Tell me more ×
Unix & Linux Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for users of Linux, FreeBSD and other Un*x-like operating systems.. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 2 down vote favorite
1

You seem to need a 4GB USB disk or flash drive to install Chromium OS onto before you can install it to your hard drive. Is there a way to install Chromium OS onto your hard drive without a handy 4GB USB disk? It would be nice if I could dual-boot it with Linux or Windows as well.

share|improve this question
would not a dvd/cd do? – Nikhil Mulley Jan 17 '12 at 12:50
1  
It can't be run from DVD, only from USB or hard drive (most Chromebooks don't have ODDs anyways, and they're slow and small compared to flash drives) – WindowsEscapist Nov 27 '12 at 20:03

2 Answers

up vote 2 down vote

Try using the losetup command to make your image file readable ask a disk so that you can copy partitions from it directly to your hard drive:

  • Run sudo losetup -f to check the next available loopback device (this will return loopx where x is the next loop device).

  • Run sudo losetup /dev/loopx whereyourimgfileis

  • Now you have the .img file mounted as a block device, so you can open it with GParted (or optionally another partition editor of your choice; however, I think (GParted is best) :

  • Run sudo gparted /dev/loopx /dev/sda

  • Now copy the two partitions from /dev/loopx to an extended partition on your hard drive (sda). You probably already know the grub2 config line to add in /etc/grub/d/40_custom to boot it:

menuentry "ChromiumOS" {

insmod ext2

set root=(hd0,x)

linux /boot/vmlinuz root=LABEL=C-ROOT rw noresume noswap i915.modeset=1 loglevel=1 quiet

initrd /boot/initrd.img

}

share|improve this answer
Thanks, I'll try this and get back to you. – wecsam Nov 28 '12 at 20:53
All right, I finally got enough work out of the way to try this as a weekend project. When I open the loop device in GParted, it shows up as about 800 MB of unallocated space. – wecsam Jan 13 at 6:19
Strange. This is really just digested information from someone else - I remember I did it the slow way and actually copied from a USB drive with GParted. Maybe .img files are compressed? Maybe you can make another loopback file and "burn" the img file to it with a program to do that. I'm flattered, but kind of out of my depth now. – WindowsEscapist Jan 13 at 15:45
Do you have a suggestion for such a program? – wecsam Jan 14 at 18:51
I don't; all my experiences with .img burners and such have been quite lackluster. Sorry. (I might be completely wrong here anyways; I think I've passed into the land of conjecture now.) – WindowsEscapist Jan 14 at 23:46
show 1 more comment
up vote 0 down vote

Sure, a flash drive is generally just a bootloader with a data partition, so just partition your disk in such a way that you have at least 4GB to spare (or use the Windows partition if it isn't installed already), copy the chromium install partition data there (using dd to make it easy) then just replicate the bootloader onto the harddisk (this bit is a bit harder). But seriously, why not just use a USB stick?

You can copy more than partitions with dd (just point it to the whole device), though you will then need to be careful when extending the partition table to fit the new disk geometry.

share|improve this answer
How do I copy an install partition? Also, I don't have a USB stick. – wecsam Jan 18 '12 at 20:53
1  
if you don't know how to use 'dd', I think buying a cheap USB stick will save you a lot of time – totaam Jan 19 '12 at 8:06
Oh, wait, I have used dd before. The install partition is inside an IMG file, though. Can dd copy from that? – wecsam Jan 20 '12 at 12:58
if you have more than one drive, you can try copying the whole IMG to the disk (you will lose anything on there though) then you can install on the other drive. If not, then you will have to use 'losetup' to access the image as a virtual disk. – totaam Jan 20 '12 at 14:25
1  
The chromeOS USB is actually made of 2 partitions; it can't be directly dded to a hard drive without data loss. – WindowsEscapist Nov 27 '12 at 20:04
show 4 more comments

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.