There’s a great project to port Android to x86!

They offer a LiveCD that you can try without changing anything on your PC.

Furthermore, you can even install it on your PC/Netbook!
It should already run on e.g. many Netbooks like the Asus EeePC.

I’ve installed it in a VirtualBox under Linux and it runs pretty well.

Some hints:

• The Windows key acts as HOME key
• The Context key (on the right of the right Windows key) acts as MENU key
• ESC acts as BACK key

To keep the settings in a VirtualBox permanently, you need to create two partitions:

• A data partition (500MB should be sufficient)
• A SD card partition (as large as you need)

You need to add the partition identifiers to the boot kernel line, see also:

http://www.android-x86.org/documents/virtualboxhowto

Have fun!

It’s very nice to have internet-everywhere via the internal UMTS G3.5 modem, and this is very easy to accomplish with (Debian) Linux.

I’ve written a small HowTo that describes the necessary steps.

Introduction

As I’ve already described in other blog articles, the Asus EeePC 901 Go is a great piece of hardware, fast and reliable with encrypted disks, and for me the perfect travel companion. Since I own this Netbook, I virtually never carry my old, big Notebook with me when I visit my customers.

Of course I’ve installed Debian Linux (Lenny) on the EeePC, so that I have my familiar desktop environment on the Netbook.

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB

HowTo configure UMTS via the internal UMTS modem

First of all, remove the battery of the Asus EeePC 901 Go and insert the SIM card of your provider into the  SIM slot. Reconnect the battery and startup your Debian system…

Activating the internal UMTS modem is pretty simple:

(You can skip the first steps if you want, they are just to make sure that the drivers are loaded correctly.)

• Make sure the correct kernel driver is loaded:
  • Open a terminal and enter the command:
  • dmesg | grep HUAWEI
  • The output should look like this:
  • [    5.426460] usb 5-6: Manufacturer: HUAWEI Technology
    [    5.417153] usb 5-6: Product: HUAWEI Mobile
• If that works, check if the USB modem is correctly bound:
  • dmesg | grep GSM
  • The output should look like this:
  • [   12.478987] usbserial: USB Serial support registered for GSM modem (1-port)
    [   12.487549] option 5-6:1.0: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
    [   12.496203] usb 5-6: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB0
    [   12.504920] option 5-6:1.1: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
    [   12.513610] usb 5-6: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB1
    [   12.525525] option 5-6:1.2: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
    [   12.534178] usb 5-6: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB2
    [   12.551416] option: USB Driver for GSM modems: v0.7.2
• You can see that the UMTS modem can be accessed via ttyUSB0..2
• Install Gnome-PPP:
  • aptitude install gnome-ppp
• Now, you need to configure Gnome-PPP to access the internet via UMTS:
• Start Gnome-PPP via the menu (Applications / Internet / Gnome-PPP)
• The main window should appear. Most providers do not need any special username/password because the authentication is done via your GSM card:
  • Username: umts (does not matter)
  • Password: umts (does not matter)
  • Phone number: *99**1# (this is important)
• Press “Setup”
• Tab “Modem”:
  • Device: /dev/ttyUSB0
  • Type: USM Modem
  • Speed: 460800
  • Phone Line: Tone
  • Check “Wait for dialtone”
• Click on “Init Strings”:
  • Init 2: AT&F (Reset to defaults)
  • Init 3: AT+CSQ (Show link quality)
  • Init 4: AT+CGDCONT=1,”IP”,”internet.eplus.de”
    (this is the APN AccessPoint)
  • This APN (internet.eplus.de) is correct for
    BASE and Simyo. If you are using another provider, ask him about the correct APN.
  • Close the “Init Strings” window
• Tab “Networking”:
  • Check “Dynamic IP address”
  • Check “Automatic DNS”
• Tab “Options”:
  • Check “Minimize”
  • Check “Dock in notification area”
  • Check “Auto reconnect”
  • Select “Check carrier line”
  • Select “Check default route”
  • Check “Ignore terminal strings (stupid mode)”
• That’s it!
• Close the “Setup” window and click on “Connect”.

Congratulations, you should now have a working internal UMTS connection!

You can distinguish the two models by looking at P/N on the EeePC box or by opening the EeePC and identifying the SSD itself:

• The slow SSD model has this P/N: 90OA0BTI4214AFNE2X2Q, the SSD is labeled “P2-SSD PS Rev. 2.0G”
• The fast SSD model has this P/N: 90OA0BTI8214AFNE2X2Q, the SSD is labeled “S4-SSD JM Rev. 1.1″

I made sure that I got a fast SSD model, but the question arises:

How fast is it?

Today, I found the time to perform some benchmarks of the SSD read/write speed.

For your information, I’m using two partitions with ext3 filesystem.

