13amp blog

The Asus Eee 901 is a tiny laptop running the latest Intel Atom processor. It has an 8.9″ screen, bluetooth, wi-fi and most of the things you’d find on a regular size laptop. The Linux version (the PC901) will be available in the next week or so with 20Gb of flash memory. The Windows XP version is now available, but with only 12Gb of flash memory.

I’ve pre-ordered the Linux one and can’t wait until it arrives. However, as you can see from this picture on the Asus website, most of them are being held back for models to use in Taiwanese railway stations.

Ever wondered just how popular wi-fi access points are in your area? I took a wardriving trip around Cambridge this morning to find out. I used this hardware:

• Sharp Zaurus SL-C1000
• Planex 802.11b CF card
• Bluetooth dongle
• Bluetooth GPS receiver

For software, my Zaurus runs pdaxrom. I use Kismet to passively scan for wi-fi access points. The device just listens, it doesn’t try to connect to the access points. For each access point, the GPS position is logged. Once back home, the data can be converted into Google Earth format with Kismet-Earth.

On this 30 minute journey I logged 1000 access points (one every two seconds!), about 80% of which were encrypted.

The Zaurus is a PDA made by Sharp and sold only in Japan. I bought mine a few years ago as it’s essentially a tiny Linux-based computer. Above is pictured my mate Dave’s SL-C3200 (with 6Gb Microdrive) and my SL-C1000.

So, why bother with a Zaurus instead of another PDA like the iPaq or Palm? Well, if you want to actually use it as a PDA, don’t bother with a Zaurus. The software supplied by Sharp is rubbish. The strength of the Zaurus is in installing new Operating Systems such as openZaurus, pdaxrom, and angstrom. I use pdaxrom and have an X desktop, and lots of standard unix tools.

I’ll post some of the cool things I’ve done with the Zaurus in a later post. But for now, here’s a video of Dave’s Zaurus with some software he wrote to change channels on his Sky box.

When I moved into my new apartment recently, I decided not to keep ploughing money into British Telecom. I wanted a VOIP (Voice-Over-IP) line with cheap call charges and no line rental.

Skype is the obvious choice but generally requires a Windows PC and some form of noddy USB headset. There’s far better alternatives if you can look beyond PC World!

Enter the Linksys PAP2T Telephone Network Adapter. This tiny box plugs into your router and gives you a phone socket to plug in a real phone (I use my Panasonic DECT phones).

You need an account with a “SIP” provider such as sipgate. They route your phone call across the internet. Free to (some) other VOIP phones and about 2p/min to UK landlines. There’s cheaper alternatives but sipgate is reliable and has good sound quality.

They even provide a local geographic number (the correct area code for your home) so no-one need know your phone is VOIP.

The only problem I had was the person I was talking with could always hear a slight echo on the line. This is because the phone socket on the PAP2T is set up for US, not UK phones, which require a different impedance. Easy fix - in the web configuration just set FXS Port Impedance to 270+750||150nF. The echo will be cured.