Building Android for the Asus Eee PC 701

2008-12-20

NOTE as of 2009-02-19:

These instructions are now probably out of date. Thanks everyone for the discussion and the links. If you’re really interested in this, you should probably check out the android-porting google group / mailing list.

BIG RED FLASHY WARNING

  • THIS WILL wipe whatever you have installed on your Eee PC
  • THIS IS at a rather experimental stage, so don’t expect everything to function appropriately

Now that you’ve read the warnings, I’ll point out that I’ve posted an installation image below. If you want to roll your own, continue from here.

Instructions

  1. READ THE WARNINGS – I won’t be held responsible if you nuke your Eee PC
  2. Get the source by following these instructions.
  3. Create a local_manifest.xml file in your .repo directory with the following contents:

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
    <manifest>
    <project name="platform/vendor/asus/eee_701" \ path="vendor/asus/eee_701"/>
    </manifest>
  4. Sync – do another repo sync to pull the eee_701 stuff
  5. Build – type

    TARGET_ARCH=x86 TARGET_PRODUCT=eee_701 DISABLE_DEXPREOPT=true make -j8 installer_img
  6. Wait … It’ll take a while, particularly webkit
  7. Make installer USB stick

    dd if=out/target/product/eee_701/installer.img of=/dev/<usbstick of your choice>
  8. BIOS Settings – Go into the BIOS settings (press F2 on boot) and set the boot device order so that the hard drive comes first. Also under IDE configuration set the internal flash drive to load before any USB drives. ADDED 2008-12-21 – You must also turn off the SD card reader for the installation procedure.
  9. Boot – Plug the usb stick into your Eee PC and boot from it. When the BIOS screen comes up, press the ‘Esc’ key to get the boot menu. Select the USB drive. You should be presented with a rudimentary installer menu. Quickly press an arrow and select option 0 (sysloader), then press Enter.
  10. Let the install run – When it’s done type “reboot” and hit enter. Once it reboots, wait a few seconds and then the android boot screen will appear. Tada!

Note that wifi and many other things don’t work right now, so I’m trying to figure them out. I’ll post the installation image shortly, and more details here as I find them.

These instructions are mostly based on information found here.

Here’s a screenshot from the awful camera on my android phone:

Android Cupcake on the Eee PC

Android Cupcake on the Eee PC

UPDATE: 2008-12-20 19:12Z

Image for your consumption is here (mirror) (torrent). (Please use the torrent if you can). This is governed by the Apache 2.0 and GNU GPL Licenses. The sources are currently available from Google.

UPDATE: 2009-01-03 22:51Z

For the pedants, and my conscience. (On a related note, hello Slashdot and Gizmodo visitors.)
The software included in this product contains copyrighted software that is licensed under the GPL. A copy of that license is available here (2008-01-04 – Link typo fixed, sorry). You may obtain the complete Corresponding Source code from me for a period of three years after the binary was posted, which will be no earlier than 2011-12-20, by sending a money order or check for $5 to:

Brock M. Tice
PO BOX 17416
Saint Paul, MN 55117

Please write “source for Android EeePC build ” in the memo line of your payment.

This offer is valid to anyone in receipt of this information.

Topics: Android · Other · TechComments (104)

104 Comments »


  1. Titimoby

    I’m currently uploading your img file and in the same time, I finish the setup of a mac OS compilation environment.

    I’ll post the result here.

    Thanks for your efforts.

    Comment posted 2008-12-21 @ 07:53


  2. Titimoby

    I had no success in booting the img provided.
    After trying another time from my ubuntu machine, I gave up with the img file.

    It seems to be corrupted.

    In the meantime, I just need a last step to compile by myself.

    Comment posted 2008-12-23 @ 10:19


  3. Brock Tice

    Titimoby: I’ve double-checked that the file on the server and the file I used for installation are the same. The md5sum is 48953dc4371284b7d4e0ed4a6f7ffa21.

    Is it not booting at all, or not installing? Do you see any error messages?

    Comment posted 2008-12-23 @ 10:23


  4. Titimoby

    Thanks for the md5sum.
    I just checked my file is ok.

    When I dd to my usb stick, the files and folders have names with special characters.

    The thing doesn’t boot at all, but the strange file names made me think i messed the dd operation.

