Muppy Questions

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nap44
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Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

Muppy Questions

#1 Post by nap44 »

Just downloaded and tested the latest Muppy v083b. Looks like a lot of hard work has gone into this version and many program alternatives are offered (maybe a few too many, but of course the unwanted are easily removed).

The developer is to be commended.

My problems though have not yet been satisfied in this version or indeed any other version of Puppy. Don't know why these problems are not given sufficient airing. It must be a great dis-incentive for users to swap over to Puppy.

Anyway here goes again.

Webcam (QuickCam Express) does not work. Never has in Puppy. Works out of the box in Ubuntu 8.04, so why not in Puppy. What needs to be done to once and for all get it to work? And if a solution is found can't all the Puppy distro developers pick up the fix and include it in their distributions.

It's inexplicably frustrating to download a newer version of Puppy and find nothing has changed with out of the box webcam support.
Tried it in Skype using Muppy Webcam. Opens MPlayer with error 'unable to open /dev/video: function not implemented. Whilst on MPlayer, it won't play a DVD in the drive. Nothing, nix, zilch!!!!! Gxine opens the DVD and plays it ok. Why not MPlayer?

Once again Cups in Muppy does not have latest printer models (eg Canon PixmaMP170 & 180). Ubuntu does. Why I ask. And when I try to add a similar model to my printer Cups asks for a username and password. What are these and why do other versions allow connection to Cups without a password when Muppy does. Don't get it! A proper waste of time! Grrrrr!

And just for tests, tried to install ies4Linux, as it is shown as an option, although I use and prefer Seamonkey and Firefox. Set up went well up to total failure. Connected to the net and proceeded to download various files. Got up to Initializing. Creating Wine prefix. Extracting CAB files.
then
/root/ .ies4Linux/downloads/ie6/EN-US/SCR56EN.CAB: No such file or directory. An error occured when trying to cabextract some files. That's it!
Nothing past this point.

And finally, just to get it off my chest. Installed DVDFabHDDecrypter as a test using Wine. Installed ok but won't recognise my DVD drive. Why? So where to from here.

That's all I've had a chance to try out so far and it's very disappointing. The distro looks like it has great potential and it is obvious that a lot of thought and effort has been input by the developer and nothing should be taken away from his work. But these issues need to be addressed urgently for it to be a day to day usable package.

Maybe I'm just different to the mainstream users. But when I look at a new distro, the very first things I do is to check my internet connection (and full marks to Muppy as it connects out of the box ...hooray), setup my printer in case I require a hard copy to read later on (my memory fails at times), check my WebCam and make sure letter typing and spreadsheet functions work. Additionally, I check to see that I can communicate with my colleagues who mainly use win$. File compatability has to be a given unless all Linux users want to live in a cave.

All the rest is just peripheral stuff to be played with later. These are the basics I believe are fundamental to any distro and they should work out of the box or be easily configured to work without requiring a degree in programming.

If anyone can address these issues in a simple way, it will greatly enhance my likeness for Puppy and perhaps help others who are also grappling with these complexities. For now, I'm back to Ubuntu. Over to you guys!

Cheers :(

disciple
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#2 Post by disciple »

Well I'm glad someone likes Ubuntu, because I found it had too many bugs and things that just don't work.
Webcam... Works out of the box in Ubuntu 8.04, so why not in Puppy
probably either because nobody has wanted to use one in Puppy, or nobody has actually tried to make it work. Maybe someone will look into it with you, but perhaps you could do a little investigation into it. Presumably you've searched the forum? Most people don't use webcams, so if there's something special needed to make it work, someone needs to be the first one to figure it out. The fact that you have it working in Ubuntu should help in figuring it out.
Whilst on MPlayer, it won't play a DVD in the drive.
I haven't used Muppy, but I've used every Mplayer package for Puppy except one, and never had a problem with DVDs. But if you want to be helpful you might want to post more information in another thread.
Once again Cups in Muppy does not have latest printer models
This might not be the problem, but I don't think Puppy includes every Linux printer driver there is, because it would be too much work for Barry. I guess because of the password issue that the latest Muppy is based on 3.01. I think the username is root and the password is woofwoof. That is one of the annoying things that came with Slackware compatibility in Puppy 3.x, which unfortunately seems to have a lot of little problems, particularly with printing. I do not recommend people use 3.x, but other people insist on doing so.

