setup application uses ActiveSync by default. Most apps do; there're some PPC applications which, while having desktop installers, don't use ActiveSync at all: for example, all apps created by Phelios Inc. - Easy Pocket PC Installer (current version 1.21) (I'll discuss desktop installer tools – I was also a judge in the Developers/Installation and Distribution category in the 2005 Best Software Awards voting so I've tested and know everything about them – in a forthcoming roundup some day). Further examples of individual apps that can't be installed into memory cards are, for example, Destinator and RVGSM (see my complete roundup on mobile phonehandler apps and some posts here on relocating it).

2. Fine-tuning your device so that you can install your programs anywhere

I've emphasized apps can't be installed in a subdirectory on a card if you install them via ActiveSync, only straight in the root directory. If you still want to avoid a lot of subdirectories in the root, other tools and/or means must be used.

2.1 Additional tools: CabInstl and Mad Programmer's FileDialogChanger

The tools that you should resort to depend on the operating system of your PDA:

1. If it's WM2003SE, then, the only tool I recommend and capable of doing this is the free CabInstl. With this tool, you'll be able to install your app (as long as you can find the CAB files it uses) in any subdirectory on your memory card, so, the root directory of the card won't be cluttered up with application/game subdirectories.

To be able to do this, first, you have to acquire the so-called CAB installation file for the program. If you're lucky, you can get it from the developer right away (for example, the people at Resco use this very good practice) or from using online repositories like FreeCabs (see my PPCT frontpaged article on these services/online repositories). In most cases, however, you'll need to hunt for them yourself in the file system of your PC (or, try to unzip them right from the installer EXE files). Please read my tips on doing this.

Once you've found the CAB file, just transfer it to the PDA and, assuming you've already associated (see the "Associate CabInstl with CAB files" checkbox in CabInstl) CabInstl with CAB files, just click the CAB file. Then, you'll only need to set the destination path by clicking the Path button at the top and choosing a target directory and click Install at the bottom left.

2. if your PDA runs an older operating system (PPC2k, PPC2k2 or WM2003), then, Mad Programmer's FileDialogChanger may be an even better choice because it doesn't make it necessary to hunt for CAB files – even if you install the application via a standard desktop installer, on the PDA, you'll be able to choose its destination.

You may want to read this thread (alternatives: iPAQ HQ, AximSite, PPC Magazine, FirstLoox, BrightHand, PocketMatrix) on setting this up.

Incidentally, why I don't recommend the clearly superior File Dialog Changer over CabInstl with WM2003SE devices, you may ask. The explanation is simple: not all CAB's will work. This is a generic WM2003SE-related problem; the same bug has been reported by several other WM2003SE users as well, see for example this thread.

You may also want to read this thread on some other tips of using directory names starting with, say, an underscore to be able to find them as easily as possible (they'll be at the directory listing in both File Dialog Changer and CabInstl when you browse the file system to choose the target directory).

2.2 Manual relocation – the not recommended way of installing

Please also note that some people recommend (see this thread) installation to anywhere followed by a manual relocation (moving the files in the file system) to another directory (or even card).

This is NOT recommended: you may end up having to modify the InstlDir and/or InstallDir values in the Registry under \HKLM\SOFTWARE\Apps, and, albeit with very few apps, also track down where the system stores (mostly in \HKCU\Software\) other references to the (original) home directory.

Another problem with manual file-moving based relocation that Remove Programs won't find the files relocated this way because \Windows\programname.unload will contain the old location, and it's by getting the full file paths from .unload files that Remove Programs removes installed applications. This means you won't be able to (automatically) remove applications that you've installed into a directory and, later, relocated it to somewhere else – you have to do this by hand.

EDIT on 31/10/2005: I've retested File Dialog Changer with non- WM2003SE devices and found out it works flawlessly with them. Thanks to Gerard for pointing out this omission, which made me re-test the "problematic" CAB files.

Also, added a lot of new stuff / broken up the article into sections so that it is more readable.

EDIT on 25/11/2005: version 1.60 for WM5 released. Please read this blog entry.

EDIT on 11/Jan/2006: please make sure you read this blog entry for the latest bug/problem reports