Messages

1

General Discussion / Hitachi 6gb Cf -- Anybody Using It With The Z ?

« on: February 12, 2006, 10:56:39 am »

Bought an Hitachi 6GB CF taken out of an Ipod and reformated it as FAT32.
The drive works fine on XP and OSX but when I try to put it into
my C3100 running cacko, it doesn't mount.
Anybody with experience of that ?
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I have some bad news for you, Brice.  Hitachi usually (but not always) cripples iPod microdrives to prevent you from doing that.  They were selling them basically at or just above cost to Apple and other MP-3 player manufacturers and people would take them out and throw the player away or stick a CF card in it because it was cheaper than buying the micro in the store.  As a result, the firmware was recoded to prevent this.  The same is true of Seagate.  No-one's really found a way around this, unfortunately.  I'd try and get my money back if I were you.

2

General Discussion / Pda Pim Apps...

« on: February 01, 2006, 04:33:39 pm »

I have to say I think that asking this question on a Zaurus site will sort of skew the answers.  If you ask most people what they use a Zaurus for, the absolute last thing they'll quote is PIM apps.  If you ask people what they use a Palm or Pocket PC for, they'll be skewed more towards PIM apps than anything.  Zaurus users tend to be Linux people first, attracted towards the Z because it is a Linux device that they can futz around with.  Linux folks, for the most part, seem to be that class of society that likes to tinker with stuff, and it doesn't matter so much if it works right off the bat.  They'll work with it/work around it.  A co-worker of mine owns an SL-5500, and he considers it a toy, not something for serious work.

I personally abandoned the Z because it WASN'T useful as a PIM device.  I would be in a world of hurt without good PIM apps.  Kernel-hacking isn't even a desire for me, much less a need.  On the other hand, I take notes on my Palm, organize my life with it, track my finances.  And yes, management does notice.  So much so, that my boss went out and got a Pocket PC.

3

General Discussion / Who Uses Sl-cxx00 For Serious Work?

« on: January 31, 2006, 03:19:43 pm »

 Unfortunately, for me, the Zaurus wasn't quite ready for serious work in the realm I would need it for.  It's a great device if you live in the server room (serial connection or even wired ethernet into the servers to diagnose problems etc.).  It's a great device if you like/are good at coding.  Unfortunately, if you're talking "out-of-the-box" useful, it's not.  Documents to Go on the Palm platform has left the old Handcom apps far, far behind, and the one company with a modern word-processor on the Zaurus platform really isn't doing very much with it and hasn't seen fit to compliment it with a spreadsheet.  I can get any number of GPS solutions for a Palm that don't require me to futz with creating my own maps following someone's arcane instructions.  In short, I don't miss my Zaurus much at all, since I sold it.  I come back here from time to time, hoping for some miraculous improvement where Openzaurus will suddenly rise to a level where it's actually out-of-the-box great and the developers can actually turn their attention to applications, but that's never really happened and I sort of despair that it ever really will.  The Zaurus, I think, is great for the eternal rebel who wants to go his own way, but if you want it to really, really work, it's just not there yet.

4

For Sale / Wanted / Selling Almost-new Sl-c3000

« on: January 08, 2006, 08:35:33 pm »

Many moons ago, I purchased a Zaurus SL-C860 from Dynamism.  Over the summer (around May), my 860 died and Dynamism jerked me around on the repair/replacement, finally shipping me an SL-C3000 after I went out and bought a Palm Life Drive instead.       To make a long story short, it has sat around for months gathering dust, and now, I'd kind of like to get some money back out of this deal.  So, I'm putting it up for sale on eBay.

Item is at:

http://cm.ebay.com/cm/ck/1065-29296-2357-0...52149356&lk=URL

5

General Discussion / Any Z's With Sdio?

« on: November 29, 2005, 08:41:30 pm »

I use to have a sdio wifi card and i remeber it bieng fairly bad, it also had the common problem of not working after about a month of usage.

besides bluetooth would thier be much benifit from somthing like this?
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I think there would be lots of benefits.  A real SD would mean faster SD read/write if I understand it correctly (so, your SD memory cards will be much faster).  Then, there will be no limitation of 1GB for SD slot (I think that's right).  

I would love to use SD slot for WiFi card instead of CF because it is hard to hold the Z with the CF WiFi sticking out.