I can't help you with Wine either sorry. This is definitely not the basics though, and I doubt that wine will be a walk in the park any time soon, because we simply don't have enough people using it, and it changes every couple of weeks.
Don't know why these problems are not given sufficient airing. It must be a great dis-incentive for users to swap over to Puppy.
These problems are not given sufficient airing because not enough people have them. We have far less users than a distro like Ubuntu, no capital base, and Barry is the only real developer working on the whole puppy package, with various enthusiasts working on different bits and pieces.
Your DVD problem is unique, or at least restricted to Muppy, which would have a user base that is much smaller again. Standard Puppy does not even use Mplayer, and has no problems with DVD.
Webcams will only work if someone makes them work, so you or someone else might need to volunteer.
Printing is "the basics", but Puppy is intended to be a tiny distro, so I don't think it's too much for someone to download a printer driver themselves if it isn't included in gutenprint. But if the problem is that we need a newer gutenprint, that is different.

Apart from 3.x, Puppy is extremely bug free in my experience, but if you want something that you can assume will just work, you need to use the normal Puppy, not a derivative with substantial additions, such as Muppy, because they don't have enough users to find and fix all the problems.

Out of the box, I consider Puppy 4 (or 2) to "just work" extremely well. It does word processing, spreadsheets, the internet, email, audio playing/tagging/recording/editing, video/DVD playing, embedded video in the browser - practically anything a normal computer user wants to do, short of video recording/editing. And I find it much simpler and much more reliable than Ubuntu. But if you have something that you can't do out of the box in Puppy, you'll either have to help get it working, or go to a distro where someone else has done the work already. Barry can't make Puppy do everything an OS could possibly do, and fit it in 87MB, all by himself, and without even the hardware to test it on.
Over to you!
If anyone can address these issues in a simple way, it will greatly enhance my likeness for Puppy
I guess my point is that some of these are really non-issues for current puppy development. Puppy 4 has no problem with DVDs, doesn't include Wine, and I don't think has the CUPS password problem, leaving us with the issue of printer drivers, and the webcam. But since you have the webcam hardware, you are a good person to make it work.
Hopefully MU will see this post though, as it may lead to some fixes in Muppy.
Do you know a good gtkdialog program? Please post a link here

Classic Puppy quotes

ROOT FOREVER
GTK2 FOREVER

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#3 Post by nap44 »

Thanks disciple for your very comprehensive and practical reply.

I really don't want to appear to criticise Puppy as it is apparent that a lot of hard yakka have been applied to making Puppy what it is. I personally love Puppy, particularly Barry's original, as it does have the basics and as long as that is your need, it is perfect. Not one single version has failed to boot up for me as opposed to many other distros that failed.

I've waited patiently for each new release of Puppy or a variation constructed by the enthusiasts to hopefully plug the gaps that fill my requirements. But each one has fallen short by one of my main requirements that stops me from going totally to Puppy. Perhaps it's too early to expect all things to all men, but I live in hope. I have received excellent help from forum members but it's all terribly confusing to me despite my best attempts to learn and absorb what I can about Linux. That's why, when I installed the latest Ubuntu as a dual boot with Xp and found that it worked out of box, I was elated.

I downloaded quite a number of programs using synaptic via the menus and they all installed and worked flawlessly. No missing dependencies or other spurious messages. Menu items were added in the expected places and the version was fast and stable on my machine. So far no problems.

Skype just worked including my webcam and I was productive immediately. Perhaps I've been lucky or just not encountered any bugs yet, that are peculiar to my requirements.

But I still have a soft spot for Puppy or indeed any variations of it. I admire Barry's outside the box type of thinking, even though I don't understand a lot of what is discussed in the forums. But as you say, Barry can't be abreast of every development out there and be expected to respond to every request. This is where the developers should come to the rescue and ensure that his work is not marginalised. Perhaps you are right in that not enough users require the same functions as me and thus testing is patchy.

But I look at it this way. Linux is the common thread. What works in Linux must be capable of working in virtually every derivation of it. Maybe I'm oversimplifying a complex task but I just wish someone would include in all new releases the most up to date packages available, not just the most up to date Puppy packages. By that, I don't mean untested or experimental packages, just up to date. And I don't mean to pick on Muppy in particular as other distros are equally guilty. My example of Cups printing is one package in question where some new distros are out of date by several releases. Up to date in some but way behind in others.

