ActiveSync 3.0: a Big Improvement!

Along with each PC Companion, Microsoft provides a copy of Windows CE Services. This desktop PC program lets you swap files and synchronize data between your desktop PC and PC Companion. Microsoft has included this program ever since the first Handheld PC shipped in late 1996. And ever since then, PC Companion users have been crying out, "There's got to be an easier way to synchronize this thing."

NT-friendly ActiveSync 3.0

Windows CE Services has been a particular headache for users of Windows NT desktop PCs. While CE Services 2.2 fixed this problem for many NT users (myself included), a quick look through the Windows CE newsgroups tells you that it didn't fix it for everybody.

Fortunately, ActiveSync 3.0 is a big improvement, especially for NT users. In less than 10 mouse clicks I installed it on my Windows NT test machine, configured the synchronization options, and synchronized data with a Casio E-105 Palm-size PC. One of the more annoying things about previous versions was the necessity of re-booting the desktop two or three times during installation. I didn't have to re-boot once during installation to a clean NT machine (i.e. one that had never had Windows CE Services installed on it). However, when I tried upgrading an NT computer that already had CE Services 2.2 installed, I had to reboot.

Previous versions of Windows CE Services (2.0-2.2) relied on a service called RAS (Remote Access Service) which operated in the background and caused some problems.

Dial Up Networking (DUN) was the source of the "every time I connect my device, IE wants to log on to my ISP" problem prior to the bug fix that shipped with IE5. Once Microsoft Engineers decided not to continue using Remote Access Service and DUN as the primary connection method, implementing auto-baud detection was possible, hence with ActiveSync 3.0 much faster connections are possible.

Using RAS meant that you had to restart your PC up to three times during installation. In addition, it wasn't easy to change the default communications speed between the two devices. Finally, RAS was a major plague for IT departments. To synchronize with NT desktop PCs, the IT department had to change user permission settings (i.e. they specify system resources a particular user is allowed to use). The problem was that some of the necessary changes were against IT policies in particular companies. ActiveSync 3.0 does not use RAS and most of those problems are gone. We tested this by setting up an ActiveSync users on our in-house NT network. It was easy and it worked without a flaw.

Change default communications speed easily

It had been difficult to change the default communications speed on previous versions of Windows CE, so we tested Active Sync 3.0 to see if it was any better. All we had to do was unplug the Casio E-105 Palm-size PC from the docking cradle, tap Start, Settings, Communications, PC Connection, Change Connection and then select Serial@115k from the drop-down list. We placed the Casio E-105 back in its docking cradle and it connected to our NT 4.0 machine at 115k! We didn't have to change anything on the PC ­ it just worked! (Not all PCs support 115k so if 115k doesn't work for you then try it at 57,600.)