    Comment posted 2008-12-23 @ 10:35


  5. Titimoby

    I have 3 remarks:

    - maybe a BS parameter is needed for the dd command.
    - I tried to compile with my mac but there is something harcoded that force the use of linux toolchain (i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc in the prebuilt folder)

    - the local_manifest.xml contains an error with the backslash caracter to remove and the must not be copied ;)

    Comment posted 2008-12-24 @ 17:31


  6. sg

    Did anybody try this on virtualbox or vmware player running on XP? Is it possible to run this build in virtual environment?

    Comment posted 2008-12-26 @ 15:38


  7. Brock Tice

    sg: You should be able to build for a generic x86 machine without the eee_701 target.

    Comment posted 2008-12-26 @ 15:43


  8. Jim Thompson

    No ‘bs=’ parameter (dd assumes 512 if not specified). I suggest that perhaps your USB thumb drive is too small. (?)

    sg: I think you need:
    CONFIG_FB_VESA=y
    CONFIG_HAVE_IDE=y

    in vendor/asus/eee_701/kernel.config

    Brock, did you get WiFi working yet? Can you build a kernel from scratch yet?

    Comment posted 2008-12-29 @ 01:39


  9. Mike Miner

    How would suggest this to be installed on somthing such as VMware? Mount in Deamon tools then install?

    Comment posted 2009-01-01 @ 11:45


  10. Brock Tice

    Mike Miner, you’d have to make sure that the partition layout matches that of the Eee PC. You should then be able to specify the boot image as the second hard drive. I haven’t tried this, but I may give it a shot in VirtualBox soon, since reinstalling over and over on the Eee gets kind of annoying when trying things out.

    Comment posted 2009-01-01 @ 12:23


  11. Brock Tice

    Jim Thompson, I haven’t got wifi or a kernel from scratch working yet. I need to spend a little time tweaking the kernel config, and I’ve been away from my Eee PC and my main building workstation on holiday break.

    Comment posted 2009-01-01 @ 12:24


  12. Mike Miner

    I’ve tried booting it as a floppy image in VMware, it complains about the partition table being corrupt. Ill get back to you if I get it working.

    Comment posted 2009-01-01 @ 12:34


  13. Brock Tice

    FWIW I’m not a Google developer, regarding comment #13.

    Comment posted 2009-01-02 @ 13:29


  14. Felipe Cepriano

    I could boot the image on VMWare after converting it using qemu-img and using it as a SCSI harddrive.
    But it hangs after some time, “Waiting for the device: /dev/block/sdb2″.

    My VMWare config has 2 SCSI HDs, a 8GB empty image as SCSI 0:0 and the Android image as SCSI 0:1.
    Using a IDE HD (for the 8GB disk, VMWare don’t give any option for the Android image) doesn’t change anything….
    In “/dev/block” only sda is listed.

    Comment posted 2009-01-02 @ 14:01


  15. sg

    Hi Brock, could you pls post the instructions for virtualbox if u were able to run this build on it?
    I found few instructions here:

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting/browse_thread/thread/66862bdb52dac936/93297601e93dd09c?q=andrd.dvlpr&lnk=nl&amp;

    I was able to install it in Virtualbox but it doesn’t boot all the way. It boots up to a certain point and i see a blank screen after that..
    I enabled VESA and IDE in kernel config file. Not sure if anything else is missing.

    Comment posted 2009-01-02 @ 14:04


  16. sg

    Felipe, did u see this link. It has instructions on VMware.

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting/browse_thread/thread/66862bdb52dac936/93297601e93dd09c?q=andrd.dvlpr&lnk=nl&amp;

    Comment posted 2009-01-02 @ 14:07


  17. SAGITARIUS A

    Wow many thanks for your great work!!!

    Hope really, that you include Wifi,Touchpad,SD Card,and that i can install apk’s.
    Then my Dreams come true.

    It was my first real android experience,far away from slow sdk emu,thx again!

    Comment posted 2009-01-02 @ 19:58


  18. Brock Tice

    I got the image to boot on VirtualBox, but it hangs when trying to write system.img to /dev/block/sda6 for some reason.

    I had to edit the GRUB configuration to point to (hd1,0) instead of (hd0,0). I see this was also mentioned in the discussion linked by sg.

    I thought it might be a bug with the sparse disk image I had used, but using a pre-allocated disk image in VirtualBox didn’t help.

