# The Ubuntu Forum Community > Ubuntu Official Flavours Support > Hardware > [other] Linux on 7" mini netbook ARM-VT8500 ?

## celem

EBay is currently flooded with super cheap tiny laptops that currently sell for around $125 but after Christmas may drop below $100. The are all pre-loaded with WINCE 5.0 or 6.0 but I feel comfortable that they could run some flavor of Linux, maybe xubuntu, if someone figured out to load it. It wont boot from a unetbootin stick - in fact I suspect that there is no BIOS and that the kernel image is factory loaded into the 2GB SSD drive.

Has anyone had any success with loading Linux onto one of these?

My little writeup on the device follows:
----------------
I purchased a small notebook machine direct from Hong-Kong distributor, through eBay. The are commonly listed on eBay as '7" mini netbook'. It is a generic mini-laptop running a WinCE6.0 kernel on a VIA ARM-VT8500 processor.

It is a cute little machine, weighing 1 pound, 5.7 ounces with a 800x480 7" screen, measured diagonally. This machine is absolutely generic with no brand name whatsoever. Installed memory is 128MB. The 2GB Flash Disk has 1.7GB of formatted space, currently with 1.59GB free. Closed, the units deminsions are 8-3/8 inches wide, 5-3/4 deep and 1-1/4 high. When open the unit is about the same size as a standard sheet of printer paper (8.5x11).

It contains MicroSoft  Media Player, Internet Explorer 6, WordPad and MicroSoft Messenger, but also several 3rd-party software packages:
a MicroSoft Office compatible suite by SoftMaker Software GmbH, supporting Word, Excel and PowerPoint formats. 
Other 3rd-part software installed is WinRAR, Foxit PDF Reader, Image Viewer and audio recorder. 
It also contains an email client, nPOP, titled Outlook on the desktop. As delivered, nPOP does not support SSL (needed for gmail and Yahoo-mail) but SSL support can be added by installing three DLL files:
 npopssl.dll from http://www.nakka.com/soft/npop/downl...pssl002arm.zip
 libeay32.dll and ssleay32.dll from http://npopuk.org.uk/2.13/dl/openssl-0.9.8l.tar.gz

The Internet Explorer browses most sites OK, albeit a bit slowly, but its antiquated java engine fails to support some sites, such as PowerMyPc.com's internet speed test. Also, YouTube doesn't work, complaining that the Flash Player needs to be updated. Yahoo Mail classic works just fine, as does Gmail. According to IronGeek.com, the browser identifies itself as Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE6.0; Windows NT 5.1)

Although the minimal documentation indicates that the SD slot is just that, an SD slot, in actuality it also supports SDHC.

There are three USB ports. The ones on the side are labeled keyboard and mouse, but they work fine with a USB-stick.

WiFi works just fine with my in-house D-Link router. In addition to built-in WiFi, there is an ethernet port.

This machine has some oddities. There doesn't appear to be a BIOS ROM - thus booting from a unetbootin USB is impossible. The WINCE kernel must be directly loaded into the flash drive at the factory, probably using some external tool. There are no disk drive letters. A plugged-in SD card or USB stick can be accessed by programs, such as WordPad, but they are not mounted on the desktop. There is no resident file explorer, but you can access the SD card or USB stick by opening the "My Computer" icon. Another way to access a SD card or USB stick directly is to access the SD card or USB stick from the command line (RUN->CMD). Another oddity is that every time you turn on the machine, the WiFi is powered off. If you want to use WiFi you must power it on via a desktop icon title "WiFi Power". Obviously this is a power conservation theme. There is a keyboard key with "Z z z" on it, which implys, to me atleast, sleep mode. However, it does nothing. Furthermore, closing the lid does not darken the screen or trigger a sleep or hibernate mode. In fact, in the control panel's Poers section, the sleep and hibernate modes are greyed out. Obviously this machine doesn't support sleep or hibernate mode - possibly due to the missing BIOS and its associated APCI. The keyboard key with "Z z z" is probably generic and intended for a different model, namely one with a BIOS.

In summary, despite its oddities, this little machine would be useful in some situations as a laptop, especially where a larger or more expensive machine was not desirable. I think that it would be useful for keeping a journal while traveling and checking email at public WiFi hotspots. The web browser's slowness and antiquated javascript support and lack of Flash significantly weaken browser functionality, but Google and many other useful sites work just fine.

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## Fafler

You would probably need to put another bootloader on it. Look at the Familiar project. It has been dead for some years, but the mailing list is still active. The aim of the project was to run Linux on CE devices like older iPaq's, but even though most of them was PXA based, i still think those guys might be able to help you.

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## dimeotane

VIA-ARM VT8500 I don't think that will run the usual i386 version of Ubuntu.  There's a quiet a few different versions of these 7 inch screened netbooks from China all with different processors.  Some are ARM, some VIA, other RDC cpu...
Some with <256mb RAM.

I think there's some out there with >256mb ram and a 1GHZ X86 processor. Like this one.  That sounds like a good set of specs to me for running the usual Ubuntu.  It is possible to run with less however (like with Xubuntu). 

I sure wish these mini netbooks had a vga out port for doing powerpoint presentations!

I've been reading prices as low as $70 to 80 USD for one of these.

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## celem

I've been thinking of opening mine up to look at the board. I read from a post by someone that did (partially) open it up, that there was a single board inside. I suspect that the variations are slight and that all are based upon the same board design and coming from the same Chinese factory.

I feel strongly that there is no BIOS (to further reduce costs) and that the OS is loaded externally via some debugging tool.

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## snowpine

Yuck, those specs are terrible... even the original 2007 Asus eee had 512mb of ram.  :Sad:

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## celem

Yes they are terrible, yet surprisingly it works fairly well. I even loaded an old PowerPoint presentation and, to my great surprise, it loaded and displayed perfectly. I could use this for presentations except there is no external VGA port. The basic office-type applications and email work fine as their processor requirements are small. The MicroSoft IE 6 browser works well but is noticeably slow. When I hit a page with lots of photos and javascript it browser will lock up until it has processed it all.

I can't help but wonder how a really lean Linux distro would work in it.

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## 00b00nt00

Is there anything here which might help?

http://www.ubuntu.com/products/whatisubuntu/arm

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## PerChristensen

A small precompiled linux image + U-boot bootloader seem to exist HERE:

http://www.arm.com/products/os/linux_download.html

Also a free ARM compiler seem to be available HERE:

http://linux.onarm.com/index.php/Main_Page

A (Windows) Burntool to burn "bootloader" and compiled Linux image on mini NB could be?:

http://www.nxp.com/products/microcon...nload/lpc2000/

or perhaps better (again Windows app):

http://www.flashmagictool.com/

Crosslink ethernet cable between host Linux or Windows box to mini-notebook for establishing connection, and then burn 
1. bootloader at right hex adress
2. then the free Linux image onto mini notebook FLASH-ROM??

Also I think it is possible to set up an ARM cross compiler on your running Linux box if you compile a new GCC compiler from source TAR ball and specify " make --with-arm " or something like when compiling.
Perhaps it is then possible to compile f. ex. math.app. Maxima for such a small thing mini notebook??

This is just fast notes,but I will happily in Xmas holidays join trying to get something to work (I run Scientific Linux 4.0 - a Redhat Enterprise 4 clone + XP on another PC)

For specs of notebook see as of dec. 18:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-7-Mini-Net...item4a9d1c41ab

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## celem

You really did your homework. These links look promising. With the Christmas arrival shipping date past, the prices are dropping. Under $100 e/w shipping is now common (http://tinyurl.com/y8bv4cf). I have to proceed carefully - I don't want to brick it.

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## PerChristensen

Hello celem
Perhaps it will only be you and I thinking this way.I have a cross cable somewhere but has to buy a new one as I am not sure which one it is,and I can`t go to the mall at the moment because of heavy snow.
As I see it we should focus on
1. Working burn tool (does a linux tool exist?) 
2. What hex address to burn U-boot bootloader to.
Let us take it easy the next days,hope other interested will join and perhaps in a few days make some sort of progress plan.Sincerely Per

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## sleeky24

I took the battery out of my netbook last night and the main board is green in colour, looks very similar to the CNM Book and also has the two jumpers that are talked about on the CNM book website, so looks like we have three variants so far!

Also my unit runs Win CE5.0 not 6.0, same specs as everyone elses machines vt8500 300mhz, 128mb and 2gb storage. Unfortunatly there is no serialview.exe on the system so I cannot provide the details from this. I tried using the serialview.exe from dwinstons files but windows CE responds by saying "this is not a valid windows CE program."

I may open the unit up further at the weekend to try and get a manufacture of the board.

Lee.

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## stw89

> I'd recommend to contact them about that: http://www.kasernet.com/contact-us
> The more we are, the better it is. It's GPL anyway, it's a legal obligation.
> 
> You can find the Linux I was talking about here: http://kasernet.livedrive.com/frameset.php?path=/files/
> 
> Kasernet's Public files > Public > YF-700 > Firmware > Busybox



Has anyone read through the SDK PDF at - 

http://kasernet.livedrive.com/frameset.php?path=/files/

Kasernet's Public files > Public > YF-700 > SDK > YF700 SDK QG.pdf

Why must we log onto the Kaser SDK server to build the kernel? (sdk.kasernet.com)

"Where is the kernel source code
After your login to sdk server (sdk.kasernet.com) with your id and password, you need go to ~/src
to check your own kernel source code"

The PDF references yf700-kernel-1.1.6.tgz

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## stw89

Ok so the YF700 looks like to have an embedded Linux OS called QRDP (Quick RDP) -

Firmware upgrade details here -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q93dhTp6hZc

Nextvolume, you have this booting? Does it make any reference to QRDP?

More details at -

http://www.thinclient.co.th/product/...d/QuickRDP.pdf

http://www.norhtec.com/products/acc/...ion-080725.doc

MicroClient TC thin client unit seems to also use VT8500.

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## nextvolume

Yes, the Kaser YF-700 thin client is what I'm already getting the kernel from. I know about the NorhTec as well.

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## dnharley2591

The password after you push F1 is ztk 
My daughter had deleted all the system files on the cnm mini it has wince5 I followed all instructions on the manufacturer site I bought three different transfer cables and I held tweezers on the specified components on the board and microsoft sync will not recognize the netbook and it does not give me the notice about new hardware so I am finding it to be very difficult to restore this machine is there any other way? I prefer linux on the machine but all I see is system initializing, please wait and it stays there I had it on for 2 days and it wont boot past that I also tried update xip with the sys restore files on a usb flash and eboot nothing seems to work. any suggestions?

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## dwinston91

nextvolume, what version of U-boot do you have on your machine?  given by the environment variable_ ver_
Mine is U-boot Version: VT8500 U-Boot 1.2.16.1 (Oct 29, 2009 - 00:00:51)

Did you update your U-Boot?

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## nextvolume

It is probably a modified git build of buildroot, as I can't find that version in the U-Boot FTP site directory.
Its base is from two years ago, I think.
The date there is most likely a build date - which, if it is, means they've built these notebooks quite recently!

I will check tomorrow as I prefer not to reboot once I get Linux loaded because it can be tricky to get loading again.

You can surely upgrade your U-Boot, but I don't know how to do so from software yet, and one should actually get a SPI flash programmer or build one for himself (because pre-built they're too expensive) otherwise
if the U-Boot upgrade goes wrong (power goes away, version which doesn't work with the hardware) your notebook will be bricked pretty badly, we don't even have an image dump for U-Boot.
On the other hand, with an SPI programmer, one could do a dump of the SPI flash and if something goes wrong, it's as easy as restoring that dump. It requires you to desolder the SPI flash (that small 8-pin chip on the module with the VT8500, etc.), though.

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## dwinston91

I was just trying to figure out if the U-boot versions were different, and that was the reason mine didn't get any further than: _Loading kernel..._

No matter how long I let it sit.

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## nextvolume

My U-Boot version is this:
VT8500 U-Boot 1.2.18.1 (Nov 24 2009 - 12:50:31)

So it's newer than yours - but it might just be the build date.

Also, does it hang when it displays Loading kernel or after it displays Booting?

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## PrFaas

Another 'lurker' coming 'alive'  :Wink: 

Very short introduction:
- linuxer since the days of Slackware-3.0
- have some experience with linux-on-arm (Toradex-pxa270)
- not afraid of a soldering iron
- own one of the 'toys' as discussed here  :Very Happy: 

I've not (yet) opened 'mine', it's an epc, vt8500@300MHz/128MB-ram/2Gig-flash, wince-6.0 . Seems like nothing special there...
'Mine' was -from-shop missing some 'apps': no nPop  :Sad:  I've remedied that by now.

I have a few questions to those who've already looked inside:
- what type number of the spi bootprom? I have in the past built a simple (rs-232-port-based) programmer for spi flash proms, and think i could perhaps read/program this one as well. 
- are there *any* signs of rudiments of an rs-232 port on the board? u-boot usually 'talks' via rs-232, and it would be no surprise if that has not been entirely disabled in this machine. An rs-232 buffer using -say- the mic jack connector to 'get outside' could then be added to get 'full control' of u-boot.. 
- has anyone tried to make a script for dhcp/bootp for u-boot? A 'normal' u-boot has support for that. With the Toradex i did most of the development while the arm effectively did a 'netboot'. It's not difficult to set up, and very convenient to try things out. I do not really fancy the idea of doing a zillion re-flashes of the thing before settling on a final linux-install....

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## dwinston91

> Another 'lurker' coming 'alive' 
> 
> Very short introduction:
> - linuxer since the days of Slackware-3.0
> - have some experience with linux-on-arm (Toradex-pxa270)
> - not afraid of a soldering iron
> - own one of the 'toys' as discussed here 
> 
> I've not (yet) opened 'mine', it's an epc, vt8500@300MHz/128MB-ram/2Gig-flash, wince-6.0 . Seems like nothing special there...
> ...


nextvolume, it stops showing anything after showing: *Loading kernel*.  It doesn't show anything else after that.

*PrFaas, t*he SPI is a *SAMSUNG_NF_K9GAG08U0M

I haven't seen an RS232 port anywhere.  At least not the traditional type of interface.
I don't have as much experience with u-boot, I am learning on the job here.   Do you have any example scripts that you can show how to do what you are talking about?
*

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## nextvolume

Trying to find the RS-232 and JTAG pins was the main reason I disassembled my unit for.
Unluckily I haven't found anything that I could recognize that was linked to them. As a side-note, I found a very useful reset button on the motherboard labeled `SW1`.
I've hacked routers so I know how they should look like and what they're for. I've never done an actual interface, I have very little electronics experience, but as there are schematics on the internet it's more due to lazyness than anything else.

It'd be great if you dumped the ROM from yours so you can just rewrite the SPI in case it gets badly flashed, etc.

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## PrFaas

I've 'taken the plunge', and attempted to open the box. Removing the screws & battery (7.4Volts, 1900mAh text on it) is easy enough. I did also 'get stuck' when attempting to remove the keyboard: I can pry up the kb from the bottom, but not really remove it: the hinges of the display are in the way. The top of the keyboard seems to have two 'hooks' that 'grab' over the display hinges, and i can not pull it forward. I don't think i'd have real problems with the cabling, but the plastic is in the way for now. I saw another user describe the same problem a few pages back.... 

W.r.t. the SPI chip, i can't veryfy, but i have the impression that the answer contained the type number of the 2 Gig 'main/disk' flash rom; i can be mistaken.. my first & main interest would be type number of the 512 kBytes (8-pins...) bootrom. Having a flash-facility and backup copy of that one would -i think- provide an 'insurance policy' against 'bricking' these machines.

w.r.t. netboot-commands for u-boot: i'll check/report tomorrow 'at work': i've got 'the set' for that there. 

For now, and 'from wet memory': it's something like:
- set kernel boot options as parameter of u-boot
- command: dhcp
- command: bootp
- command: bootm <address>

1-st command is to request an IP address using dhcp
2-nd command is to download (via tftp) a bootfile
3-rd command is to actually boot the kernel.

You also have to -when building the kernel- set the kernel-configuration option to have support for a 'root NFS' filesystem. At 'the other end' (meaning a linux workstation) you need a dhcp server, a tftp server and an nfs server. Plus -of course- the entire kernel/config and an nfs-exported filesystem for the 'little one' to use as root filesystem... A bit of a hassle to set up, but then you have your 'little machine' completely booting from the network. Everything (except the messages from u-boot) ends up on the disk of your workstation. Any changes can be made on the filesystem of the 'big brother', and tried out relatively easily. The fun is that u-boot fully supports 'all this'. Dunno if *this* build of u-boot does that though... It *can* be compiled-out  :Wink:

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## dimeotane

Has anyone gotten their hands on a model that has the x86 compatible processor?  Seems to me that could be much easier to get Ubuntu on for about the same price.

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## dwinston91

*Building and Debugging ARM Linux Using ARM Embedded Linux, ARM RealView Development Suite 3.1 and RealView ICE 3.2*

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## cyknife

Hi...

I've followed along since post 70# or so. Purchased one of these  after Christmas for a song (unwanted gift). Neat little boxes. I received a variation of via vt8500@300mhz 128mb 2gb. with the removable SoC. I've included pic links of main board. Has anybody sizzled their power adapter yet? Mine blew after one hour.

http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/h...e/P1000323.jpg

http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/h...e/P1000324.jpg


Under wince 6.0 how does one determine the actual cpu speed?

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## stanwu

*HI* *Per Christensen*

we got your email, and thanks for your request that we had ask the authorize of source code from manufacturer now.

the VT8500 YF-700 thin client (NetClient), this board is more similar as x86 platform:

*Hardware Specifications** NetClient

*Model
YF-700 V1.1 support VESA mount

CPU
VT8500 SoC Arm9 250-400Mhz
Memory
DDR2-400 128/256MB On-board
Video Capability
2D Graphic Acceleration (JPEG decoder)

VGA Resolution
1024x768 16-bit Color
Storage Interface
- NAND Flash 1/2/4 GB on board
- 40-pin IDE x1 support IDE to SATA adapter

- SD/MMC x 1
LAN
- 10/100T LAN x 1
WLAN (Optional External USB Dongle)
- IEEE 802.11b/g (USB interface)

- Infrastructure Mode (Client Mode)
Audio
- AC97
Front Panel I/O
- Audio x2 (Mic in & Headphone out)
- SD/MMC Card Reader
- Power Reset Push Button
- Power and IDE Storage Activity LED
- USB 2.0 x 3 - outside x2  inside x1

Rear Panel I/O
- LAN x1 with Diagnostic LEDs
- PS/2 x2
- VGA x1
- Power Input：MINI DIN JACK-6pin（5V/3A）(1-3W)，
- Power ON/Off Switch
Side Panel I/O
- 9-PIN Male RS-232 x 1
- USB 2.0 x 1
- Internal 40-PIN IDE x 1 (Under Slide Cover)

hardware demo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGaJ91197ko


the platform is the open system that you can install full Debian into NAND flash disk and 100% compatible with pre-build binary code of Debian for ARM

If our manufacturer allow us to support the open souce community that we will full support software of hardware as we could  :Very Happy:

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## PrFaas

I've only seen the bottom of my own the board so far, but: 'mine' looks yellow and exactly like the foto from 'cyknife'. Zooming into that foto, is that a set of pins marked 'J17, gnd, RX, TX, +5V' i see? I do have to zoom in until 'almost pixel-resolution'... That does look like a hint of a serial port if ever i saw one  :Wink: 

And: an SoC module: very interesting. I did not manage to find any 'connecting' information on the web yet, but:

- if it is a 'custom-off-the-shelf' module, then finding the actual 'maker' of the module could prove very interesting. It is quite possible that a bsp is provided for the module.