I'd be very happy to liase with anyone especially the Muppy developer to get my webcam working or a simple way to get the latest Cups installed, but my lack of knowledge may be a hindrance rather than a help. Maybe it would help anyone else with similar problems but who knows, maybe it's just me. I like to think it's not. :lol:

Kind regards

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MU
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#4 Post by MU »

when you start the printer-wizard, it tells you, that you need to enter "root" "woofwoof" as password.
The installed Cups is already more recent than that in Puppy 3.
It is not the very latest though, as it is very problematic to install.
I got this working multilingual with some days of trials, and so will keep it for a while.
In the Muppy-Threads were reports, that some people had to install an older version, to get their printer working:
http://dotpups.de/dotpups/Printing/cups ... l-v0.3.pup

Muppy is the first puplet with some webcam support.
It covers cameras supported by 2 drivers: gspca and pwc.

If your cam is not supported, maybe another module must be added.
I depend here on people providing detailed informations, e.g. what Kernelmodule works, when they use Ubuntu.

DVD:
I added mplayer rc2 to Muppy.
http://dotpups.de/puppy3/dotpups/Multimedia/
(MPlayer-1.0rc2.pet)
Also here, I depend on detailed feedback.
If it fails e.g. for DVDs, you might install another version like rc1, and then report, that this version now works with DVDs.
http://dotpups.de/dotpups/Multimedia/Mplayer-1.0rc1/
Then I could check that, or revert back to rc1, as DVD support is quite important.

ies4linux:
During my tests I once encountered, that a downloaded file was missing.
The next day it worked.
It seems, that the microsoft download-servers were not accessable that day.
If you still have problem with that, I could send you a required file via mail for tests.
I am not allowed to package Muppy with these files due to the License-issues of Microsoft.
Also note, that Internet Explorer runs unstable for me.
It is not intended at all as a replacement for Puppys browsers.
It is only of some kind of sense for webdevelopers, who want to try their sites in IE to check compatibility.
I should add a warning-dialog about this.

Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
Posts: 108
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#5 Post by nap44 »

Hello Mark,

Thanks for your reply. I'll have a play with your suggestions and get back to you.

As I'm a complete novice could you tell me where I must look in Ubuntu to find the information you require about my webcam and how to set it up.

This is the information I've found in Ubuntu although now I can't remember how I found it. I think I just typed:- "lsusb and lsmod | grep videodev" from the terminal on advice form the forum and it returned this:-.

device id of webcam 046d:092f. Logitech, inc Quickcam Express Plus. Video driver is 29440 I gspca

I'll get back to you on the kernel in Ubuntu as I need to reboot the machine I'm using. How do I find this information.

Regards,

MU wrote:
Muppy is the first puplet with some webcam support.
It covers cameras supported by 2 drivers: gspca and pwc.

If your cam is not supported, maybe another module must be added.
I depend here on people providing detailed informations, e.g. what Kernelmodule works, when they use Ubuntu.

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MU
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#6 Post by MU »

device id of webcam 046d:092f. Logitech, inc Quickcam Express Plus. Video driver is 29440 I gspca
So it uses the gspca-module.
Then it should work in Muppy theoretically.

Can you run in a consolewindow please
muppywebcam

Then copy&paste the text that is shown there.
You can select it with the mouse, then MIDDLE-click in the forum-message to paste it.

Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
Posts: 108
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#7 Post by nap44 »

Hi Mark,
This is all that outputs.

# muppywebcam
bash: muppywebcam: command not found
#

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MU
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#8 Post by MU »

sorry, big M :oops:

Muppywebcam
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
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#9 Post by nap44 »

# Muppywebcam
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules

ERROR: Module v4l2_common is in use by videodev
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules

nap44
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#10 Post by nap44 »

Hi Mark,
Just found another prob.
Click Setup->Puppy Package Manager
Click DotPup Webpage
Goes to Cups printers page

Probably just a link problem in code.

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MU
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#11 Post by MU »

ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
that is ok.
ERROR: Module v4l2_common is in use by videodev
That is not ok.