    By the way, converting the installer image for VirtualBox is easy:


    VBoxManage convertdd eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z.img eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z.vdi

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 12:50


  19. Thom

    When I try this:

    I get an error
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 202, in
    _Main(sys.argv[1:])
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 186, in _Main
    repo._Run(argv)
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 96, in _Run
    cmd.Execute(copts, cargs)
    File “/Users/tmorrow/mydroid/.repo/repo/subcmds/sync.py”, line 78, in Execute
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/command.py”, line 60, in GetProjects
    all = self.manifest.projects
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 78, in projects
    self._Load()
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 117, in _Load
    self._ParseManifest(False)
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 128, in _ParseManifest
    root = xml.dom.minidom.parse(self.manifestFile)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/minidom.py”, line 1913, in parse
    return expatbuilder.parse(file)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/expatbuilder.py”, line 924, in parse
    result = builder.parseFile(fp)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/expatbuilder.py”, line 207, in parseFile
    parser.Parse(buffer, 0)
    xml.parsers.expat.ExpatError: not well-formed (invalid token): line 5, column 1

    But if I remove the from the xml it works

    Then when I build with

    TARGET_ARCH=x86 TARGET_PRODUCT=eee_701 DISABLE_DEXPREOPT=true make -j8 installer_img

    I get

    build/core/product_config.mk:207: WARNING: adding test OTA key
    ============================================
    TARGET_PRODUCT=eee_701
    TARGET_BUILD_VARIANT=eng
    TARGET_SIMULATOR=
    TARGET_BUILD_TYPE=release
    TARGET_ARCH=x86
    HOST_ARCH=x86
    HOST_OS=darwin
    HOST_BUILD_TYPE=release
    BUILD_ID=
    ============================================
    build/core/main.mk:178: implicitly installing apns-conf_sdk.xml
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/builtins.c
    prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc -m32 -o out/target/product/eee_701/obj/lib/crtbegin_static.o -c bionic/libc/arch-x86/bionic/crtbegin_static.S
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/init.c
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/lib/crtbegin_static.o] Error 127
    make: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs….
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/devices.c
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/builtins.o] Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/init.o] Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/devices.o] Error 127

    I don’t know what I have done wrong….

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 12:59


  20. TitiMoby

    I have this error :
    Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory

    shows… that you are building from a Mac like me ;)
    I searched on android dev forum but no answer on that kind of topic.

    the first error came from the xml file.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 14:16


  21. Oren

    You know, redistributing a binary without providing the source *yourself*, is a violation of the GPL. Of course, no one is going to call you on that technicality but I just thought I”d mention it.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 15:37


  22. Thom

    Darn the luck. I am using a mac. Also I tried downloading the img file but when I try to mount it on my mac it fails thus I don’t know how to put it on a flash drive.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 16:48


  23. Brock Tice

    Oren,
    The main (only?) GPLed component is the kernel, and I actually used the prebuilt one in the Git repository.

    I looked briefly into how to get the source for that version of the kernel from the Android repository so that I could compile the madwifi drivers, but didn’t find them. I do intend to post the source once I figure that out. I know very little about Git, so I’ll have to learn a bit more first.

    Clearly someone has called me on it — you. I was aware of the problem, but considering that I made no modifications, I didn’t think anyone would be pedantic enough to care. But then, I didn’t expect Slashdot-level exposure either.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 17:24


  24. Brock Tice

    Thom, don’t mount it. Just use dd on the command line. You’ll have to figure out which device is the flash drive using disk utility, and then probably use sudo to run dd.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 17:40


  25. Thom

    Brock please delete my post 26 the dd command is backwards and this is the correct one.

    For those mac users. I got my usb flash drive to write.

    In terminal:
    Type: mount
    Mine was /dev/disk1s1
    Type: diskutil unmount

    my img file was on my desktop so this is what I typed to make it
    sudo dd if=~/Desktop/eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z2.img of=/dev/disk1s1

    Yours will be where it is located and what you saved the file as. So yours will not be an exact duplicate most likely

    Now comes the other problem. I don’t have an eeepc. I have the acer aspire one. I hoped they had real similar hardware and would work. I put in my flash drive and started the machine. All I got was a flashing cursor on the top left. Nothing more. The aspire one doesn’t have an option to disable the card reader. Any thoughts or was it a pipe dream to think it was going to work?

