Brock M. Tice
PO BOX 17416
Saint Paul, MN 55117

107 thoughts on “Building Android for the Asus Eee PC 701”

1. Titimoby 2008-12-21 at 07:53

   I’m currently uploading your img file and in the same time, I finish the setup of a mac OS compilation environment.

   I’ll post the result here.

   Thanks for your efforts.
2. Titimoby 2008-12-23 at 10:19

   I had no success in booting the img provided.
   After trying another time from my ubuntu machine, I gave up with the img file.

   It seems to be corrupted.

   In the meantime, I just need a last step to compile by myself.
3. Brock Tice Post author2008-12-23 at 10:23

   Titimoby: I’ve double-checked that the file on the server and the file I used for installation are the same. The md5sum is 48953dc4371284b7d4e0ed4a6f7ffa21.

   Is it not booting at all, or not installing? Do you see any error messages?
4. Titimoby 2008-12-23 at 10:35

   Thanks for the md5sum.
   I just checked my file is ok.

   When I dd to my usb stick, the files and folders have names with special characters.

   The thing doesn’t boot at all, but the strange file names made me think i messed the dd operation.
5. Titimoby 2008-12-24 at 17:31

   I have 3 remarks:

   – maybe a BS parameter is needed for the dd command.
   – I tried to compile with my mac but there is something harcoded that force the use of linux toolchain (i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc in the prebuilt folder)

   – the local_manifest.xml contains an error with the backslash caracter to remove and the must not be copied 😉
6. sg 2008-12-26 at 15:38

   Did anybody try this on virtualbox or vmware player running on XP? Is it possible to run this build in virtual environment?
7. Brock Tice Post author2008-12-26 at 15:43

   sg: You should be able to build for a generic x86 machine without the eee_701 target.
8. Jim Thompson 2008-12-29 at 01:39

   No ‘bs=’ parameter (dd assumes 512 if not specified). I suggest that perhaps your USB thumb drive is too small. (?)

   sg: I think you need:
   CONFIG_FB_VESA=y
   CONFIG_HAVE_IDE=y

   in vendor/asus/eee_701/kernel.config

   Brock, did you get WiFi working yet? Can you build a kernel from scratch yet?
9. Mike Miner 2009-01-01 at 11:45

   How would suggest this to be installed on somthing such as VMware? Mount in Deamon tools then install?
10. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-01 at 12:23

    Mike Miner, you’d have to make sure that the partition layout matches that of the Eee PC. You should then be able to specify the boot image as the second hard drive. I haven’t tried this, but I may give it a shot in VirtualBox soon, since reinstalling over and over on the Eee gets kind of annoying when trying things out.
11. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-01 at 12:24

    Jim Thompson, I haven’t got wifi or a kernel from scratch working yet. I need to spend a little time tweaking the kernel config, and I’ve been away from my Eee PC and my main building workstation on holiday break.
12. Mike Miner 2009-01-01 at 12:34

    I’ve tried booting it as a floppy image in VMware, it complains about the partition table being corrupt. Ill get back to you if I get it working.
13. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-02 at 13:29

    FWIW I’m not a Google developer, regarding comment #13.
14. Felipe Cepriano 2009-01-02 at 14:01

    I could boot the image on VMWare after converting it using qemu-img and using it as a SCSI harddrive.
    But it hangs after some time, “Waiting for the device: /dev/block/sdb2”.