- the SODIMM connector (foto top) is very likely to provide access to all relevant bus/Io signals.

Since mr 'cyknife' managed to disassemble his machine to board level: would you be willing to give a hint as to how you got past the snag with the display hinges that got me 'stuck'?

I'm seriously considering to get me a 2-nd one of those machines  :Very Happy:  'Mine' comes from the local 'pots and pans' (cooking utensils, not less) shop, no less..

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## idiamin

Hi, another lurker here.
PrFaas That is Definitely "GND RX TX 5V". Someone hook it up to the serial Port. Here is a cable we can probably make ourselves. hxxp://superdroidrobots.com/shop/item.asp?itemid=335

I know this is not on topic , but has anyone tried X-Lite on Windows CE?

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## PerChristensen

*stanwu*

Thank your for kind reply from you at www.kasercorp.com

The specifications of the KASER VT8500 YF-700 thin client (NetClient) seem very similar to specifications of the mini netbook talked about in this forum. 
Hardware with CPU + Sound + Port configuration look identical (in addition the netbooks has WiFi Ralink RT 2070/RT 3070).

Your YouTube video show the VT8500 YF-700 Netclient`s capability,and it is very interesting what you mention about Debian for ARM. 
I belive it will be to a lot of help if the manufacturer agree in releasing the source used by your NetClient.Otherwise another solution probably can be found.

The positive attitude at kasercorp is very appreciated.Users of your compact MP4 players,home entertainment boxes and thin client are to be envyed.

On behalf of the thread thank you for reply,and thank you for your time.

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## cyknife

> Since mr 'cyknife' managed to disassemble his machine to board level: would you be willing to give a hint as to how you got past the snag with the display hinges that got me 'stuck'?
> 
> I'm seriously considering to get me a 2-nd one of those machines  'Mine' comes from the local 'pots and pans' (cooking utensils, not less) shop, no less..


I disassembled mine as follows:

1 Removed all screws from bottom, batt. cover first (note two longer screws for batt cover and two machine screws mating to keyboard from bottom.)

2 Unplug batt. 

3 Pull the keyboard. It has 4 pressure tabs forward of the row of function keys. Set each tab with a tooth pick etc. lift board and decouple the ribbon cable. 

4 Decouple remaining ribbon cable(s)

5 Separate top cover perimeter from bottom half then gently lift cover. It will pivot about the panel hinges but will snap away harmlessly @45 degree or so. 

6 After that remove one screw in the main board and four screws at the hinge points. Decouple the video and lamp connectors.

7 Lift board from side with two usb ports. Its free.

reassemble reverse

NOTE the two longer screws for the the batt. cover will penetrate the other side if installed without the batt. cover.

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## dwinston91

Here is another U-boot Reference guide: http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit...BPG.pdf?fpsp=1

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## PrFaas

There was an 'unanswered question' about what has to be set to make u-boot perform a netboot. I've dug into the 'doc' i had at work, and -for the toradex/colibri module- we've used the following u-boot commands to get a netboot:

setenv bootargs "root=/dev/nfs ip=:::::eth0: console=ttyS0,9600n8"
dhcp
bootm

The 1-st command is to prepare the kernel for net-booting, and tell the kernel to use a root-filesystem 'on nfs'. The contents of 'bootargs' is a set of parameters that will be passed to the kernel.

The 2-nd command is to let u-boot request an IP address and a boot-file (the kernel) from the dhcp/tftp server

The 3-rd command is to actually boot the kernel

Note that this is *only* the 'small brother' part of net-booting. The server ('big brother') needs some information to make the entire story work:

- a configured dhcp server
- a kernel file
- a nfs-exported root-filesystem

But: the good news is that -when these commands are 'passed' to u-boot- it will *attempt* to netboot. As you will have seen, there is not a word about over-writing any flash-filesystem, nor is there a 'saveenv' command used on the 'small brother's u-boot, just some instructions to use the network. When you'd monitor the network -with tcpdump for instance- you should 'see' the 'small brother' attempting to get an IP address and boot-info. Without the services installed and configured, that *will* fail, but -if 'small brother' does try to netboot- that shows that the u-boot in the 'small brother' is compiled with support for this operation, and for networking. U-boot is a way more potent bootloader than any BIOS i've ever found on any 'normal' computer. To set up the actual services to perform a successfull netboot is not quite trivial, but only a matter of 'work'  :Very Happy: 

I'm going to see if i can 'open' the small machine and connect an oscilloscope to the TX 'pad', to see if u-boot is attempting to 'talk' to the serial port, and -if so- to see what voltage it generates there. I'm assuming that the RX pin will accept the same voltages that it generates on the TX pin. All assuming that these nice 'pins' are indeed the connection to the serial console and that u-boot is actually 'talking' there of course  :Wink:

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## dwinston91

> There was an 'unanswered question' about what has to be set to make u-boot perform a netboot. I've dug into the 'doc' i had at work, and -for the toradex/colibri module- we've used the following u-boot commands to get a netboot:
> 
> setenv bootargs "root=/dev/nfs ip=:::::eth0: console=ttyS0,9600n8"
> dhcp
> bootm
> 
> The 1-st command is to prepare the kernel for net-booting, and tell the kernel to use a root-filesystem 'on nfs'. The contents of 'bootargs' is a set of parameters that will be passed to the kernel.
> 
> The 2-nd command is to let u-boot request an IP address and a boot-file (the kernel) from the dhcp/tftp server
> ...


So the entire u-boot script file consists of just these three lines?  Also can you provide some details of how to setup the "big brother machine"?  Like where to put the kernel file and the exported nfs filesystem.  which kernel and nfs filesystem did you use? And are there any additional settings on the dhcp server that need to be setup? or how should I setup tftp?    I know I have lots of questions. :Smile:

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## corruptbinary

Another lurker here, just thought you guys should know that haleron is offering hte same netbook with a choice of win ce or linux for an extra $15....dunno if the source code is included or not...weird.

here is the link, you might need to register to view it:

http://haleron.com/index.php?page=sh...hk=1&Itemid=27

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## corruptbinary

I forgot, I found 2 more devices that seem to be using the same chipset 

1) framechannel - digital picture frame - seems to be runnign linux using openembedded but im not sure
http://www.thinkingscreen.com/

2) MicroClient TC -  by NorhTec a thin client runs Quick RDP embedded linux
http://www.norhtec.com/products/mctc/index.html

hopefully everyone together can figure out a solution!

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## corruptbinary

MontaVista Linux Professional Edition 4.0/5.0 supports our processor, but does not appear to be free or open source ...?

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## nextvolume

It's probably derived from Monta Vista Linux, indeed. If you open up uzImage.bin in an hex editor you can see the string "Montavista Linux" in it.

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## PerChristensen

corruptbinary,great with a helping hand,but unfortuneately the mini netbook I own does not support booting from USB drive.
I made a "Ubuntu rescue remix" bootable USB stick boot my windows laptop,but it did not impress the mini netbook in any way.Also a bootable SD card with the remix did not work.

Another subject:
According to the Web the Nokia 770 internet tablet has a 250 MHz Texas Instruments OMAP 1710 ARM compatible CPU (arm926tej core) with 64 megs of available internal flash memory.OS is Linux based Maemo 2006.

The source for the Linux Maemo distrbution 2006 used on these Nokias is available from the Maemo site.A brief look at the source of the Maemo 2006 kernel (2.6.16) does not indicate modification of the original kernel source from kernel.org as far as I can see.

Source for some Maemo specific apps. exist in the distro (browser,calculator),but otherwise it looks like a full but small Linux distribution.So perhaps an ARM kernel compiled from unmodified kernel.org source (with all modules set to "on" in config) will work,and the "via_ata_interrupt" issue experienced by nextvolume is caused by some WLAN driver problems in the kernel from the KASER YT-700 (supporting USB dongle WiFi)??.

A .jffs2 root filesystem is availabel at Maemo,also some Maemo ARM compiled non Linux-standard binaries can be downloaded.Nokia has its own bootloader.

nextvolumes SD card boot is elegant,and perhaps a script can prepare "littlebrother" for netboot,as suggested by PrFaas / dwinston91.

A lot of non available hardwarespesific information has to be given to u-boot as I see it.Coming week-end I will try setup crosscompiler http://www.codesourcery.com/gnu_toolchains/arm and compile kernel 2.6.16,if my Linux system not is outdated.

----------


## xmob

Registered, just so I can de-lurk.   :Wink: 

I wouldn't bother with Maemo.  It's VERY tailored to Nokia devices (currently using a Nokia N900 here) and there are some closed source components.  A more suitable version might be Mer (http://wiki.maemo.org/Mer).  This is a fully open source distribution.

I have one of the CE5 CnM Books from Maplin.  These seem to be using eboot.   :Sad:  However, I have a plan.  I will report back soon.  <booting up ARM toolchain as we speak>

BTW - People need to be aware that these are ARM devices and standard Linux distros WILL NOT ever work as they for x86 devices.

----------


## nextvolume

It is a common misconception that all you need to make something run on hardware is to supports its processor. While the code will most probably run, it won't do anything meaningful because peripherals are programmed in a different way.
You program peripherals through the memory address paradigm on ARM, and on different SoC platforms you have peripherals for which the memory address you have to communicate them with is located at another place, and they often even have different behaviour.

So we have to wait Kaser to release the source code if we want an out-of-box Linux. Otherwise a port needs to be started (and an hardware technical document needs to be started). You can ..ehm find something about the VIA VT8430 but that's too little for our purposes so it will take a lot of reverse engineering.

----------


## corruptbinary

But these are system on a chip right? wont all vt8500 program its built in peripherals the same way?  I could be wrong, just asking  :Smile: 

and it seems montavista is open, but they have a tool for embedded developers to quickly port linux.

----------


## corruptbinary

The VIA VT8500, is from Wondermedia, a spinoff of VIA, called the wm8510, Prizm.

Im trying to get aa BSP and docs from them.

----------


## corruptbinary

OK here is all I found out so far.
here is the link for wondermedia, the via spinoff
http://www.wondermedia.com.tw/index....d=51&Itemid=23

the 8430 appears to be the dual core version of the 8500:
VT8430 multimedia application processor parameter list: 
Dual-core architecture (250MHz ARM926EJ-S + 200MHz DSP) in a more smooth multimedia playback capabilities to support a variety of media hardware decoding    Video: MPEG-1/MPEG-2/MPEG-4/H.264/DIVX/XVID   Audio: MP3/WMA/AAC/AAC + / DTS / Dolby Digital   Image: JPEG * Video Interface: LCD (1024x1024) / TV-Out / CCIR656/601 IO / MPEG2-TS * Audio Interface: I2S / AC97/PCM/SPDIF * Memory, storage support: DDR/DDR2/NAND Flash SPI / LPC Flash for boot ROM IDE I / F SD (SDIO) / CF / MMC / MS * Peripheral Interface: USB 2.0 OTG x 1 & Host x 1 UART/I2C/SPI 10/100 Ethernet MAC * Security Engine: DES/3DES, AES, RC4 * Package: 21x21 PBGA 
VIA VT8430 is designed specifically for multimedia entertainment based on ARM926EJ-S RISC core application processor to support a variety of common audio and video hardware decoding, which is very suitable as personal multimedia device as a whole SoC solutions, such as the PMP (portable multimedia players), in-car entertainment, DMA (digital media partners), etc.. 8430 contains a wealth of peripheral interfaces, can very easily add a variety of external modules to increase product features, such as hard drive, WiFi module, FM modules, mobile TV module, GPS module, infrared remote control module, various types of USB devices, which also specially designed for safe and added a dedicated encryption engine, enabling customers to easily achieve the low cost of data encryption requirements. 
8430 is the VIA entire ARM SoC in a family now has a variety of products based on the 8430 program: GPS navigation systems, multimedia players, handheld mobile TV, BSP package supports standard Linux and Microsoft's WinCE platform. Welcome all kinds of Design House, and are interested in consulting a friend calls come to negotiate. 
VIA Technologies, Inc. The company is an authorized agent, For more detailed information, please call contact. Contact: Mr. Chen Tel: 13751153055 / 0755-82916972 ext: 38 E-mail: JohnnyChen@leadinglight.com.cn

this site supposedly has a datasheet, but im not about to pay $35 to find out:
http://www.pudn.com/downloads140/sou...ail606986.html
http://www.pudn.com/downloads116/doc/detail492254.html

goodluck

----------


## nextvolume

You can find those datasheets here
It's not very nice of them to close the specs to program our own systems.

----------


## corruptbinary

Oh excellent nextvolume!

----------


## corruptbinary

i'm going to be buying another mini netbook,

but id still like linux on this via

----------


## PrFaas

> So the entire u-boot script file consists of just these three lines?  Also can you provide some details of how to setup the "big brother machine"?  Like where to put the kernel file and the exported nfs filesystem.  which kernel and nfs filesystem did you use? And are there any additional settings on the dhcp server that need to be setup? or how should I setup tftp?    I know I have lots of questions.


I feared i would bore you with all too long a monologue  :Wink: 

On my example machine, 'three lines' mentioned is indeed all that was needed to get u-boot into 'netboot mode'. Again: this will work *only* if the networking interface and the netboot-supporting code was compiled into the u-boot on the 'small brother'. It would be worth a try.... See below why even without any of the servers active, just making a script with those three lines could be of some use....

W.r.t. the 'big brother', i'll give the example of the configuration for 'my' 'small brother':

You need a dhcp server installed and configured on your network. It would help it that one is the *only* dhcp server: if -for instance- a router on the network is also willing to issue IP addresses to 'any' client, there is quite a chance that the router will provide an IP address to 'small brother', but it is quite unlikely that that router will also provide the rest of the information... That will not result in a successfull netboot. The dhcp server described here will be configured to provide the complete netboot information, a router is usually configured to only provide IP addresses, nameserver adresses and default gateway information. Antoher thing, it is 'best' to use a rather 'quiet' and isolated network for this kind of experiments: for the things we're going to do here, security is *not* assured  :Very Happy:  We're also going to 'tcpdump' the network, and on a busy network it will be quite a job to 'pick out' the few interesting network packets from in-between 'the flow' on the network.

A dhcp server is usually configured with the file /etc/dhcpd.conf. For my netbooting of 'small brother' i have the following information in that file:



```
# the colibri: the development board: boot config
host colibri {
 hardware ethernet 00:14:2d:00:0a:d4;
 fixed-address 192.168.0.200;
 option host-name "colibri";
 next-server 192.168.0.1;
 filename "/home/prf/projects/boot/uzImage.bin";
 option root-path "192.168.0.1:/home/prf/projects/rootfs";
}
```

description:

The 'hardware ethernet' is followed by the MAC address of the 'small brother'. I'll explain in a moment how i get my hands on that one. 

The 'fixed-address 192.168.0.200' sets the IP address of 'small brother'. I have used a fixed IP address to make exporting the NFS filesystem easier. It can be any valid and 'free' IP address on the network that the 'small brother' is connected to. 

The 'option host-name "colibri"' is to provide a host-name to the 'small brother'. It *is* extra, and not strictly needed. The 'next-server' is the IP address where 'small brother is going to attempt to get its bootfile from; So: 'next-server' is set to the IP address of 'big brother'.

The 'filename "/home/prf/projects/boot/uzIimage.bin"' contains the path of the kernel file that must be loaded: in my case that is the file '/home/prf/projects/boot/uzImage.bin'. 

The kernel itself is an arm-kernel, pre-processed for use as a netbootable kernel. I'll come back to how to prepare the kernel for that in a moment. The 'option root-path "192.168.0.1:/home/prf/projects/rootfs"' is the path of the root-filesystem. It is a directory that is nfs-exported.

Now to the 'loose ends' of the previous description: 

How to get the MAC address of 'small brother'? I use tcpdump for that. The first thing that 'small brother' does is to broadcast on the network for a dhcp server. It uses the 'broadcast MAC address': ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff as destination address (mind you, this is a MAC address, not an IP address..), and its own MAC address as source MAC address. This network packet will show up in tcpdump as a DHCPDISCOVER packet. 

A DHCPDISCOVER in the tcpdump output is the signal that someone is attempting to get an IP address from a dhcp server. On our 'quiet' network, that must be 'small brother'  :Smile:  So: the '00:14:2d:00:0a:d4' is the MAC address of 'small brother'. You have to copy/paste the address into dhcpd.conf, and restart the dhcpserver to make the dhcp server actually accept this as an address that it will 'service'. 

-intermezzo-
That is also why a 'script-test' using the sdcard method could be interesting: if 'our' u-boot supports netbooting, then this 'DHCPDISCOVER' will show up on the local network, even without an actual dhcp server.
-end intermezzo-

The kernel file: (the file '/home/prf/projects/boot/uzImage.bin' of the example): I'm no specialist there, but it is a normally-cross-compiled arm-kernel, the result of the command:



```
make vmlinux
```

of kernel compilation. Note that you will have to have everything 'preset' for cross-compilation when building that kernel. Allow me please to leave the monologue of how to generate and set up a cross-compilation toolset for a 'to be continued'  :Smile: . That vmlinux file is pre-processed in two steps:



```
arm-linux-objcopy -O binary -R .note -R .comment -S vmlinux linux.bin
gzip linux.bin
```

arm-linux-objcopy is one of the tools from the 'binutils' package of cross-compilation tools... This results in a file linux.bin . Reason for that conversion: I do not know.... That linux.bin is converted to a u-bootable image file with the command:



```
mkimage -A arm -O linux -T kernel -C gzip \
   -a 0x00008000 -e 0x00008000 -n "Linux Kernel Image" \
   -d linux.bin.gz uzImage
```

mkimage sould be more 'known' to you than to me by now: it is the same program that is used to generate the sdcard script files. The resulting file 'image' is the file that must be copied to the directory: '/home/prf/projects/boot' so that the 'small brother can load it. The other options of mkimage, i'm not sure of, i've got them from the 'recipe' of the colibri bsp. The 'uzImage.bin' file should be made world-readable (chmod a+r uzImage.bin). 

Here is where the tftp server comes into play: After getting the response from the dhcp server (which contains the path to the 'uzImage.bin' file), the 'small brother' will attempt to load the 'uzImage.bin' file using tftp. To make that a success, you will need to have a tftp server installed on the 'big brother' machine. You can test if the tftp server works using the command 'tftp localhost'. That is an ftp-like command-line client which uses the tftp protocol and server. Tftp is very limited, it has no 'ls', and needs a full pathname of a file to 'get'...

One note on my Wondermedia WM8505 machine: it has as 'own' default IP address 10.1.8.250, and has a 'built-in' preset IP address for the boot-server of 10.1.8.37 . Meaning: If you set your 'dedicated boot-lan' to have 10.1.8.37 as IP address for the 'big brother' then the preset IP addresses that are set in u-boot of the 'small brother' should be ok already. I did find that -when attempting to tftp my kernel with 192.168.0.1 as address for 'big brother' that the tftp failed.

Finally: the root-filesystem. That should be a directory on 'big brother' which contains a directory tree that will form the root-filesystem of 'small brother'. Note that this includes the user-id's and permissions that the 'small brother' will see. You will need to nfs-export the directory tree.

To export the directory tree to nfs-clients (in our case that is 'small brother') you will have to have an nfs server installed and enabled and enter the following line in /etc/exports:



```
/home/prf/projects/rootfs 192.168.0.200(rw,no_root_squash)
```

and restart the nfs server after you've edited that line into /etc/exports.