You already mentioned bluetooth.
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Sadly, this has been covered elsewhere in the nearly resoundingly negative.  The fellows who have the skill to do this are the Open-Zaurus guys, but as MickeyL has noted on several occasions, they just don't have the time.  They have one really sharp kernel-guy who can write device-driver code, but he has a demanding day-job and they have a lot of uses for him with just keeping the regular kernel working.      So, in the end, we won't see an SDIO stack anytime soon unless somebody volunteers to work on it.

6

General Discussion / 5gb Help

« on: October 17, 2005, 03:49:18 pm »

Is this an OEM or retail packed drive? If it's an OEM or a drive you ripped out of another device, the firmware may not support being used in a PDA.
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OEM,,, but I thought someone had it working???
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No-one from THIS board has managed to make it work.  

7

General Discussion / Help Picking My First Zaurus (ok Went For C760)

« on: October 12, 2005, 11:27:23 am »

Hello All

Sorry if this is in wrong forum but it seemed pretty general to me   

Bit of advice, been looking at getting a Zaurus in some form for a few weeks. I started off looking at a cheap 5500 on ebay which I missed out on due to my inability to tell the time   , I have since looked at and bid on a few others but no luck so far.

Stumbled on this site

http://conics.net/shp/pda/zaurus-sl-c700/index.html

The Used SL Machines seem reasonable but I have a couple of questions.

1. Has anyone bought from these lads ? Getting it shipped to london
2. Which one to buy , or should I carry on looking for a 5500
3. the New SL-C1000 @ $450 USD seems a good price Is this a big improvement over the 8xx 7xx range
4. Is the keyboard on the 1000 and up models a big improvement on the 7xx 8xx
5. What do you think of the prices ?
6. The thickness of the old machines does appeal , as the new ones look a tad chunky.
7. Is the screen quality the same across the range ?

I would list all my requirements for the machine but I cant think of any  justifcation for me buying one (Not that that has ever stopped me) .

The only Zaurus I have had my hands on was the c750 in japan great screen.
 
Current Pda's Treo 650, Tungsten T3, Ipaq H4100 ,Zodiac 2 (x2), psion 3c ,psion revo, psion netbook, psion 5x so apart from my netbook pretty linux free so my need is great   

Cheers For any Help

John
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1. Has anyone bought from these lads ? Getting it shipped to london

If you're in old Londinium, get it from Trisoft.  They're in Europe (Deutschland, if I recall correctly).  Much closer to you.

2. Which one to buy , or should I carry on looking for a 5500

Don't bother getting a 5X00.  All you'll find are factory-refurbs with questionable batteries or used with questionable batteries.  They have limited RAM and limited Flash space anyway.

3. the New SL-C1000 @ $450 USD seems a good price Is this a big improvement over the 8xx 7xx range

If you don't have a lot of bucks to spend, the SL-C1000 is a good deal.  It's got 128 Meg of Flash, 64 of RAM, it's still in production, and it comes with a decent battery.

4. Is the keyboard on the 1000 and up models a big improvement on the 7xx 8xx

Yes.  I owned an 860.  When it fried, the vendor sent me a 3000.  The keyboard is much better.

5. What do you think of the prices ?

Prices for the SL-C series are high outside Japan, but that's the price for getting a cutting-edge device outside of its market area.

6. The thickness of the old machines does appeal , as the new ones look a tad chunky.

There isn't much difference in thickness, especially if you get the extra-large battery for the SL or early SL-C range.  The benefit of the SL-C range is that the screen is protected when it's closed down over the keyboard.

7. Is the screen quality the same across the range ?

No.  Everyone agrees that the SL-C range had generally better screens than the SL's.  The one excpetion is the SL-6000.  This has the largest and best screen of all the Zaurii.  Unfortunately, they're rare as hen's teeth, and if you thought the SL-Cs were "chunky", you'd be in for a shock with the 6000.

Jomo

8

General Discussion / Zaurus C860 Touchscreen Problems, Please Help?

« on: September 24, 2005, 08:22:47 pm »

I'm really disappointed    because my Zaurus's touchscreen doesn't work. The LCD shows the OS and anything else perfectly normally and the backlight and everything work, but I just can't seem to get the touchscreen to register my taps. I totally erased the NAND Flash and reflashed it with Cacko, the original Sharp ROM and X11, none seem to register my taps. When I hold D and M and get into the service menu mode, the screen seems to work, but if I tap on one thing, it seems to be off by about 0.5 inches. I can't seem to find out how to realign the screen or run the "Touch Panel" thing. It just says something and I can't click or type anything. Does anybody know what the problem could be? I'd like any help I can get.