    My VMWare config has 2 SCSI HDs, a 8GB empty image as SCSI 0:0 and the Android image as SCSI 0:1.
    Using a IDE HD (for the 8GB disk, VMWare don’t give any option for the Android image) doesn’t change anything….
    In “/dev/block” only sda is listed.
15. sg 2009-01-02 at 14:04

    Hi Brock, could you pls post the instructions for virtualbox if u were able to run this build on it?
    I found few instructions here:

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting/browse_thread/thread/66862bdb52dac936/93297601e93dd09c?q=andrd.dvlpr&lnk=nl&

    I was able to install it in Virtualbox but it doesn’t boot all the way. It boots up to a certain point and i see a blank screen after that..
    I enabled VESA and IDE in kernel config file. Not sure if anything else is missing.
16. sg 2009-01-02 at 14:07

    Felipe, did u see this link. It has instructions on VMware.

    http://groups.google.com/group/android-porting/browse_thread/thread/66862bdb52dac936/93297601e93dd09c?q=andrd.dvlpr&lnk=nl&
17. SAGITARIUS A 2009-01-02 at 19:58

    Wow many thanks for your great work!!!

    Hope really, that you include Wifi,Touchpad,SD Card,and that i can install apk’s.
    Then my Dreams come true.

    It was my first real android experience,far away from slow sdk emu,thx again!
18. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-03 at 12:50

    I got the image to boot on VirtualBox, but it hangs when trying to write system.img to /dev/block/sda6 for some reason.

    I had to edit the GRUB configuration to point to (hd1,0) instead of (hd0,0). I see this was also mentioned in the discussion linked by sg.

    I thought it might be a bug with the sparse disk image I had used, but using a pre-allocated disk image in VirtualBox didn’t help.

    By the way, converting the installer image for VirtualBox is easy:

    
VBoxManage convertdd eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z.img eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z.vdi

19. Thom 2009-01-03 at 12:59

    When I try this:

    I get an error
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 202, in
    _Main(sys.argv[1:])
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 186, in _Main
    repo._Run(argv)
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/main.py”, line 96, in _Run
    cmd.Execute(copts, cargs)
    File “/Users/tmorrow/mydroid/.repo/repo/subcmds/sync.py”, line 78, in Execute
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/command.py”, line 60, in GetProjects
    all = self.manifest.projects
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 78, in projects
    self._Load()
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 117, in _Load
    self._ParseManifest(False)
    File “/Volumes/android/mydroid/.repo/repo/manifest.py”, line 128, in _ParseManifest
    root = xml.dom.minidom.parse(self.manifestFile)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/minidom.py”, line 1913, in parse
    return expatbuilder.parse(file)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/expatbuilder.py”, line 924, in parse
    result = builder.parseFile(fp)
    File “/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/xml/dom/expatbuilder.py”, line 207, in parseFile
    parser.Parse(buffer, 0)
    xml.parsers.expat.ExpatError: not well-formed (invalid token): line 5, column 1

    But if I remove the from the xml it works

    Then when I build with

    TARGET_ARCH=x86 TARGET_PRODUCT=eee_701 DISABLE_DEXPREOPT=true make -j8 installer_img

    I get

    build/core/product_config.mk:207: WARNING: adding test OTA key
    ============================================
    TARGET_PRODUCT=eee_701
    TARGET_BUILD_VARIANT=eng
    TARGET_SIMULATOR=
    TARGET_BUILD_TYPE=release
    TARGET_ARCH=x86
    HOST_ARCH=x86
    HOST_OS=darwin
    HOST_BUILD_TYPE=release
    BUILD_ID=
    ============================================
    build/core/main.mk:178: implicitly installing apns-conf_sdk.xml
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/builtins.c
    prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc -m32 -o out/target/product/eee_701/obj/lib/crtbegin_static.o -c bionic/libc/arch-x86/bionic/crtbegin_static.S
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/init.c
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/lib/crtbegin_static.o] Error 127
    make: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs….
    target thumb C: init <= system/core/init/devices.c
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/builtins.o] Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/init.o] Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory
    make: *** [out/target/product/eee_701/obj/EXECUTABLES/init_intermediates/devices.o] Error 127

    I don’t know what I have done wrong….
20. TitiMoby 2009-01-03 at 14:16

    I have this error :
    Error 127
    /bin/bash: prebuilt/darwin-x86/toolchain/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-4.2.1/bin/i686-unknown-linux-gnu-gcc: No such file or directory

    shows… that you are building from a Mac like me 😉
    I searched on android dev forum but no answer on that kind of topic.

    the first error came from the xml file.
21. Oren 2009-01-03 at 15:37

    You know, redistributing a binary without providing the source *yourself*, is a violation of the GPL. Of course, no one is going to call you on that technicality but I just thought I”d mention it.
22. Thom 2009-01-03 at 16:48

    Darn the luck. I am using a mac. Also I tried downloading the img file but when I try to mount it on my mac it fails thus I don’t know how to put it on a flash drive.
23. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-03 at 17:24

    Oren,
    The main (only?) GPLed component is the kernel, and I actually used the prebuilt one in the Git repository.

    I looked briefly into how to get the source for that version of the kernel from the Android repository so that I could compile the madwifi drivers, but didn’t find them. I do intend to post the source once I figure that out. I know very little about Git, so I’ll have to learn a bit more first.

    Clearly someone has called me on it — you. I was aware of the problem, but considering that I made no modifications, I didn’t think anyone would be pedantic enough to care. But then, I didn’t expect Slashdot-level exposure either.
24. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-03 at 17:40

    Thom, don’t mount it. Just use dd on the command line. You’ll have to figure out which device is the flash drive using disk utility, and then probably use sudo to run dd.
25. Thom 2009-01-03 at 18:47

    Brock please delete my post 26 the dd command is backwards and this is the correct one.

    For those mac users. I got my usb flash drive to write.

    In terminal:
    Type: mount
    Mine was /dev/disk1s1
    Type: diskutil unmount

    my img file was on my desktop so this is what I typed to make it
    sudo dd if=~/Desktop/eeeDroid_2008-12-20_1843Z2.img of=/dev/disk1s1

    Yours will be where it is located and what you saved the file as. So yours will not be an exact duplicate most likely

    Now comes the other problem. I don’t have an eeepc. I have the acer aspire one. I hoped they had real similar hardware and would work. I put in my flash drive and started the machine. All I got was a flashing cursor on the top left. Nothing more. The aspire one doesn’t have an option to disable the card reader. Any thoughts or was it a pipe dream to think it was going to work?

    Thanks
    Thom
26. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-03 at 18:49

    Thom, I’m sure you mean if=(…)/eeeDroid_…img of=/dev/disk1s1.

    I’m not sure what is different with the aspire one. As Dima (the google developer in the linked discussion) mentioned, the installer is quite fragile. That’s probably the first thing the enthusiast community will want to improve. I have some other higher-priority stuff going on, but eventually I’d like to take a look at modifying the installation script.
27. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-03 at 18:50

    Haha, deleting post 26… We must have been writing at the same time.
28. Thom 2009-01-03 at 19:12

    Well just tried it again with a fresh download image and it does the same thing. Just a flashing cursor. Oh well. It was worth a try…

    Thanks
    Thoom
29. s g 2009-01-04 at 00:11

    Hi Brock,
    I was able to install the image in virtualbox (i got past the/dev/block/sda6 problem by following the link i posted earlier). It boots up to a certain point after installation and shows a blank screen. I see the same problem with the image i built(i did enable VESA and IDE in kernel config).
    Can anybody help?
    Thanks
30. Titimoby 2009-01-04 at 05:21

    Thanks to Thom, I manages to get.. the blinking cursor 🙂

    No worries, I’m still trying to figure it out 😉
31. Richard 2009-01-04 at 07:31

    @Thom
    That’s DD for you.

    When DD is running, there is no feedback, just a flashing cursor, when it is done, you should get the prompt back, I learnt this back when I hacked a friend’s apple TV to give it a 1TB drive

32. Pingback: Compiling Google Android for x86 with VMWARE & Ubuntu Linux on Windows « Napalmpiri

33. Martin 2009-01-05 at 13:12

    hello all, I’ve downloaded the provided img dd’d it to a usb flash device factory formatted from an ubuntu machine and went I reboot I just get a grub message appear in the top right hand corner of the screen with a flashing _ (underscore) and it doesn’t go anywhere from there. Has anyone else experience the same thing? If so, what am I doing wrong, I’ve tried several times to dd it to the usb stick as well as a SD card but too no avail, should you dd if the volume is mounted or unmount I tried both ways and nothing, any help would be greatly appreicated, thanks, Martin.
34. Martin 2009-01-05 at 18:54

    Okay, I finally managed to do it, I had download the file again as it seemed not to download correctly, I have managed to load it up on my MSI Wind, if someone can give me some advice on have to tweak the kernel for different hardware – specifically wifi, I have a wifi card in there from an original intel mac mini the core core duo not the core2duo. Any hints or advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
35. Thom 2009-01-05 at 20:54

    Richard. The flashing cursor is on the boot of the machine with the flash drive in the mini not during the dd command.

    Thanks
    Thom
36. Martin 2009-01-06 at 13:47

    Thom, does your flashing cursor say grub to the right of it?
37. Tim 2009-01-07 at 09:38

    Can the USB ports in the Eee be used in peripheral mode somehow? I would really like to connect adb and ddms to Android on the Eee, as if it was a phone device. (Ethernet and/or WiFi would also be nice. Has anybody had any luck activating these?)
    Tim
38. Brix 2009-01-07 at 13:48

    “(Ethernet and/or WiFi would also be nice. Has anybody had any luck activating these?)”

    I’m very curious about this as well. I’d like to be able to install on the eee, but I’m hesitant to do so without wifi support, seeing as that was the reason for getting it in the first place.
39. Andrew 2009-01-07 at 14:10

    Martin, i think i have the same problem as Thom, and it is just the blinking underscore, nothing else
    (it appears on the top line for maybe 1/10 second, then bumps to second line)
40. Andrew 2009-01-07 at 14:11

    i’m on a galaxy black 2G Surf, that has Win FLP on it…if it matters…

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42. Martin 2009-01-08 at 12:21

    Andrew, make sure when you dd the image to a usb drive that you dd to the actual drive and not a partition of that drive. for example say you have a usb drive under linux in /dev/sdb1 – the 1 in that indicates at partion of that drive so dd it to just /dev/sdb without a number after it and it should sort your problem out. Thanks, Martin.
43. Andrew 2009-01-08 at 12:27

    Well, I’m on a mac, so would it be /dev/disk1 instead of /dev/disk1s1?
44. Martin 2009-01-08 at 13:36

    Andrew, I guess it works the same like that on a mac, I have and do use a mac but not for anything remotely unix related so can say for definate, give it a try, it can’t hurt just make sure you’ve got the correct drive, type df from a terminal and make sure, you don’t want to wipe out your hard drive or something else! Martin.
45. Matthias 2009-01-08 at 14:58

    Richard Stallman used to request $100 for copies of the source for emacs. You may want to follow in his footsteps for those who are overly pedantic.
46. Chris 2009-01-08 at 22:34

    Thanks for the IMG, it worked perfectly. I’ve installed it on my eee 701. I noticed there’s no mouse support and everything is done through the keyboard. Any idea on how to get to a terminal?
47. Chris 2009-01-08 at 22:39

    Answered my own question, ctrl + alt + F1 just like any sane linux distro.

    Home = Home
    Esc = back

    No idea what the search key is.
48. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-08 at 22:44

    Chris: Yep, and the windows menu button = menu. Also, the brightness keys seem to work, but none of the rest do.
49. Chris 2009-01-08 at 22:49

    Also, the menu button = menu. How convenient.
50. Brock Tice Post author2009-01-10 at 00:11

    So, I finally got a kernel (2.6.27) to build from scratch, but SurfaceFlinger segfaults continually, so the interface won’t load. *sigh*

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