Tag Archives: eee

Installing Web cam in Asus Eee

My Eee didn’t come with a webcam. I didn’t really think about it and, anyway I just wanted one, and as they are in short supply, I just got what I could get.

Then I found a Eee webcam in ebay. Somebody fried the motherboard of their Eee and was selling of the parts. I end up paying 35au$ including freight. Not cheap, but most of it went to the postal service.

This a picture description of how I installed it – Mostly done as an excuse to do a few macro shots. The shots was prepared for web using gimp on the Eee…

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Asus Eee First Impressions

Well, the first impression is that it’s small. Really small.

And cute! Holding in my hands, I get the feeling that it’s my best new friend and I’ll never let it go again. The only reason that I’m not writing this using it, is that it’s charging. I can clearly understand why this it the new hot sell. Once you had it in your hands you want to own it. Turning it on only makes it better – the screen is just beautiful.

I went by the office today to pick it up, and turned it on (it booted in 16seconds) and walked down the hall to find somebody to show it to. Handing to our (female) secretary, she exclaimed “wow, that’s cute. And it will fit right into a ladies handbag. How much is it?”. Handing it to my wife when I came home, the first thing she says, is “wow – it will fit right in a ladies handbag”. Any gadget that has that kind of instant lady appeal has to be a winner. I can’t wait until I can bring it to a cafĂ© and see what kind of effect it will have :-).

The “simple” user interface is nice, but I’m not sure I understand the idea behind it – starting any application will reveal a normal, not the easy GUI. But I guess that it’s better then the usual “Start” menu. All the needed applications are there, as expected. Inserting my wife’s 2GB usb key had the desired effect of giving my a choice to open a file explorer, and it was easy to find a document, and a double click opened it in OpenOffice.org (started in seconds).

I haven’t tried to change the keyboard to a Danish one yet and I haven’t tried to install any software, but everything seems to work.

Things to do:

  • Open it and see if I got one with a Mini-PCIe or not.
  • Set up mail.
  • Make sure flash and stuff works in the browser.
  • Add Adblock and Google Sync plugins to firefox.
  • See if there’s any linux Pentax RAW support, so that I can view pictures from my camera as I take them.
  • Possible add a bluetooth dongle and see if I can get Dial Up Networking to work over my phone.

(hey! Merry Christmas!)

Asus eee PC – in the mail…

I’ve ordered an Asus EEE PC – or rather I’ve asked my boss who’s currently in the US to buy me one and he assures me it has been ordered. Not sure exactly which model he has ordered, but the white 4G surf model seems to be the only one in stock, so it’s probably that one. Which is fine. Anything by the 2G model…

I intend to use it as a couch computer. Something to do a bit of surfing on while the wife is watching TV. I’ll tell you more when I get it…