    Thanks
    Thom

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 18:47


  26. Brock Tice

    Thom, I’m sure you mean if=(…)/eeeDroid_…img of=/dev/disk1s1.

    I’m not sure what is different with the aspire one. As Dima (the google developer in the linked discussion) mentioned, the installer is quite fragile. That’s probably the first thing the enthusiast community will want to improve. I have some other higher-priority stuff going on, but eventually I’d like to take a look at modifying the installation script.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 18:49


  27. Brock Tice

    Haha, deleting post 26… We must have been writing at the same time.

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 18:50


  28. Thom

    Well just tried it again with a fresh download image and it does the same thing. Just a flashing cursor. Oh well. It was worth a try…

    Thanks
    Thoom

    Comment posted 2009-01-03 @ 19:12


  29. s g

    Hi Brock,
    I was able to install the image in virtualbox (i got past the/dev/block/sda6 problem by following the link i posted earlier). It boots up to a certain point after installation and shows a blank screen. I see the same problem with the image i built(i did enable VESA and IDE in kernel config).
    Can anybody help?
    Thanks

    Comment posted 2009-01-04 @ 00:11


  30. Titimoby

    Thanks to Thom, I manages to get.. the blinking cursor :)

    No worries, I’m still trying to figure it out ;)

    Comment posted 2009-01-04 @ 05:21


  31. Richard

    @Thom
    That’s DD for you.

    When DD is running, there is no feedback, just a flashing cursor, when it is done, you should get the prompt back, I learnt this back when I hacked a friend’s apple TV to give it a 1TB drive

    Comment posted 2009-01-04 @ 07:31


  32. Compiling Google Android for x86 with VMWARE & Ubuntu Linux on Windows « Napalmpiri

    [...] And you’re set. Ref: http://virtuallyshocking.com/2008/12/20/building-android-for-the-asus-eeepc-701/ [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-01-04 @ 10:07


  33. Martin

    hello all, I’ve downloaded the provided img dd’d it to a usb flash device factory formatted from an ubuntu machine and went I reboot I just get a grub message appear in the top right hand corner of the screen with a flashing _ (underscore) and it doesn’t go anywhere from there. Has anyone else experience the same thing? If so, what am I doing wrong, I’ve tried several times to dd it to the usb stick as well as a SD card but too no avail, should you dd if the volume is mounted or unmount I tried both ways and nothing, any help would be greatly appreicated, thanks, Martin.

    Comment posted 2009-01-05 @ 13:12


  34. Martin

    Okay, I finally managed to do it, I had download the file again as it seemed not to download correctly, I have managed to load it up on my MSI Wind, if someone can give me some advice on have to tweak the kernel for different hardware – specifically wifi, I have a wifi card in there from an original intel mac mini the core core duo not the core2duo. Any hints or advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

    Comment posted 2009-01-05 @ 18:54


  35. Thom

    Richard. The flashing cursor is on the boot of the machine with the flash drive in the mini not during the dd command.

    Thanks
    Thom

    Comment posted 2009-01-05 @ 20:54


  36. Martin

    Thom, does your flashing cursor say grub to the right of it?

    Comment posted 2009-01-06 @ 13:47


  37. Tim

    Can the USB ports in the Eee be used in peripheral mode somehow? I would really like to connect adb and ddms to Android on the Eee, as if it was a phone device. (Ethernet and/or WiFi would also be nice. Has anybody had any luck activating these?)
    Tim

    Comment posted 2009-01-07 @ 09:38


  38. Brix

    “(Ethernet and/or WiFi would also be nice. Has anybody had any luck activating these?)”

    I’m very curious about this as well. I’d like to be able to install on the eee, but I’m hesitant to do so without wifi support, seeing as that was the reason for getting it in the first place.

