Hacker News Reader

Comment by beretguy | Hacker News Reader

Framework and chromeos feel like a very strange combination to me.

Hard disagree from me. I've had a lot of Chromebooks and 3 frameworks, and it's a terrific match IMHO. I do wish you could switch back and forth between Linux and Chromebook without replacing the main board, but even that is a great fit. As needs change, you have options. Chromebook is great for many users especially now that it runs Linux apps, and can even be a very capable dev machine.

You need to swap out the mainboard to install Linux?

It's the other way around. If you want ChromeOS (in particular with its Verified Boot system for the OS image [1]), you need special hardware that comes with Chromebooks, including the Framework Chromebook. That has nothing to do with the ability to run Linux, though.

If you don't care about Verified Boot, you can install ChromeOS-Flex on a Framework Linux device (https://www.reddit.com/r/framework/comments/um0mk6/chromeos_...)

On the other hand, installing Linux on Chromebook hardware is straightforward.

The options are:

1. Use the Debian Linux VM (Crostini) that is already present on Chromebooks:

https://chromeos.dev/en/linux

All you do is click on a few buttons in the settings. This approach preserves Verified Boot.

If you want to replace ChromeOS on a Chromebook with a Linux distro, you can use Crouton: https://github.com/dnschneid/crouton

This approach removes verified boot.

1. https://www.chromium.org/chromium-os/chromiumos-design-docs/...

Okay, that's what i thought.

IIRC Flex does not have Android support

> I do wish you could switch back and forth between Linux and Chromebook without replacing the main board

Crouton? It won't have full capabilities being in a chroot, but I remember it being more than adequate for almost everything I needed it for. 5 years ago.

Sorry I was pretty unclear. By "Linux" here I meant, "a traditional Linux distro" not just Linux inside the Chromebook. Crouton is amazing but pretty outdated at this point not being kept up to date, but crostini is, and neither of those require a main board swap

Gotcha. Yeah see I had no clue Crouton was unmaintained. Shows how long its been since I've used a Chromebook I guess. I'm not even familiar with Crostini. Only heard the name.

Imagine all the schools with Chromebooks deployed, suddenly there's an option for their own IT staff to easily replace broken parts instead of buying new Chromebooks or sending them elsewhere to repair. Decent market for that.

This has existed for a while:

https://edu.google.com/chromebooks/chromebook-repairability

Some school districts have summer internship programs for students interested in learning how to do the repairs.

https://www.pcmag.com/news/google-encourages-kids-to-repair-...

You can upgrade and repair your laptop!

But after a few years you can no longer update your web browser.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com