Vectorlinux for Asus EeePC?

[kidd]

HarryB,
It's great we have your input. Thank you very much.

I think you just catched the idea and feeling of community and OpenSource

[lagagnon]

I've just acquired an Asus eee PC 1000 and contrary to some of the gumph in here

What "gumph"? Please explain.

Rather than muck around trying to get the so-called "expert" Xandros desktop, I've been experimenting with various Linux builds

It takes about 30 seconds work to get the KDE desktop on the Asus Eee's and a LOT more work to get a completely new distro on it, unless you already know that.

and now I've come to VL, only to find that no-one's interested.

Only perhaps those VL users who actually own an Asus Eee, of which there are probably only a small handful.

This absolutely cracks me up, as clearly you aren't aware of the possibilities if you could produce a really rocking distro for this box - there's a few hundred thousand linux newbies out there that would be very interested.

We are a small volunteer run distro so if you are willing to help get an Eee VL distro ready that would be great...

And people wonder why Linux can't compete with Microsoft. I think it's obvious. The opposition is far too splintered.

I agree but it does give everyone lots of choice!

Anyway, I'm going to have a go at getting VL working on it, on the basis that if it really is too much trouble, I can just bin it.

Let us know how it goes and please post your comments here so others can improve on your findings.

But I would like to say that it shows a singular lack of imagination and enthusiasm to discard this wonderful little netbook in such a dismissive manner.

Please show us where anyone on this thread showed a lack of imagination, enthusiasm or dismissiveness.

[wcs]

Most of the issues in running a Linux distro on a netbook stem from the kernel that is used (and X autodetection).
Netbooks are more and more supported with recent kernels, and you can expect the latest VL 6 to run much better than VL 5.9.
I haven't tried the latest release candidate yet on a netbook, but you should expect wireless and wired, hibernate functions, and screen resolution to be working out of the box... and that should apply to a lot of distros, not specifically VL.
 
That said, there will always be some issues like special keys, customised scripts, and connecting to an external monitor that might require extra stuff not in the default distro.
These could be handled by having a package in the repo that installed the relevant stuff, so I don't see the big deal.

It makes much more sense (I think) to have this package in the repositories than to produce a VL version specifically for the EEE. A new VL version would require a lot of work and a lot of testers. I find that a bit silly, when the majority of people don't have netbooks (at least, not on this forum). Plus, the eee isn't the only netbook on the market and not even the one that has been sold the most. Finally, there are different models of the EEE.... surely, you don't mean to suggest that the VL crew release (and support) a whole distro just for a single computer model. If someone is up for it, great... that's what open-source is all about. But given the limited resources, you should appreciate that it makes more sense to focus on a general distribution.

In the end, we do what we can. I have made an effort to get VL 5.9 running properly on an aspire one, documented the steps on a thread, and will do the same for VL6, possibly creating a package for the aspire one.
Feel free to do the same with the EEE.

[caitlyn]

My netbook is a Sylvania, not an Eee PC, but I can say this for all netbooks with certainly:

VL 5.9 doesn't support them or supports them poorly at best.
VL 6.0 supports them very well indeed.

If you's read the release announcements for the various betas and release candidates for VL 6.0 you would know that making VL work on netbooks of all sorts has been a very high priority for the developers, but they are concentrating on the new version, not on last years release.

Harry, I'll assume your post came about because you simply didn't look at the rest of the development section of the forum.  Your assumptions are incorrect.  I realize there is a lot of forum to look through and I don't blame you for not realizing that what you want is already happening.  I do blame you for assuming that the VL devs don't care rather than asking if anything is being done.

[no2thesame]

Installing Vector Linux 6 STD Gold on an Asus eee PC 1000H is not difficult once the you can get at the hard drive. I did the initial part of the installation by swapping the hard drive to another (bigger) laptop with a CD drive, and installing from the CD. see:
http://forum.vectorlinux.com/index.php?topic=9070.0

There were a few surprises with the original set-up with Windows XP:
 - Boot time was fast at 32sec, (now with login password into Xfce 1 min 30sec)
 - Star Office (OpenOffice) 8 was installed
 - Keyboard had strange bindings, @ and " were swapped, # was the English Pound symbol.
 
The installation was very easy, I chose the non-graphical installer. I didn't want XP so wiped out all the partitions on the hard drive, otherwise my install went much the same as this one:
http://linux.seindal.dk/2009/02/11/asus-eee-pc-1000h-with-debian-lenny-testing/

I don't have a wireless network to test it on so I'm not sure if that is working. The same applies to Bluetooth.

APM fails on loading. I'm not sure where to go there.

The webcam works, as do sound and the SD card reader.

The screen resolution is 1024x600 and looks good with Xfce. A USB mouse, attached before booting, works, but the touchpad no longer has full support.

I want to install Skype (why isn't it in the repositories?) and test the microphone. I still have to configure the keyboard's special keys.

My daughter (who bought it) is very happy with it (she bought it) and once she has logged in, it runs quite quickly.

