Android-x86

[petergriffin]

On my old(ish) lappie running Windows 7 (never bothered to do any Windows updates), I've installed and started playing with Android-x86:
Android-x86 - Porting Android to x86

It's fun! And it works!

It must be booted in Vesa-mode (nomodeset) but it's not a great loss because Android was not meant to run on large screens. Wireless mouse works, wifi works, Ethernet could work with some hacking but I can't be bothered.

It's faster than Windows 7 and I haven't paid a penny.

Touch obviously doesn't work but mouse can do the job.

Youtube works great, better than on Windows or Linux. Flash is not needed. Apparently Google Play is not supposed to work but the icon is there (I can't be bothered to try if it works). I've installed Firefox mobile and it looks pretty neat.

So now I have an old netbook running Kitkat outperforming a bloated £300 new Samsung.

Discussion.

[VectraMan]

I installed it in a VM. It seemed a bit clunky (but then it was a VM) and without the touchscreen didn't really make sense.

Not sure on the app support for x86 Android. There are a few phones and tablets out there, but I'd guess you'd have problems with things like games as they will have been written in C++ (rather than Java) and probably only compiled for ARM.

[petergriffin]

Mine runs directly from a usb key but can save permanent data on a hard drive or on the key itself. My netbook is only 2G ram and it works fine.

At the moment I only use it to browse the net and it works fine without any apps.

It should support touchscreen on some modern hybrid tablet-laptops.

About the apps: I've installed a couple of apps from f-droid and they work fine.

I'm not interested in games, but then why would anybody play Android games on a x86?

[petergriffin]

Public apology: Android-x86 is cr@p!

Public apology: Android-x86 is cr@p!

I have already sacrificed three memory sticks with Androidx86. File system corruption is impressive!