[speedbal]

I am not sure if anyone can confirm whether or not you can set it up to boot to Linux without a keyboard? No point in having an xbmc box that requires you to plug in a keyboard to reboot!

My assumption is this would also work on the Chromebox. C720 and the Asus Chromebox are very similar hardware. The "write protect" screw seems to have already been identified on the Chromebox. Will try once they have a usb 3.0 capable SeaBIOS since I am too much of a linux noob to install it without a usb drive (or very detailed instructions).

speedbal

[nickr]

Why not use usb2?

[Matt Devo]

I am not sure if anyone can confirm whether or not you can set it up to boot to Linux without a keyboard? No point in having an xbmc box that requires you to plug in a keyboard to reboot!

My assumption is this would also work on the Chromebox. C720 and the Asus Chromebox are very similar hardware. The "write protect" screw seems to have already been identified on the Chromebox. Will try once they have a usb 3.0 capable SeaBIOS since I am too much of a linux noob to install it without a usb drive (or very detailed instructions).

speedbal

yeah, it looks like there need to be a few firmware tweaks before it can be booted off an external device (USB or SD card) period, let alone without using the keyboard to select the boot device. But once that happens I'd expect OpenELEC to work pretty much out of the box.

using Crouton's built-in target for XBMC, you'll only get 12.0 RC3 at best (w/-r trusty), unless you install it manually with a different target. So not really a viable option for daily use at the moment, more just something to play around with.

---

Why not use usb2?

because the 400U only has USB3 ports (4x), unlike all earlier ChromeOS devices which had at least one USB2 port

[nickr]

If you can install Ubuntu and can then use a partitioning tool, you could perhaps install openelec as a dual boot with Ubuntu using something like this:

http://wiki.openelec.tv/index.php/Manual...multi_boot

[Matt Devo]

If you can install Ubuntu and can then use a partitioning tool, you could perhaps install openelec as a dual boot with Ubuntu using something like this:

http://wiki.openelec.tv/index.php/Manual...multi_boot

anything you install thru Crouton is installed in a chroot, not in a separate partition. And while you might be able to resize the existing partitions and create a new one, you won't be able to boot it since the BIOS requires a signed kernel header when booting from the normal (non-legacy) BIOS.

[nickr]

Ahh ok didn't know all that. Cheers.

[speedbal]

I am not sure if anyone can confirm whether or not you can set it up to boot to Linux without a keyboard? No point in having an xbmc box that requires you to plug in a keyboard to reboot!

My assumption is this would also work on the Chromebox. C720 and the Asus Chromebox are very similar hardware. The "write protect" screw seems to have already been identified on the Chromebox. Will try once they have a usb 3.0 capable SeaBIOS since I am too much of a linux noob to install it without a usb drive (or very detailed instructions).

speedbal

yeah, it looks like there need to be a few firmware tweaks before it can be booted off an external device (USB or SD card) period, let alone without using the keyboard to select the boot device. But once that happens I'd expect OpenELEC to work pretty much out of the box.

I just removed the magic screw and put in the needed parameters in the script (0x489 which does what the link says or 0x11 which does short splash and boot from usb only). It seemed to work like i would expect it to (try to boot of usb without keyboard presses). It should work after they fix the firmware to recognize usb 3.0 with no keyboard. Can't wait.....

To read more about the script... here is the source code

speedbal

[Matt Devo]

I just removed the magic screw and put in the needed parameters in the script (0x489 which does what the link says or 0x11 which does short splash and boot from usb only). It seemed to work like i would expect it to (try to boot of usb without keyboard presses). It should work after they fix the firmware to recognize usb 3.0 with no keyboard. Can't wait.....

To read more about the script... here is the source code

speedbal

good to know, thx

[quintixbox]

This is perfect XBMC machine, only a little more than the crappy cubox I paid for but have not even received a shipping notification email...

will sell the cubox asap and get this espicially if this gets XBMC support and I thinnk why wouldn't it?

Just curious here, on what grounds do you qualify a product you haven't even tested yet as "crappy"?

[nickr]

Why not use usb2?

because the 400U only has USB3 ports (4x), unlike all earlier ChromeOS devices which had at least one USB2 port

Very sound reasoning!

---

This is perfect XBMC machine, only a little more than the crappy cubox I paid for but have not even received a shipping notification email...

will sell the cubox asap and get this espicially if this gets XBMC support and I thinnk why wouldn't it?

Just curious here, on what grounds do you qualify a product you haven't even tested yet as "crappy"?

And indeed on what grounds does someone qualify a product that he hasn't tested as a "perfect XBMC machine"

[bmfrosty]

I'm going to go ahead and ask a stupid question. Why can't we open this up, add an upgraded m.2 ssd, and some new RAM, and install Windows 7? 4GB of RAM would be plenty, and so would a 64GB m.2 ssd just to get the machine up and running. Then you would have a complete xbmc machine with no flaws. Since it's a haswell, the hd graphics video driver should be easy to find, it's just sound and nic/wireless.

