Tag Archives: Virtualbox
Daily Chrome OS Builds for VMWare and VirtualBox Now Available
Posted on 13. Mar, 2011 by Daniel Cawrey. 
5 Comments
Hexxeh has now made available for everyone daily Chrome OS builds that can be used in VM. He has created both VMWare and VirtualBox versions of his Chrome OS Vanilla, which are snapshot builds of Chromium OS that the Chromium Team works on developing every day.
If you’ve been frustrated because you did not get a Cr-48 or you could not get Chrome OS Vanilla to work on your own PC for hardware reasons, there is now an alternative with these new images that have been released today.
The instructions are pretty simple, according to Hexxeh.
To use this, just create a new virtual machine in VirtualBox, and when it asks whether you want to create a new hard drive or use an existing one, point it to the VDI file you downloaded and extracted. Using the VMWare downloads is even easier! Simply download, install VMWare Player and then double click the VMX file in the archive you downloaded.
Around 6PM GMT every day a new build is release, and while not all of these are stable, an auto-update function in the VM images will keep you updated on the newest features that are arriving in Chromium OS. The open source version of the operating system is where most things are tested, and generally appear before arriving in Chrome OS Beta.
via Hexxeh.net
Chrome OS Zero VM Image Available
Posted on 19. Jan, 2010 by Daniel Cawrey. 8 Comments
One of the problems that I experienced with Chrome OS Zero is that I was unable to get the image that Hexxeh released to work in either VMWare or VirtualBox. I spent an entire morning over the weekend banging my head to no avail, although it’s possible I couldn’t get it to work because of said head-banging. Fortunately, Hexxeh now has a VM image up on his site, so for those of you wanting to run Chrome OS Zero using VMWare, here is your chance!
Note: According to Hexxeh’s Twitter account, this doesn’t appear to work with Sun’s VirtualBox. I assumed he tried it after converting it into a vdi file since his site is hosting a vmdk file. Oh Well.
First Look: Chrome OS Zero
Posted on 12. Jan, 2010 by Daniel Cawrey. 0 Comments
Well, I’ve had the chance to load up the old USB drive with Zero and take it for a spin. In fact, I’m writing this post with Zero right now. I have to say that there is a lot more polish to this version compared to previous builds. In the past I noticed that there seemed to be slight glitches here and there within the interface, especially in the navigational bar at the top. However, these types of issues are to be expected since this was a part of a very early version of the operating system – although they now appear to be gone.
The load time for Zero is very fast – seven seconds to login at my count. Once logged in with the facepunch/facepunch combo, I quickly connected to my wireless internet. I was able to surf around with ease, and felt like I could really get used to this on a day-to-day basis. One problem is taking screenshots and the handling of image files, however.
In the top right, it appears that the options menu to the far right where you can see your machine’s battery status and wireless connection has been removed, and that’s probably because you can access the OS’s preferences from the wrench icon – this was probably changed to reflect how the Chrome browser is set up.
Extensions are a big deal to Chromium, and anyone who uses the Chrome browser would agree with this fact. That’s why the have been added to this version of Chrome OS. Of course, being the intrepid blogger I attempted to take screenshots of Zero with the Aviary extension tool which allows you to take screens in the Chrome browser. Unfortunately I received a rather polite error stating that Flash was just not going to cooperate with me.
I’m not sure what the issue is with Flash yet, but I’ve posed my question at the Chromium Group to see if I get an answer. I did a quick search over there and it looks like there is an issue with it. Since Flash has been reported as a potential security risk perhaps early builds are going to go without it until regular users start adopting the OS.
I’m not sure how how automatic updates work in Zero, but according to Hexxeh’s site this is a new feature in this build. I think it’s a great idea since that will be how all updates are delivered in the future for Chromium.
Where to Download Chrome OS
Posted on 04. Dec, 2009 by Daniel Cawrey. 0 Comments
At this point, there are already several different flavors of Chrome available. It all depends on what kind of system you plan on installing Chrome OS on, and we can give you a run down on what you need to know.
If you want to run Chrome on a virtual machine (VM) such as Sun’s VirtualBox or VMware, you can get a compiled version of Chrome OS here.
As reported earlier, there is a version that has been released by Dell that has been successfully tested on their Mini 10v. The build is loaded via a USB device, and you will need one that has a spare 8 GB. You can get it here.
There is a smaller more comprehensive version of Chrome OS that has been developed as well. According to the developer, it offers a wide array of support in terms of hardware. This is by far the most comprehensive site that is out there, and also offers excellent instructions on how to install Chrome. The version is called Chrome OS Cherry, and the build supports wifi and can be loaded on a 1GB memory stick.
