Page 1 of 1

Xubuntu 14.04: Hercules Deluxe Webcam

Posted: Sun Aug 14, 2016 7:29 pm
by ^rooker
Friend of mine found an old webcam in his house.
It was originally packed and never used before.
The webcam is called "Hercules Deluxe Webcam".

I'm intending to use it with GNU/Linux Xubuntu 14.04 (64bit).

Unfortunately, Hercules doesn't seem proud enough of its products to give it a proper identifier, like a tech-products usually have. Something like "XX421" or so.
No. It's just "Deluxe Webcam".

Since it doesn't seem to work automatically when I plugged it in, I'll take notes here about what I encountered.

Code: Select all

$ lsusb
Bus 001 Device 009: ID 05a9:4519 OmniVision Technologies, Inc. Webcam Classic
The Ubuntu Wiki entry for the ov51x driver/kernel module describes exactly what my camera looks like:
"This guide has been reported to work with a Hercules Classic Webcam, an el-cheapo webcam incorporating 4LEDs for low lighting usage."
Here's also a test report (in German) - including an image.

Unfortunately, "rastageeks.org" seems to be down (or gone completely). So either there's a mirror for "ov51x-jpeg-1.5.9.tar.gz" - or this is yet another case where damn proprietary thinking forces me to throw away a piece of never used hardware :evil:

Okay. Found a mirror of this file. Hope it works?
https://sourceforge.net/projects/salix- ... v51x-jpeg/

CONCLUSION:
Kernel module written for v2.6 - Makefile won't work on 4.2.x (as is the case on my setup).
Not worth bothering. Will throw this away.

Damn Hercules. Damn OmniVision.
Don't buy their products.


Links: