I asked some questions about webcams in Linux a few months ago in this forum and had a few comments, none of which worked. So far, I've managed to get an ov511 type (PC-EYE) to function under SuSE 8.2 (only) with gqcam. Since then, I have failed with an 0x41e (Creative badged) and an 0x506 (3Com badged). Neither of these worked reliably and satisafactorily under 'doze, either, even with the supplied drivers; they were dropped PDQ. Now I see a plethora of requests for help with similar units on many Linux websites, most with nil or minimal response. Huge quantities of webcams containing these sensors seem to have been dumped into the marketplace.
It occurs to me that there were two common 'budget' sensors in the supply chain a year or so ago; these were eagerly packaged by the usual suspects of greedy badgers with hopelessly inadequate support, even under Windows. One of these elements (ov511?) can sometimes be made to function under Linux, but only by the IT fraternity capable of following detailed instructions for console editing, directory entry manipulation and if they are adept with tarballs and the suchlike (ie a tiny minority of putative users). There are quite a few suggestions on a couple of Linux-usb websites, but these still appear to have worked only for a few.
From all of it this, it would seem that there is one sensor type in particular that no-one can make function under Linux and that no-one in the Linux community has been able or willing to get to grips with.
Perhaps - perhaps - a new K3.4 with 2.6 kernel will radically improve USB access? But the camera list also needs updating for generic types and I don't see this happening for obsolute kit. Sadly, the industry seem to have generated another collection of plastic dinosaurs ready for landfill and downstream planet pollution unless someone can persuade a keen Linux coder to accept this very considerable intellectual challenge.....
OG.