As for the contents of the exported filesystem, please allow me to keep that for the next 'monologue'  :Very Happy:  For now, i'll just mention that it should contain a valid and usable root-filesystem for the 'small brother'.

Is that long enough for one of the 'to be continued' sessions?  :Smile:

----------


## PrFaas

BTW: i've just started the 'backup' machine (let's call it #2) i got today. Source: the same shop i got #1 from, exterior and other information is exactly the same as #1, same box, same price. But: the 'my computer'-> properties results in a slightly different set of information: Processor type is now 'WMT, ARM-WM8505', and the OS is WindowsCE, version 6.00, (build 3122). 

So far, i've also found that the 'player' has acquired a 'skin'; a nicer one than the rather 'bare' one i saw before.... The inside looks like the same yellow pcb i've seen on #1.

No: i've not disassembled #1 yet: i can either write long monologues or handle a screwdriver, but not both at the same time  :Wink:

----------


## dwinston91

Thanks so much PrFaas, that information is soooooo helpful.  :Wink:

----------


## corruptbinary

So far I have emailed just about every company talked about in this thread with no good responses to where the kernel sources are for the yf100, tc, etc... I have also found names of the people who ported the kernel to the via netbook and emailed them with no response.

once they released a product with the linux kernel they have to distribute the source with any changes, right?

----------


## nextvolume

If a way to disable PATA can be found (and thus the kernel in my easypc_linux.tgz archive boots even when it doesn't manage to mis-detect the PATA controller) it is already useful as a remote testing machine.

It is unlikely far more common than you think to not give out GPL sources. The same thing happens also with a lot of routers.

----------


## PrFaas

Just a 'fyi': I managed a full disassembly this morning; Will make foto's later on the day. Looks like i have one 'spare' USB-ish set of pads that go to the display unit..., a tsop set of pads on the bottom of the CPU module, something that looks like a serial port set of 'pins' and one 'yet-unknown' chip that is not 'present'.

[update]

After making foto's (~ 65 Mbytes of picture files... I could perhaps upload them somewhere; suggestions are welcome  :Smile:  ). And a bit of net-searching i think i've got a bit better idea of what hardware is in my system. 'Mine' is one of the yellow/orange boards, with a plug-on CPU module. 


The CPU module contains the CPU (VT8500), plus a DDR2 128 MB (64MBx16) sdram chip. Plus one SO8 chip that appears to be the SPI bootrom that was mentioned before. Sorry, but i have to disagree that the 'big' chip (at the bottom of the mainboard) is *not* the bootrom, but the 2Gig 'disk' chip. 

So far, i've bee able to track down:

- on CPU module:
A3R1GE4CFF: 128 MBytes ddr2 RAM (on CPU module) 
EN25F04-100: 512 Kbyte boot-flash (on CPU module)
VT8500: no datasheet, CPU etc..

At the bottom of the CPU plug-in module there is a set of pads for a tsop chip, unpopulated...

- on mainboard:
SG850G: single USB 2.0 port -> 4 ports 'hub'
VT1613: audio analog front-end
VT8106: MII <-> LAN so-called 'physical interface' chip, 100 MBps

I've been able to grab the datasheets for all but the CPU chips. I've got something 'close' to the 2 Gig 'disk' chip datasheet, but not entirely of the same chip.

The green 'square' module on the mainboard is -i presume- the WiFi... No 'doc' of that one yet..

From following some traces, i get the idea that there should be an USB-connected chip in the display module, presumably to control the backlight (could be interesting... Has anyone already managed to open the display unit?).

So far, so good, now we're in for an oscilloscope session with this gnd/tx/rx/5V pads... Let's see if we'll get some u-boot messages there. First i'll have to partially re-assemble the machine: i need the display moule connected in order to be able to switch the machine on  :Smile:

----------


## PerChristensen

There should be a pic. of disassembled screen with info of WiFi below.

Excellent tutorial in post #148 from PrFaas.After setting up the CodeSourcery crosscompiler I now see the complexity of Linux on ARM pointed out by nextvolume.

A small comment to PrFaas`s tutorial:
If using CodeSourcery you have to use an "expanded" objcopy command ( look in CodeSourcery /bin ).Also you have to gzip the linux.bin before using mkimage on it.

Because of old Linux system I am not able to use newer version than 2007 CodeSourcery + the ARM patched Linux kernel 2.6.24.4.
This setup produce kernels accepting the PrFaas torture,but Images are quite big (3 Mb) - perhaps because embedded linux flag is not set in config.A Versatile board kernel compiled nearly flawless (a few warnings),but do not boot using nextvolumes easypc SD card trick.
When playing with the config one easily get errors when compiling.

For the interested I have attatched the Versatile board default kernel config which work.If it can be to any help anybody are welcome to ask for a vmlinux / linux.bin / image + modules of their own brand.

----------


## PrFaas

If i understand right, the screen unit is kept together by 4 screws that are 'hidden' under the small rubber 'pads' on the front of the display unit?

Another question: one of my two machines 'burned' under 'full sail'; I did not do anything special with it, it was happily running its WinCE-6.0 and then it just went 'lights-out' and never came back. Fortunately i was able to swap it at the shop i bought it from  :Very Happy:  

One thing however: i did notice that the right-hand side of the screen unit of the 'burning' machine was 'hot' ever since i first got it. It was not not extremely hot, but about as warm as the underside of the main unit box at the place of the CPU module. Could anyone report if that is also the case with his/her system? I suspect a 'from-factory' problem with what i now expect is the chip i could see on the picture of the previous post at the right-hand side of the screen.

To be honest, i expected that the backlight voltage converter would be at that location, and never bothered too much that it got hot. I've seen inefficient DC --> LCD backlight voltage converters before.. I've even repaired a few after they burned in bigger laptops than this. Seeing a simple chip there makes me think again. looking again: From the text next to the picture i get the impression that it is the WiFi module that's located there (Ralink-RT-2070, combined with me previously seeing that the connection seems to be an USB link on the main-board...). I'd better think again about that 'odd' module on the mainboard then (i thought it would be the WiFi..). The screen unit is a much better place for a WiFi module than somewhere at he bottom of the box, in between -say- a metal table-top and the mainboard, that i'll agree with any day  :Wink:  

Two other things to remark:

- The gnd/tx/rx/5V pins set on the mainboard has 3.3 volts at the tx pin. That implies a bit of a warning for anyone that wants to connect a rs-232 circuit there: it is very likely that the rx pin should also be 'fed' with 0.0 to 3.3 volts signals. Using a 'standard' rs-232 driver/receiver, with 5.0 Volts output of the receiver might not be a good idea. Most likely, these signals end up directly at the CPU itself, and it could well be that the CPU does not tolerate 'full' 5.0 Volts input signal levels.

- I now no longer have any 'true' VT8500 systems: both the #2 machine and the 'swapped' #1 machine have WM8505 as CPU. I don't think it will make all too much of a difference, but *some* changes are bound to have happened between VT8500 and WM8505.

As an 'edit' & remark to mr. PerChristensen: I do not see the attached kernel config; could it have gone missing? And: i've opted for building (and actually managed to build) a toolchain using the 'crosstool' script-set. I had to make on change to the patches set: allowing it to use the 'gcc (GCC) 4.3.3' of my system as compiler...) I'd love to give building a few kernels a try....

----------


## PerChristensen

To take the screen apart remove the four small "rubber corks" and unscrew,then use your nails.Leads to loudspeakers are very fragile but relatively long.

By second thought I perhaps applied a Versatile vendor specific patch to the kernel.I read somewhere patching for ARM should not longer be necessary.

Among other things the patch (from ww.linux-arm.org) set crosscompile environment in makefile to arm and prefix for tools beeing used to arm-none-linux-gnueabi- ,something which can be edited manually.

And one has to set PATH to the first /bin directory in the CodeSourcery toolchain.Symbolic links from CodeSourcery gcc etc. in the next /bin in the tree are set by default.

The config file dissapeared,I will give it another try.I also attach a pic. of the mysterious chip - looking like something alien,but we are also far out by now :Wink:

----------


## moblo

Hi there, Im new to this forum and have been watching this thread very closely. I have just ordered one of these netbooks. I have no knowledge of programming or writing kernals/OSs, and I have basic knowledge of hardware, soa lot of what I have learnt is purely from reading this entire thread. I may not be able to help in terms of writing code etc, but I would be interesting in testing things on my netbook for u guys once I get it. 
I love the idea of linux on this baby, and particularly want good divx/music/multimedia support, proper internet with decent flash.java support. I look forward to seeing how this 'project' progresses.
On a side note, I am also keen on hardware customization. The kinds of things I have in mind is integrating usb bluetooth/32gb usb key internally, and also looking into possibly upgrading the ram/nand. Obviousle without the netbook and not having done much research into the components, I accept this may not be possible.
Also, finally, thanks to you guys who are contributing to this thread, cos you put in so much time and effort to come up with solutions for others.

----------


## PrFaas

Judging from the wiring at the 'back' of the pcb, it seems like our 'mystery chip' has something to do with the keyboard: Pins 17 and 18 of the thing go to the CPU module connector, with very few connections at the top of the board, most seem to 'via' to the bottom, and then to the keyboard connector. No sign of any datasheet of the thing though  :Wink:   HT-95A-1? never heard of the thing.... 

HT however seems related to Holtek semiconductor, so i'm going to have a peek 'over there'. Let's see if 'they' have a credible keyboard scan chip.  

As far as the pins go, it does resemble the HT82K629 (Holtek) keyboard encoder chip. Up and including pins 17/18 for interface with the CPU, a 'strap option' for pin 7 (mini keyboard select), Vdd at pin 15, Gnd at pin 27, RC-reset circuit at pin 28... I might still be a bit 'off' (it could be a big or small brother of the chip i found...), but this does resemble the pinning & function of the 'mystery chip' quite well. 

Assuming that HT82K629 is a 'match', then i'd guess we have one less problem w.r.t. getting the keyboard operational with linux: the HT82K629 supports both USB and PS/2 as interface protocol... Not some obscure undocumented interface protocol, but *the* two standard keyboard interface protocols no less  :Very Happy:

----------


## celem

> celem, I zipped up the folders under My Computer on my machine.  It can be downloaded from here: http://rapidshare.com/files/32905128...e_bak.zip.html


dwinston91 - I was away for two weeks and without internet connectivity. The link that you posted is now blocked with a max download reached, so I cannot download the files. Is there anyway that you could repost? Thanks in advance.

Celem

----------


## dwinston91

celem, nextvolume put them on his site with his files.  They can be found here:
http://tails92.sepwich.com/files/easypc/

It is the one called wince_bak.zip, I believe.

----------


## litch84

(FYI)

I've found another variety of these netbooks:
- The EPC branded ones.

*Hardware details:

* *Wireless Chip:*
  CHIP:     RT2070L
  PCB Label:       BL-RT3070-50

*MiniPCI SoC: P709_CPU_V3*
  MCU: WonderMedia WM8505
  DDR2-800 128MB: Zentel A3R1GE4CFF

*MOBO: P706_MAIN_V5*
  Sound: VIA VT1613 
Ethernet PHY: VT6103X  USB HUB: GL850G
  ?: HT-95A-1
  RAM/FLASH?: Samsung 943  K96AG08UOM

*Description / Notes:*
The unit also has a 7" LCD with a ARM926EJ-S based SoC. The Wireless module actually looks like someone ripped it out of a USB 802.11 stick and just wired it directly to a usb port. It sits on the RH side of the LCD screen, just above the speaker.

Wonder Media is actually owned by VIA and I'm guessing the WM8505 is the successor of the VT8500, WM also just released the WM8510, which is one step further again.

The system by default runs WinCE and features the ususal SD card slot, usb ports and inbuilt speakers etc...

I should have taken photo's but the main board (Labelled *P706_MAIN_V5*) But anyway, it has a mini-pci slot with a mini-pci card in it (Labelled *P709_CPU_V3*) it that has the SoC and RAM on board... Interchangable CPU's?

I've also been hacking up the scriptcmd file and trying to boot ANYTHING other than CE, but to no success. I came close to getting some random ARM826 based Thinclient imag to boot but it really doesn't like the integrated LCD.

Will take some photo's soon and will update on U-Boot progress.

----------


## lalitgr8

Hi 
I am following this link for last few days and is very interesting and informative. this week I too have brought 7" mini laptop and it will really wonderful to have linux have on this laptop. just waiting for breakthrough to  possible install on my laptop.
BTW, I will like to ask a question. I will really  really appreciate if someone could answer that.
intially I was able to download video from you tube and save it on storage card and then was able to play with core pocket media player ,tcpmp, which came installed on mini laptop. and then tried to install tcpmp flash player plug as I was not sure which version I have to try ie pocketpc, smart phone version for windows ce I tried all and end up messing up  core pocket media player. Now it plays some video but does not play flash video and an error message cone that video codec FLV1is not supported by this player.
Just wondering if any one got an idea that which core pocket media player version will work for arm 8500 processor window ce 300MHZ , 2GB or I will be highly obliged if anyone can post core pocket media player files that they have on their mini laptop so that I will able to fix it. your help will be much appreciated
thanks and regards

----------


## PrFaas

Some posts back in this thread, there is a link to a restore image (VT8500.rar). If you download that one, un-rar it, and look around, you will find the media player's files.

----------


## InterPhase

Hi!

I'll also get one of these netbooks in the next few days and it would be really great to actually have a full X and these things, but I know we're far away  :Wink: 

Having followed this thread, I wondered if we could work around the via_ata message by passing combined_mode=ide|libata to the kernel.

Could anyone try to do this (setenv bootargs 'combined_mode=ide' OR 'combined_mode=libata'')?

Another possibility would be to let WinCE initialize all the hardware and inject a small loader into a kernel DLL of WinCE, but I think this would be rather complicated....

- InterPhase

----------


## InterPhase

Well, things look quite good as far as I can see them:
- We got NAND access (see dmesg.txt in the easypc_stuff.tgz)
- To change the 1024x768 default resolution all we need is either access to the kernel sources or some debugging/reverse engineering skills (which I don't have)
- All peripherals of the VT8500 should be supported by the kernel

What we still need to know in order to run linux on it:
- Where does u-boot usually boot from (mem-addr), so we can flash NAND (for the really brave  :Very Happy: )
- Serial port?
- X drivers?

(well, please correct me if I'm wrong)

- InterPhase

----------


## tlk23

Has anyone considered using HaRET for testing?  http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/HaRET . It seems it would be a lot safer than flashing test versions of linux.  

HaRET runs on my ARM-AK7802 netbook (CE 5.0).  Just need a few "minor" details, like the proper memory location to load the linux image.

----------


## PerChristensen

*InterPhase*

I changed nextvolumes easypc linux scriptcmd by making a .txt file like this:

setenv bootargs mem=112M root=/dev/ram rw initrd=0x01000000,40960K init=/linuxrc lcdon=1 lcdid=9 lcdbpp=16 lcdpath=GE *combined_mode=ide* setenv lcdparam 
1,30000,5,1024,768,48,40,40,3,29,13,1,D8110004|0x4  000000,D8110024|0x4000000,D8110044|0x4000000,D8110  03c|0x2,D811005c&~0x2
saveenvtextout 0 0 "Loading kernel" ffffff
fatload mmc 0 0 /script/uzImage.bin
textout 0 20 "Loading ramdisk"fffffffatload mmc 0 1000000 script/myram.gztextout 0 40 "Booting" fffffffatload mmc 0 4000000 /script/scriptcmdsleep 5bootm 0 

Made new scriptcmd with 
mkimage -A arm -O linux -T script -C none -a 0 -e 0 -n scriptcmd -d script.txt scriptcmd

and booted the easyPC linux from SD /script folder with the new scriptcmd,but nothing new.First boot are with "television snow" stopping,then shutdown + restart again is followed by fastrolling clear text on screen,but stopping at via_ata_interrupt.
Nice with positive thinking :Smile:  - you think,I work!

And celem,welcome back!

----------


## litch84

I've just set up a linux-arm toolchain for compiling a new kernel.

It's compiling right now, fingers crossed!

Also found some random info on ARM and framebuffers, my main priority right now is getting (fresh) kernel support for that LCD... Once that's done everything else will follow with greater ease...

Although I haven't even looked for a JTAG / Serial header, but I cbf hacking up a serial cable and trying.

----------


## litch84

> I've just set up a linux-arm toolchain for compiling a new kernel.
> 
> It's compiling right now, fingers crossed!
> 
> Also found some random info on ARM and framebuffers, my main priority right now is getting (fresh) kernel support for that LCD... Once that's done everything else will follow with greater ease...
> 
> Although I haven't even looked for a JTAG / Serial header, but I cbf hacking up a serial cable and trying.



Build failed, missing symbols.

Trying an earlier kernel 2.6.18.8...

----------


## InterPhase

> *InterPhase*
> 
> I changed nextvolumes easypc linux scriptcmd by making a .txt file like this:
> 
> setenv bootargs mem=112M root=/dev/ram rw initrd=0x01000000,40960K init=/linuxrc lcdon=1 lcdid=9 lcdbpp=16 lcdpath=GE *combined_mode=ide* setenv lcdparam 
> 1,30000,5,1024,768,48,40,40,3,29,13,1,D8110004|0x4  000000,D8110024|0x4000000,D8110044|0x4000000,D8110  03c|0x2,D811005c&~0x2
> saveenvtextout 0 0 "Loading kernel" ffffff
> fatload mmc 0 0 /script/uzImage.bin
> textout 0 20 "Loading ramdisk"fffffffatload mmc 0 1000000 script/myram.gztextout 0 40 "Booting" fffffffatload mmc 0 4000000 /script/scriptcmdsleep 5bootm 0 
> ...


Hi PerChristensen!

thanks for trying it out. Could you maybe try to set it to combined_mode=libata (its the 'older' implementation of IDE in the kernel)?

- InterPhase

----------


## InterPhase

> Build failed, missing symbols.
> 
> Trying an earlier kernel 2.6.18.8...


litch84, what exact symbols are missing?

- InterPhase

----------


## litch84

> litch84, what exact symbols are missing?
> 
> - InterPhase



All good, successfully compiled 2.6.18.8 kernel.

ran mkimage on it to make compatible uzLinux.bin, tho I haven't tested yet because I went looking for a serial header...

Well, I found a header, not sure what exactly it is...

4 pin header, +5V, GND, RX, TX.

USB matches for the 5v power rail / ground but its data pins are usually called D+ and D-
JTAG requires at least 6 pins....
RS232 can do 3-wire TX/RX but there no requirement for the +5v rail?


RX and TX run directly to the CPU card, GND to mainboard ground and +5v comes from the power area where the Batt plugs in...

Any ideas?

----------


## litch84

FYI:

http://www.ekengroup.com/en/product/index.asp

Original Manufacturer of the P70x boards.

Wonder if they'll email me a datasheet about debugging this damn thing....

----------


## PerChristensen

*InterPhase*

When using your *combined_mode=libata* instead of combined_mode=ide in the scriptcmd *one bypasses the "television snow"* and boot directly into txt mode without having to reboot.
Text roll fast,i can only see txt: probing /dev/something before rolling start and ends some 20 seconds later,with via_ata_interrupt.

I have tried to cut off u-boot header of nextvolumes uzImage.bin and then gunzip the original vmlinux, but cannot find out where to cut.Some mkimage tools add 64 byte,others 72 byte.
The u-boot header in uzImage.bin is made with a MontaVista Linux 2.6.10 tool,the hexeditor say.

