I installed Lubuntu 20.04 on an old Compaq Presario C700 (C795EL). Everything seems running smoothly but the webcam (built in) isn’t recognized.
If I start Cheese, the led next to the webcam lights up but I get the message No device found. Same on guvcview.
No different outcome also on Skype and Zoom.
There is no option to activate the webcam from the keyboard, I tried to look into it as well but it is simply not possible.
Someone in a different tread also suggested to try to go on a website where a webcam is required as for them somehow did the trick, I had nothing to lose and tried it as well, no results.
I would gladly provide more information but being a basic user, I have no clue which one is relevant (and which command should I use).
@wxl It is built in.
The led goes on whenever I launch Cheese or any other software that is supposed to activate the webcam, and even though I get the message No device found, the led stays on and it turns off only when I shutdown the pc.
I will say if you have nothing in /dev/video, that indicates that the kernel doesn’t recognize the camera. I find that somewhat unlikely, unless there’s a hardware failure.
This is the outcome:
/: Bus 04.Port 1: Dev 1, Class=root_hub, Driver=uhci_hcd/2p, 12M
/: Bus 03.Port 1: Dev 1, Class=root_hub, Driver=uhci_hcd/2p, 12M
|__ Port 1: Dev 2, If 0, Class=Human Interface Device, Driver=usbhid, 1.5M
/: Bus 02.Port 1: Dev 1, Class=root_hub, Driver=uhci_hcd/2p, 12M
/: Bus 01.Port 1: Dev 1, Class=root_hub, Driver=ehci-pci/6p, 480M
There’s a package called v4l-utils that you could install and see if it can come up with anything. v4l2-ctl --list-devices is the command to show related devices once you have it installed.
That said, I’m guessing you won’t find it. You could rifle through dmesg to see if there are any messages related to the camera to get some clues.
That’s indeed bizarre. I am pretty sure that with previous versions it was working, but I cannot swear by it.
If I run v4l2-ctl --list-devices I get the following message:
Cannot open device /dev/video0, exiting.
If the issues cannot be solved, I guess a plugged in webcam should work, right? I might be able to retrieve one.
So first off, it’s not Lubuntu that handles the webcam, at least as far as we define Lubuntu as a particular desktop environment and collection of applications based on core Ubuntu. It’s also not Ubuntu, at least as far as we define Ubuntu as a particular set of basic Linux utilities. What it is is the Linux kernel, which is something core to every Linux distribution. Nearly all distributions carry a full set of modules for a ridiculous array of possible devices and so the idea of bothering with “device drivers” is all but pointless in most cases. Sometimes things need tweaking (rarely), but even if there were problems with loading the “driver” (kernel module in Linux parlance), there would be a device file (e.g. /dev/video0) and with that, the system would report information about the device via those other commands I mentioned.
tl;dr any webcam should just work, USB or not.
…unless it doesn’t work. My personal favorite motto for Linux is “Linux can do amazing things, but it can’t fix broken.”
I’m not sure that is the problem as the kernel doesn’t even seem to detect it. I mean, I guess it could cut all power to it, making it effectively seem unconnected, but that seems unlikely. I have a keyboard light that can be turned on and off with keys, as well as going airplane mode, but regardless of state, the devices are still there.
Unfortunately there’s no such a key on my keyboard. It was of the first things I checked out, but thanks for suggesting it. I’m gonna edit my post so the info is included.
I think my pc is acting quite weirdly. Last night at a certain point I noticed the led light from the camera was off, so I open up cheese and guvcview, and they both kinda acted as they recognized the webcam. No error message showed up, just a black screen. When I closed them the led turned off.
Today I tried again, at first I got this error message from Cheese There was an error playing video from the webcam, then I tried with guvcview but again I got No device found, so just out curiosity I went back to Cheese and it was again No device found there as well, with the led staying on.
I’m not expecting much, but maybe it is somehow a relevant info.
I’m thinking, still, that this sounds like a fundamental problem of electronics. If you can get it to apparently behave again, check out some of those commands we went through before. I bet you’ll come up with something. And then when it dies again, they will go back to not working. At least if you can see that, it should convince you that the problem isn’t the kernel’s ability to handle the webcam.
i) install windows in dual mode with linux in the same computer and check if the camera works. If it works, the camera has no electronic problem and it is only a software problem.
ii) try different ubuntu flavours (ubuntu, kubuntu, Xubuntu, etc…) in live mode to know if the camera problem is only with Lubuntu or the problem is with all the ubuntu ecosystem.