One partition contains the Linux base system and the programs and is not encrypted. The other partition keeps my data (including my /home) and is encrypted using Linux’s LUKS infrastructure. I’m using AES 256 bit encryption (aes-cbc-essiv:sha256).

For the test, I created a 512MiB testfile using “dd”.
To avoid biased results because of Linux’s extensive file caching, I’ve rebooted the system after the write command, before doing the read speed test.

Unencrypted write test

che@eee:~$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/unencrypted/ssdtest bs=512k count=1k
1024+0 records in
1024+0 records out
536870912 Bytes (537 MB) copied, 22,7062 s, 23,6 MB/s

Unencrypted read test

eee:~$ dd if=/unencrypted/ssdtest of=/dev/null bs=512k
1024+0 records in
1024+0 records out
536870912 Bytes (537 MB) copied, 6,62449 s, 81,0 MB/s

Encrypted write test (aes-cbc-essiv:sha256)

eee:~$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/crypto/ssdtest bs=512k count=1k
1024+0 records in
1024+0 records out
536870912 Bytes (537 MB) copied, 31,3594 s, 17,1 MB/s

Encrypted read test (aes-cbc-essiv:sha256)

eee:~$ dd if=/crypto/ssdtest of=/dev/null bs=512k
1024+0 records in
1024+0 records out
536870912 Bytes (537 MB) copied, 28,2782 s, 19,0 MB/s

Of course, the performance on the encrypted partition is much slower than on the unencrypted partition. Furthermore, the CPU performs at 100% load when encrypting/decrypting, and that leads to a much shorter battery life. Therefore, I think it’s the best trade-off to only encrypt the data and keep the Linux base system unencrypted.

Conclusion

I’m very happy with the overall speed of my system, the slower performance of the encrypted “/home” is not really noticeable under real work conditions.

In this benchmark, there is of course a big difference between the unencrypted (W: 23.6MB/s, R: 81.0MB/s) and the encrypted (W: 17.1MB/s, R: 19.0MB/s) filesystem.

But remember: To have a secure system, it’s very important to move some directories to the encrypted partition, like:

• /home
• /tmp
• /var/tmp (I’ve moved the whole “/var” to the encrypted partition)

And depending on your system setup:

• /srv
• /var/spool
• /var/cache
• /root
• …everything else that you like to protect from thieves

Furthermore, it very important that you either also encrypt your swap partition or do not use a swap partition at all!

I’ve installed 2GB in the EeePC and do not use a swap. Of course, using a LUKS swap partition with a random key would also be secure.

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB

• The EeePC is great!
• The screen is a little bit to dark
• The workmanship could be improved
• Conclusion

The EeePC is great!

It’s (for my purpose) the perfect travel companion with a good tradeoff between size/weight and performance. The battery runs for a long time (5-6 hours).

The screen is a little bit to dark

When using the EeePC outside on sunny days, the screen is a little hard to read because even with 100% brightness, it’s still pretty dark.

The workmanship could be improved

One thing that bothers me is the poor workmanship of the EeePC case. My EeePC is only one month old and I always transport it carefully in a suitable notebook bag. Nevertheless, the case already looks very “used”.

There are some kinds of “micro cracks” in all four corners of the lid cover. I think the glue between the (transparent) top of the lid cover and the (white) main part of the lid did loose a bit and that creates this “micro cracked look”.

Furthermore, the hotkey bar stained the inner side of the lid.

But these small quality problems do not really change my opinion about the EeePC. It’s just a recommendation what could be further improved…

Conclusion

Buying the Asus EeePC 901 Go was one of the best acquisitions in my life!

It’s size, weight, performance, battery life and connections (LAN/WLAN/UMTS) make it the best companion for people who need “real” access to internet (not some kind of semi-internet-access like e.g. an iPhone offers) while travelling around.

I love it!

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB

So, I bought an Indian prepaid SIM card (I’ve choosen Airtel). That was the easy part. With this SIM card I can make calls to Germany for a few rupies (around 10 Rupies=0.15€ per minute).

But getting the GPRS internet access working was a bit more complicated. Airtel SIM cards do not have GPRS activated out-of-the-box.

I searched the web and found many different opinions, how to get this work. But, in fact, none of them worked for me. The guys at the airtel shop also told me something different, also the guys at the Airtel customer care hotline (call 121 to reach them, but be prepared that their English is – uhm – different).

Finally, I found a very easy solution solution. It works great for me is is pretty cheap. They will charge 0.3 Rupies per 50kB without any additional fees. So, one Megabyte will cost 6 Rupies or ~0.10€. That’s ok for me.

