Embedded Windows XP

Solution 1:

A customer of mine has several similar machines. They are all a little bit differently configured depending on the manufacturer and the model. Here are some tips I can give you:

• Usually those systems have two states, one is the standard mode and the other one the administration mode. Normally you get into the administration mode by pressing either a special button at the industrial pc while starting up or by pressing a special button configuration on the front panel (often at start-up too).
• Do not expect to use any remote management software on these machines. The technical specification are pretty low. The only thing we are doing is saving the blueprint on a mapped share on the windows server.
• Many systems have their own configuration interface. My customer has even one machine where the network card is configured in their software. So it could very well be that your local guy has to configure everything for you.
• What I can recommend you as well is to go to the website of the manufacturer. They often have the PDF of the manual there. This PDF explains you how you get into this administration mode and what you will be able to do there.

Solution 2:

If you can boot from a USB drive that might get your foot in the door.

Solution 3:

First off, Plug and Play has nothing to do with Accessibility options. As for how to get around your problem, I don't have XP embedded, so this is pretty much guesswork.

• See if the Plug and Play service is installed. Perhaps it has merely been disabled, not uninstalled.
• Does XP embedded have Remote Desktop? I suspect not but if it does you can do whatever you need through that.
• If you really want to reinstall the OS contact Microsoft. It is they who created it, not the machinery supplier, and I suspect they will sell it somewhat cheaper. If embedded is anything like workstation you may be able to perform an in-place reinstall, saving you from having to reinstall applications.

As for the lack of a PS2 port, that's becoming very common now.

Solution 4:

Also, there is such a thing as a PS/2 port doubler/splitter: I used to use them sometimes on laptops with a single PS/2 port. Maybe it would also work on your industrial PC?