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I've just installed Debian “Squeeze” and would love it if I could get my webcam up and running. As usual I don't have a faintest idea of what I'm doing in linux - everything is so damn hard.

But I've googled some, and it's a package named pwc that I need to install to get it up and running ( it's Philips drivers but run on my Logitech too if I understand it correctly).

So I head over and do a apt-cache search pwc but the only result is setpwc - program to set and query settings of (mainly) Philips WebCams.

So I reckon I need some help from a guru, how do I install the correct driver for my webcam?

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It's more "unfamiliar" than "hard". – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Jul 1 '12 at 19:47

1 Answer

Have you just "tried it" ? Linux often has the drivers you need already ready & waiting, usually you just need to plug it in.

A simple program to see what the camera's seeing is Cheese. Look for that in your synaptics (or whatever you use to manage your packages).

Plug your camera in.

Start cheese.

SMILE!!

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Cheese does not work either. I got no webcam usb hardware listed up :( – Jason94 Aug 6 '12 at 6:45
Hmmm, "no webcam usb hardware" means the system isn't recognizing your webcam. lsusb should show something relating to the camera, but it does depend on the drivers. The kernel module 'pwc' supports a range of usb prod:vend items, could you post your prod:vend values from the 'lsusb' output? (looks like: 046D:08B1 (as an example)) You could also do tail -f /var/log/syslog and watch the output AS you plug in the camera, it could show some information pertaining to why the camera isn't being seen. – lornix Aug 6 '12 at 21:24

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