Here’s what you need to do to activate GPRS on your Airtel SIM card:

• Dial *567#
• You will receive a message with GPRS options (“1” to activate GPRS, “2” to deactivate)
• Answer to the message with “1” (without the quotes)
• You will receive a message with possible GPRS tariffs (for me, there was only one tariff available: “1” 0.3 Rupies for 50kB)
• Answer to the message with “1” (without the quotes)
• That’s it, you will receive a confirmation message and the GPRS settings for your phone in the next few minutes
• On the laptop, create a dialup connection that uses your mobile phone as modem (via cable, IrDA or Bluetooth) and use “*99***1#” (without the quotes) as phone number, and a any text as username and passwort

As you see, it’s really easy if you know what to do.

For your information, the GPRS access point (AP) for Airtel is “airtelgprs.com“, but normally, you don’t need it, because they will send you the settings for your cell phone by SMS.

PS: I can recommend Airtel for India, they have a good network coverage, even in rural areas, you can recharge your phone on every second corner and the tariffs are pretty cheap.

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB

The installation of Debian (“Lenny”) GNU/Linux was pretty straight forward. There is an EeePC subproject on debian.org, see http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEeePC.

Here’s the summary:

• Download http://eeepc.debian.net/debian/images/debian-eeepc.img
• Insert an USB stick (all data will be erased!) and enter these commands in a terminal:

  dd if=debian-eeepc.img of=/dev/<YOUR-USB-DEVICE>

  sync

• Put the USB stick into the EeePC and power it up
• Press F2 to enter the BIOS
  • Make sure that all hardware components (e.g. WLAN/webcam) are activated, so that the Debian installer installs the appropriate packages
  • Verify the boot order, so that the EeePC will start from the stick
  • Save and exit the Bios
• Connect the EeePC to your LAN if you like to do the installation via wired network
• Reboot the EeePC from the stick and follow the Debian installer instructions

Possible caveats:

• If you abort the installation process in the middle of the installation, your system is (of course) unbootable.
  • If you try to restart your system, you will probably not see the BIOS screen (and hence not be able to restart the installation from the USB stick), but only a black screen with a single line: “Error 2″
  • Don’t panic! (Well, to be honest, I did )
  • Take a small paper clip and put it in the “reset hole” in the bottom of the EeePC (while the EeePC is running), that should reboot the EeePC completly and allow you to restart the installation (it took me some time to find this out)
• If you wake the EeePC up from standby mode, the WLAN may not work, if you press Fn-F2 twice, it will work again, but there is a nicer solution:
  • Create a file /etc/pm/config.d/eeepc with the following line:

    SUSPEND_MODULES="$SUSPEND_MODULES ath_pci"

  • After that change, WLAN is reactivated correctly after waking up from standby mode

Look at the Debian EeePC troubleshooting wiki page for recent problems.

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB

I’m talking about the “ASUS EeePC 901Go 16G Linux”. It’s a small 8.9″ notebook with a 16GB SSD and a G3.5 UMTS modem on-board.

I did tinker with the idea of buying such a companion for a long time now, but did not find the perfect model until now. Either the screen was too small (7″), the overall size was too big (with >= 10″ screen), a very slow processer was inside, the battery life was too short or the notebook had Windows preinstalled (I don’t like to be forced to pay the Microsoft tax)…

I’m using Linux on my “normal” notebook as well as on my desktop PC, so I’d like to have my well-known Linux environment (Debian) on this small gadget, too.

The “ASUS EeePC 901Go 16G Linux” perfectly fits my needs. It’s small, is a piece of solid workmanship, has a 16GB SolidStateDisk (i.e. no moving parts like a harddisk) and a G3.5 UMTS modem included. It ships with Xandros Linux preinstalled, but installing other Linux distributions is easy because the hardware is well supported in the Linux kernel.

The preinstalled Xandros linux has the UMTS APs of T-mobile hard-coded, so you cannot use other UMTS providers without hex-editing some files. But this is a software netlock only, so if you install Windows (why the hell would you like to do this? ) or another Linux, you are free to use any UMTS provider.

Here are the full specs of the EeePC 901 Go:

• Processor: Intel® Atom CPU 1,6 GHz
• RAM: 1GB DDR2 PC5300 S0DIMM (1 slot, max. 2GB)
• Screen: 8.9″, resolution 1024×600
• HDD: 16GB SSD (Solid state disk), MMC/SD/SDHC optional
• Network: 10/100/1000 MBit/s LAN (RJ45)
• WLAN: 802.11 b/g (54Mbit max.)
• Battery: 6 cell / 36 watt (~5 hours real battery life)
• Size: 225 x 175.5 x 22~39 mm
• Weight: ~1.1 kg

	BASE offers an UMTS flatrate for 17.50€
	Simyo offers a prepaid UMTS solution, 24ct/MB or 10€ for 1GB