How would you deal with the BenQ s6?
 

Well I mean other than using it as a parking block or door stop.

Yeah I fell in for the BenQ s6 2Gb 512 ram and with the limited information I have been able to aquire on the internet I thought it best to see what you folks might think would be the best way to make this a functioning mobile computing unit.

I sold myself on the idea that the BenQ could make for a nice back up unit to my cell phone and GPS when out on my motorcycle being much more compact than my Dell mini 10.

It is the typical BenQ s6, Euro charging I adapted to U.S. U-ground power supply for charging, no signs of the 3 axial G sensor, Alice mobile decal, Alice moble browser, won't load a browser, won't update....

So what I have been able to do so far is send a text to my phone, it looks as though it connects with my wireless routers and bluetooth from my phone. It will play music from micro sd as well as from interior memory. There are picture on it that load, all the buttons seem to function correctly.

My thoughts are, if I'm able to load a functioning browser and maybe GPS functions I'm good to go for a ride with the little BenQ, GPS isn't a must but would be nice and I'm fairly sure it has no GPS hardware inside. If there is another Linux based OS that will function well with the BenQ I'd give a run at installing it.

Maybe I should exlain I'm not all that computer savy and do have limited resources at hand. I do have an 8Gb flash drive, mini A to female USB cable, USB A to mini A cable so maybe I have what is needed to either load a funtioning browser or a better OS on the BenQ s6?

Already answering myself as I just found Ubuntu MID 8.04.1 and have downloaded it. I have also seen the 8.10 and new beta version.
A little more research before I go ahead and install one of them is planned.

Edit: Research says not a good idea!

Ubuntu 8.04 and 8.10 are VERY OLD
and unsupported

the current version of Ubuntu is 12.10

8 is 4 major versions " out of date"

I learned this just after I downloaded it and than watched a youtube BenQ s6 fail.

I'm looking into MeeGo now.

Making a bootable SD card has been beyound me so far so, would there be a string of terminal text anyone would know for this process? I have tried a few utilities and may still put Mandriva on my desk top for Mandriva Seed for this process.

The SD card boot seems the way so I can utilize a USB keyboard in the USB port during installation. This came by way of the MeeGo web site.

I have narrowed my potential options down to either MeeGO tablet 1.2 as a stand alone OS or Joli OS or maybe Jolicloud.

MeeGo has me wondering how internet connection may go as well as the touch screen kinda being a toss up 50/50 thing, capacitive or resistive, I don't know yet. Besides this the unpackaged size of the OS could be too much for the BenQ.

Being Joli is internet based (at least the cloud vesion anyway) it could be the wiser of the two I feel as it seems this may allow for the browser I'm looking for as well as a lot of apps all by way of the net. As well it may not hog resources like a full on OS would.

It does look as though internet functions are work although hard for me to confirm without a doubt with no working browser. This is my next test as I'll set up the email options and see if I can email myself.

I do know that the bluetooth is working because I sent a text to my phone by way of bluetooth.

My USB keyboard works through the benQs USB port as well.

No input yet? No experiences with the BenQ s6 to share? You know what people think of others that talk to themselves, right? LOL!

you might have a look at the install instructions for Backtrack 5
BUT i would NOT put that os on a handheld !!!
-- just do not do the "full disk encryption "
http://www.infosecramblings.com/back...sk-encryption/

and yes it is rather technical

a sd should be able to replace a usb thumb drive

have you looked at using the community version of "Android"
" CyanogenMod "
http://www.cyanogenmod.org/

Thanks for the reply!
Nice to have a couple more options to work with! Is the " CyanogenMod " another potential option or a sig line you use?

Android has crossed my mind although I don't know if Adroid and Linux interface at all. I'm with the idea Android is Windohs based but that would just be a guess.

My Nokia E5 phone is one of the few reason I still have Windohs on my desk top, well that and Garmin products really about some up the whole. If I were able to do away with Windohs completely it wouldn't hurt my feelings at all!

It doesn't look as though that was a sig line after all. :doh:

I haven't gone too deep into the research yet although the View Sonic G Tablet Mod looks like a contender.

Thanks!

it's Atom based, x86 - http://bodhilinux.com may do (it's Ubuntu based): http://forums.bodhilinux.com/index.p.../7172-benq-s6/

Thank you,
That answered the Nvidia question running around in my head! So we have a new top contender that I had passed by and didn't pay enough attention to. :)

Maybe Bodhi isn't the answer.

I have been toying with Bodhi for just a few minutes in Virtual Box and the unloaded package uses 8.6 Gb. Just a tad chubby for a 2Gb hard drive I'd think.

Originally I thought I could delete a bunch of files and such through Virtual Box, then create an image and by way of Unetbootin create a live SD of that image to boot onto the BenQ but I'm not sure there would be enough system left to do much of anything.

I'll see if I can knock it down to size but my guess is the work will be pointless.

You are correct, it is a Z500 Intel Atom cpu with 512Mb of DDR2 ram. It runs at about 800Mhz and can be clocked up to 1.2 Ghz if I remember correctly.

it don't seem possible: a few days in the past, I've successfully installed it in a VM with 3GB of disk (the http://www.bodhilinux.com/about_bodhi.php says "The minimum requirements to run Bodhi Linux are only: 300+MHz CPU, 128MB RAM, and 2.5GB hard drive space!", and the forum link I've posted, http://forums.bodhilinux.com/index.p.../7172-benq-s6/, states "The default install uses around 1.4 GB in space.")

Okay, I was pretty tired when I seen 8.6 Gb on the monitor and it could have been the partition I was working in too.
I'm sure your thread/post will clarify a lot for me.

Thank you!

:Edit
Kinda hard to follow you over on the other forum although I did read others have installed Bodhi on lesser systems.

This is all very new to me and I'm likely to have a few bumps in the road along the way. Hardly worth the $60 I paid for the BenQ but it could end up being a cool little unit eventually if it would ever function correctly.

Edit:2
I can't seem to get my BenQ to install the Bodhi. What's the trick?

Edit:3
I think I got it this time, I wasn't creating my Sd correctly I guess.
Edit:4
I still botched SD card but Bodhi looks like a no go so far, I did only run it off of the Sd card by way of dumb luck, maybe good, maybe bad?
No wifi that I can see
No calibration of touch screen that I had seen, may have just found the calibration though.
Didn't see any blue tooth configuration
The wifi problem may have been something I had read of and had forgotten.
I can change the date on the BenQ with Bodhi but can't change the time settings.
No button functions as well.

I guess I'll give MeeGo a run and see how it goes.

good luck (it's the maximum I can help now :P)

* post the results here, I'm interested: short before this, I was considering to buy a S6 :)

I never got MeeGo installed and just got an email from the retailer offering to take this thing back so before I make myself nuts I'm sending the BenQ back.

It was opened before I had seen the product, flopping around in the box when I took the package from the mail person. I managed to pull up some data logs from 12/24/2012 which were the last so my guess is this was a Xmas gift that was never given and has been returned at least once before.

This BenQ would have worked for me would I have been able to change the default browser but it was locked down to be a money whore from the start. The default home page was an Italian site that no longer exists.

The office applications, when they would load took forever to do so and wouldn't have been very user friendly with no physical keyboard. If I would to have been able to make the BenQ functional I would have purchased a silicone keyboard as I have a male Mini USB A to USB A female adapter.

Granted the BenQ s6 is a lot cheaper than most touch screen phones that will do more but with what I have seen of the BenQ s6 I'd spend the extra on a good phone and not waste your time with the BenQ s6.