----------


## PrFaas

> Well, I found a header, not sure what exactly it is...
> 
> 4 pin header, +5V, GND, RX, TX.
> 
> USB matches for the 5v power rail / ground but its data pins are usually called D+ and D-
> JTAG requires at least 6 pins....
> RS232 can do 3-wire TX/RX but there no requirement for the +5v rail?


I have the same on my system. My guess: A header for connecting a serial/debug port: I actually have 'high hopes' of finding the u-boot 'console I/O' as low-voltage-RS232 signal on those pins. In my previous experience, the Toradex arm-board, u-boot 'talks/listens' via a serial port. On my system VT8500, the TX was at 3.3 Volts 'at rest' (WinCE booted..), i expect that the RX will also need a 0.0 / 3.3 volts signal (NB: and 5.0 Volts will probably be too much.... ).

NB: i just connected an oscilloscope to the tx pin and powered-up the machine: there is definitely something 'coming out' there that looks like serial communication. Still needs an RS-232 buffer so to see: signal levels seem like 3.3 volts, pulsed to 0.0 volts, as would be normal 'pre-buffer'.

After a few more measurements: looks like 115.2 KBaud: i see ~10 us pulse-width (my 'scope' is not phenomenal: 20 MHz audio-scope...) The 'talking' does not really stop after boot: when the machine is 'operating', i get more 'babbling' when i press the power-button. I'm 'running' with the keyboard removed, so the number of buttons i can press is a bit limited  :Smile:

----------


## litch84

Hmm, do the levels go from 0 - 3.3v or -3.3 to +3.3 relative to GND?

Might be TTL, which would make sense because of the low volatage.

I've already got a TTL -> RS232 breadboard at home, I'll give it a shot tonight.

----------


## PrFaas

The 'rest' voltage of tx is 3.3 volts. It 'pulses' to 0.0 Volts...

I'll attempt some ASCII-graphics, but forgive the quality please  :Smile: 



```
______      ____      _____    __ = 3.3 Volts
      \____/    \____/         __ 
                                  = 0.0 Volts
```

Just hope that 'comes out right'  :Smile:  The lower line is at 0.0 volts, the upper one at 3.3 Volts. Considering: The CPU is probably generating the signals; The CPU has 3.3 Volts supply (I/O) voltage; The 'usual' signal output for RS232 -before the RS232 buffer chip- is 'high' (our 3.3 V) when no data is transmitted; the start-bit is 'low' (0.0 V). I've repeated myself quite a few times here, hoping the message gets across  :Smile: 

I'm thinking about either my 'standard' 74HCT14 with 100-Ohm series resistor at the output as RS232 buffer chip, or else let's see if i can get my hands on any of the more modern chips...

getting over-confident now: an attempt at a circuit diagram for an rs232-buffer circuit in ASCII:



```

tx (of board) ----|>o----|||||-----> rs-232 connector txd pin

with ---|>o---- = one of the 6 inverters of the 74HC14

and  ---|||||-- = a 100 Ohm resistor
```

For the receiver, i'd usually take another of the gates of the 74HCT14, with diode/zener/resistors at the input as protection, and -for this case- a voltage divider for 5.0 --> 3.3 Volts conversion at the output. That however is beyond my skill and competence to draw in ASCII....

----------


## Matriark TerVel

Thanks to all who have contributed to this thread. I've found it most helpful. I came across one of the 7" "smartbooks" today, and, by God, I'm going to run Linux on it if I have to drive myself insane in the process.  :Capital Razz: 

It would be a really nice gesture if Kaser would release their kernel code to the general public, but alas, I wouldn't look for that to happen any time soon. It would be very likely that if one bought one of their devices, they'd be able to request access to their SDK server, and thus, their kernel code. I would be more than happy to take that step, but the closest store I know of that carries that device is 100 mi. from me, and I don't want to drive 200 mi. just for a bit of code that's only going to help marginally anyway.

I will point out, however, that because they distribute the binary of their kernel to the general public, that they're required (as far as I remember) by the GPL to also give anyone who obtains that binary access to the source code upon request. However, I doubt that appealing to them from a legal standpoint will do much good.  :Sad: 

That said, I've been messing with their kernel image a bit, and figured I'd contribute a bit of information myself. I may rehash a fact or two, but bear with me.

Here's a quick braindump on extracting the kernel image from the u-boot image:



```
$ mkimage -l uzImage.bin 
Image Name:   MontaVista Linux 2.6.10
Created:      Thu Sep 10 23:53:09 2009
Image Type:   ARM Linux Kernel Image (uncompressed)
Data Size:    1674288 Bytes = 1635.05 kB = 1.60 MB
Load Address: 0x00008000
Entry Point:  0x00008000
$ dd if=uzImage.bin of=zImage skip=64 bs=1 count=1674288

-- Look for gzip magic: 0x1f8b which immediately follows "Done, booting the kernel." ---

$ dd if=zImage of=vmlinux.gz bs=1 skip=12068 count=1662220 ; rm -f zImage
$ file vmlinux.gz 
vmlinux.gz: gzip compressed data, from Unix, last modified: Thu Sep 10 23:53:09 2009, max compression
$ gzip -d vmlinux.gz
```

A more interesting fact is that the YF-700 shares similarities with the VT8430. According to the VT8430 datasheet posted in this thread, the memory region D820:0000 - D82F:0000 is used for UART 0. If you disassemble the code in the zImage, you'll find there's a routine that writes messages (e.g. "Uncompressing Linux...") within that region (i.e. to a serial port.) 

Thus, it's possible that the YF-700 (and vicariously, our little smartbooks) share more similarities with that platform. One could infer that the VT8500 is based on the VT8430.
Similarly, one could infer that the mystery port being discussed in the last few posts is indeed a serial port (although you couldn't be sure without actually interfacing with it.)

Eventually, I might try to do a bit of reverse engineering, and hopefully, start writing platform drivers (don't hold me to it.)  :Capital Razz:  If Kaser would release their code, or if someone would donate a YF-700 to me so that I can go through the proper channels to get access to it, it would save a great deal of time since we know that the CPU and framebuffer (at least) are very similar.

For the interested, here's how to dump the CE Roms (.nb0 files):


```
$ mkdir normal_nk ; wine dumprom.exe normal_nk.nb0 0x80100000 -d normal_nk > normal_nk.txt
```

dumprom.exe can be found at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~itsme/projects/xda/dumprom.html

The ROM images seem to contain most (if not all) of the platform-specific drivers in DLLs.  :Wink:

----------


## litch84

By all means good luck with the disassembly; I believe there's methods of torture more appealing!

Kernel 2.6.32.4 has quite a bit of support for AB926EJ-S cores,
- LCD PL011 support (Found in our chips: VT8500, WM8505)
- SD Card reader via AMBA support
- etc...

I'm re-compiling the arm toolchain from:
* http://www.kegel.com/crosstool/cross...ool-howto.html

For those who are scared of compiling your own toolchain, you should be. The above link makes the headache into a mild itch at the back of your skull though, it makes it in to 3 easy steps:
1. Download Script
2. Run script relating to your ARCH (demo-arm.sh)
3. Make coffee (EDIT: Took me ~1 hour on a Quad Xeon P4 3.0)

To compile kernel 2.6.38 with gcc >= 4.x you'll need to hack the config file:
./crosstool-0.43/build/arm-unknown-linux-gnu/gcc-4.1.0-glibc-2.3.2/glibc-2.3.2/configure

Line 2275:
    3.[2-9]*|4.[01]*)
 Change to:
    [3-4].[2-9]*|4.[01]*)

Once that's done, I'll recompile the new kernel with the new support and see if I can get some LCD console action..

I'd be freakin lucky if it worked the first compile tho, so don't hold your breath.

----------


## Matriark TerVel

> By all means good luck with the disassembly; I believe there's methods of torture more appealing!
> 
> Kernel 2.6.32.4 has quite a bit of support for AB926EJ-S cores,
> - LCD PL011 support (Found in our chips: VT8500, WM8505)
> - SD Card reader via AMBA support
> - etc...


Some would say it's worse than death, but for a true masochist of an engineer, it can be very rewarding.  :Evil or Very Mad: 

The LCD support would be lifesaver to say the least. Saves me the hassle of reversing it, although I wish we had an external port for UART0.  :Wink: 

 What I've determined so far is the bit I mentioned about UART0 in my previous post, and now, I've confirmed that the DRAM controller is consistent with the VT8430.




> Once that's done, I'll recompile the new kernel with the new support and see if I can get some LCD console action..


I look forward to hearing how you fare.

----------


## nextvolume

Yeah, there are surely many similarities between the VT8430 and the VT8500. Also the RTC chip is the same, I tried writing values to the memory addresses for it with U-Boot before booting CE and it worked, I could set the time to 00:00 and to 23:28 by shifting the values accordingly in a 32-bit word and then writing them.

It's great that you went to disassemble the kernel. I had thought about doing that as well, to see where we have to modify it to make the PATA detection always fail, so at least we will have already a pretty decent remotely controllable Linux. 
Does that routine not do its own checksum on the gzip? If it does the check it's going to take another step. If it doesn't, it's as easy as extracting the image, modifying it, and then compressing it again.

Also, let our voices be heard, go to:
http://www.viaarena.com/forums/showt...394#post250394. 

It's me, just under another nick.

With this C function you should be able to generate the date value, day of week is still missing, though



> unsigned int generate_time_dword(unsigned int sec, unsigned int min, 
>     unsigned int hour)
> {
>     // Day of week setting missing but if the date is 1/1/2000
>     // just for testing it is not needed
>     unsigned int time_val;
> 
>     if(sec >= 60 || min >= 60 || hour >= 24)
>         return 0xFFFFFFFF; // A value is out of bound, return invalid
> ...

----------


## litch84

Made a TTL -> RS232 converter based on this schem:

http://sodoityourself.com/max232-ser...vel-converter/

Netbook won't switch on if it's connected. Went over my connections 10 times, no worky.

I'm assuming that the circuit detailed above, the caps are too big and draw too much current therefore overloading the rail and it fails to initiate boot.

Even plugging in the header to my circuit after it's booted instantly turn the unit off.

I don't have any .1uF caps lying around so that theory will just have to wait...

Since my area isn't so much electronics, I must ask if there is there a way I could integrate an external +3.3v rail to the MAX232 chip so that it doesn't rely on the netbook's supply?

Therefore proving my theory right/wrong?

----------


## nextvolume

There are some prebuilt RS232<->TTL circuits which are available on the internet.
Some don't cost much. Maybe you could try using one of those?

----------


## Digger Driver

> (FYI)
> 
> I've found another variety of these netbooks:
> - The EPC branded ones.
> 
> *Hardware details:
> 
> * *Wireless Chip:*
>   CHIP:     RT2070L
> ...


Hi Guys, 
I'm hoping you can help me.
I'm trying to fix this smartbook Litch84 has described above and you guys seem to be the only people on the planet that know anything about them.
An old Lady friend of my Mum bought it online from Hong Kong.
When i firsrt started it up it gave the Smartbook Logo and loading OS but it had done that for two days.
I then tried the fix with the VT8500 on the SD card and it started to move but then froze after successfully loading the first 3 bits.
I turned it off and tried again and all i get now is a blank screen.
I know its a little off topic but if any of you Guys can help i would be most gratefull
PS please bear in mind i'm not a Up to your standard of experience so you might have to use baby talk. :Very Happy: 
Cheers.
Digger.

----------


## celem

> ...For the receiver, i'd usually take another of the gates of the 74HCT14, with diode/zener/resistors at the input as protection...


A divider of 12k and 18k resistors yields 3.3v at the junction. Also consider a 74LCX245 buffer which is a 5-volt tolerant device.

----------


## litch84

I've just spent nearly 12 hours straight on this; here's what I've done so far (to no avail):
- Managed to find a few resistors and give an approximate 3.3v to my little RS232-TTL converter - No data at all.
- Built a 2.6.34.x kernel with all the support for the SoC - Dead
- Built a 2.6.28.10 kernel with the configs off www.arm.com - Dead
- Various different config options, recompiled kernel, etc...
- Made a RS232 null modem cable with some leads I had lying around, compiled a kernel with USB-Serial support for the chip I had (PL2303) - No data.
- Used RealView-Versatile kernel images from www.arm.com - Dead

@PrFaas:
You said the TX was normally high (+3.3v) does this need to be inverted before it gets to the MAX232 input? It should still spit out garbage if that's the case, shouldn't it?

----------


## PerChristensen

*Matriark TerVel*

Pls. check your inbox

----------


## Matriark TerVel

> Yeah, there are surely many similarities between the VT8430 and the VT8500. Also the RTC chip is the same, I tried writing values to the memory addresses for it with U-Boot before booting CE and it worked, I could set the time to 00:00 and to 23:28 by shifting the values accordingly in a 32-bit word and then writing them.
> 
> It's great that you went to disassemble the kernel. I had thought about doing that as well, to see where we have to modify it to make the PATA detection always fail, so at least we will have already a pretty decent remotely controllable Linux. 
> Does that routine not do its own checksum on the gzip? If it does the check it's going to take another step. If it doesn't, it's as easy as extracting the image, modifying it, and then compressing it again.


I figured if the DRAM controller was similar, the RTC would be as well. You just saved me the time of reversing the RTC driver.  :Wink: 

IIRC there's a CRC32 checksum in the zImage, but you can decompress it. You can't just recompress it with gzip without patching the sizes and the CRC. It'd be much more worthwhile, IMHO, to just use mkimage with the uncompressed image if you wanted to create a new u-boot image.




> Also, let our voices be heard, go to:
> http://www.viaarena.com/forums/showt...394#post250394. 
> 
> It's me, just under another nick.
> 
> With this C function you should be able to generate the date value, day of week is still missing, though


Our voices will be heard indeed (when we have open source platform drivers!)  :Wink:  With the VT8500, I wonder why VIA went all tight-lipped, but at any rate, hopefully very soon it won't much matter.  :Capital Razz: 

@litch84:
The platform is quite different from the Versatile boards (and any other currently supported platform), and thus will need its own platform drivers. There may be a piece of hardware here or there that's supported already, but the core platform won't be just yet.  :Capital Razz: 

Everyone, also take a moment to thank PerChristensen. He's decided to donate a YF-700 to me, which will make our lives much easier.  :Smile:  It will save me a tremendous amount of time, and bring us one step closer to having open source platform drivers, and support for our little "smart books."

If and when I get something implemented, I'll setup a new fork at Github. At that time, I'll also setup a site for the project on my domain: http://hentenaar.com  :Smile:

----------


## PrFaas

> @PrFaas:
> You said the TX was normally high (+3.3v) does this need to be inverted before it gets to the MAX232 input? It should still spit out garbage if that's the case, shouldn't it?


First thing to check would be a simple DC voltage measurement between the gnd and tx pin of your board. I found 3.3 Volts there. If you have one, connect an oscilloscope at those same two pins: i found 3.3 Volts, pulsed to 0.0 Volts, pulse width about 10 us. Pulses happen upon boot of the 'mini', and also -once booted- when i press the power button. 

Next thing: connect your max232 RS232 buffer, but please do not connect the rx pin: a max232 has 5.0 Volts output, and connecting that to the 3.3 Volts input of the CPU is *not* a good idea.... I remember you mentioned that the machine did not repond if you've got that connected, and frankly i'm surprised the CPU chip can survive that kind of input signals.... The rx driver would only be usefull if there is an u-boot 'listening' anyway. Usually, u-boot gives you a chance to 'interrupt' its preconfigured autoboot, and that's where an rs232 input comes into play. When you just want to 'listen' to the communication that's coming out of the 'mini' (my name for these small computers) a tx circuit is enough.

Next: Check on the output of the MAX232: I'm not sure that a max232 is the best chip for the job: it could be that 3.3 Volts is not enough to be seen as 'high' by the max232 :-/ The max232 output should be about -10.0 Volts, pulsed to +10.0 Volts, 'in sync' with the pulses on the tx pin. As far as i know, you'd not need any inversion between the tx signal and the max232: the 'traditional' serial port output signals are also 'high', pulsed to 'low', just like what i've seen here. If that fails, your max232 is probably not a good driver for this application: I have spent a few minutes on looking for another driver chip, (Lineair Techonolgies has some nice 3.3Volts-compatible ones..), but have not decided upon which one to use yet. I think i'll try the 74HCT14 first (the coming weekend..): it is my prefered rs232 driver. The resulting signal -at the rs232 pins- is not entirely conform the rs232 spec, but the 'driver chip' (74HCT14) is high-speed, and about completely zero-power: very nice for this kind of battery-powered system. Besides: the resulting output is very resistant to short-circuit: the 100 Ohms resistor limits the current when the output driver inverter's signal is 'high', and when -as most of the time- the output is ~0.0Volts, there will be about no current at all if you'd 'short' the 'rs232-buffer'. 
I've found that about all inputs of 'normal' rs232 buffers are compatible with this solution, so long as you do not try to drive an all too long cable with the 74HCT14 as rs232 buffer chip.

A next step would be to connect the rs232 signal to a 'kermitted' real rs232 port, check the baudrate, and see if the signals make any sense  :Smile:

----------


## nextvolume

It is great if they're going to give us open source drivers (and if they are, can someone contact me privately?), but if they gave us the specifications it would be better. I don't feel like reversing source codes just to get a small grasp of how the hardware works in case I want to port another OS like NetBSD, etc.

----------


## dario_

> I have tried all of your options. The in-kernel 3070sta driver doesn't support wpa_supplicant or iwpriv
> the 2x00usb drivers don't work at all.
> so I ended up again with the Ralink driver from the manufacturer.
> 
> It all seems to be memory related. I have cleaned up the system from unneeded services (like consolekit, networkmanager and policykit) and completely uninstalled networkmanager en wpa_supplicant. now it works quite reliable.


Can I ask you if you think to share your distro, when working?
It would very usefull, for all us that can't make it ourselves!
Thank you, have a good time

----------


## WendyB

> Can I ask you if you think to share your distro, when working?
> It would very usefull, for all us that can't make it ourselves!
> Thank you, have a good time


Yes, that's my plan.
I even made a Trac project for it, already:
http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/trac/Linux_VT8500

I hope to have a first release by the end of the week, or maybe first half of next week.

I'm just looking for a place to host a 500MB+ file. To start I will host it on some filesharing service.

----------


## WendyB

Here it is:

Hopefully all went well regarding permissions, device files and usernames
If not, please inform me.

Read the included readme before, please.

http://www.filedropper.com/easypc-ge...dy-preleasetar

or even better:
http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/tra...i/DownloadList

----------


## Joe of loath

> I'm just looking for a place to host a 500MB+ file. To start I will host it on some filesharing service.


Create a dropbox account and put it in the 'public' folder  :Smile: 

I won one of these on ebay today dead cheap as it was faulty. I got it for £36 (~55 USD) posted, as apparently it won't charge. Not a problem for me, I race radio controlled cars, so have a house full of batteries just waiting to go in, and power supplies + chargers to charge the battery it came with.

Anyway, I'm hoping to stick Debian on it. For those running Debian, what software are you running RE window manage/Desktop environment, file browser, music player etc. I know it's only got enough memory to run one of these at a time, but I have loads of old boxes, so I'm used to it.

----------


## omrip

Hey Wendy

*What is the size of the.bz2 file - every time I try to download it hangs on diffrent sizes-and I can't extract even the readme file
*once I got the full archive-whats next - what do I do?

