Yes Windows 8.1 it was made to work here first by one of our Joggler forum peers from a USB stick on the O2 Joggler with Seabios. It booted OK. After a bit it would quit working. (booting). Next test was using an SSD drive via a ZIF cable and the SeaBIOS mode. This was using Windows 8.1 preview customized lite release and it did work fine rebooting over and over again from the SSD drive.
There wasn't a lot of interest because it used a ZIF drive and the USB drive didn't work well , Buzz's Ubuntu works better.
That said here I use a touch screen software / SAPI TTS and its really the same whether it running on old MS CE (have that here too), XPe, 7e or Win8.1 Lite. It looks identical on all of the OS's (and you don't really see the OS). Current
stock automation touchscreen build is XPe using a bulk purchase of embedded licenses used for some advertising company that went out of business a few years back. The always issue with Wintel though was that Realtek GB NIC and no battery. My little fix loads up some other driver, then the standard driver and I am good to go with it unless I power off the unit. I did put some big icons on the screen to load the broken drivers (almost broken) and regular drivers and it works for me. I also added Asix 100Mb USB NICs to a few of the Openframe / Joggler devices. Here is a picture of one with a Gb link running just fine.
Here after seeing it work I used a regular Windows 8.1 ISO DVD ROM build to put "fat" Windows 8.1 on the OpenPeak 1's using the ZIF connected 16Gb SSD drive. Kind of expensive license though for a Joggler. I did thin it out a bit letting it run for a few months. The drivers mostly installed themselves. There is kind of a fix that I use to utilize the Gb port on the Jogger. I load up the wrong Realteck driver and its says its up then disconnects itself. I then load the old drivers and it works fine.
Much faster Windows 8.1 lite is on the PipoX7 using a Baytrail CPU / 2Gb of RAM / 32Gb of MMC drive space.
how I'd go about running a licensed version of Windows 8.1 on the Joggler
Standard Windows 8.1 installation DVD ROM; follow the prompts. (too expensive)
I have settled a bit on using XPe builds as it quite fast on the Openframe 1's.
I did purchase a PiPo X7 to play with Windows 8.1 lite. This is a licensed version of Windows 8.1 lite. I was hoping to use that license for Joggler / Openpeak 1 device. Only thing is is that the EFI BIOS is really tweaked up a few notches and propietary. You think that the Joggler EFI was customized; well the PiPo X7 is much more customized. I also purchased an HP (new old stock) Windows 7 embedded terminal hoping to use that license; testing and it did now work for me. I do get it to boot for a few seconds.
I hear that you can purchase a Windows 8.1 32bit lite very reasonable priced these days. Way way less than $100 USD.