Category: Computers

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OLPC – Give One. Got One.

We signed up the first day the OLPC Give One, Get One program started, so today, someone delivered our OLPC XO laptop.

 Hopefully, some fortunate kid on the other end is in possession of the one we gave.

There were only two sheets of paper and three components in the box: the laptop, the battery and AC adapter. I was able to connect the battery but I was stumped on how to open the XO laptop.

Everything is iconic with this computer, so it took me awhile to figure out the illustration – extend the WIFI antennas then unfold the screen. I kept thinking the hinge was a latch.

Now I’ve worked on it for 6 hours trying to get the XO Wifi to work with my Linksys WRT-54G v2 router. I’m using WPA-PSK TKIP, reduced the WPA Shared Key from 24 characters to 8, tried manually configuring the network, installed the official signed build 653, rolled back to build 650, all to no avail.

I’ve tried this, this , this and this, turned off wireless encryption on the router to see if I could connect (I did) – and now I’m slightly frustrated, especially since other people seem to be able to have some success with WPA encryption and the XO.

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Commodore VIC-20

Wired has a photo gallery,”Looking Back at 25 Years of the C64, the Ultimate ’80s Computer“

Commodore VIC-20

My first computer, the Commodore VIC-20, was actually the precursor to the Commodore 64. I remember rushing out to buy the $(US) 299 VIC-20 from a computer store on Lexington Avenue in the 50’s.

The VIC-20 I bought came with 5K RAM and a tape cassette storage device. It was marketed for games that were sold on ROM plug in cartridges, but there was a word processing application and a 300 baud modem. I later upgraded the RAM to a total of 8K and bought the 5.25″floppy disk drive.

Commodore VIC-20

I think I used the VIC-20 with Citibank’s first online banking service, “Direct Access” (or was the first iteration called Home Base?). Kim Moser has put up a few photos of Citibank’s Direct Access brochures. The main thing I remember about it was that at 300 baud (Citibank gave me the modem), I could pretty much read the data that was coming up on the screen as it scrolled. When modems got up to 2400 baud, I couldn’t keep up. A Compuserve and Prodigy membership followed shortly after that.

I passed the VIC-20 on to my mother, when Kenny, (who gave me a lot of stuff) gave me an Apple II+, which I still have. That was the start of my downward experience with computers.

VIC-20 Photo courtesy of cbmeeks and Wikipedia, C64 photo courtesy of Commodore

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Via pc2500, ITX and ATX Form Factors

When I first read about ClubIT’s $59.99 (USD) gOS Developer Kit, I started thinking about applications where I could use it. How can you pass up a $60 ‘puter?

Via pc2500 motherboard and SilverStone SST-LC11S-300 Case

The Via pc2500 motherboard is relatively small – it conforms to the FlexATX form factor which is 9.0 in. x 7.5 in. (221 mm x 191 mm). I first thought the Via board would be a good starting point for a car computer. With a small touchscreen LCD, I could use it for a GPS and an A/V source for music (and video).

As I started looking for cases, there seemed to be a dearth of cases for the FlexATX motherboard. Most FlexATX cases also fit the larger microATX motherboard. (FlexATX is an addendum to the microATX specification). I may have confused the ATX motherboard sizes with the ITX form factor developed by Via Technology.

Form FactorMax. WidthMax. Depth
FlexATX9.0″ (229 mm)7.5″ (191 mm)
microATX9.6″ (244 mm)9.6″ (244 mm)
ATX, full-size12.0″ (305 mm)9.6″ (244 mm)
Mini-ATX11.2″ (284 mm)8.2″ (208 mm)

The ITX form factors are much smaller than the ATX specs:

mini-ITX 6.7″x 6.7″ (170 mm x 170 mm)

Form FactorMax. WidthMax. Depth
nano-ITX4.7″ (120 mm)4.7″ (120 mm)
pico-ITX3.9″ (100 mm)2.8″ (72 mm)
mobile-ITX2.953″ (75 mm)1.772″ (45 mm)

SilverStone LC11 Case

I was unable to find a small FlexATX enclosure that might fit under the seat of a car or inconspicuously in the trunk. Instead I found a Silverstone SST-LC11S-300 for $27.51 (USD) on eBay. For a motherboard that has a maximum power draw of 20 watts, this case is a little overkill. But until I find a suitable enclosure, I have another HTPC.

As for the OS, I tried installing the gOS and received an error, /sbin/modprobe “abnormal exit.” I found several reported bugs in Ubuntu that described the same error that required a kernal fix . Instead, I installed an OEM version of Vista, and have the PC headless at the moment.

(3 December 2007) Doing more research on the abnormal exit during the install of gOS and Ubuntu 7.04 led me to add the boot parameter all_generic_ide after hitting F6 on the boot screen. This problem is discussed in the Ubuntu Forums.

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gOS: The Little Desktop Linux that Came Out of the Blue

The gOS, an Ubuntu-based Linux distribution that is used on the recently released Everex PC, has exploded into popularity. The $199 Everex TC2502, is sold out at Wal-Mart. ClubIT has a $59.99 gOS Developer Kit based on the VIA C7-D processor and the Via PC-2500 motherboard. This is the same processor and motherboard that is used in the Everex TC2502.

Via’s main selling point for this processor and chipset is its Carbon Free Computing Initiative. Via has introduced a new benchmark called the TreeMark Tree Rating. Via emphasizes the lower amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) created in generating the electricity used in computing with the VIA C7-D processor compared to other computing platforms.

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