$180 = ASUS Chromebox
$55 = 64GB M.2 SSD (http://www.amazon.com/MyDigitalSSD-Super...00EZ2E8LQ/)
$40 = 4GB DDR3L (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6820231702) (Not sure what the mobo maxes at, might have to do 2GBx2)

Total: $275 final, still better then an NUC in my opinion since that's final cost for a non Atom Haswell.

Windows is a massive flaw, 3 decades in the making.

[deathtical]

I'm going to go ahead and ask a stupid question. Why can't we open this up, add an upgraded m.2 ssd, and some new RAM, and install Windows 7? 4GB of RAM would be plenty, and so would a 64GB m.2 ssd just to get the machine up and running. Then you would have a complete xbmc machine with no flaws. Since it's a haswell, the hd graphics video driver should be easy to find, it's just sound and nic/wireless.

$180 = ASUS Chromebox
$55 = 64GB M.2 SSD (http://www.amazon.com/MyDigitalSSD-Super...00EZ2E8LQ/)
$40 = 4GB DDR3L (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6820231702) (Not sure what the mobo maxes at, might have to do 2GBx2)

Total: $275 final, still better then an NUC in my opinion since that's final cost for a non Atom Haswell.

Windows is a massive flaw, 3 decades in the making.

That's a very general and mostly inaccurate statement. Windows has provided excellent job security for thousands of IT professionals for over 20 years. In all seriousness, there is nothing wrong with Windows, it just isn't the best platform for this kind of device or use. If you solely want to use the cromebox for XBMC then you would want to use something far less bloated and more specialized for that like OpenELEC + XBMC.

[Dark_Slayer]

I just removed the magic screw and put in the needed parameters in the script (0x489 which does what the link says or 0x11 which does short splash and boot from usb only). It seemed to work like i would expect it to (try to boot of usb without keyboard presses). It should work after they fix the firmware to recognize usb 3.0 with no keyboard. Can't wait.....

To read more about the script... here is the source code

speedbal

Thanks for that info

I'm now curious you could use the script to "enable other OS" (as it had that option) then use the internal 16GB SSD for OpenELEC?

[FishOil]

I'm going to go ahead and ask a stupid question. Why can't we open this up, add an upgraded m.2 ssd, and some new RAM, and install Windows 7? 4GB of RAM would be plenty, and so would a 64GB m.2 ssd just to get the machine up and running. Then you would have a complete xbmc machine with no flaws. Since it's a haswell, the hd graphics video driver should be easy to find, it's just sound and nic/wireless.

$180 = ASUS Chromebox
$55 = 64GB M.2 SSD (http://www.amazon.com/MyDigitalSSD-Super...00EZ2E8LQ/)
$40 = 4GB DDR3L (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6820231702) (Not sure what the mobo maxes at, might have to do 2GBx2)

Total: $275 final, still better then an NUC in my opinion since that's final cost for a non Atom Haswell.

Windows is a massive flaw, 3 decades in the making.

That's a very general and mostly inaccurate statement. Windows has provided excellent job security for thousands of IT professionals for over 20 years.

Job security for people plugging the security disaster that is windows.

Thanks, I needed a laugh today.

I gotta agree, Windows IS a massive flaw, 3 decades in the making.

[CaptainHarlock]

For those who are looking for a confirmation that a Asus Chromebox could be turned into a fine HTPC, this is a copy of a post I have made on xbmchub forum yesterday:

I have received my Asus Chromebox (MSRP 179$USD) a few days ago and I just finished to setup it up into a fully functionnal HTPC with XBMC and all the add-ons.

I succeed after spending long hours trying differents kind of setup to finally get one where everything was working flawlessly on it. I mean EVRYTHING...and the setup that I have on it right now is rock solid. Ubuntu is very fast and responsive. XBMC, the graphic driver and HDMI (with sound working on the same cable) are working fine.

It is at least a 500-600% increase in performance and stability (so far) over my previous OUYA setup running SPMC. Thanks to the Haswell architecture. I'm 100% satisfied...

FYI I'm running the chromebox with the stock hardware (the cheapest model: Celeron + 2GB RAM, 16GB SSD) and the performance are perfectly fine for HTPC needs and XBMC. I only add a external USB HDD to get more storage for my data.

However, not all kind of Linux distros are possible at this time for the chromebox. This is due to a USB3/firmware/legacyBIOS issue. This will likely get fixed in a near future but a direct OpenElec installation is not possible atm. The only setup that has worked without issues for me with this machine was a full installation of ubuntu with XBMC.

Important: Forget the popular crouton script for now. You must use chrubuntu on it to get the full potentiel of the box and you must absolutely install Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy) to get the full Intel drivers support. This is the instructions that I have followed to get my current installation (minus the hardware upgrade part in my case):

http://www.willispickering.com/content/u...and-ubuntu

Cheers!

By the way, I now have a OUYA for sale...