Full Support for the Eee 701SD in Linux

If you have read my review of the Asus Eee 701SD, you understand the basics of the machine and the software as it comes out of the box. If you haven't, it might be helpful to read that if you are interested in the size of the machine and some other specifics.

As of the date that I wrote the last article, the Linux community had not added support for the wireless card found onboard in the Eee 701SD. The 701SD was (and still is) a fairly new addition to the world as it was introduced in July of this year. Since it was no new, I didn't expect that it would be fully functional across the board in most Linux distributions. But I knew enough to keep my eyes open for the support to pop up, as it usually does, in short-order.

About a week ago, I found that full support does exist for the 701SD. A member of the community has created a custom kernel to support the 701SD, among other models. When I discovered this, I read the information on the site and it explained that if UbuntuEee was installed on your computer, you might only need to run through the updating process to get the new kernel and, therefore, get your hardware working. Since UbuntuEee was one of the secondary distributions I had tried before, I already had the download and knew the installation process. So I installed UbuntuEee and went through the update process with my fingers crossed.

After all the updates were installed, I watched the wireless icon appear in my task bar. I clicked on it and selected my network, entered my password, and connected immediately. I checked the other hardware to see if it worked. I played music, initiated the webcam, and recorded sound. It all worked! And I was finally running a standard distribution, so the number of applications available to me was greatly expanded.

Now all I had to do was find the right programs for me and get rid of what I didn't need. One of the first things to go was the selection of games. I don't usually play computer games, but when I do, I tend to favor doing so online at places like www.pogo.com. After that, I had the pleasure of installing application after application and evaluating them to see what fit my needs.

One of the first things I did was install BasKet Note Pads - the same note-taking software I ran on my old distro. it worked out so well, I had to keep using it. My nest installation was that of PDFEdit. I need the capability to edit .pdf's because many times I need to share a document that I need to protect. We will see how this one works out. My next find made me ecstatic. I have a large collection of books and have always wanted a way to keep track of them. I may have found the perfect solution with the Alexandria Book Collection Manager. I have high hopes that it will help me keep track of my books and to whom I might have lent them. The only other software of note that I changed was the video player. It came pre-loaded with Totem, which I found out quickly didn't support playing the videos I take with my phone (a Verizon LG enV2). As a matter of fact, it turned out quite difficult to figure out how to get those videos (.3g2) to play in Linux at all. My Linux guru (AKA husband) figured out that you have to be running MPlayer with basically all the codecs available. Then you have to make sure that the program is looking in the right places for the right codecs. That was definitely something I didn't understand. But with his help, I got my computer to play these files with MPlayer. I also loaded ThinkFree Mobile, and am happy using it to write this review. It's compatibility with Microsoft Office is something I cannot attest to yet, as I still have plenty of testing to do to satisfy myself. However, I have not seen any problems yet.

I am extremely happy running a standard Linux distribution that I can customize and use just as well as the version of Xandros that shipped with my 701SD. I have so much more power to do what I want to with my computer and make it fit my needs more closely. Thank goodness for the members of the Linux community that never encounter a problem too big.