[stretchedthin]

I want to install Skype (why isn't it in the repositories?) and test the microphone. I still have to configure the keyboard's special keys.

Skype is easy to install from the skype site, just download the static package, and extract.  Doulble click on skype (with the small s) and
your up and running.

Getting the video going is a little more involved. This flash how to tutorial will walk you through the whole thing.
http://www.opensourcebistro.com/Tutorial/VL60/11.Network-apps/skype/skype.htm

[no2thesame]

Skype is working!! No problem at all. The microphone and video worked without any setting up.

Too easy! VL is getting boring. 

Skype is easy to install from the skype site, just download the static package, and extract.  Doulble click on skype (with the small s) and
your up and running.

Getting the video going is a little more involved. This flash how to tutorial will walk you through the whole thing.
http://www.opensourcebistro.com/Tutorial/VL60/11.Network-apps/skype/skype.htm

I installed from the Vector package I downloaded from:
http://vectorlinux.osuosl.org/veclinux-5.9/extra/net/skype-2.0.0.72-noarch-1.tlz

..it is the latest version and I only had to "install" and had it is listed under Network in the menu. Made a desktop launcher (as per tutorial)

Hey, I love the tutorials! I poked around and looked at several others too. I thought I knew about VL!! I learned a lot. The video section on Skype is now unneeded except that it showed me how to test. I like the simple way you explain things. I picked up something new from every video I watched.

These tutorials need links from the front page of the VL website.

[stretchedthin]

Thanks, I've been putting a lot of time into them (the tutorials) so your nod of recognition is truly appreciated.

Interesting that your asus's video worked for skype right out of the box.  Same on my acer apire one, but not so on my other systems using logitech webcams. 

I'll update to include where to find that skype 5.9 version .tlz in the tut's.
Thanks again.
Ken

[dawnsboy]

I have installed VL 6.0 Lite to the 4Gig SSD internal drive on my Eeepc 701 shortly after its release.  I love the desktop and theming that comes with the Icewm window manager.  I was pleased by the performance of VL on this netbook.  Congratulations on a fantastic distro.

What Works:

800x480 display (option offered with initial configuration during install)
Intel Sound
Web Cam
Wifi (although not very well on wpa or wep encrypted router)
VL Hot detects usb flash drive and external usb dvd/cdrom without difficulty.

What Doesn't Work:

Ethernet

Not Tested:

SDHC card ( mislaid my 4Gig SDHC card so am unable to test it at this time)

Observations:

The default Xandros OS is the only linux OS that I have tested where wifi works well on both open and encrypted networks.  Every other distro has (with varying degrees of success) worked well with open networks but had some difficulty with encrypted networks.  Some refuse to work on encrypted networks at all while others will connect one time and not the next (but then hook up again later or not) and yet others negotiate a connection without difficulty but download speeds are similar to that of a dial up connection all the way up to about 25kb intermittently on dsl broadband.

WPA connection with VL 6.0 Lite falls into the latter group with connection speeds at or just above those acheived in dial up connections.  I have not tested it on an open connection but I believe it would be likely to perform well since most Linux distros that I have tried do very well with open networks.

Having the ability to connect with WPA encrypted networks is a convenience for use about the house but is not a necessity.  I generally sit at my desk and have the option of plugging in the cable (which is what I do most of the  time).  I only encounter open networks out of the house.

On that basis compliing the driver for ethernet use would be the only task necessary to make VL 6.0 Lite useful on this little box.  However, installing kernel sources and dev files leave only about 500MB given the applications that I chose not to install.  Not much room to manuever there given the fact that I only have a 4Gig SSD to work with.

wcs wrote:

It makes much more sense (I think) to have this package in the repositories than to produce a VL version specifically for the EEE. A new VL version would require a lot of work and a lot of testers. I find that a bit silly, when the majority of people don't have netbooks (at least, not on this forum)

This makes a lot of sense.  The folks over at Puppy Linux have compiled a series of packages against the 2.6.25.16 kernel used in the 4.1.x and 4.2.x releases.  These provide drivers for sound, wifi, eee fan and cpu control and Fn key functionality.  One only need to download and install them with a single click.  That works well.  Ubuntu variants can use Adams kernel and drivers.

@Caitlyn

I think that you made a good choice with the Sylvania netbook.  I really enjoy my Eeepc.  I have no problem with the small screen and keyboard and I can overclock the CPU to the rated 900MHz ( which is enough for me).  I made a simple gui to allow me the option of changing fan and clock speeds from the desktop.  However, the lack of hard drive space is a limitation.

[Pita]

I have installed VL-6-STD-Gold on a HP Mini-Note PC 2133 with barely a problem worth mention and most runs like a charme.
The person using the machine is an absolute newbie on any computer and after having had some paid-for computer lessons
is just totally happy. Wireless Internet connection just works extremely well, moveing to different routers and systems w/o tweeking anything.
Opera opens within 3 seconds on this Mini-Note against 12 sec on my Desktop PC.