HN Explorer

I just received my CR-48, now what should I do?

9 points by joejohnson ↗ HN
I received my Chrome Notebook from Google this weekend. I've been playing around with it and put it in developer mode. Does anyone have anyone know any interesting hacks that people have tried with this computer? I feel like there is a lot of potential here for a cool project.

13 comments

[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 39.0 ms ] thread
Zpirate
See if you can install a Linux distro.
kemsiro
you can install Mac OS X on it :-)
anigbrowl
Me too. The one thing I can't do with it that would be really useful is reading from a USB stick/drive.

Mac OS has already been done and Google themselves give instructions on how to stick Ubuntu on it for replacement or dual boot.

minalecs
you can put the computer in developer mode and access the usb stick from terminal.
anigbrowl
I've done that - I'd just like to get at it by dragging and dropping files rather than via a console. Lots of people have USB sticks, not so many know their way around BASH. Almost every PC has a USB connector, but it's not so unusual to encounter older ones that don't have wifi or be in some place without a good signal. In these cases it's hard to transfer data onto the CR-48 for later upload to the cloud.
joejohnson
Also, if you try to upload photos or documents through a web app (I tried facebook's, but I've heard others work) you are given a simple browser that will let you view the underlying file system and see the contents of your USB flash drive.
IVirOrfeo
Get GSM up and running using an active SIM Card. Get SubSonic Up and running on a server and access it via Cr48 Try Wiz-help Cloud-in some non existing apps like xmame with tonido If your cr48 is a FISH, open it up and document the inner configuration, I am certain that it is different from the PONY. Find a way to check hardware specs without opening the machine.
joejohnson
What do you mean using an active SIM card? I enabled the free 3G data plan with Verizon, if that's what you mean.

What are the different hardwares that my cr48 could be. I was not aware that there are multiple models. Is there some way to check this from the shell?

IVirOrfeo
I would love to see a hacker news CR-48 User group. I feel that hacker news played a big role in me getting one.
zck
Can you elaborate how? I ask selfishly, but it would be interesting to know.

I have a hunch that one of the main reasons I wasn't sent one was because I said I use Firefox instead of Chrome -- I thought that lying would be a bad idea, even if they never found out.

proexploit
I had that hunch too (of course, pure speculation). Coincidently, I've now moved to Chrome primarily anyways.
IVirOrfeo
Quite frankly, I would love to have my social networking done here instead of other places.