----------


## WendyB

> Hey Wendy
> 
> *What is the size of the.bz2 file - every time I try to download it hangs on diffrent sizes-and I can't extract even the readme file
> *once I got the full archive-whats next - what do I do?


Hi omrip,

The filesize is 500MB. I will look for other ways to upload the file, like dropbox or maybe torrent

If you can't download, drop me a pb with your email and I will send it.

If you have the archive you have to extract one included file to an sd card and the other archive (WHILE BEING ROOT!) to a USB stick

edit:

try the dropboxlink:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18154481/eas...elease.tar.bz2

----------


## emostarxd

How to upload this disto to the netbook?
VT8500 (~240mhz) version doesn't boot from SD card.
It has bootloader (F1) with password 'zte' and I have only erase options... :Sad:

----------


## WendyB

> How to upload this disto to the netbook?
> VT8500 (~240mhz) version doesn't boot from SD card.
> It has bootloader (F1) with password 'zte' and I have only erase options...


Have a look here: http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/tra...llingThisLinux

----------


## DonutFUN

Hey Wendy

I've tried to install it and it just comes up with the "Smart book" screen. and stops, no loading bar, no text, nothing don't know why

Also I was thinking the other version of Linux for the VT8500  that is still incomplete (easypcliinux 0.2 and 0.1), I think he sopped making it, but it does work with the SD card, so you could get the driver from there probably, and it does have the Ethernet working I think.

Just thought I'd give my input
Thanks for working on this
-DonutFUN

----------


## Blazr

.

----------


## Joe of loath

Linux yes (posting from Debian on my WM8505 netbook), flash no. these netbooks don't have the grunt to decode AVIs, let alone flash video, even ignoring the lack of decent flash player for  Linux+arm.

----------


## zeveroth

So I have the via wm8505 smartbook from sylvania. I installed a android 1.6 os. My only problem for the most part is that it only stays on when the poewr adapter is plugged in. As soon as I unplug it, it shuts down thinking that there is no battery life. The smart book was working fine, if you consider wince and it's super crappy overall preformance "fine", before I installed the android os. I did this b\c my daughter could not use facebook options well on wince and some other internet stuff she uses on the desktop. Android seems to eliminate all her problems, but has killed the idea of portability. Any way to fix this would be great.

As a note: I have read that the power issue has something to do with the OS thinking that is is supporting a touch screen. Seeing this is not a touch screen smart book, is there any way to fix this?

----------


## zeveroth

sorry double post.

----------


## zeveroth

So I am guessing this is a dead thread? 2 days and no response from anyone?

----------


## abrasive

Unless you can dig into the android FS and find whatever code is responsible for low-battery shutdown - or find a different Android variant that reads battery differently - there's not much to be done. Many of the netbook style machines don't actually sense battery in any meaningful way. I guess another option, if you're electronically inclined, would be to try and locate and rip up the charger sense line. Wouldn't recommend it...  PS. I'm amazed this thread even still exists, after over 1 year and 1100 posts... Why doesn't anyone use the Wiki (bento-linux.org) and forums (http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/) that sprung up to help?

----------


## DonutFUN

It's not a dead thread, it is updated every at least 2 weeks or so I'd say.
I don't know anything about your problem otherwise I'd help

----------


## dario_

> Hey Wendy
> 
> I've tried to install it and it just comes up with the "Smart book" screen. and stops, no loading bar, no text, nothing don't know why


I notice the same issue on my vt8500 netbook, WendyB, maybe something wrong in the script?
I also report that there is a SD/MMC card driver ready for use at 

http://groups.google.com/group/vt850...83acbcd4aaafef

but i suspect it's only for wm8505.... it needs to be tested on vt8500. Can it be useful?

----------


## WendyB

I was very busy last week

The version I'm working now at least should support both VT8500 and WM8505 and different screen resolutions.

So, if you get a black screen my guesses are:

Your netbook is a wm8505your netbook has different resolution (not 800x480)the bootloader has trouble reading the kernel image from SD card (SD card is SDHC, or wrongly formatted/partitioned)

----------


## WendyB

> Unless you can dig into the android FS and find whatever code is responsible for low-battery shutdown - or find a different Android variant that reads battery differently - there's not much to be done. Many of the netbook style machines don't actually sense battery in any meaningful way. I guess another option, if you're electronically inclined, would be to try and locate and rip up the charger sense line. Wouldn't recommend it...  PS. I'm amazed this thread even still exists, after over 1 year and 1100 posts... Why doesn't anyone use the Wiki (bento-linux.org) and forums (http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/) that sprung up to help?


You're right. This thread is not the most convenient place to discuss this thing, but the other forum isn't very often updated.

----------


## zeveroth

Thanks for teh help everyone. I will dig deeper and If I come up with anything useful, I will post it back on here. I just wish someone other than me had this problem. lol

EDIT: So I may have found a solution to my power problem with the android 1.6 os that I installed on my smart book.



```
http://sites.google.com/site/gyplace/home/informatica/how-to-install-android-on-smartbook-smartmedia-wm8505-and
```

I am confused on how to comment the files as the post describes. A quick skim through and you will see what I am talking about.

----------


## Gemma22

Hello,

and sorry if this has already been answered, I have searched this thread and not found a solution.

I have an EPC WM8505 netbook running windowsCE, I was wondering if it is possible to use a 3g dongle on this model, I have tried various but due to lack of drivers for CE have had no sucess, I was wondering if there is a flavour of Linux I can install onto this machine which will enable me to use my 3g modem dongle?

Many thanks

Gemma

----------


## WendyB

> Hello,
> 
> and sorry if this has already been answered, I have searched this thread and not found a solution.
> 
> I have an EPC WM8505 netbook running windowsCE, I was wondering if it is possible to use a 3g dongle on this model, I have tried various but due to lack of drivers for CE have had no sucess, I was wondering if there is a flavour of Linux I can install onto this machine which will enable me to use my 3g modem dongle?
> 
> Many thanks
> 
> Gemma


You might try the Linux I'm currently working on. There are several drivers for USB-dongles in it. I'm almost finished and almost ready to put it online.

----------


## WendyB

Finished my Gentoo install for EPC VT8500
A complete release with Midori webbrowser, Claws email, Pidgin messenger etc.
Kernel should support VT8500 and WM8505 and different resolutions (you have to change some files for the resolutions)

Download:
http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/tra...i/DownloadList

----------


## DonutFUN

I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but I can't get that version of Linux to work.
I have a VT8500 and all that happens is that it turns on and displays the "Smart Book" screen, where the loading bar usually shows up, and nothing happens.
Just to double check what I did was:
Put the script folder with all 4 files on a fat32 sd card (256MB)
and then i partitioned a 3.7 gig Usb Drive
First part was ext3  3.6 Gb
Second part was the swap at 133.35 Mb (I thought you said that 100 was enough, so I thought I'd try that)
then I just dragged the files from the archive manager to the ext3 part.

----------


## WendyB

> I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but I can't get that version of Linux to work.
> I have a VT8500 and all that happens is that it turns on and displays the "Smart Book" screen, where the loading bar usually shows up, and nothing happens.
> Just to double check what I did was:
> Put the script folder with all 4 files on a fat32 sd card (256MB)
> and then i partitioned a 3.7 gig Usb Drive
> First part was ext3  3.6 Gb
> Second part was the swap at 133.35 Mb (I thought you said that 100 was enough, so I thought I'd try that)
> then I just dragged the files from the archive manager to the ext3 part.


Mhhz, even without a proper USB-stick it should boot the kernel until it reaches the point where it tries to mount the root fs.
(i once tried to boot without the USB-stick and it waited until I inserted the USB-stic and went on happily)
If it stalls at this point it appears to be unable to load the kernel image, or the kernel is crashing in a very early state.
Maybe you have hardware which is slightly different from what I have.

By the way, you have to extract all the files being root onto the USB-stick, otherwise permissions are messed up.
as root:
cd /where/your/usb/root/is
tar -xjvp -f /where/the/archive/is/file.tar.bz2

maybe you could try extracting the SD card files as well, being root. I see now that I have archived them as being my local user.

----------


## DonutFUN

I actually did do them as the root, so the permissions should have been good, and as for the sd card I had to do it on my other computer with XP because for some reason it doesn't let me, it has an error come up saying the permissions are wrong for some reason.

----------


## emostarxd

Hi,

I have downloaded the Gentoo for EPC VT8500, but netbook can't start the install from SD card...
When I push the Power button, I see the message (Press F1 to update the system) with password "ztk" and this menu have only the options to format NAND flash.
Please help me to boot this linux on my EPC (VT8500, ~240 mhz, 128 RAM. 2 gb NAND)

----------


## WendyB

> Hi,
> 
> I have downloaded the Gentoo for EPC VT8500, but netbook can't start the install from SD card...
> When I push the Power button, I see the message (Press F1 to update the system) with password "ztk" and this menu have only the options to format NAND flash.
> Please help me to boot this linux on my EPC (VT8500, ~240 mhz, 128 RAM. 2 gb NAND)


It shouldn't try to install, only to boot from SD-card and then the USB-stick.
Maybe you have a different BIOS?

----------


## WendyB

> I actually did do them as the root, so the permissions should have been good, and as for the sd card I had to do it on my other computer with XP because for some reason it doesn't let me, it has an error come up saying the permissions are wrong for some reason.


I recently uploaded a slightly different version where the permissions should be fixed

----------


## alchark

ZTE is a completely different processor manufacturer from VIA/WonderMedia, so you have an incompatible machine (your vendor has probably misspecified the processor, as it happens in China).

----------


## emostarxd

alchark, so what should I do in this case? I need the Linux installed on my EPC but without Linux this netbook is a junk.
Sorry for my bad English  :Smile:

----------


## alchark

I don't really know anything regarding Linux on ZTE machines. Look around, maybe you'll find something. If you find register descriptions, you could try to port the latest kernel yourself :Wink:

----------


## justsomeguy11

hello there everyone...let me start off by appoligizing for my noobiness !!! lol....here is my sistuation...

i recently picked up one of these mini netbooks...when i got it home all it did when i fired it up was show a very dull black screen..you could barley tell it even turned on because the screen was so dull....nothing happend after that ! absolutly nothing at all....it charged fine and doesn't have a low or dead battery..now let me also say that i am NOT a programmer or very effecient with programming knowledge..i do however have a androice epad that i've been playing with and have been reading up on the past few months in order to actually make good use of the device, so i know the terms like rooting and firmware, kernells and stuff like that even though i haven't been able to physically try them...ok getting off topic already ! lol....

is there a way i can get this thing up and running again? i've tried to read through this forum (this is the only place i've been able to find any kind of support for this product )..

i tried to put a sd card into the device as well as a usb stick but neither showed anything when i turned it on...so i'm thinking that the OS got wipped or erased or soemthing....now after reading though this thread it seems like i can attach the device to my comp and can put a kernell? on it..or a new bootloader or something? i just don't know where to start !!! :Confused: 

there is info on the first page but it is from 2009 so i'm not sure if there's more up to date info out there or new files and stuff to try to put on the device? when i plug it into my comp, should the comp see it as another drive? or is there a proggy i have to install in order to even see the device?

i know i'm asking alot and again i appoligize for my stupidness !! but any help would be sooooo appreciated ! i'm at a totall loss with this thing, i have also opened it up to see if i could find any kind of maker because it's so generic there is absolutly NO manafacture name on it anywhere...the only thing i could really see when i opened it up was a samsung chip on the MOBO..

if there is any kind of info that i have to supply in order to make sure i put the right files on it just let me know and i'll post it. but like i said there's not alot of info on this thing..but it's still opened up so if i need some kind of chip id number or something just let me know and i'll take a look...i just want to see some kind results because from the time i bought this (off the local classifieds ads) and the guy i bought it from said " yup it works great the battery is just dead)....figures that the 1 time i don't check something out is the 1 time i get ripped off !!!! but that's my own stupidness once again isn't it !!! lol.....

but again before i ramble more and more thank you for any and all assistance i can get on this thing. i would love to get it up and running and see what i can do with it..

thanks everyone !!!!!!

justsomeguy11

----------


## experx

> Hi,
> 
> I have downloaded the Gentoo for EPC VT8500, but netbook can't start the install from SD card...
> When I push the Power button, I see the message (Press F1 to update the system) with password "ztk" and this menu have only the options to format NAND flash.
> Please help me to boot this linux on my EPC (VT8500, ~240 mhz, 128 RAM. 2 gb NAND)


Hi,

Did you get a solution or workaround on how to flash or load linux on these kind of netbooks ? I tried all options except format but it fails. Please post if you got a solution.

----------


## justsomeguy11

man i can't even see the F1 message....can't boot from sd card or a usb stick...i also tried to hook up to my computer via. the network cord..still nothing...was hoping that i would be able to see the mini netbook that way at least...but couldn't even get to that..i don't know how the hell i'm going to be able to get it to boot from anything in order to restore the OS...i am sooooo lost here ~~~~

** when i took apart the device i seen a chip that had this on it :

samsung 
K9GAG08UOM
PCB0

then on the MOBO up in the corner it said this :

P701_main V8
100324

i hope this info is revelent to getting this beast up and running !!

thanks guys

----------


## emostarxd

I think we need to find a method how to install the U-boot to ZTK VT8500 devices with F1 msg on startup. This will allow to install any distributives using SD card and scriptcmd.
I think this can be done only via USB cable.

----------


## justsomeguy11

> I think we need to find a method how to install the U-boot to ZTK VT8500 devices with F1 msg on startup. This will allow to install any distributives using SD card and scriptcmd.
> I think this can be done only via USB cable.


how do you get the computer to reconigize the device with a usb cable? is there some kind of proggy or something you have to install in order to see it? i'm really stuck here trying to get this device to even see something so i can get some kind of OS on this damn thing !!

----------


## emostarxd

I saw the some utilites from China developers, this utils was created for USB connect. Also the USB connection need to eject the EPC battery and enable the jumper on the motherboard. I can't find the link to this manual but it's exist on this topic.

----------


## justsomeguy11

> I saw the some utilites from China developers, this utils was created for USB connect. Also the USB connection need to eject the EPC battery and enable the jumper on the motherboard. I can't find the link to this manual but it's exist on this topic.


i'll have to look around and see if i can find that utility...if anyone out there has the link please please share !!!

also i never seen any kind of jumper on the mobo ! hopefully it isn't on the bottom side of it. because there is some kind of ribbon on the top of the mobo that doesn't look like it disconnects very easily. it goes from the mobo at the bottom of it under the keyboard and attaches to some kind of plastic piece that is at the bottom of the mobo...i'll have to inspect this tonight when i get home and see if i can find that jumper. at this point i will try anything to get this sucker going ! all i get is the dreaded faded black screen ! no F1 message or anything, that is why i'm thinking the OS got wipped out or something got so crupted that nothing works ...

if anyone else has any kind of idea how to get this damn thing up and running please please please share !!! like i said i only get the faded black screen. i tried to boot from usb stick as well as SD card....but the device didn't read either one of them and just acted the same with them in as it did without anything in it. 

i'm a very newbie here and can't find my way aroudn the site very well yet (because i'm not sure what any of this is) !!lol.....so if anyone can link that manual or help me out I would be sooo appreciative !!!!!

thanks everyone !!!!!


justsomeguy11

----------


## justsomeguy11

ive tried to search this site for that usb proggy but still cant navigate my way around very well.....at least i managed to find this site though !! like i said this is the 1st place i've even found people talking about these mini netbooks to support them ! if anyone else found any other sites out there can you pm me them or link them here please...cause i really need to get this thing going...

----------


## emostarxd

I have found this manual:
http://194.150.201.35/cnmlifestyle/c...7SErestore.htm

----------


## justsomeguy11

> I have found this manual:
> http://194.150.201.35/cnmlifestyle/c...7SErestore.htm


 
THANK YOU VERY VERY MUCH EMOSTARXD !!!!!!!!!! 

this looks very promising to try that's for sure..can't wait until tonight to give it a shot. i will post back my results. 

one quick question though...do you think any usb cable will work? or is there some kind of special adaptor you have to use ? i'd think that just a normal usb to usb cable should work right? when i got the device the guy never gave me anyting besides the ac plug ...

AGAIN THANK YOU SO MUCH !!!!!!  :Very Happy:  :Very Happy:  :Very Happy: 

justsomeguy11

----------


## emostarxd

> use a pair of tweezers or the bared ends of a cable tie to short the component


This will allow to connect via any USB-to-USB cable.
Please try and let me know. I can't find this cable on any shop and I have ordered its production from the service master.

----------


## justsomeguy11

> This will allow to connect via any USB-to-USB cable.
> Please try and let me know. I can't find this cable on any shop and I have ordered its production from the service master.


just wanted to give an update...i thought i had one of these cables kickin around in my box of messy cables but didn't ...gonna pick one up tonight or tomorrow morning and give this a try this weekend FOR SURE....so i'll post back my results....(hopefully they will be good results)....

cheers..

justsomeguy11

----------


## PerChristensen

Hi emostarxd and justsomeguy11
Together with Celem,Winston91,Nextvolume,PrFaas and many others many months ago we tried to find the partition (of many,probably) on the Via VT8500 where to burn a new boot-loader and therefrom find where to install a linux distribution.Unfortunately there seem not to exist a "lift-off" tool for the VT8500 like the chinese tool for the different ZTK Samsung brand you are talking about.I guess you will find a partition for the boot-loader,a (hidden?) partition for the kernel and another for the file system on your machines,perhaps even more partitions.If you succsede in lifting off and burning back on your Anyka machines with the chinese tool I will be impressed.Good luck
PS: There is much confusion around processors on these small books.The CNM books linked to above is to the "silver" windows CE edition,another linux CNM version use a different chip I vaguely remember,but I may be wrong.

----------


## justsomeguy11

> Hi emostarxd and justsomeguy11
> Together with Celem,Winston91,Nextvolume,PrFaas and many others many months ago we tried to find the partition (of many,probably) on the Via VT8500 where to burn a new boot-loader and therefrom find where to install a linux distribution.Unfortunately there seem not to exist a "lift-off" tool for the VT8500 like the chinese tool for the different ZTK Samsung brand you are talking about.I guess you will find a partition for the boot-loader,a (hidden?) partition for the kernel and another for the file system on your machines,perhaps even more partitions.If you succsede in lifting off and burning back on your Anyka machines with the chinese tool I will be impressed.Good luck
> PS: There is much confusion around processors on these small books.The CNM books linked to above is to the "silver" windows CE edition,another linux CNM version use a different chip I vaguely remember,but I may be wrong.


i finally got my hands on a usb to usb transfer cable....was a real pain trying to track one down...well hopefully i'll at least be able to read this device...

you say we will find a partition (hidden)..what do ya mean by that? seems like you've done your homework on these things...any tips you can give in regards to at least getting the thing back up in running condition? i'm not looking at doing anything fancy with it (at the moment)...i just want to start by getting back to a state where it can be used, and then test different things after i can at least get into the damn thing..

are you saying you couldnt get to the kernel? is that why you said "hidden"? or did you find only part of it?

there seems to be more then just confusion around the processors..seems to be alot of confussion around the whole device. i'm thinking it's because the device is not that popular. and also that there's not a lot to it is there...just another little chineese toy that got over marketed and confused people as to what it can do so people bought it...

i bought it just for something to screw around with and see if i could get it going since when i got this it was in a bricked state and i was bored...now instead of being bored i'm pulling my hair out ! lol...but since you seemed to have screwed around with these alot more then me and tips and advice as to some steps would be great !!

thanks buddy...

