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Google may add Windows 10 dual-boot option to Chromebooks
Google appears to be working on dual-boot support for Chromebooks. XDA-Developers has discovered that Google has been working to support an "alt OS mode" for its Pixelbook laptop for months now. Dubbed "Campfire," an obvious nod to Apple's own Boot Camp feature, Google's dual-boot is rumored to support Windows 10 on Chromebooks.
XDA-Developers claims Google is attempting to pass Microsoft's hardware certification for Windows 10 to allow its Pixelbook to officially run the alternative operating system. References to Microsoft's Windows Hardware Certification Kit have appeared in development builds of Chrome OS, and Google's Campfire work might extend to other new Chromebooks in the future.
Dual-boot support is said to be arriving on the Pixelbook soon, as Google engineers are pushing through multiple changes for Chrome OS to support the new feature.
That makes Google's recent attack ad a little funnier.
Also at Engadget, The Register, 9to5Google, Tom's Hardware, and CNET.
See also: Why cheap Chromebooks running Windows will benefit Google, not you
Related: ChromeOS Gains the Ability to Run Linux Applications
Google's Fuchsia OS Adds Emulator for Debian Linux Applications
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 14 2018, @08:58AM (5 children)
I may be wrong, but I thoguht ChromeBooks had very little internal storage. Wouldn't polluting a ChromeBook with Windows require more storage (and increase the cost)?
On a side note, those low-end chips that are adequate for CromeOS are going to struggle mightily with all that Windows 10 telemetry data, let alone the whole OS.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday August 14 2018, @09:34AM (1 child)
16-32 GB has been typical for low-end Chromebooks. To meet the minimum Windows 10 requirements (30 GB + 10 GB for ChromeOS), they could boost it to 64 GB. That's not exactly going to break anyone's bank in 2018+. ChromeOS Pixelbooks on the other hand are relatively pricey and come with 128-512 GB of storage.
Low-end Chromebooks have used a mix of chips, with Celerons being common. There's been some improvement in the Celerons over the years. But a high-end Pixelbook comes with a Core i5 or i7.
This feature may be intended for developers so that they can do more on the Chromebook without needing another Windows device. If that's the case, the feature will probably debut on Pixelbooks and some other high-end models first, just like sandboxed Linux applications did [theverge.com]. A rumored upcoming Pixelbook 2 release [digitaltrends.com] could be the time to debut Windows 10 support.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 14 2018, @10:55AM
Hell.... Comparing Google to Microsoft? Kinda like comparing Democrats to Republicans!
I can't trust either one!
Its the same meme as stepping onto a car lot, and the salesman asks I will be taking the blue car or the red car? He could care less which one I take, as long as I buy a car!
To me, the only correct response is "neither". We've got to fix this damned thing before we are ALL held captive to the copyright/electronic-lock boys who will make it impossible to see what they are doing behind our back.
I'm still pissed at Microsoft for that FTDI chip nuker, and at Google for gussying up Android in such a manner I haven't figured out how to root it to get it to stop sending ads to me and killing its own battery in the middle of the night.
Both of these guys have demonstrated a willingness to sacrifice the customer who buys their stuff and takes it home. To me, having either of them around me is like being around someone I flat do not trust, and I have to constantly watch them. I never remember having to watch my old DOS machine like this! It was more like the old washing machine I still have.... it just does what I instruct it to do. Nothing more. Nothing less. I knew what I asked for, and I could walk away knowing when I got back what I was going to get.
Yes, I still have the old DOS machine. Its the only machine I have that I actually trust. I can even leave it connected to the internet, knowing the stuff I coded for it ( from Jeremy Bentham's "TCP/IP Lean") will do what I told it to do, and not run someone else's agenda in the background, detection of presence protected by electronic lock and copyright. Its an old 386SX with a 3COM 3C905 board. So I can code special packets for it that use no published protocol, other than wrappering the payload as required by the routing hardware.
All programmed with C++ and assembler.
I can send the packets to myself from anywhere, then figure out what I got, and if its anything special - one of mine, that is - when I get it. Lets me easily do "port knocking" and things like that to identify myself to my program. This is so I do not come home and find my water sprinklers on because someone else tried to botnet me with a script running on some adserver.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday August 14 2018, @11:15AM (1 child)
I'm pretty sure that the largest storage on any Chromebook is 64 gig. However, you can modify a few of the latest Chromebooks, and install a 240 gig SSD into it. (There is a write prevent for the BIOS that you have to turn off, before installation.) Once that is complete, you can format the drive with any legitimate file system, and install your favorite OS.
This isn't precisely the article that caught my attention, but it seems to cover most of it: https://www.codedonut.com/chromebook/install-full-native-standalone-linux-on-any-chromebook-elementaryos/ [codedonut.com]
NOTE: Early Chromebooks aren't compatible! They are too damned slow, with limited resources. Only a couple of the newest Chromebooks will give you a satisfactory experience running Linux on a "laptop".
(Score: 2) by pdfernhout on Wednesday August 15 2018, @12:42AM
Started with an Acer Chromebook 15" CB5-571.
Upgraded the firmware to avoid boot warning with "press space to erase": https://mrchromebox.tech/ [mrchromebox.tech]
Upgraded with: ZTC 128GB Armor 42mm M.2 NGFF 6G SSD Solid State Drive. Model ZTC-SM201-128G.
Installed GalliumOS. https://galliumos.org/ [galliumos.org]
I'm happy with it. Even runs VSCode and Minecraft.
You can try out GalliumOS it without flashing the firmware or upgrading the flash memory -- which I did at first, but there are some drawbacks so I eventually did both of those.
The biggest challenge of the 21st century: the irony of technologies of abundance used by scarcity-minded people.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday August 14 2018, @01:58PM
My Pixelbook has 128 GB storage, 8 GB RAM, and that's the low end Pixelbook. The bigger ones have 512 GB nvme with core i7, 16 GB memory.
Even though it "seems" like a glorified web browser, it only seems that way.
Even without running it in "developer mode", you can run Android apps on it today. Including, for example Termux [google.com].
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.