Please type
lsmod
and paste the results here.
Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#12 Post by nap44 »

More on Mplayer.
1. Click MPlayer from menu
2. MPlayer-video large box opens together with a smaller box with controls FF,Play,RW etc
3. In smaller box 00<NO MEDIA OPENED and no speaker volume bars.
4. Right click in larger box and select DVD->Open Disc
5. DVD Drive active briefly.
6. Small box now displays 01<Chapter1 and speaker volume bar full.
7. Click Play
8. Progress bar goes full briefly, larger box increases in size and displays at lower right bottom of screen, then disappears and original two boxes remain.


Next did this.
Menu->Setup->Setup Puppy->Puppy Software Installer
Selected MultiMedia->Open
Selected MPlayer-1.0rc2.pet
Clicked Uninstall. Nothing happened!
Clicked Go and the package was downloaded again I think from the web.
After this was finished, the package icon changed to a yellow box.
Repeated attempt to run MPlayer from the Menu (it was still showing as an option) and it open up again as above (my first paragraph) but this time the theme was different. Going through the same procedure as above just repeated what I've described above.

What I'm trying to do is to uninstall this package as per your advice but no success so far. I don't want to install a previous version (rc1) until I know that the 1.0rc2 has been removed correctly. Am I doing something wrong.

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#13 Post by nap44 »

MU wrote:
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
that is ok.
ERROR: Module v4l2_common is in use by videodev
That is not ok.

Please type
lsmod
and paste the results here.
Mark

# lsmod
Module Size Used by
pwc 84224 0
gspca 683344 0
videodev 27904 2 pwc,gspca
v4l2_common 16896 1 videodev
parport_pc 31716 1
lp 12616 0
parport 35528 2 parport_pc,lp
compat_ioctl32 1408 1 pwc
v4l1_compat 14596 1 videodev
snd_pcm_oss 41888 0
fan 4868 0
thermal 13960 0
processor 23084 1 thermal
battery 10116 0
snd_mixer_oss 16896 1 snd_pcm_oss
usblp 14080 0
sis900 22784 0
mii 5888 1 sis900
snd_intel8x0 33692 0
snd_ac97_codec 101668 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 2304 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 75656 3 snd_pcm_oss,snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec
snd_timer 22020 1 snd_pcm
snd 52068 6 snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_timer
soundcore 7520 1 snd
snd_page_alloc 10120 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
fuse 44052 2
unionfs 83732 1
nls_iso8859_1 4224 4
nls_cp437 5888 4
usbhid 24928 0
usb_storage 83264 3
ehci_hcd 31116 0
ohci_hcd 21252 0
usbcore 127128 8 pwc,gspca,usblp,usbhid,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,ohci_hcd
sr_mod 17188 0
ide_cd 39200 0
cdrom 36768 2 sr_mod,ide_cd
squashfs 47620 1
#

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MU
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#14 Post by MU »

you cannot uninstall it, just overwrite, as it is in the write-protected sfs.
Just install rc1 over rc2.
Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
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#15 Post by nap44 »

ok, I'll give that a try
MU wrote:you cannot uninstall it, just overwrite, as it is in the write-protected sfs.
Just install rc1 over rc2.
Mark

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MU
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#16 Post by MU »

hm strange... I am not sure, why my script does not unload it, here that worked.
I think you must do this:
start the bootmanager from the system-menu.
There, click on the "blacklist module".
Move v4l2_common to the right pane.
Click on "ok" "quit" and reboot.

Now again:
Muppywebcam
lsmod

Is it still listed now?
Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

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MU
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#17 Post by MU »

I just tried Muppys inbuilt mplayer rc2, it plays the StarWars 3 DVD correctly.
Can you play videos with Mplayer?
If not, maybe you had not the correct video-out device selected in the options?

Mark
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=173456#173456]my recommended links[/url]

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#18 Post by nap44 »

What do you mean by the boot manager. Is it menu->shutdown-> then what!
:oops:

Also MPlayer plays *wmv files ok with video and sound.


quote="MU"]hm strange... I am not sure, why my script does not unload it, here that worked.
I think you must do this:
start the bootmanager from the system-menu.
There, click on the "blacklist module".
Move v4l2_common to the right pane.
Click on "ok" "quit" and reboot.

Now again:
Muppywebcam
lsmod

Is it still listed now?
Mark[/quote]

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#19 Post by nap44 »

Hi Mark,
This is what I did. Booted up Puppy Dingo 4 as it is a bit simpler for me to cope with at the moment.