Thanks!
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Have you installed a screen-protector at all?  If so, this may be the problem.  Some screen protectors (ESPECIALLY the adhesive kind) apply too much pressure to the screen, registering as one long click and preventing anything else from registering.

9

5x00 General discussions / Is It Over? Is My Zaurus Dead?

« on: September 03, 2005, 09:01:00 pm »

Hi,
My 5500 is only two mounths old. Now I got all the software I notice that when I take it after a full charge (orange light goes off) I imdiatly get 33% marked in the battrey meter. It then holds for like 15 min - and shuts down.
I use a Wifi connect+ CF card. but even without it I still get only 20 min.
How would one test the battary, or the device?
I bought another battary that jolds 1800 mAh and got similer resaults.
Is it over?
must I RMA the unit?
Niv
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Your 5500 is probably much more than two months old, considering that Sharp stopped making them entirely about three years ago.  Did you buy it off of somebody on eBay or did you get it from an online dealer?  There are companies that are offering "refurbished" units, as I recall.  That means that your battery is probably dead, or close to dead.  The most likely repair option is to buy a new battery from Conics or Trisoft, depending on where you are.  There is a good probability that there are still "new" 5500 batteries lurking around that have never been out of the packaging.  That should get you back up and running.

10

General Discussion / Seagate Microdrive - Not Cf Flash Type

« on: August 31, 2005, 11:26:15 am »

(also I can hear the drive clicking when I start the zaurus)

Does it actually spin up though, I wonder if the drive is trying to draw too much power?


Si
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These drives are "electrically" compatible with a standard CF reader.  The signals are all the same.  Ie. the WILL spin up when you apply electricity.  However, the firmware was purposefully written to restrict access.  The firmware looks to make a handshake with the "approved" device the firmware was written to talk to.  If it doesn't "see" that device, it refuses communications.  Seagate/Hitachi/IBM/Apple got burned when the iPod Minis and several other MP3 players came out.  Seagate and Hitcachi were selling their microdrives for hundreds of dollars more than Apple and the other MP-3 player manufacturers were getting for the whole MP3 player.  Apple in particular, had a hefty discount on their microdrives.  Result, people would buy the player, open it up for the drive and stick a standard 128MB or 512MB CF into the player.  Player still worked and they got the drive.  Seagate and Hitachi changed the firmware to prevent this trick from working.  There are tools floating around that will let you bypass the firmware.  Microsoft did something similar on their original X-Box hard-disks, but Linux tech-heads managed to get around it.  However, I personally don't know where to find them.  The drives are cheap enough now that I don't really see the gain in trying to mod OEM drives to work outside of the players they originally came in.

11

C1000/3x00 General discussions / Sdio/battery Life On The C3k

« on: August 19, 2005, 09:16:34 am »

It doesn't have SDIO capability.

Are you sure? Surprising, since the PXA270 programmer's manual clearly state SDIO capability (chapter 15). Look for it on Intel's site.

Maybe there are few devices and even fewer drivers, but it seems the hardware supports it.
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Yes and no.  EVERY clamshell since the SL-C760 has the internal wiring for SDIO.  However, since nobody's writing SDIO drivers for Linux, this does us a fat lot of good.  There's only one SDIO peripheral that currently has been demo'ed on a Zaurus.  That's C-Guy's SDIO WiFi card.  The driver was buggy and caused problems with standard SD memory cards.  So, if you WANT it to work, you'll have to spend the time to learn to program device drivers, and even then you'll need an Interface Control Drawing to know what you're doing.

12

Angstrom & OpenZaurus / When Is Openzaurus Going To Be Ready?

« on: August 16, 2005, 12:40:21 pm »

If only a normal user knew how much work and dedication creating a project like OZ takes they could truly admire it for what it is instead of complaining about little bugs. This distribution is targeted towards geeks mostley if your not a geek and complain about little bugs that we expect don't use it.

