Exploitee.rs

Has anyone experimented with non android OS's on this thing?

I'm thinking that with it's specs, this thing would be an interesting little host for a distribution of linux, possibly running something like XBMC. People have run the ubuntu dist on handsets like the nexus one (and others), I don't see why one wouldn't be able to run it on something like the revue which is at least x86. I just wonder about the drivers for the video, but with android essentially being linux, I'd hope that wouldn't be too much of a problem.

as of yet, this hasnt been discussed or considered. we are still working to get a stable root going thus far.

I think it might be worth looking into. When I looked at the revue it was mostly because I was looking for a replacement for the AppleTV's I had running XBMC. I just wanted something with a little more juice that had proper HDMI support. The revue fits that bill, and then some.

I'll need to do a little research which I'll start this weekend. Mostly I just want to look into how hard it is to run a custom kernel, so I can get a custom init going. I'm just assuming this won't be too hard since root seems to be permanent. Just a matter of using a kernel that won't brick the revue

The other thing will be a graphics driver. Do we know how the interface to the TV is accessed now? I'm guessing it's as a straight frame buffer or something like that that's accessed and managed directly by android. The challenge would be in driving something similar using X. However it must be at least minimally possible if they've gotten ubuntu running on something like a Nexus One, so I'm guessing that the driver access would be similar. I know there was a plan at some point to port XBMC to something that used a framebuffer directly (or I might be thinking of mythtv).

I dunno.. I think getting it to boot something else would be great fun right about now. Plus, root works just fine (it seems) with the android 2.1 releases, so I'll start there, if I can

Since the revue went on sale it has been flying off the shelves, I'm sure many of us would really like to have this happen. (And would donate!) It's pretty much a netbook connected to the TV, maybe a dual boot into windows 7?

Itsjusttim wrote:Since the revue went on sale it has been flying off the shelves, I'm sure many of us would really like to have this happen. (And would donate!) It's pretty much a netbook connected to the TV, maybe a dual boot into windows 7?

I think Windows in general is a bit of a stretch. At least I think it'd be beyond my skill level and not likely worth it for most people. This is for much the same reason it wouldn't work on an AppleTV. There's no BIOS, the mechanisms and hooks that Windows expects to be there on a regular PC for it to do it's thing aren't there. While it might be possible to run Windows on this thing, it'd definitely take custom drivers and likely custom work on Windows.

Linux is much easier, and what I'd like to try only because it's already running on these systems. Android is, after all, Linux. I'm not a C programmer, my experience is limited to interpreted languages, scripts, etc. I'm a sys-admin, been working with linux in it's various forms, booting on things that ought not to be booted on, for many years.

I've already done a little looking and found some good leads. There's work in xorg for it to drive the CE4100 which is used on this system. That provides the graphics layer. My next step is to receive my $99 revue and actually get it rooted, which means building my TTL serial device. My revue shipped today, so hopefully I'll have that on thursday and can get rooting it. I am intending to use this box in a bedroom, an will hack on it when I can

Without the source to compile the drivers, it'll be more difficult to put any old version of Linux on there, regardless that Android has a Linux kernel.

Chinpokomon wrote:Without the source to compile the drivers, it'll be more difficult to put any old version of Linux on there, regardless that Android has a Linux kernel.

That's the point though... The linux kernel is available, and the drivers for the CPU are included in it, in source form. From the surface it doesn't look like it should be that difficult to accomplish. There may be stuff you'd need to do after an installation, certainly custom installing will be necessary. However, even if we have to boot ubuntu with the kernel that comes with the android setup, and some... hobbled together modules... we should in theory be able to get an ubuntu (or some other dist) system running on it.

Sounds great! Very excited about the potential.

dr4stic wrote:

Chinpokomon wrote:Without the source to compile the drivers, it'll be more difficult to put any old version of Linux on there, regardless that Android has a Linux kernel.

That's the point though... The linux kernel is available, and the drivers for the CPU are included in it, in source form. From the surface it doesn't look like it should be that difficult to accomplish. There may be stuff you'd need to do after an installation, certainly custom installing will be necessary. However, even if we have to boot ubuntu with the kernel that comes with the android setup, and some... hobbled together modules... we should in theory be able to get an ubuntu (or some other dist) system running on it.

Well, yes we have a kernel, but it is a customized Kernel for Android... this isn't the same kernel we'd build for Ubuntu.

I think if you read my thread about booting to a USB stick, the biggest sticking issue is going to be trying to make a bootloader do what we want. I'd be happy for someone to prove me wrong, but this seems to be the most significant hurdle.

Now if we wanted to try to do a simultaneous Linux distro, someone could try something like this: http://androlinux.com/android-ubuntu-de ... n-android/. This isn't a full replacement though and not really optimal.

Kernel signing will be a problem here, and of course you'd have to have root, so this is limited to the Android 2.1 rooted devices. The biggest problem though, the ubuntu.sh shell script attempts to mount /system as read-write. I don't see this happening until we can get a true root by replacing the bootloader.

Question, what OS does the Revue run,and what version?