Installed your Muppywebcam-Puppy301 package.
Installed Skype-2.0.0.63 package.

Rebooted
Muppywebcam is in the Multimedia menu but has no icon beside it.
Skype is in the Internet menu under Skype internet telephony.

Ran Skype. Voice test works ok as is. No video is detected.

Found the bootmanager and 4vl2_common on the left and added it to the right as a blacklisted item. Clicked ok and rebooted.
Note, when I checked the 4vl2_common file again in bootmanager, it is listed on BOTH sides of the dialogue box. Is this normal?

In console typed the commands you suggested:
This is the result below.

# Muppywebcam
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module v4l2_common is in use by videodev
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
/usr/local/xawtv/xawtv: error while loading shared libraries: libXxf86dga.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
# lsmod
Module Size Used by
pwc 96256 0
gspca 683344 0
videodev 27904 2 pwc,gspca
v4l2_common 16896 2 pwc,videodev
compat_ioctl32 1408 1 pwc
v4l1_compat 14596 1 videodev
parport_pc 31716 1
lp 12616 0
parport 35528 2 parport_pc,lp
snd_mixer_oss 16896 1
usblp 14080 0
sis900 22784 0
mii 5888 1 sis900
snd_intel8x0 33692 1
snd_ac97_codec 101668 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 2304 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 75656 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec
snd_timer 22020 1 snd_pcm
snd 52068 5 snd_mixer_oss,snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pc m,snd_timer
soundcore 7520 2 snd
snd_page_alloc 10120 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
fuse 44052 0
unionfs 83732 1
nls_iso8859_1 4224 3
nls_cp437 5888 3
usbhid 24928 0
usb_storage 83264 3
ehci_hcd 31116 0
ohci_hcd 21252 0
usbcore 127128 8 pwc,gspca,usblp,usbhid,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,ohci _hcd
sr_mod 17188 0
ide_cd 39200 0
cdrom 36768 2 sr_mod,ide_cd
squashfs 46856 1
#


Mark, I've noticed something strange. When I followed the procedure described above the first time I did it, the 4vl2_common file moved over to the right and I could not see it in the left pane. Also when I typed lsmod in the console, the file 4vl2_common and also the other 4vl1_compat did not show up in the listing. All I've done since is check to see if Skype recognised my webcam and also double checked the blacklisted item. What you see above is the latest test and you can see that the files are back in the list produced by typing Muppywebcam. And also they are again listed in both sides of the blacklisted panes.

Somethings not right I suspect.
What should I do now?

nap44
Posts: 108
Joined: Thu 09 Aug 2007, 01:52

#20 Post by nap44 »

OK,
Just rebooted again and went straight into the console and typed Muppywebcam.
Here's the output:-
# Muppywebcam
ERROR: Module gspca does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module pwc does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module videodev does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module v4l2_common does not exist in /proc/modules
ERROR: Module v4l2_common is in use by videodev
ERROR: Module sn9c102 does not exist in /proc/modules
# /usr/local/xawtv/xawtv: error while loading shared libraries: libXxf86dga.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

lsmod.
Here's the output:-
# lsmod
Module Size Used by
pwc 96256 0
compat_ioctl32 1408 1 pwc
gspca 683344 0
videodev 27904 2 pwc,gspca
v4l2_common 16896 2 pwc,videodev
v4l1_compat 14596 1 videodev
parport_pc 31716 1
lp 12616 0
parport 35528 2 parport_pc,lp
snd_mixer_oss 16896 1
usblp 14080 0
sis900 22784 0
mii 5888 1 sis900
snd_intel8x0 33692 1
snd_ac97_codec 101668 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 2304 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 75656 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec
snd_timer 22020 1 snd_pcm
snd 52068 5 snd_mixer_oss,snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pc m,snd_timer
soundcore 7520 2 snd
snd_page_alloc 10120 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
fuse 44052 0
unionfs 83732 1
nls_iso8859_1 4224 3
nls_cp437 5888 3
usbhid 24928 0
usb_storage 83264 3
ehci_hcd 31116 0
ohci_hcd 21252 0
usbcore 127128 8 pwc,gspca,usblp,usbhid,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,ohci _hcd
sr_mod 17188 0
ide_cd 39200 0
cdrom 36768 2 sr_mod,ide_cd
squashfs 46856 1
#

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