SmartDevice CAB “is not a valid Windows CE Setup file”

Question

(This can be considered a follow-up on my question here. )

After successfully building a CAB setup file for my handheld WCE5 device, (a Datalogic Memor laserscanner) I went on to try and install it. However, upon starting the CAB, the device throws me the following error message:

The file "\\Setup.CAB" is not a valid Windows CE Setup file

I have no idea why it's saying this, especially since I made the CAB file using VS08's "Smart Device CAB Project" template.

Is there some setting I missed while building the CAB? All that I did was add the to-be-installed-project's output and add a shortcut on the desktop with a fancy-pansy icon.

The project is targeting Windows CE as well, and deploys and debugs just fine on the Memor.

Answer 1

It the CAB-file compressed? There is an option called 'compress' in the Smart Device CAB Project that can be turned off.

This option can cause this error, because not every CE version can handle compressed setups.

I also got this problem with a CE 6.0 project (OS version 8.2).

Answer 2

Memors come in either Windows Mobile 6.1 or Windows CE 5.0 flavors.

Are you sure your device uses CE and not Mobile?

A Windows Mobile device's desktop will look sort of like the screenshots below - because I can't seem to get the CE SDK installed right now (I've got too many other applications open). A Windows Mobile device can be confirmed by clicking [Start] > [Settings]:

Go to the [System] tab and select [About]:

On mine, you can see I'm stuck with WM5.

By contrast, a typical Windows CE device would have a screen somewhat like this image I found on Google:

ANOTHER UPDATE:

Is your project, perhaps, set to Windows Mobile, like shown below?

If this is a Windows CE Project, you'll need to target the Windows CE platform.

I can't install the Windows CE SDK on my machine, though. I discovered yesterday it has to be run on Windows XP.

** Friday Update **

Try creating another deployment project (you don't have to finish the Wizard), and see if you have a Windows CE option like the Target Platform like in "Step 2" pic below (I do not).