    Comment posted 2009-01-07 @ 13:48


  39. Andrew

    Martin, i think i have the same problem as Thom, and it is just the blinking underscore, nothing else
    (it appears on the top line for maybe 1/10 second, then bumps to second line)

    Comment posted 2009-01-07 @ 14:10


  40. Andrew

    i’m on a galaxy black 2G Surf, that has Win FLP on it…if it matters…

    Comment posted 2009-01-07 @ 14:11


  41. CatWithNoName » Blog Archive » I want a spare Eee now, and a helicopter.

    [...] Building android for the EeePC is a pretty exciting looking article, but I need a throwaway Eee that I don’t really care about having it working at all times. Anyone got any spares? I’m strongly inspired by the XP on a USB stick project as well. I’ll probably do the latter – it will be really handy for my Eee to have the option of XP as well. [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-01-07 @ 15:22


  42. Martin

    Andrew, make sure when you dd the image to a usb drive that you dd to the actual drive and not a partition of that drive. for example say you have a usb drive under linux in /dev/sdb1 – the 1 in that indicates at partion of that drive so dd it to just /dev/sdb without a number after it and it should sort your problem out. Thanks, Martin.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 12:21


  43. Andrew

    Well, I’m on a mac, so would it be /dev/disk1 instead of /dev/disk1s1?

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 12:27


  44. Martin

    Andrew, I guess it works the same like that on a mac, I have and do use a mac but not for anything remotely unix related so can say for definate, give it a try, it can’t hurt just make sure you’ve got the correct drive, type df from a terminal and make sure, you don’t want to wipe out your hard drive or something else! Martin.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 13:36


  45. Matthias

    Richard Stallman used to request $100 for copies of the source for emacs. You may want to follow in his footsteps for those who are overly pedantic.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 14:58


  46. Chris

    Thanks for the IMG, it worked perfectly. I’ve installed it on my eee 701. I noticed there’s no mouse support and everything is done through the keyboard. Any idea on how to get to a terminal?

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 22:34


  47. Chris

    Answered my own question, ctrl + alt + F1 just like any sane linux distro.

    Home = Home
    Esc = back

    No idea what the search key is.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 22:39


  48. Brock Tice

    Chris: Yep, and the windows menu button = menu. Also, the brightness keys seem to work, but none of the rest do.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 22:44


  49. Chris

    Also, the menu button = menu. How convenient.

    Comment posted 2009-01-08 @ 22:49


  50. Brock Tice

    So, I finally got a kernel (2.6.27) to build from scratch, but SurfaceFlinger segfaults continually, so the interface won’t load. *sigh*

    Comment posted 2009-01-10 @ 00:11


  51. sid77

    Nice post! I’ll try as soon as possible an android build :-P
    About the kernel: I’d suggest going straight with 2.6.28.x as it has everything needed by an eeepc 70x (atl2 and ath5k)

    ciao

    Comment posted 2009-01-11 @ 12:09


  52. CMJ

    What is the status on WIFI?

    Comment posted 2009-01-11 @ 21:20


  53. Brock Tice

    Until I can get a kernel build, or get the build tree of the prebuilt kernel, I can’t get wifi working. Apparently the GUI is also not prepared to load differently-named wifi modules, although that could certainly be hacked.

    Comment posted 2009-01-11 @ 21:32


  54. multimolti

    Hi!
    I downloaded your IMG file and used “dd” to copy it to my USB thumbdrive, but somehow it’s not working.
    When my Eee PC boots from the USB thumbdrive, many lines of console stuff are rushing through my display, it often says A N D R O I D and stuff, but at some point I get an error:
    ANDROID [ 5.492799] init: Unable to open persistent property directory /data/property errno: 2
    sh: can’t access tty: Waiting for device /dev/block/sdb2

    Then there is some more [sdc] stuff, and in the bottom line I can type commands. Don’t know what to do, when I enter “reboot” it reboots and no change it made to my SDDs (WinXP and Win7 are still there).

    What can I do? Please help me!

    Comment posted 2009-01-12 @ 11:04


  55. Brock Tice

    Please check the directions in this post — you need to turn off your SD card reader in the BIOS, and set your boot order appropriately.

    Comment posted 2009-01-12 @ 11:06


  56. multimolti

    SD card reader is turned off, and I think the other things are configured correctly as well.

    Boot Device Priority:
    1. HDD:SM-ASUS-PHISON
    2. Removable Dev.
    3. ATAPI CD-ROM

    Hard Disk Drives:
    1. HDD:SM-ASUS-PHISON
    2. HDD:SS-ASUS-PHISON
    3. USB:

    Comment posted 2009-01-12 @ 11:14


  57. Brock Tice

    Hm, that’s not what mine looks like. Is this an Eee 701?