----------


## PerChristensen

I am afraid I only can help with these two links:

A brasilian site with links to VT8500 + VT8505 restore software
http://www.netbookce.tk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2

Anyka Forum 
http://mininetbooks.your-board.com/

If processor is VIA ARM the first link should help in restoring.The second link goes to forum for netbooks with another brand of ARM processor (CNM book "silver" etc.)

----------


## bornagainpenguin

I hate to be _that_ guy, but this is a 114 page thread on this subject, which covers quite a bit of ground.  Could anyone whose been doing this for awhile post an update for those of us coming in late?  I mean something simple explaining what hardware is known to be supported in Linux, which desktops are recommended, and generally whether it is practical to get one of these and seek to install Linux on them?

If Android is recommended, what are the options with apps?  I have an Android tablet so I might be able to get some apps from there to run on one of these but generally that is heavily dependent on which revision of the system you're using and at last look I think someone said only Android 1.6 was supported?  Is that right?

What are the options with regards to WinCE on these (yes, I know I know...) is it possible to convert them to Windows Mobile devices and hopefully access more apps that way?

I have a friend who has one and he's been quite disappointed with his as is, if I manage to get it from him to work with it I'd like to have some idea of what is known to be possible before I waste a lot of my time duplicating what is already done.

Thanks!

--bornagainpenguin

----------


## justsomeguy11

> I am afraid I only can help with these two links:
> 
> A brasilian site with links to VT8500 + VT8505 restore software
> http://www.netbookce.tk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2
> 
> Anyka Forum 
> http://mininetbooks.your-board.com/
> 
> If processor is VIA ARM the first link should help in restoring.The second link goes to forum for netbooks with another brand of ARM processor (CNM book "silver" etc.)


awesome links !!! thank you very much !! i just had to totally take the mobo out of the unit and flip it to find out that it is a WM8505...so at least now i know what i'm dealing with. the second link is great for any beginners (like me) who want to read up on these devices since there isn't very many forums out there i've found on this thing..one thing i can't figure out is when the instructions say you have to jump the certain pins i can't find anywhere the name/number of the pins your suppose to jump..there is a picture of them but its not clear enough to read, and on my unit there's alot to choose from. but there is nothing like master/slave pins or pogo pins type things...mostly just little things sodered on the mobo (sorry for my lack of proper explanation of the things sodered on the mobo). 

however first i am going to try the SD card thing and see how that works before i try this jumper thing !! will post back results as i go...i know i was supposed to do this the other weekend but things came up and i can only do this once in awhile and only little things at a time..lol....


***update***

so i've gotten a little bit ahead now. i downloaded 2 different files from that link above (thanks again). 1 was the 8505 and the 2nd was the vt8505..the 2nd one has gotten me the progress. i've managed to get it to step 3 of upgrading..which is safe mode. it says upgrade safe mode sucessfull....then it's just hanging..but this is a step forward at least !!! i tried to upgrade it 2 times in a row now but it keeps hanging at the same spot. i'm going to try some more tomorrow evening and see what else i can get it to do...gotta get some sleep now..

.O 1 dumbass thing i did...i tried a couple times but nothing was happening at first when i put the SD card in...until i flipped it upside down..then it worked ! wierd that you have to put the sd card in upside down !! in any device i've used sd cards in they will only go in one way, try to put them in wrong and they usually just don't fit...well that wasn't the case here and you should have seen the big smile on this guy's face when i saw that screen pop up with something other then just black lines and saw actual words come across it and it start to upgrade !!!!

anyway, i'll post more results tomorrow...its a bonus that i haven't had to use the jump method with usb-usb yet...

cheers

----------


## justsomeguy11

i've been getting so frustrated with this damn thing i think i gotta put it aside for a bit before i smash the damn thing ! 


]i've download about 6 or 7 different versions of wm8505 files , including 2 or 
3 androids, sylvania's,and afew unnamed ones'..all giving the same results. all  freezing up in the same place..,right afterit says sucessful safe mode upgrade...the androids freeze after awhile as well...i've never gotten to any screen where is says to reboot the device..always freezes up way before that point...man i just don't know what else to try or to do !!! i'm at a totall loss here..i've read about a million different threads thanks to the link above..but still nothing !!! FML ~

----------


## justsomeguy11

I hate this device. love the challenge...but am starting to get very fustrated

does no one have any ideas, hints, tips or advice out there !!!???!!! lmao...guess the support for this device is pretty much non-existent huh...

has anyone ever gotten this device to boot properly by doing the usb-usb way?

----------


## vinceCOOK

Hello, 

I don't know if you know but you can now get a FREE Ubuntu Linux desktop computer........ in the cloud. 

amazon web services. 

It is free for the year and comes with a 1.2 ghz cpu and 700 ram and hard drive space. You have over 30 thousand 
software titles you can install and it remembers it's state on power down.  (micro instance)

So you can use any VT8500 or wm8050 machine with windows CE on it
Windows CE comes with REMOTE DESKTOP which will allow you to dial
into the FREEcloud Linux machine.

That's it.....you have Linux on your low cost netbook for FREE. 


Windows CE comes with REMOTE DESKTOP ready to go. So these chinese laptops will work right away for getting 
you into a linux computer easily and free over ethernet or WI FI. 

These free cloud computers from Amazon are excellent...been using it for many months...you are allowed to use it 24 hours per day for the whole year for FREE. Also you will find that surfing the web and FLASH works perfect and is FAST on the cloud computer. Faster than any slate or laptop. 

Just go to amazon web services....watch the youtube video about how you open a free account with a pre-pay credit card from the corner store. Then start a Linux machine up. 

To choose your Linux machine just click LAUNCH INSTANCE and then select PUBLIC AMI's and type "desktop" into the search and choose EBS as the type. 

You will see Ubuntu Linux desktop versions are all listed  i386........use one of those recent examples.  (Lucid) 

Currently Amazon are NOT supporting SOUND. They are working on getting sound going on The ubunut cloud machines. 

Thanks. 

So in summary, any Slate or laptop can quite happily act as a windows or Linux computer by simply using a free cloud computer. It will work wellfor FLASH and tonnes of free Linux software. 

Vince.

----------


## mails65

This a great knowledge base, i have come to understand the basics of this evil device, many thanks. Still it seems i cant get my 7"mini laptop to boot from the sd card. I insert the SD card, in which the android-ARM-8505-Smartbook file is copied, i power on the laptop and then:
pocket CMD v 6.00
storage card\MassProduction.bat:File not found

This is what i get, and then it just boots to wince. Have i got it all wrong? Can someone please help, im not so experienced with all these  :Sad:  thanks in advance  :Smile:

----------


## justsomeguy11

justa bump to see if anyone has any updates or progress......

cheers everyone

----------


## heartburnkid

Playing with my mom's Sylvania WM8505-based smartbook, and I think I might have borked it... I tried to install the Android image on page 66 of this thread, and the install seemed to go fine; however, after the reboot, the screen stayed black for upwards of 5 minutes.  So, I downloaded the WinCE rom from Sylvania's website, and tried to flash back to that; again, the install went fine, and it booted into a live WinCE install, but when I tried to reboot the machine, nothing.  Just a black screen.

Anybody have any ideas?

----------


## Joe of loath

If you leave it and let it boot, can you ping it from the network? Mine failed, but I noticed the caps lock keys made the LEDs flash, so I typed in what I needed to log in and connect to the network, and I could ping it and ssh in.

----------


## heartburnkid

Afraid not.  It doesn't even seem to be touching my router; no sign of it on the active clients list or on the DHCP leases.

----------


## Joe of loath

Tried booting Debian from SD card?

----------


## PrFaas

> Hi emostarxd and justsomeguy11
> Together with Celem,Winston91,Nextvolume,PrFaas and many others many months ago we tried to find the partition (of many,probably) on the Via VT8500 where to burn a new boot-loader and therefrom find where to install a linux distribution.Unfortunately there seem not to exist a "lift-off" tool for the VT8500 like the chinese tool for the different ZTK Samsung brand you are talking about.I guess you will find a partition for the boot-loader,a (hidden?) partition for the kernel and another for the file system on your machines,perhaps even more partitions.If you succsede in lifting off and burning back on your Anyka machines with the chinese tool I will be impressed.Good luck
> PS: There is much confusion around processors on these small books.The CNM books linked to above is to the "silver" windows CE edition,another linux CNM version use a different chip I vaguely remember,but I may be wrong.


Sorry for the late reply... As far as i've been able to find out the bootloader is loaded from the 8-pins 'serial prom' that is located close to the actual CPU/SoC. In my case, the CPU and the serial prom are both located on a small 'plug-in' board on the machine's main board. It seems possible to 'blast' the contents of that serial prom when doing an 'incompatible' upgrade. In theory, it should be possible to de-solder the serial prom from the CPU board, and re-flash it. I presume there is some JTAG way to do that, but lacking 'doc' of that, de-soldering and re-flashing the prom seems the only way. For the DIY-er there are two obstacles:

1) to build a serial-prom programmer: the interface of the serial prom is an SPI interface, so it would not be all too difficult to trap together something for that. For smaller proms than this (93cx6 types..) i made something like that in the past, including a program to read/write those small serial (flash-)proms. The difference is that the proms i had where DIL, and this is an SO-8 package (meaning: it is smaller, and i have no chip socket for SO-8 ). You'd have to solder the chip into the programmer or else program the chip 'in-circuit'... The latter seems 'tricky' to me: one mistake and you burn your CPU chip. I have the datasheet of the serial boot-prom chip: it is a dead-common 512Kx8 SPI serial prom; nothing *really* special: Farnell has them for a few 'bucks'...

2) to obtain a binary file of the 'correct' serial-boot-prom for your machine. Only if you are *really* sure you have a correct boot-image-file for the exact computer you have is there any chance of success. 

NB: one thing that irks me is that the serial prom *has* a write-protect input, and that that pin has not been used to provide for *some* protection of the boot-prom's contents... A simple pull-up resistor & 'jumper' could have made the boot-prom 'bullet-proof... Well, against accidental over-writes that is...

----------


## justsomeguy11

> Sorry for the late reply... As far as i've been able to find out the bootloader is loaded from the 8-pins 'serial prom' that is located close to the actual CPU/SoC. In my case, the CPU and the serial prom are both located on a small 'plug-in' board on the machine's main board. It seems possible to 'blast' the contents of that serial prom when doing an 'incompatible' upgrade. In theory, it should be possible to de-solder the serial prom from the CPU board, and re-flash it. I presume there is some JTAG way to do that, but lacking 'doc' of that, de-soldering and re-flashing the prom seems the only way. For the DIY-er there are two obstacles:
> 
> 1) to build a serial-prom programmer: the interface of the serial prom is an SPI interface, so it would not be all too difficult to trap together something for that. For smaller proms than this (93cx6 types..) i made something like that in the past, including a program to read/write those small serial (flash-)proms. The difference is that the proms i had where DIL, and this is an SO-8 package (meaning: it is smaller, and i have no chip socket for SO-8 ). You'd have to solder the chip into the programmer or else program the chip 'in-circuit'... The latter seems 'tricky' to me: one mistake and you burn your CPU chip. I have the datasheet of the serial boot-prom chip: it is a dead-common 512Kx8 SPI serial prom; nothing *really* special: Farnell has them for a few 'bucks'...
> 
> 2) to obtain a binary file of the 'correct' serial-boot-prom for your machine. Only if you are *really* sure you have a correct boot-image-file for the exact computer you have is there any chance of success. 
> 
> NB: one thing that irks me is that the serial prom *has* a write-protect input, and that that pin has not been used to provide for *some* protection of the boot-prom's contents... A simple pull-up resistor & 'jumper' could have made the boot-prom 'bullet-proof... Well, against accidental over-writes that is...


thank you very much for that info !!! unfortunatly i don't have skills anywhere close to what is described here. on top of that i got this unit for 40 bucks from someone (because of the fact that he screwed it up) so i guess i should have just bought a case of beer instead of this toy..lol...but it was a great learning experience reading up on this stuff that's for sure~ maybe one day someone will conquer this machine and i'll be able to get it going. 

it's just a pisser that the way everyone describs how to get these things going with the sd card won't work for me (but that's normally my luck that nothing is ever easy)..

it's still boggles me though why it's freezing up on safe mode/normal mode when booting from the sd card. no matter what file i put on it does that ! then just stays on the logo when rebooted....i was really hopeing that my kid would be able to use this and have her "own" laptop...(she's only 5)....lol....

thanks again guys...it's all greatly appreciated and i love to hear everybody's new ideas...

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Playing with my mom's Sylvania WM8505-based smartbook, and I think I might have borked it... I tried to install the Android image on page 66 of this thread, and the install seemed to go fine; however, after the reboot, the screen stayed black for upwards of 5 minutes.  So, I downloaded the WinCE rom from Sylvania's website, and tried to flash back to that; again, the install went fine, and it booted into a live WinCE install, but when I tried to reboot the machine, nothing.  Just a black screen.
> 
> Anybody have any ideas?


Hi,

It sounds like we have the same sylvania smartbook. I want ubuntu on it. No, it won't boot from an sd card with linux netbook. I also installed android on an e-reader. I didn't like android. I can switch it back, but I like the sylvania clam-shell better so I'm not bothering with the e-reader.

So you want ideas? Not sure if this will help you any but here is what I noticed with the sylvania: You have to have an SD card formatted in fat32. Then put windows ce on the root of the sd card. You of course, have to take the compressed file from www.digitalgadgets.com [sylvania website], expand it into a folder, find the script folder and copy the script folder to the root of your SD card. (It was the same way with the android install on the e-reader.) Ok, with the smartbook turned off, insert the sd card, power up the smartbook and that should flash the unit. After the unit boots to windows ce, I powerd the unit off and removed the sd card. When I powerd up again, i just gave it a few minutes to start and it eventually did. The first boot after a flash seems to take longer.

Is that how you tried it too?

So to install Ubuntu, we need someone to code ubuntu into the same format with a script folder for the root of a fat32 SD card. Personally, I'm not sure how that works. But I sure would like to have it on this sylvania smartbook.

Best of luck to you, OooBuntuRox  :Guitar:

----------


## Joe of loath

No way you'll get any form of Ubuntu you recognise onto these: See how much memory you're using. Lubuntu uses around 90mb at idle, Ubuntu around 256.

The machine has 128mb of memory, so Lubuntu will use most of it, and Ubuntu won't run at all. Debian with Fluxbox uses around 30mb.

----------


## heartburnkid

> Hi,
> 
> It sounds like we have the same sylvania smartbook. I want ubuntu on it. No, it won't boot from an sd card with linux netbook. I also installed android on an e-reader. I didn't like android. I can switch it back, but I like the sylvania clam-shell better so I'm not bothering with the e-reader.
> 
> So you want ideas? Not sure if this will help you any but here is what I noticed with the sylvania: You have to have an SD card formatted in fat32. Then put windows ce on the root of the sd card. You of course, have to take the compressed file from www.digitalgadgets.com [sylvania website], expand it into a folder, find the script folder and copy the script folder to the root of your SD card. (It was the same way with the android install on the e-reader.) Ok, with the smartbook turned off, insert the sd card, power up the smartbook and that should flash the unit. After the unit boots to windows ce, I powerd the unit off and removed the sd card. When I powerd up again, i just gave it a few minutes to start and it eventually did. The first boot after a flash seems to take longer.
> 
> Is that how you tried it too?
> 
> So to install Ubuntu, we need someone to code ubuntu into the same format with a script folder for the root of a fat32 SD card. Personally, I'm not sure how that works. But I sure would like to have it on this sylvania smartbook.
> ...


I doubt it'd make a difference, but my SD card is formatted as FAT16.  I'll go ahead and try it with a FAT32-formatted card.

EDIT: Nope, the FAT32-formatted card made no difference.  How long are you talking about leaving it up to boot?  Because I've gone as long as a half an hour with nothing to show for it...

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> No way you'll get any form of Ubuntu you recognise onto these: See how much memory you're using. Lubuntu uses around 90mb at idle, Ubuntu around 256.
> 
> The machine has 128mb of memory, so Lubuntu will use most of it, and Ubuntu won't run at all. Debian with Fluxbox uses around 30mb.


thank you. I sort of knew it was too big. but i am also heard that someone is working on a version of linux for mobile devices and that would work well on this ubit. this is more like a PDA than a notebook.

Being that there are so many versions of linux I thought that someone might jump in and mention a version of LINUX that would work. There are versions of LINUX for embedded systems. But I am of course searching for something open source.

Perhaps if enough people ask, Linus T will consider writing a version of Ubuntu for mobile devices. The size alone won`t get Linux on these embedded systems. It will have to be ib te correct code format too.

Thanks very much for your comments.  :Wave:  

Does anyone know how much memory windows CE actually requires to run?

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> I doubt it'd make a difference, but my SD card is formatted as FAT16. I'll go ahead and try it with a FAT32-formatted card.
> 
> EDIT: Nope, the FAT32-formatted card made no difference. How long are you talking about leaving it up to boot? Because I've gone as long as a half an hour with nothing to show for it...


try this link:
http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/...?id=4&t_id=177

let us know how you make out.

OooBuntuRox  :Guitar:

----------


## heartburnkid

Finally had a chance to take another crack at this.  The files on the link you provided didn't really help; however, after snooping around that forum, I did find this.  This works, and my mom's smartbook is now running Android 2.1!

Thanks, OooBuntuRox!

*EDIT*:  OK, apparently it's not 2.1, it's 1.6 skinned to look like 2.1.  Still, it works!

----------


## philcolbourn

> This is the pit i fell in to when buying the ubisurfer... the processor is different, and i can't get stuff from the littlelinuxlaptops stuff to work on it.


what is the cpu in the ubisurfer 7?

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Finally had a chance to take another crack at this.  The files on the link you provided didn't really help; however, after snooping around that forum, I did find this.  This works, and my mom's smartbook is now running Android 2.1!
> 
> Thanks, OooBuntuRox!
> 
> *EDIT*:  OK, apparently it's not 2.1, it's 1.6 skinned to look like 2.1.  Still, it works!


You're welcome.

Glad to hear you got somewhere. So the link I sent basically said that once you get android to work, you can then install wince again. There was plenty of info to poke around in on that site.

I'll bet that when you try to install linux it formats the smartbook internal memory to something other than fat. Once that happens, the smartbook probably chokes and can't read the partition.

You may also be able to take a bricked smartbook and run a usb cable from a pc to the smartbook. The smartbook might pop up as a drive. If it does, you could try formatting the partiton as fat32 and see if you can reload winCE from your SD card the usual way with a script folder on the sd card, etc.

I'm glad that you have something you can at least use. I didn't like android and would still like to get some form of linux (Ubuntu mobile? !!!) on my smartbook. If not, I have my eye on and acer netbook for $198. Just like the CVS smartbook, it will be hard to get your hands on one for that price.

The lowest I can find one in stock is $235 before tax and shipping. Not worth it to me. Maybe I'll hunt for a book and learn how to program embedded systems/ arm processors.

Good luck to you.

I have some links to images for the 8505. If I come across them, I'll post them/ edit this message.

OoobuntuRox,  :Guitar: 
*
Woops:* I just noticed this at the same site we've been discussing. Perhaps a few people will want to play around with the info there. If not, I'll eventually get to poking around with it. It sounds like you can run a version of linux right from and SD card by creating 2 partitions. I think thats what it was driving at. But I only glanced at it.

