Elonex ONE and ONEt software comparison

I'm gradually working my way through various tests on my Elonex ONEt (evenings and weekends) and putting the results up on the "Software Comparison" page.

Some things are good, others not so good.

For example, the ONEt works well in combination with my old still camera - which is 3.2 megapixels and stores photos on an SD card - the SD card slot on the ONEt works fine and I can view my photos nicely and show slideshows to the family - fine for showing off my photos to someone who doesn't have a computer. The ONEt Media Player also plays the 320 by 240 pixel movies (QuickTime .MOV file type) that the still camera records quite well.

But, it's not up to playing the 640 by 480 pixel .MPG video files I can get off my video camera.

Printer setup turned out to be relatively easy, just fire up the CUPS Printer Manager, select "Add Printer" - from the "Devices" drop down menu select the Network Printer on my home network that CUPS had already identified (it told me its IP address and name in case I had more than 1 network printer) - the tricky bit was selecting the driver on the next screen - it turns out that oldest is best, selecting an "old" HP Deskjet driver for my "new" HP Officejet worked fine - adjust the parameters for A4 paper and 600 dpi (the best the driver would do) and we're away with something usable at least.

One disappointment is that there's no Samba Client (network browser) so I can't copy files from the shared drives on other PCs on my home network - I can see this being a problem in a classroom situation where the teacher has the project work stored on a shared drive on the teacher's PC and students are supposed to copy the start files from the shared drive and put results back there when they have finished. The original Elonex ONE manual clearly shows a Network browser in action...

So, the ONE does definitely have more/better/newer software than the ONEt (except for the Internet Browser where Saramao is more cut-down than Bon Echo) - the ONE has Java, Network browsing (as we've just said), built-in games, a younger child's drawing package, built-in programming software, better WiFi support (according to reports, though neither is perfect) - but the ONE is heavier and the attempt to produce a tablet PC means the ONE has to have a supporting strut to hold the screen up and the tablet support software is obviously not perfect from comments on our email group - as usual, you take your pick and decide which combination is best for you...

Ed

xterm, root and games on the Elonex ONEt

In case you missed my earlier aside, there's xterm, a patch to give access to root, three games, a Contact Manager and a text editor at: http://www.littlelinuxlaptop.com/software.htm with the hope of more to follow

"grumpyoldman64" has told us about a WiFi patch at: http://www.maplin.co.uk/media/A98HX_WiFi_Patch.zip which improved his signal level and a Dutch based group discussing the software in detail: http://projects.kwaak.net/twiki/bin/view/Epc700/WebHome

Though there is a hint at: http://www.elonex.co.uk/support/products/lnxonet.shtm that one of the 4 automatic software updates is that missing WiFi patch - and the fact that automatic updates appear to work suggests that you don't need Little Linux Laptop's automatic update patch.

The Elonex Support page also includes a link to the manual and to the relevant restore images for the ONEt and ONEt+ - which I suspect are more up to date than the Trendtac EPC700 image offered at the Little Linux Laptop site.

And, as you gathered it looks like deliveries of the ONEt and ONEt+ have started and support pages have appeared.

The ONEunion hasn't appeared yet (and schools did start back a fortnight ago here in Scotland) and my personal ONEt hasn't arrived yet, but it does look as if we are making progress.