    Comment posted 2009-01-12 @ 11:18


  58. multimolti

    No, I’ve got the Eee PC 900.

    Comment posted 2009-01-13 @ 15:26


  59. sameb0at

    multimolti, I’m having the same issue on my eee 900.

    Keep me posted if you get it to work, I really don’t know what I’m doing.

    Comment posted 2009-01-14 @ 09:15


  60. multimolti

    Nobody knows a solution? I would really like to try it!!

    Comment posted 2009-01-16 @ 08:16


  61. Qube

    @Brock – Does 2.6.28 give us wifi out of the box then?

    Comment posted 2009-01-19 @ 16:44


  62. Iuri Fiedoruk

    Does anyoe tryied putting this into a SD card instead of the internal SDD of the eeePC unit?
    If possible, I could give a try. I do not want to void my ubuntu installation.

    Comment posted 2009-01-23 @ 11:43


  63. Keija

    hello, i’m really interested in this work! sadly, the installer stops when trying to

    “writing raw image ‘data/system/img’ to ‘dev/block/sda7′ (offset =0)”

    is there a solution (or diagnosis) for this problem? i dd multiple times but always got the same error :S … sd card is deactivated

    Comment posted 2009-01-25 @ 15:42


  64. Brock Tice

    Keija,
    I’m not sure. I’m not really an expert, and I haven’t been messing around with this lately. I suggest you (and others) join and post to the android-porting google group, where much more knowledgeable people than I can answer your question. Good luck!

    Comment posted 2009-01-25 @ 15:47


  65. Keija

    Thanks for your answer. I think i’ll wait, until there is a new version with wi-fi or so :) my programming skills are limited to (one semester of) java programming ;)
    but nonetheless i’ll follow this project! i can imagine android beeing ideal for the 701, beeing lightweight and designed for a small screen :)

    Comment posted 2009-01-26 @ 04:50


  66. multimolti

    Hey, I have another problem…
    I did the dd if=out/target/product/eee_701/installer.img of=/dev/ stuff to create my bootable thumbdrive, but its not working (see comments above).
    Now I want to use my 4GB stick as usual, but Windows XP detects it only as 4,35MB stick. I formatted it 3 times, no help, I think the hidden partition takes it all.
    How can I get my 4GB back? Please help!!!

    Comment posted 2009-01-26 @ 11:31


  67. etx

    multi you may have a partition map still on there. try dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/’yourdevice’ to zero it out and then repartition in the OS your wanting to use it in.

    Comment posted 2009-01-26 @ 20:25


  68. Wang

    Hello,
    I fallow the steps to build image, and the image is generated successfully and workable thanks.
    But I has a question, When I boot the eeepc by your image, the api_demos and dev_tools are included to the menu, and I can run the application, such as terminal emulator, but if I boot eeepc by myself image, the api_demos and dev_tools do no exsit, is there any motification of Makefile, generic.mk, or other files ?
    Thank you.

    Comment posted 2009-01-28 @ 00:01


  69. Brock Tice

    I didn’t do anything special. The build process may have changed since I wrote this.

    Comment posted 2009-01-28 @ 09:43


  70. Android no Eee - O futuro dos NetBooks « Eu amo Eee PC

    [...] mso-bidi-language:#0400;} Quem conseguiu a proeza foi o pessoal do grupo android-porting, aqui <!– /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-02-03 @ 06:41


  71. keating

    Could you provide the kernel config? I use the kernel config in vendor/asus/eee_701 to re-compile kernel and it fail.

    Comment posted 2009-02-05 @ 08:53


  72. Brock Tice

    I used the pre-built kernel, which is supposedly compiled with the config file in that directory. However, the kernel source in the tree is not of the same version. If you want to use that config, try getting the same kernel version from the Android tree. I think it’s 2.6.25?

    Comment posted 2009-02-05 @ 09:08


  73. Martin

    multimolti, delete all partions on the USB stick using Linux, either gParted or cfdisk. Then format it in fat32 with either one of those tools, and then use windows to do a full format on it using device defaults options in the format window. I hope this helps.

    Comment posted 2009-02-06 @ 09:30


  74. multimolti

    Hi Martin,
    Thanks for the tip but I did it already using Windows XP. If you go to the partition manager, you will see every partition and can delete them, then format the USB stick again with FAT32.

