Pegatron Cape 7
Pegatron Cape 7 net top PC
Bought without an operating system which made it very cheap.
It is a tiny device that can either sit on its own stand, or be clamped to the back of a monitor to leave the desktop free.
It has a bright blue power LED bright enough to illuminate a large room at night.
Specifications
Manufacturer : Pegatron Model . . . : Cape 7 Graphics . . : nVidia Processor . : Intel Atom 230 @ 1.6 GHz (one core or two?) RAM . . . . : 2 Gb (That's 1 Gb on the motherboard and 1 Gb SODIMM.) Hard drive . : 160 Gb FSB . . . . : 533 MHz L1 cache . . : 24 Kb L2 cache . . : 512 Kb
What I have learned
Maximum memory: The 1GB SODIMM can only be replaced with a 2GB SODIMM. With the 1Gb on the motherboard that makes a total of 3Gb.
Linux Mint was installed and runs very well, unless the RAM is exceeded when it runs like a dog.
The original Hitachi 5K320-160 hard drive, model HTS543216L9A300, died after less than two years.
It has an interesting feature in that it will not shut down. When told to do so, it reboots.
It came with an incredibly tiny WiFi USB dongle. It is labelled as a "PEGATRON WL-166N11". I got it working on Windows XP using Mediatek Wireless Utility and an RT2870 driver but Windows says it is a "Ralink RT3070 802.11b/g/n Wireless Lan USB Device" made by Pegatron.
Reviews
Consumer review: PC Advisor 10th June 2010
Technical spec: Eclipse Computers evaluation
Technical spec: Mesh Technology evaluation
Technical review: Hardware Heaven review
Someone else's site with photos of it in use: link
Taking it apart
My apologies for the out-of-focus photos.
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When dismantling the Pegatron Cape 7, you will need to undo the two screws under the flap on the 'front'. They are not easy to get at.
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The ports on the 'back' of a Pegatron Cape 7. Monitor, 4 x USB, network, power, speakers. I have removed two of the six screws and the two thumb screw sockets for the monitor lead. You can see how much smaller it is than a keyboard.
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The top has been released from the Pegatron Cape 7. This is the 'front'. That flap next to the power switch obscures two of the six screws that need to be undone to remove the case.
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This is a Pegatron Cape 7 with the lid removed. On the left is the video socket; it is necessary to remove the two monitor lead thumbscrew sockets to get the lid off.
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To remove the lid of the Pegatron Cape 7, you have to remove 6 screws and the two monitor thumbscrew sockets. Here they are arranged in the base.
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The top has been removed from this Pegatron Cape 7. The hard drive is on the left and the RAM strip bottom right.
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The top has been removed from this Pegatron Cape 7. The hard drive is on the right. The RAM strip has been removed and is to the top left.