Like people have already said if you want stability stick with the sharp roms or an stable fork of them.
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Oh, believe me, I know, and I always indicate my appreciation when I ask a question on these boards.  Having spent more than a few hours repairing/restoring other folks' computers and generally being Mr. Fix-It on my own time, I understand the Oz/Opie folks' situation.  I also make clothing and leather goods and occasionally turn a wrench or do carpentry.  It's a hobby for me, but I do give my time to other people for help with their decks and their porches and their cars and their kids' halloween costumes.  All I can say to Spam is: "Consider the cost you paid for Oz."  Nothing but a relatively small amount of bandwith (for the download).  They, on the other hand, spent HOURS (weeks and years for the veterans) working on Oz for free.  Oz/Opie is one of the better PDA user interfaces I've seen, and, while there are things I wish it did better, there are things I wished my $500 Palm did better, and Palm/PalmSource rakes in millions a year to do their thing.  So I'd like to take this moment in a rather sordid and un-necessary thread to thank MickeyL, Brian Hurley (if you ARE one of the Oz guys), and all the Oz people for all the stuff they do.  I'd also like to thank LPotter for building Qtopia ROMs and Maslovsky, Stupkid, and Iamasmith for their work on Cacko.

13

Software / Sharp Boot Loader Question

« on: July 18, 2005, 12:42:30 pm »

This is probably a really silly question, but here goes:

I have this brand new SL-C3000...  (Don't ask...)  I'm interested in trying something a little more advanced than just flashing what-ever fork of the Qtopia/Oz family is available at the moment.  I've seen blurbs about people managing to squeeze a lot of more heavy-weight OS's onto their Z's (Debian springs to mind.).  How is this supported in the Boot Loader.  Ie. Are the hooks there for ANYTHING to be booted off the Z's hard-disk, or am I restricted to something that somehow mimics the original Qtopia installation?

Thanks in advance, fellas...

14

For Sale / Wanted / For Sale: Ce-rh1 Remote

« on: July 17, 2005, 08:19:58 pm »

My SL-C860 fried several months ago.  I was given a SL-C3000 as a replacement.  Trouble is, the CE-RH1 remote doesn't work with the newer clamshells.  Therefore, my brand-spanking new, barely-out-of-the-box Zaurus Remote must go.  If you are unfamiliar with the unit, it is an "in-line" remote that plugs into the headphone jack and enables you to use the zaurus as an MP-3 juke-box with the screen turned off.  It does NOT work with the SL-5X00 series, though.  It works strictly with the clamshells up to the SL-C860.  Looking to get about 40 USD for the item.  (Sells at Conics.net for 63.)  I'll ship anywhere in CONUS.  No foreign buyers, please.

Contact me at richsjunkl@msn.com if you're interested.

15

C1000/3x00 General discussions / Sd Wifi

« on: July 04, 2005, 08:21:00 pm »

here you go


21 dollars and mines still works just fine.  c1000 saurus a and sl5500  zaurus.  thninking of getting a second one.


out of the box plug and play

pretec cf card
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Thanks Cresho, but what I'm looking for is an SD wifi card. Need my 4gb microdrive to stay in the CF slot.

Thanks,

gdog
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gdog, I THOUGHT about plunking down the $100+ US for the Sandisk Wifi for the same reason you're thinking about it.  I too own a 4 Gig Hitachi Micro.  I downloaded the C-guy's driver, but didn't have the cajones to buy the 100 dollar card to experiment with, since C-guys will only verify that it works with THEIR card, for obvious reasons.  Additionally, should you ever get sick of the stock ROM (most people do), the C-guys driver doesn't work with any of the ROMs built by the folks on this site (Cacko and Oz).  And, as I said, the C-guys driver was buggy anyways.  What's really needed for the Z (all the wiring is there already on at least the SL-C760 and up), is for somebody in the Open Zaurus crew to write an SDIO stack.  That would, generically, support some of the SDIO cards that are out there.  After that, you'd probably still need a specific driver for the card, but it may be possible to write a generic WiFi driver if the SDIO standard is 'standard' enough.  If MickeyL reads this, the question is: Does the Open Zaurus/Opie/GPE crew have any intention of doing an SDIO stack in the future?  I know you guys are busy just getting basic functionality to work, and Sharp isn't helping at all (especially when they keep coming up with new devices and obsoleting the old ones), but it would be REALLY nice to have true dual-card functionality.  Even being able to use SD storage cards at faster than the old MMC card speeds would be super-nice.