    Comment posted 2009-02-06 @ 09:37


  75. Martin

    multimolti, okay, not a problem, glad you sorted it out.

    Comment posted 2009-02-06 @ 09:40


  76. Nada

    Hmmm, how do I shut it down. Tried the shutdown command, but get an error message that it’s not allowed…

    Realy cool, wonder what I’m going to use it for?

    Comment posted 2009-02-10 @ 15:35


  77. RzR

    Hi,

    If it maters I made a video of the installation :

    http://www.newlc.com/en/android-everywhere-phone-netbook-and-unimaginable-devices

    I also built an image I am about to share at the same URL, if testers want to test it , im me …

    Regards

    Comment posted 2009-02-13 @ 05:59


  78. TheComputerGuy

    What about an Android Live-CD???
    Can you guys do it?

    Comment posted 2009-02-15 @ 13:50


  79. ehung

    Hi, everyone:
    I have a problem about booting from the USB thumbdrive of eeepc 901. I get an error:
    ==============================
    ANDROID [ 2.947380] init: Unable to open persistent property directory /data/property errno: 2
    VFS: Cna’t find an ext2 filesystem on dev sdb2
    Waiting for device: /dev/block/sdb2
    Device /dev/block/sdb2 ready
    init: untracked pid 883 exited
    Could not mount /dev/block/sdb2 on /data as ext2
    sh: can’t access tty; job control turned off
    …………omitted……….
    ===============================
    And I have check my USB stick.
    The cmdline, kernel, ramdisk are be in sdb1, and boot.img, bootdr.bin, system.img, userdata.img are be in sdb2.
    Maybe Someone can give me some suggestion to boot android in my eeepc 901.
    Thanks in advance.

    ehung

    Comment posted 2009-02-17 @ 00:20


  80. Magazine of e - The Online Internet and Technology magazine » Blog Archive » Windows 7 Vs. Linux: The Battle For Your Desktop

    [...] for modest hardware including lower-resolution displays. Work in this field is ongoing, such as this post which instructs how to make Android run on an Asus Eee netbook — since, as it turns out, the [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-02-17 @ 08:56


  81. Blogs

    [...] and was hoping I could trick it into installing to an SD card instead. I really should have read this article, with a big flashing red warning about this fact. Oh well – I can always hunt out the install CD [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-02-17 @ 12:48


  82. Psirus

    Did somebody get the .img work?????? on a linux machine with dd?

    Comment posted 2009-02-19 @ 07:22


  83. Android on eeepc 701 (eeedroid) - luca bonesini weblog (il bone)

    [...] Oggi sul piccolino è salito Android; giusto un esperimento: funziona quasi tutto (manca il supporto a mouse e wifi). Seguite queste istruzioni. [...]

    Pingback posted 2009-02-19 @ 11:43


  84. Brock Tice

    Psirus: Several people. Did you check the MD5? Are you using my image or did you build your own?

    Comment posted 2009-02-19 @ 11:53


  85. Psirus

    yes i checked the MD5 of the dowloaded image….i allways stucked in a loop or something else…”GRUB loading Stage2….”

    btw i try to install it on a samsung Q1 …actually the same hardware like an eee besides the it use a HDD

    Comment posted 2009-02-19 @ 12:34


  86. nada

    Psirus:

    Did you turn off the SD-card reader in Bios? It doesn’t install unless you do this.

    Comment posted 2009-02-24 @ 14:14


  87. lars

    Martin,

    I also have a MSI wind and can’t find a way to disable the card reader. How did you manage to boot it ? I get the GRUB loading msg and the flashing cursor…

    Comment posted 2009-03-01 @ 20:40


  88. Daniel

    I’m having this error running on VirtualBox:

    ANDROID [ 5.706849] init: Unable to open persistent property directory /data/property errno: 2
    sh: can’t access tty; job control turned off
    I/installer( 1621): Waiting for device: /dev/block/sdb2

    Then it gives me a shell. And I get stucked here;
    Any suggestions? Thanks!

    Comment posted 2009-03-04 @ 12:43


  89. Beyounn

    You need to find the real device node used by usb and then run /system/bin/installer -p /dev/block/whatever node

    Comment posted 2009-03-19 @ 21:50


  90. 360vr

    Anyone got it to work on Acer Aspire One Netbook?

