Running Connect SW on Windows 2000

[kacir]

Dear SONY.

Yesterday evening I have received PRS - 500 and guess what was the first thing I have done after I stopped admiring it?

Yes. I have "hacked" your Connect software.
(please look up "hacking" on wikipedia)

Why?
Because I wanted to use it and You didn't let me do it. You say that my Windows 2000 operating system is not good enough to connect a simple device to my PC and upload a few files.
Gues what?

Here is how I "installed" Connect software in w2k PC.

- downloaded Connect SW v 1.1 from the net
- installed it on a borrowed PC with XP
- connected the reader to XP computer
- moved directory C:\Program Files\Sony\ to w2k computer
- copied file dsound.dll and dsound.vxd from XP copputer to the C:\Program Files\Sony\CONNECT Reader\Data\bin\
- copied files PRSUSB.cat PRSUSB.inf PRSUSB.sys from XP computer into c:\hack directory on w2k computer
- manually started "CONNECT Reader.exe" binary from C:\Program Files\Sony\CONNECT Reader\Data\bin\
- connected Reader to W2k computer
- I was prompted to provide drivers - so I pointed the "Found the new HW" wizzard to the c:\hack directory.

Tadaaaaaa ...
The connect software is uploading texts to my brand new Reader at this very moment.

Happy hacking dear felow readers ;-)

[igorsk]

You could skip installing on XP step by running the setup with -a switch.

[NatCh]

Very nice.

[westsan]

sweet!!

Now will someone tell me how to get at the internals of the device?

[TadW]

Originally Posted by westsan

sweet!!

Now will someone tell me how to get at the internals of the device?

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=115 <-- plenty of good information there. (not for the faint hearted)

[virginian]

While setup with -a switch works fine (thanks to igorsk), you still need one extra step from the kacir's hack.

After connecting Reader to W2k computer you will be prompted to provide USB driver. By default New Hardware wizard will try to locate driver in the “C:\windows\Drivers" folder. Not surprisingly, with no luck, because Sony Reader USB driver actual location is "C:\Program Files\Sony\CONNECT Reader\Data\bin\"

So, just click "Browse" and point HW to this folder.


I'm still wondering, why Sony prohibits W2K installation?

[aru]

Help!
I just bought my Sony reader and I have no XP machine at home. Iam running win 2000. I tried to run setup with the -a switch by clicking "start", then "run" typing H:\connect -a and clicking "ok". The installation took its course, the connect was about to start, but then stopped with with the comment "connect reader.. has generated errors and will be closed by windows."
Does anybody know what I did wrong?

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

I tried installing the Connect SW on Win2k, and adding the "-a" to the "run" dialog. For me, it worked just fine. (I do not have a reader, but I wanted to be able to convert my e-books to the reader format for sale, and evaluate them on my PC.)

I had a similar thing happen to me when I clicked on the Connect Store icon. Everything else works okay.

Did the software you tried to install come on a CD with the reader? If so, perhaps the CD has an additional instruction to look for the reader that is throwing things off.

I downloaded the SW from Connect's website, and used that. If that works, you should be able to plug in the reader, then use the CD to load the drivers.

Originally Posted by virginian

I'm still wondering, why Sony prohibits W2K installation?

I'm sure Sony simply doesn't want to get bogged down with supporting older Windows formats... coupled with the fact that Windows post-2000 is designed to be more easily scanned by vendors, so they can check your HW and SW and monitor for illegal file use and sharing...

[aru]

Thank you, Steve. I actually tried both, version 1.0 from the CD and 1.1 from the website. I also did another attempt following Kacir's description exactly (I installed the reader on my PC at work), and I still get the same problem. If anybody else has any more Ideas to try, please let me know.

[JSWolf]

I have one suggestion. Upgrade to XP from 2K.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I have one suggestion. Upgrade to XP from 2K.

Don't get me started...

There are no services XP offers that I need, and no software I need or want that doesn't run on Win2K. Win2K is one of the most robust versions of Windows made to date, thanks to the years of updates and patches, and it is not being targeted by the latest viruses. I don't believe in replacing things that still serve their purpose. (My car and my motorcycle are 7 years and 9 years old, respectively, paid for, and still do their job, too.)

So, until I need something from my PC that Win2K simply can't handle, I'm staying put, and hacking it until it starts smoking!

[kacir]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I have one suggestion. Upgrade to XP from 2K.

Come on ...

Why should I spend aditional hundreds of dollars just to be able to connect a simple device to a PC and upload a few files?

XP offers in comparison with W2k:
Forced activation
Built-in aggresive spyware called WGA
Barbie look that slows the interface down
Resource hogging
Ability to run a very lousy application that has managed to break every GUI guideline in existence - The CONNECT software

At home I very, very rarely boot Windows anyway, because FreeBSD is my system of choice.
I have used Connect SW to delete the junk that came loaded on my Reader. For transfering the files to the Reader I use memory card plus card reader that can work under FreeBSD, Linux W98 and even OSX. I will use Connect SW once more to spend my $50 credit and that will be it. Period.

At work, I had to update from Windows 98 to Windows 2000 in order to be able to run latest Autocad and other SW. Why should I make my [relatively old] computer run even slower by installing XP?

[virginian]

I still use Windows 2000 because it works just fine on my old Pentium 3 computers. Speaking about XP, it took me almost two years before I learned that indexing on XP computer(at work) by default turned on!

By the way, after you successfully installed Connect under Win2000 you still need one more little trick if you want to upgrade Connect to the next version. Don't click OK after downloading update file via Connect Update Menu option. Locate file in the temoprary folder, copy it into other folder and run with -a switch. I'm on vacation in Europe now and don't rememer the exact location, but it's in the Personal Document's folder and further under Connect application entry.

I used Sysinternals FileMon utility to find update file location.

P.S. I installed and upgraded Connect on my both Win2K computers without any issues.

[aru]

For the reasons explained by other people in this thread, I am not going to "upgrade" to XP.

However, I would really like to be able to use connect on my Win 2k computer. So I tried again to install using the -a switch and the copy from my computer at work both give me the same results. The program is shutting down before it even starts.

Is there anything that conflicts in win2k with the connect software?

Is there another software that works like connect? Does it make sense to check with Sony?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by kacir

Come on ...

Why should I spend aditional hundreds of dollars just to be able to connect a simple device to a PC and upload a few files?

XP offers in comparison with W2k:
Forced activation
Built-in aggresive spyware called WGA
Barbie look that slows the interface down
Resource hogging
Ability to run a very lousy application that has managed to break every GUI guideline in existence - The CONNECT software

If your XP is legit, the activation is not an issue.
WGA is not spyware if your XP is legit.
The interface can be changed. I went back to the classic look (aka Win98) and I like it much better.
What I've done for resource hogging is to turn off a lot of the extra resources that I don't need. Works well that way. If you bother to look on the net, you can taylor XP so it works quite well.