----------


## Fallingwater

I got linked to this thread from a DealExtreme post.
I've seen several of these small netbooks on sale on DX (and eBay, but DX usually sells them cheaper - about €60), but their operating system puts them squarely into wordprocessor territory - in that they aren't really good for anything else. Can Linux actually be ran on them, and if so how? I'm ok with non-Ubuntu distros (in fact I tend to prefer Debian - no offense!), as long as *some* flavour of it can run. 
I understand this question has probably been answered in this thread, but it's 116 pages long, which makes it hard to figure it out on my own without taking many hours to read through it all.

Thanks  :Smile:

----------


## Joe of loath

There was a website on it, but it seems to have gone offline  :Sad: 

However, this forum may be of use http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/index.php

----------


## Fallingwater

But, has nobody managed to install Linux here?

How about Android?

----------


## Joe of loath

I have Debian on mine  :Very Happy:  However, I broke it trying to install Android, so now it's headless.

----------


## SoSammy

> ... Go to the place on devio.us... www.bento-linux.org (or the #easypc IRC channel on FreeNode) is the stablest place you're going to get when you want a link to the forums (in case they move again, hehe).


  Sigh.  I dutifully saved a link to that site and waited to get my hands on one of these machines.  I have one now, and the site appears to be gone.    If the info and images from bento-linux.org are mirrored somewhere, I would greatly appreciate a link.  Googleing finds some things on download sites, but I don't know what they are out of the excellent context provided on the bento-linux.org site.  TIA,  SoSammy 

--UpDate--
Ok, found a good instructions here:
http://blogold.chinaunix.net/u3/1109...php?id=2367230 

 ... which references files here: 
http://bur.st/%7Eabrasive/wm8505_linux/1.0/ 

... and if that source vanishes, the files are also here: 
http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...505_linux/1.0/ 

There are some very basic instructions in abrasive's files too.

----------


## Fallingwater

> I have Debian on mine


Fantastic. How did you load it on your computer? Did you follow a guide, and if so, which one?
Thanks  :Smile:

----------


## Joe of loath

I followed a guide, it was on bento-linux.org...

I could mess about with my install if you want, get it as close to vanilla as possible and clonezilla + upload it to my server for you?

----------


## X-Windows

Jumping on board here, got one of these cheep netbooks running Debian and IceWM right now. After some searching around there appear to be two types of these, models with NAND and models that use USB. I spent about 4 days trying to get past the "Loading filesystem" freeze during normal Debian installation. Eventually found a great site here that shows how to install Debian on one of these "no NAND" devices. Basically install android and use its boot loader to launch Debian.

I've made a few posts as "Don" in the comments there, i couldn't get my device to connect to any secured wifi ap's. Posted my wpa_supplicant.conf file for anyone else with this problem (works for unsecured networks).

Everything is working (albeit a little slow), except the sound. I can get sound out of the android install but not under debian, lspci shows no sound card. Does anyone know if it is possible to use whatever driver android uses and install that to debian? Would be very much appreciated.

----------


## Joe of loath

Can you boot from SD just by extracting the fatpart and extpart to a fat32 and ext2 partition on the SD, respectively? That's how I did it, then installed X and fluxbox on top of that. Was just about usable with netsurf as the browser  :Razz:

----------


## Fallingwater

> I followed a guide, it was on bento-linux.org...
> 
> I could mess about with my install if you want, get it as close to vanilla as possible and clonezilla + upload it to my server for you?


Wow, thanks, but I don't yet have one of these... I'm thinking of getting one because I love cheap Linux-running devices, but I'm still trying to figure out what netbook can run what OS...

X-Windows: by USB you mean their internal memory is in fact a USB mass storage device? While the NAND netbooks just have a normal flash memory drive?

----------


## Joe of loath

No need for me to mes around with mine, looks like someone mirrored the files  :Very Happy:  http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...505_linux/1.0/

----------


## X-Windows

> Can you boot from SD just by extracting the fatpart and extpart to a fat32 and ext2 partition on the SD, respectively? That's how I did it, then installed X and fluxbox on top of that. Was just about usable with netsurf as the browser


With mine, every time I tried to use a double partition SD card it would fail to see the ext partition. The only way I could get it to work was by installing from a single fat32 partition.

FallingWaters: Yes, I believe that is how these devices are made, I couldn't see a usb card when I took mine apart (granted I wasn't looking for it at the time), but if your model has trouble installing any of the debians, try the method gyppe used in my above link. I believe as soon as you get to a useable root terminal you can install whatever you want (although I have no experience with this).

Also, if you are looking for something more supported, I would defiantly go with an eePC. Better hardware support and a good bit speedier than these 7" netbooks (which are about as powerfull as a smartphone).

Joe of Loath: does the sound work on your netbook? Do you know what the sound card is or how to install drivers for it?

----------


## Joe of loath

I never tried the sound under Linux, but AFAIK it's just a slightly messed around AC97. People got it to work, but only using OSS, and it wasn't terribly stable.

Your netbook seemed to have the worst of both worlds. I couldn't install to mine, as I had an internal USB drive, but I could boot from SD card no trouble.

Mine got nuked when I tried to install android. I need to use a serial console to rebuild the uboot, because somehow the android install killed the lcdinit part of the boot sequence. The netbook boots, but the screen is blank.

----------


## X-Windows

Would be great to get sound working on this, would be a decent little device then.

I'm sure you already tried everything but I can upload the script file that boots mine into debian root terminal if you think it might help. Also heard that reinstalling windows can fix the uboot.

----------


## Joe of loath

I can boot Debian, and SSH in fine, but the LCD won't fire up. Installing Windows might work, but it will have to be an unattended install, because I can't see what's going on  :Razz:

----------


## abrasive

> I can boot Debian, and SSH in fine, but the LCD won't fire up. Installing Windows might work, but it will have to be an unattended install, because I can't see what's going on


Try using this kernel instead. It's built from projectgus' tree, with my latest patches - which should make the display work on all 8505 machines, and has a large number of other bugfixes and improvements over the original bento-linux release.

----------


## Fallingwater

How about installing Debian on this netbook or this one (they seem almost the same, except the black Android one can use 32GB SD cards while the other is apparently limited to 16)? Their 350MHz 8650 CPU should be a bit faster than the 8500 netbooks and they have twice the RAM (256MB).

Also, if I were to install Android instead, is there a limit to what version I can install?

----------


## Joe of loath

Now, they look identical to mine, but the SoC appears to be different. I guess you'd need to have one in front of you to know.

----------


## justsomeguy11

> . i downloaded 2 different files from that link above (thanks again). 1 was the 8505 and the 2nd was the vt8505..the 2nd one has gotten me the progress. i've managed to get it to step 3 of upgrading..which is safe mode. it says upgrade safe mode sucessfull....then it's just hanging..but this is a step forward at least !!! i tried to upgrade it 2 times in a row now but it keeps hanging at the same spot.cheers


 



> Try using this kernel instead. It's built from projectgus' tree, with my latest patches - which should make the display work on all 8505 machines, and has a large number of other bugfixes and improvements over the original bento-linux release.


just wondering if this will work with my sistuation quoted above? no matter what file i've tried to put on my machine it ALWAYS does the exact same thing and freezes at the exact same spot...hopefully this file will work although i have given up all hopes of seeing this machine actually boot up and become useable  :Sad:

----------


## franvalmo

> ok for the mount test.
> ok for the tar (except some badblocks but it gave me the prompt back)
> i shut it down & ... it asks for login & password ... hummmmmm?...


hello, and thanks in advence. I found as answer of my epc minilaptop -just when I try t install linux debian - the flllowing message: ... Can't find extpart.tgz on SD card. I push ENTER and in console I write: 
# ls /dev/mmsblk0*
 /dev/mmcblk0   /dev/mmcblk0p1
then I try to mount ...
# mount /dev/mmcblk0p1 /mnt/sd
mount: mounting /dev/mmcblk0p1 on /mnt/sd failed. Device or resource busy
.. What supposed am I to do? Help and Thanks in advance

----------


## abrasive

> hello, and thanks in advence. I found as answer of my epc minilaptop -just when I try t install linux debian - the flllowing message: ... Can't find extpart.tgz on SD card. I push ENTER and in console I write: 
> # ls /dev/mmsblk0*
>  /dev/mmcblk0   /dev/mmcblk0p1
> then I try to mount ...
> # mount /dev/mmcblk0p1 /mnt/sd
> mount: mounting /dev/mmcblk0p1 on /mnt/sd failed. Device or resource busy
> .. What supposed am I to do? Help and Thanks in advance


It looks like mmcblk0p1 is already mounted... and it can't find 'extpart.tgz' on it! Did you remember to copy that on to the card?

----------


## franvalmo

And Would you be so kind to up this files somwhere else not bento what is down, please, I´ve been looking for that for many days without good result. I 've been looking for information about how to mount linux on wm8505 and in mine not goes as well as I'm expecting. Please up it and notice the link.
franvalmo or email me infosiaco@gmail.com





> hey there. long story short i've been following the thread for a week or  two and recently got a WM8505 (spicy red color), been in touch with  abrasive and some other peoples via the IRC room (  irc://irc.freenode.net/#easypc ) and we've been able to A) figure out an  issue that ships with these devices and B) a way to work around it by  using both an SD card AND a USB stick.
> 
> If you have been trying to  boot debian live via SD card on a WM8505 and have not been able to,  likely by getting a loader that never finishes loading, then  instructions on a temporary easy work around are to follow. The issue  specifically is that the SD reader itself on the motherboard and/or the  kernel mounts the SD card itself in Read Only mode -- which makes it  impossible for Debian to do its ninja magic and get itself running.  Abrasive thought maybe his SD reader was broken, so he performed a  hardware work around, but both myself and another user in IRC have been  able to verify that this is the case. Have no fear! this totally works:
> 
> *How to Live Boot Debian via SD + USB
> 
> *Going  to briefly describe the basic steps required to prepare both an SD card  and a USB flash drive for live booting Debian without installing or  overwriting your nand. Basically, the SD card provides instructions on  what to do and which filesystem to load, and then it loads the debian  filesystem off the USB stick so you can play live. All the packages you  install and changes you make will stick.
> 
> You will need to format  your SD card and USB stick much in the same way you previously did,  difference being SD card holds the script directory and is FAT32 while  the USB stick is EXT2 and holds the Debian filesystem. The following  references fdisk specifications.
> ...

----------


## Joe of loath

What you quoted answers all your questions - it explains what to do, and has working links for the files you need.

----------


## jamespoo

i read around there was an 3.1 android for this device ive put 2.2 on mine but cant find 3.1 i did find a link on mediafire but it was dead

----------


## Joe of loath

3.x are tablet-oriented releases, they won't be great on a netbook like this.

----------


## jamespoo

here is android 2.2 work on my 2.2 just format sd card and copy file to root of sd put in the netbook sd slot turn on install and your done this is the only one that has worked for me all others after install gave me black screen 

http://www.cheap-hack.com/files/wm85...505_V2_mod.zip

----------


## akq

Hey guys,
I have read almost all of posts here, but I still don't know what to do.. I have a 7" netbook with VT8500 - it seems that's the same as in first post. The problem is, when I download any of system mentioned here and prepare SD Card with Fat32 and Script folder, my computer doesn't recognize it while booting and loads Windows CE. I guess that is something wrong with a boot loader, but i don't know how to change or install it - there is no bios nor any setup. Do you know any sites with step by step intructions how to resolve my problem? Or anyone of You know how to help me?

----------


## scu-ba-de-buntu

> Hey guys,
> I have read almost all of posts here, but I still don't know what to do.. I have a 7" netbook with VT8500 - it seems that's the same as in first post. The problem is, when I download any of system mentioned here and prepare SD Card with Fat32 and Script folder, my computer doesn't recognize it while booting and loads Windows CE. I guess that is something wrong with a boot loader, but i don't know how to change or install it - there is no bios nor any setup. Do you know any sites with step by step intructions how to resolve my problem? Or anyone of You know how to help me?


you need to tell the firmware where to pull data from. Try hitting F1 or that zzz/f1 button. its been a while so i don't remember which one gets you to firmware. then there may be a password ztr or something.

----------


## akq

@scu-ba-de-buntu:

I have tried it many times - there is no key that cause any reaction during system boot. My netbook doesn't show any information how to enter firmware setup, Windows CE starts at once. It completely ignores SD card with script folder. Do you have any idea?

----------


## scu-ba-de-buntu

Are you sure it is a VIA? what is its brand/labeling?

You should still be able to write to it with something. You may have to connect something on the inside however.

----------


## jagotu

Hello. I bought one of these (on the box it says "Ez book"). I was playing with it and now it stays on "Loading device drivers...". But if I put some script on SD card and put it into laptop, it does nothing. It just normally tries to boot wince and stays on loading drivers. I don't have any message before wireless book screen appears. No press F1, no machine info, just nothing. Is there any way to fix it?

----------


## Thanitos

Hello everyone. I have been following this topic for a very long time waiting for someone to post a file I could use with my China made mini netbook from ebay, with an ARM WM8505 300 MHz processor and an 800*480 7" screen. I have tried COUNTLESS Linux and Android files but to no avail, I have also lost the Windows CE 6.0 Script folder I have saved. Does anyone have an Android or Linux Script folder to work with my set up and a windows CE file to revert this machine to factory?

----------


## WendyB

I'm almost finished with a new version Gentoo 'distro' which I have tested on a VT8500 BV7.
Other hardware might work, but I have never tested it.

In my version the netbook should at least do something when inserting the SD-card with the scriptcmd directory

If you use my version and end up with a garbled display or stalled boot-process then that's good news: it works (almost). :Wink: 

Here are the former versions for download:
http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/tra...i/DownloadList

passwd for root is 'easypc12'

----------


## Cheetles4

Hey, I'm completely new to the whole Linux thing. I understand basic Linux terms and stuff, but otherwise I'm a complete noob. 

Anyway, the thread is quite interesting because of it's potential applications. I have found a mini netbook that runs android 2.2 native with an 800mhz Via arm 8650. Is there a Linux distro that I can run on it?

I want to know since if I can download a Linux distro there is a possibility to run small games like Starcraft, or quake or even Half Life on the netbook, thus transforming it into a tiny gaming device. I would also like to know if this is possible. Thanks

----------


## justsomeguy11

> I'm almost finished with a new version Gentoo 'distro' which I have tested on a VT8500 BV7.
> Other hardware might work, but I have never tested it.
> 
> In my version the netbook should at least do something when inserting the SD-card with the scriptcmd directory
> 
> If you use my version and end up with a garbled display or stalled boot-process then that's good news: it works (almost).
> 
> Here are the former versions for download:
> http://trac.freya-webtechniek.nl/tra...i/DownloadList
> ...


can you PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE and once more PLEASE do something for the WM8505 as well....lol....i seem to be in the group of people that CANNOT do anything with it ! it always just hangs when trying to load ANYTHING into it. and if i shut it off because of the hanging and it boots back up it just hangs on the logo screen. and boy o boy i've tried EVERY different script out there, and they all do the exact same damn thing......NOTHING...lol....all i can do is sit back and keep watching these sites for someone to finally fix this crazy *** problem ... and no one seems to know why these units won't load the scripts (or whatever the OS is called). of if someone does know i've never been able to get an answer why....so i BEG of you to do a WM8505 as well.lol...i bought the unit from the classifieds for my 5 year old to have her own laptop..but when i got it home and plugged it in all i had was a black screen so i've never even been able to use it..lol...i currently have it ripped apart (which was the only way i was able to find out it was a WM8505) because these chinesse clones are horrible when your trying to find a model # or anything like that..

anyways, thanks for hopefully helpin a dude out !!!! lol

cheers,

----------


## Thanitos

> can you PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE and once more PLEASE do something for the WM8505 as well....lol....i seem to be in the group of people that CANNOT do anything with it ! it always just hangs when trying to load ANYTHING into it. and if i shut it off because of the hanging and it boots back up it just hangs on the logo screen. and boy o boy i've tried EVERY different script out there, and they all do the exact same damn thing......NOTHING...lol....all i can do is sit back and keep watching these sites for someone to finally fix this crazy *** problem ... and no one seems to know why these units won't load the scripts (or whatever the OS is called). of if someone does know i've never been able to get an answer why....so i BEG of you to do a WM8505 as well.lol...i bought the unit from the classifieds for my 5 year old to have her own laptop..but when i got it home and plugged it in all i had was a black screen so i've never even been able to use it..lol...i currently have it ripped apart (which was the only way i was able to find out it was a WM8505) because these chinesse clones are horrible when your trying to find a model # or anything like that..
> 
> anyways, thanks for hopefully helpin a dude out !!!! lol
> 
> cheers,


Not only that but windows CE 6 on these things is just horrible, it just seems like a fat and over sized OS for these things and I would love to get Linux on it because frankly I'm starting to grow on Linux over Windows. 'Sadly Windows looks at his large space capacity shrinking beneeth his feet as Linux slowly consumes all that is Windows.' 

I have tried almost all the methods for the ARM8505 and I just get stuck at installing or booting or what have you. The one that requires Fat 32 and EXT2 just wont find the Extpart.tgz file no matter how I place it on the SD card and in Ubuntu the card gets locked and I need root permission to put anything on and I am not THAT skilled (or skilled at all for that matter) with ubuntu

----------


## jl2

TPB has a torrent for wm8505. I found that via blekko, second page of results, or thereabouts.
https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/601...roid__linux%29
There is also projectgus which, if I remember, has a fair bit on the 8505 netbooks.
I cant help any further than that, because .. mine is 8500.

----------


## deaddonky

I've just came into ownership of_ this_ netbook. However, it seems to be a branded version:

http://www.menqgroup.com/products/pro/E102a.asp 

It has a samsung s3c2450 533mhz, 128mb RAM and 2gb flash.  It has a 10 inch screen, 3 USB ports, microphone and headphone jacks, and an sdcard port.  The Operating system is Windows CE 6.  

I've been following this thread with interest, but there there is much to read. It is my hope that I can boot a working Linux on my machine. However, what would be needed in order for this to happen? Any help on this would be really appreciated.  

Thanks, 
Mark

----------


## vinceCOOK

Hi JL2

This appears to be the only working LINK for getting hold of the "easyPC linux 0.2" operating system for netbooks.

Non of the other links work from this forum.

Also, long google searches and other forums revealed no
way of getting hold of "easyPC linux 0.2"

So thanks for that

Vince.






> TPB has a torrent for wm8505. I found that via blekko, second page of results, or thereabouts.
> https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/601...roid__linux%29
> There is also projectgus which, if I remember, has a fair bit on the 8505 netbooks.
> I cant help any further than that, because .. mine is 8500.

----------


## vinceCOOK

hello

yes. Your link also has the ANGSTROM LINUX operating system
for the wm8050 chip machines. That is real handy.

"mini2440simpleX11GnomeMatchbox-image-mini2440"

(that is the operating system file above....it's a Linux
Operating system)

Vince.

----------


## vinceCOOK

Hello

your link also helps by mentioning "daupara" under Linux
operating systems

I searched that word above and it brings you to the proper
FULL Debian Linux with x11 and fluxbox ....for wm8050 chip
machines.

here is that operating system file for download.

http://www.daupara.de/wm8505_linux/extpart.tgz

Basically, your link shows FOUR versions of linux for these
netbooks. There is infact a FIFTH version now which is free
and is based on Gentoo and works on vt8500 chip machines.

The best Linux for the wm8050 machines is what i have listed
above here.