    Comment posted 2009-03-26 @ 11:45


  91. carnagex420x

    ANDROID [ 5.706849] init: Unable to open persistent property directory /data/property errno: 2
    sh: can’t access tty; job control turned off
    I/installer( 1621): Waiting for device: /dev/block/sdb2

    Then it gives me a shell. Same here!

    #2 Thoughts

    1) Only sda1-8 are listed so the internal drive is not being detected.

    2)I still dont know how to mount the second partition to /data.

    Comment posted 2009-04-17 @ 08:13


  92. carnagex420x

    There are options in the menuconfig for SATA drives I turned on and complied a new kernel but I haven’t been able able to build an installer yet. On another note heres a good site! > http://eoghans.devsite.googlepages.com/androidinvirtualbox

    Comment posted 2009-04-20 @ 02:46


  93. Iuri Fiedoruk

    I wish someone could make a updated image with version 1.5 that was just release. Anyone? :)

    Comment posted 2009-04-25 @ 11:56


  94. Sean

    Looks like there’s been some progress recently (e.g. wifi and lan are working).

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting/browse_thread/thread/fbb0d5b655bd25e3/8d10bacba2beb585

    Comment posted 2009-04-29 @ 10:43


  95. Nootilus

    Heya, I downloaded your IMG file and succeded in creating the USB key with it. Managed to boot the eeePc on the key. So it booted with a matrix-like fall of verbose lines and suddently stopped at this one:

    [ 8.494929] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0

    And nothing else. If I press return, I have the command-line and can type in “reboot”.

    What should I do?

    Thanks anyway for all the good work and tips here ;)

    Comment posted 2009-04-30 @ 13:39


  96. Nootilus

    Addentum to my issue: I discovered several error messages atop the one where the boot stucks. They are:

    ANDROID [ 4.011280] init: unable to open persistent property directory /data/property errno: 2
    # I/installer( 1865): Waiting for device: /dev/block/sdb2

    I don’t know it those are hints of what’s going wrong. I also have to tell you my comp is an asus eeePc 701 first gen (2gb sdd) with 2gb of RAM, actually running eeeBuntu 2.

    Thanks again if you can help me.

    Comment posted 2009-05-01 @ 03:04


  97. YaManicKill

    I’m looking at porting this to my Lenovo Ideapad S10e, and was wondering what I would need to change in the xml file, and the build instructions to do this?

    Comment posted 2009-06-07 @ 10:56


  98. andyhdsn1

    Hey, i have been reading up on android running on netbooks, and the couple of “DIY” posts i have seen have been for the eee pc. Is there any reason why? because i would LOVE to have this running on my Acer Aspire One. Is this possible? If so anyone got any ideas on how to do it?

    Thanks in advance

    Comment posted 2009-06-10 @ 18:00


  99. orelhossaurus

    Hi all.
    Maybe this will help someone ;)
    http://code.google.com/p/live-android/

    Comment posted 2009-07-10 @ 13:23


  100. flavian

    Hey, i have download android code and get installer.img, but i have some errors on my EeePC:

    [drm] LVDS-8: set mode 900×480 14
    console: switching to colour frame buffer device 100×30
    sh: can’t access tty; job control turned off
    scsi 2:0:0:0 Direct-Access USB 2.0 CardReader Sd0 0100 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
    sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removale disk
    sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
    android_power: wakeup(0->0) at 1016***
    android_power: wakeup(0->0) at *******
    android_power: wakeup(0->0) at *******
    android_power: wakeup(0->0) at *******
    (this message appeared about every 5 seconds)

    What should I do?

    Thanks anyway for all the good work and tips here

    Comment posted 2009-07-29 @ 01:03


  101. Iuri Fiedoruk

    For people looking to test Android, a tip: Look for Live Android on Google :)

    Comment posted 2009-07-29 @ 08:05


  102. Jan Isaksson

    I cannot make because of my java-version. It’s openjdk6 on archlinux. I cannot rollback to 5 because there’s no such version. Anything I can do?

    Comment posted 2009-10-25 @ 09:47


  103. Brock Tice

    Jan, Unfortunately these instructions are well out of date.

    Please check out the android-porting mailing list:

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting

    Comment posted 2009-10-25 @ 11:46


  104. Jan Isaksson

    OK. Thanks for your answer.

    Comment posted 2009-10-25 @ 13:18

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

Leave a comment