[Windows Phone 8 Development and Hacking] compu829:
All, I am starting this thread to chronicle what new features I can see in the extracted vhd. from the SDK. I will be uploading it here so you all can play along, too!

I am hoping to see if I can "hack" this vhd to enable some bonus features in the emulator. Also, it appears it might be flashable to some devices as all the proper boot parts are present. Enjoy!

Partition list:

DISKPART> list disk

Disk ### Status Size Free Dyn Gpt
-------- ------------- ------- ------- --- ---
Disk 0 Online 238 GB 0 B
Disk 1 Online 10 GB 0 B

DISKPART> select disk 1

Disk 1 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> detail disk

Msft Virtual Disk SCSI Disk Device
Disk ID: AE420040
Type : Virtual
Status : Online
Path : 0
Target : 0
LUN ID : 2
Location Path : UNAVAILABLE
Current Read-only State : No
Read-only : No
Boot Disk : No
Pagefile Disk : No
Hibernation File Disk : No
Crashdump Disk : No
Clustered Disk : No

Volume ### Ltr Label Fs Type Size Status Info
---------- --- ----------- ----- ---------- ------- --------- --------
Volume 4 H EFIESP FAT Partition 32 MB Healthy
G:\EFIESP\
Volume 5 F DPP FAT Partition 10 MB Healthy
G:\DPP\
Volume 6 G MainOS NTFS Partition 2264 MB Healthy
Volume 7 I CRASHDUMP FAT32 Partition 2304 MB Healthy
G:\CrashDump\
Volume 8 J Data NTFS Partition 5627 MB Healthy
G:\Data\

DISKPART>

Features list (In no particular order)

1. Podcast support (including new "Podcast Marketplace")!

2. Xbox Music will support a "Music locker" in the cloud. Service hasn't launched yet.

3. New "LOCKANDWALLPAPER" control panel - Possibly set a wallpaper behind the live tiles?

4. New "Notification center" control panel - (You guys already knew that)

5. New Voices to choose from! They are named "Kate", "Mark", and "Zira"

- Voices have the ability to update themselves in the background.

6. New "Navigation bar" control panel

Preinstalled Apps List

1. File Manager! (appx)

2. BatterySense (appx) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/s...playname/c551f76f-3368-42bb-92df-7bfbb9265636

3. Bing Finance (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-finance/1e0440f1-7abf-4b9a-863d-177970eefb5e

4. Bing Food (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-food-drink/cc512389-0456-430f-876b-704b17317de2

5. Bing Health (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-health-fitness/cbb8c3bd-99e8-4176-ad8c-95ec6a3641c2

6. Bing News (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-news/9c3e8cad-6702-4842-8f61-b8b33cc9caf1

7. Bing Sports (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-sports/0f4c8c7e-7114-4e1e-a84c-50664db13b17

8 Bing Travel (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-travel/19cd0687-980b-4838-8880-5f68aba1671e

9. Bing Weather (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bing-weather/63c2a117-8604-44e7-8cef-df10be3a57c8

10. Calendar (appx)

11. Podcast (appx)

12. GamesHub (xap)

13. IE Tile Manager (xap)

14. Microsoft Media PlayReady Client (appx)

15. Microsoft VC LIBs 12 (appx) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/s...-package/5dec6302-3af3-4a4b-bc6e-d800779376b9

16. Microsoft VC LIBs 12 Preview (appx)

17. SkyDrive WPB (xap)

18. Xbox Music (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/xbox-music/d2b6a184-da39-4c9a-9e0a-8b589b03dec0

19. Xbox Video (xap) http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/xbox-video/6affe59e-0467-4701-851f-7ac026e21665

Observations

1. All the interesting EFIESP\Windows\Packages files (xml and reg) appear to be encrypted now.

2. there is an "FFUloader.exe" efi app at EFIESP\Windows\System32\boot

3. .appx files can still be opened in 7zip/winzip/etc

4 FileManager appx has the following capabilities: ID_CAP_PM_1ST_PARTY" "ID_CAP_PUBLIC_FOLDER_FULL"

5. Appx file structure is quite different from the xap structure we know so well. Great writeup on .appx can be found at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappd...ing-a-simple-and-secure-app-package-appx.aspx

SoCs targeted in test:

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8960_TEST</FeatureID>

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8960_Test_4gb</FeatureID>

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8960_LOWCOST</FeatureID>

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8974_TEST</FeatureID>

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8x26_TEST</FeatureID>

<FeatureID>SOC_QC8X26_USESD_TEST</FeatureID>

A quick google of the MSM8974 chipset...reveals that it is used in the Galaxy Note 3 and theLG G2! I am speculating that there is something similar coming out soon for WP.