I wonder if this Debian Linux above will work on wm8650 chip
machines. It's a faster newer chip inside netbooks

Thanks

Vince.

----------


## vinceCOOK

Hello

i have found so much about these netbooks today.

You can now run Android 2.2 Froyo on the wm8050 machine.

This android has full proper flash support in the web browser.

All the details about this android version are at

http://projectgus.com/2010/11/froyo-...for-eken-m001/

it also works on SLATES containing the wm8050 chip.

There are, infact, lots of Debian linux builds for the chinese
slates with wm8050 chips.

Vince.

----------


## Spider-Web

Well, after spending 2 hours scrolling and digging here's interesting link, i guess it was not mentioned before. It installs Debian on arm wmt8505, so with proper will you may make it install Ubuntu as well. Good Luck all

uh oh http://blog.chinaunix.net/space.php?...g&cuid=2367230

----------


## GreatGeak

Hello gents.
I recently purchased one of these fancy little netbooks, and I kind of wanted to join in the fight.

For every OS/Update/flash I attempt, I seem to get an error message like massproduction.bat not found. This appears when the command prompt comes up, before the operating system even loads.

It's frustrating because everything that works for everyone else, does not seem to work for me.

Here's the processing info:
Processor

Processor Type: VIA ARM 32bit CPUProcessor Clock Speed: 266M HzProcessor/Manufacturer: VIAProcessor Model: VIA-ARM 920

----------


## pierreyy

im in desperate need of help!




http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...7#post11412547



please check it out!  thanks in advance!

----------


## nadimvirus

> So it must be an SD card? Can it be a USB Flash Drive?


ple can u help me i cant download this file but i want this file ple help

----------


## nadimvirus

> So it must be an SD card? Can it be a USB Flash Drive?


 sir i m wating 4your reply

----------


## jl2

nadimvirus::
Kid, dwinston91 has not posted for 9 months. So if you want that file, you have to tell us what its name is.

----------


## dervxerox

I've managed to get my netbook to boot linux thanks to WendyB's instructions but as my touchpad is busted (doesn't work in Wince either) I'm unable to test the GUI. How do I persuade my usb mouse to work?

----------


## ghostship

> Hello
> 
> your link also helps by mentioning "daupara" under Linux
> operating systems
> 
> I searched that word above and it brings you to the proper
> FULL Debian Linux with x11 and fluxbox ....for wm8050 chip
> machines.
> 
> ...


Hello everybody,

after hours of work i finally managed to boot this Distribution posted in the Link above.
Now I don't know the Login data. Please could somebody post Login and password?

Thanks to everybody.

----------


## jl2

root/toor
http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/...p?id=4&t_id=27
If that does not work, search for passwordless login, and change /etc/passwd /etc/shadow on the SD card

----------


## dudesky1325

Hey guys, I recently dusted off my mini crap book because while browsing the android maarket on my phone, I found multiple apps that install linux flavors to phones. The requirements match that of our little netbooks so if youre able to install the new 2.2 version that has been made available to us (at bentolinux.org or earlier in this thread) then you should be able to use this app that installs linux inside android. I have yet to try but I will be back as soon as I do, good luck!

----------


## JMichaelAnderson

Just bought a Sylvania Smartbook, SYNET07WICV, after reading the comments below concerning this product and Linux, is there any new news on how to erase windows and replace with ubuntu?

Michael

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Well, after spending 2 hours scrolling and digging here's interesting link, i guess it was not mentioned before. It installs Debian on arm wmt8505, so with proper will you may make it install Ubuntu as well. Good Luck all
> 
> uh oh http://blog.chinaunix.net/space.php?...g&cuid=2367230



I am getting a 404/ not found error on this link. I'm also a bit skeptical about clicking on a blind link to china unix. Lots of malware and hacking over there. No?

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Just bought a Sylvania Smartbook, SYNET07WICV, after reading the comments below concerning this product and Linux, is there any new news on how to erase windows and replace with ubuntu?
> 
> Michael


I haven't succeeded with it yet. I did read an article some time back that claimed the newer versions of Ubuntu would include ARM versions in Ubuntu.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> I haven't succeeded with it yet. I did read an article some time back that claimed the newer versions of Ubuntu would include ARM versions in Ubuntu.


Additional Comment: I was able to load Android 2.2 along the way but there are many icons that don't function. I'm not very impressed or interested in using Android.

Is it possible to take advantage of the Android installation and use it's layout to install Linux over it?

Thanks, OoobuntuRox  :Guitar: 

UPDATE: I found the links below. Some look like they have promising info but they are talking about extracting a tar.z file. I'm lost there. I haven't work with tar files. Can someone try this out and pitch in with the rest of resolving this? They instructions say you can install debian. That may be close enough. Once that is done, maybe ubuntu can be substituted. I am also wondering about a distro called DSL (dam small linux). Maybe that offer a solution too.


http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...ux/1.0/INSTALL

*WM8505 Debian - abrasive <abrasive@axdf.net> april 2010*
How to INSTALL to your WM8505 based netbook: WARNING - this will destroy all user data - no warranty is given as to whether it will work, make your hair catch fire, or melt the screen off your netbook!  1. Create a single, large FAT partition. 2. Extract the 'fatpart.tgz' archive to the partition 3. in the 'script' folder so created, replace 'scriptcmd' with 'scriptcmd.install' 4. copy 'extpart.tgz' into the root  When you are done, there should be 1 folder (script) and 1 file (extpart.tgz) in the root of the SD card. Boot from the card, wait a while. It will ask you to remove the card, at which point it will reboot into your new Debian install!


http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...nux/1.0/README

*WM8505 Debian - abrasive <abrasive@axdf.net> april 2010
*Creating a bootable SD card:     You need at least a 256MB card. 1. Format the card with partitions:     1. FAT (32MB will do)     2. EXT2  (rest of the card) 2. extract fatpart and extpart to the FAT and EXT2 partitions, resp.  Card will boot to a text console, and won't touch any existing install (eg. WinCE).   Handy notes: to reduce console spam on tty1, run dmesg -n 1  to enable wifi, modprobe rt3070sta to disable,     rmmod rt3070sta (see also wi-on and wi-off scripts under 'useful')  sound is untested in this release  the kernel sets the system time from the RTC, but not vice versa; the driver interface is unknown     configure the time with 'date' and use /sbin/wmt-rtc --sys2hw  release includes apt-get, you should set up /etc/apt/sources.list for a local mirror you may wish to mkdir /var/log/apt wpa_supplicant is included also.  mtd(block)7 is a small (~300mb) flash partition; mtd9 is the rest of flash (~1.7gb)  X11 works fine; if you have a large enough card.  apt-get install xserver-xorg-video-fbdev xfonts-base xinit and your favourite wm. the package scripts get the X conf wrong, you need to add:     Driver "fbdev" to the Device section in /etc/X11/xorg.conf (a working xorg.conf is under 'useful')

http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive..._linux/useful/


*MISC links:*

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...cessor-756154/

http://www.armedslack.org/

http://www.armedslack.org/doku.php?id=installation

http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/viewtopic.php?id=4&t_id=193

http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...505_linux/1.0/

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...cessor-703336/


*Updating to include Instructions on extracting Tar files*
*Extracting Tar Files:*

http://www.unix.com/unix-dummies-que...-tar-file.html

in order to extract a tar file use the command

tar - xvf filename

and to zip it give

tar -cvf filename

----------


## iggybeans

I have a friend who has a functioning Debian distro that uses an Android kernel.
He's supposed to send me a copy of his SD card.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> I have a friend who has a functioning Debian distro that uses an Android kernel.
> He's supposed to send me a copy of his SD card.


Is it something you can share? I have the WM8505 not the VT8505. I wonder if it will work.


I have the Bento version working about half way. Bento boots up to the point where it searches for the SD card then just sits there with the progress bar scrolling.

OooBuntuRox  :Guitar:

----------


## jl2

SD card has to be R/W Some of these books are upside down & you have to set it RO WM is another name for VT

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> SD card has to be R/W Some of these books are upside down & you have to set it RO WM is another name for VT


Yeah, the card is W/R and I was sure to leave the lock tab off. I figured that the os would try to write temp files to the sd card. Yes, the card slot is upside down. RO? Are you saying it needs to be locked to avoid disk writes?

Regarding VT vs WM, I am surprised to hear that they are the same. One site I went to made a big deal out of making sure you have the correct image and weather you had VT or WM. It had easylinux listed for VT and Bento Linux listed for WM. I opened the CMD file and I am wondering if the reason it doesn't boot is because the search path isn't set correctly. I'm not sure how to verify what my actual SD device path is though. I think it may be flash3 or similar. even if it is, I'm not sure how to update linux. Do I have to do a built as part of any updates? Or, can I update the cmd file like DOS autoexec.bat and config files?

It seems that most people have there sd boot cards working about 50 to 75% of the way. 

have to go. OooBuntuRox,  :Guitar: 

So what do you say Iggybeans. any chance you can share that working image of the sd card?

----------


## jl2

Some boards have a bug, and  you have to set your SD card RO to make it RW...
Also, if you crash or poweroff you might need to run e2fsck on the card (sda2) before it will boot. That sounds like what is happening to you.

If you want droid, try modroid if you can find it. It was on Megaupload. 

The problem is not Via or WonderMedia, the problem re easy & bento is the CPU .
When it boots, and you are on the net, apt-get update followed by apt-get upgrade It is debian. Expect the first upgrade to be biggish.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Some boards have a bug, and  you have to set your SD card RO to make it RW...
> Also, if you crash or poweroff you might need to run e2fsck on the card (sda2) before it will boot. That sounds like what is happening to you.
> 
> If you want droid, try modroid if you can find it. It was on Megaupload. 
> 
> The problem is not Via or WonderMedia, the problem re easy & bento is the CPU .
> When it boots, and you are on the net, apt-get update followed by apt-get upgrade It is debian. Expect the first upgrade to be biggish.


Thanks for your help.

I looked into modroid. people are complaining that it knocks out the wifi. I don't want to loose wifi. It also seems that an 8605 and 8705 have been released since this 8505 So its getting harder to find people devoted to working on them. a few sites are now closed and simply say "DON'T BUY ONE".

I came across an interesting site called: http://www.yourwarrantyisvoid.com

It has a section on the hardware internals. I'm going to ad the links to the long list that I have gathered so far. When I get it all figured out,  hope to edit and drop the extraneous information.

Regarding bento Linux, There may be a few things with the SD card I am using.  I partitioned an 8gb SD card with a few 2 GB partitions. I may drop to a smaller card to see if it helps. Each time the card hangs, I do a full format and set t up again. I may have a swap area on it. I have since heard that can cause problems. So I have to remove it if it's there. But the configuartion of linux I am using may be affecting the image too. I am going to try a different Linux box (basic, no security, etc) and start from scratch. 

Thanks, OooBuntuRox  :Guitar:

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> Additional Comment: I was able to load Android 2.2 along the way but there are many icons that don't function. I'm not very impressed or interested in using Android.
> 
> Is it possible to take advantage of the Android installation and use it's layout to install Linux over it?
> 
> Thanks, OoobuntuRox 
> 
> UPDATE: I found the links below. Some look like they have promising info but they are talking about extracting a tar.z file. I'm lost there. I haven't work with tar files. Can someone try this out and pitch in with the rest of resolving this? They instructions say you can install debian. That may be close enough. Once that is done, maybe ubuntu can be substituted. I am also wondering about a distro called DSL (dam small linux). Maybe that offer a solution too.
> 
> 
> ...



*Updating to include links to hardware information and more Bento Linux info:

Interesting articles from a site called: your warranty is void .com

Hardware Inside the box! :* 
http://www.yourwarrantyisvoid.com/20...book-from-cvs/
*
Comments on Windows CE or Linux:* 
http://www.yourwarrantyisvoid.com/20...ook-revisited/

OooBuntuRox,  :Guitar: 

Update: I think my problem is that I am incorrectly or unsuccessfully extracting my compressed files. I am getting the script folder in the fat partition without trouble but I am using windows7 and 7Zip (or P7Zip) to do that. When I use Linux to extract my ext files I am getting an error. I think it is due to file permissions. I keep getting an error. The files appear to extract but I don't think they are writing to the disk correctly. There are error messages with each file.

----------


## jl2

"Dont buy one" is good advice. I got a Tosh TE2100 for a lot (75%) less. However there is the thrill of the chase to consider.
Make 2 directories, one 30 or 40MB fat, the other a big linux, ext2 or 3 or 4, does not matter.
unpack the fatpart, copy the extpart (I hope my recall is correct) into/onto the small FAT dir.
Insert into SD slot. power on. away you go.
If you get your script dir, then things are working up to that point.
That way you do not risk your UBOOT or anything else inside the WM rom. 
Then install whatever you need. stay away from gnome. It will cripple  your netbook. That leaves openbox & lxde & icewm & jwm. wicd  for your network. and disable syslog.  your other friend is mc
** I am using a modroid wifi driver in my Abrasive-Debian install ** It  works so I dont know what they are talking about. ** i just checked on a  modroid netbook, and wifi works **
Sound crashes the system. I even try a usb sound dongle, still crashes. Apart from that, it works.
To extract a tar file tar -xf tarfile.tar  To uncompress it add z,j, or J  depending on how it was compressed.  tar -zxf tarfile..gz :: -jxf  tarfile.bz2  :: -Jxf tarfile.xz
What sort of error? like no space left on device? or permission  denied???? no space means you are on sda1, not sda2. permission meas you  have to be root.

----------


## jl2

you have to be root otherwise you get permission denied, or operation not permitted when you do tar -zxf extpart.tgz
in fact i remember now, root is necessary to give the correct permisisons to the files. Otherwise it will not work.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> These things suck


 :Very Happy:  Yup. I thought there would be hardware hacks to stack memory, etc. A year later, Nope!  Still a paperweight. I like the size and the weight. I got it to work  fine with CE6 (stock OS). Well, fine as far as connecting o wifi,  checking email. But it is a dog for browsing the net, youtubing, etc.

Like Tim Taylors son (of tool-time) used to say: You might as well throw  it up against the wall now and save yourself a lot of headaches.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> you have to be root otherwise you get permission denied, or operation not permitted when you do tar -zxf extpart.tgz
> in fact i remember now, root is necessary to give the correct permisisons to the files. Otherwise it will not work.


I was trying to extract it using the gui. I looked for an as admin option. I was avoiding the command line because I knew I'd screw up the path. Is there an easy way to sudo in the gui?

Also Ubuntu has encryption installed. I wasn't sure if that might be affecting it.

----------


## OooBuntuRox

> "Dont buy one" is good advice. I got a Tosh TE2100 for a lot (75%) less.


I know. I got a used lappy for $25. Its the weight and no spinning hd platters that I like on the smartbook. Flip it any which way you want while using the smartbook.

However there is the thrill of the chase to consider.

Thats about what it boils down to. I thought I'd learn or gain something from it. Aside from learning patience, I haven't learned much from it.

Make 2 directories, one 30 or 40MB fat, the other a big linux, ext2 or 3 or 4, does not matter.

directories or partitions? I think you mean partitions. Thanks. I may have given up on it. A lot of people put them back to stock from what I see. I wouldn't have mind android on it if you could work with it easier. A lot of icons were locked to the desktop and didn't work either.

unpack the fatpart, copy the extpart (I hope my recall is correct) into/onto the small FAT dir.
Insert into SD slot. power on. away you go.
If you get your script dir, then things are working up to that point.
That way you do not risk your UBOOT or anything else inside the WM rom. 
Then install whatever you need. stay away from gnome.

...less and less reason for me to pursue this..

It will cripple  your netbook. That leaves openbox & lxde & icewm & jwm. wicd  for your network. and disable syslog.  your other friend is mc
** I am using a modroid wifi driver in my Abrasive-Debian install ** It  works so I dont know what they are talking about. ** i just checked on a  modroid netbook, and wifi works **

...beyond my current abilities. I wouldn't know where to begin.

Sound crashes the system. I even try a usb sound dongle, still crashes. Apart from that, it works.
To extract a tar file tar -xf tarfile.tar  To uncompress it add z,j, or J  depending on how it was compressed.  tar -zxf tarfile..gz :: -jxf  tarfile.bz2  :: -Jxf tarfile.xz
What sort of error? like no space left on device? or permission  denied???? no space means you are on sda1, not sda2. permission meas you  have to be root.

I think it was probably permissions or similar. I was extracting them with the gui on one box, ten copying the files to the sd card. But I am certain the errors occurred during the extract. I went back and looked/ tried it several times.

Now I see there is an WM8650 out there. And one of these Sylvanias that comes stock with Android on it.

I may come back to it at a later time... or just get something different that is still light. I played with pandigital, then got rid of it. I may have settled on a netbook for now.

Thanks everyone. OooBuntuRox  :Guitar:

----------


## nick1221

Is there an operating system that would work on my computer with a WM8505 processer? A link to the download with instructions would be perfect. Because I can't seem to find one.

----------


## karamel4e

Hello,

 :Wave:   My first post. I have one of these netbooks - Jay Tech UMPC 9901 with WinCE installed. Following the instructions in this threat I am trying to put some other OS on it. I decided to start with the live Debian (not to break the windows for now). I managed to start it with an SD card only (not the USB). It is working fine. It drops me to the "wiliam" prompt. What I'd like to do now is install X11. Unfortunately, I do not know how to configure the network adapters in CLI. I've done this once or twice in ubuntu previously but most of the commands are "command not found". Not sure what to do now. In this threat, it is said to use "modprobe rt3070sta" to enable wifi. When I write this I get no error message. 

In other words, could you please tell me how to connect to internet?

 Thanks

----------


## sdse78

> Is there an operating system that would work on my computer with a WM8505 processer? A link to the download with instructions would be perfect. Because I can't seem to find one.


I'm looking for the same thing myself. Abrasive if you're still on the forum could you please offer up some help. 

I found your files here. http://projectgus.com/files/abrasive...505_linux/1.0/

However, when I format my SD card FAT it seems it cannot be found.

I get this message "Can't find extpart.tgz on SD card!"

It's there so what is the problem? Why can't it read the file?

----------


## jl2

http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/...t_id=12&page=1
search wondermedia abarasive
you have to be root.
my card has a small fat part, with a script directory, and a big ext part which has the OS . i also have a swap part, and another ext part for keeping some files which might be useful in the future, if we have a big flash crash.

----------


## sdse78

> http://devio.us/~nextvolume/via_arm/...t_id=12&page=1
> search wondermedia abarasive
> you have to be root.
> my card has a small fat part, with a script directory, and a big ext part which has the OS . i also have a swap part, and another ext part for keeping some files which might be useful in the future, if we have a big flash crash.


Hi! Thanks so much for posting. Everything I try doesn't seem to work. Did you get it to work for yourself? If so, can you tell me how you did it minus abrasive's method. I've tried his and it does not work. I'm almost thinking it's not possible for it to work on my machine.  :Shocked: 

I have a red Sylvania Smartbook.

http://www.sylvaniacomputers.com/pro...?id_product=41

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## xorgnak

I have one, and it's currently running abrasive debian.  I use it without X11, but it's apparently possible.  There are a few issues to be dealt with, but it's great.  It's small enough to almost fit in my pocket, and with aplay or cmus it makes an excellent mp3 player.  I recommend one to anyone.  And honestly, I'd be happy to have the community.

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## HiRez_L

If anyone is still interested in these, Newegg has them on sale for 30 bucks.  I'm thinking of picking one up, so I can work on debian on it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...Tpk=synet07526

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