Last month, those who signed up for Google’s small Chrome OS pilot program got an early Christmas present when they received a Cr-48. The Cr-48 is a machine specifically manufactured for Google to allow the company to put laptops powered by the Chrome OS into the hands of users to solicit feedback before a more formal push to consumers. The laptop gets its name from the fact that Cr-48 is an isotope of the element chromium which has an obvious connection to the Chrome OS.
Being that Google has received 60,000 of these Cr-48’s, potentially all for the pilot, it was a statistical probability that a few of these laptops would land in the hands of geeks who weren’t happy to just keep Chrome OS running on it. Soon after members of the pilot began receiving the Cr-48 someone figured out how to put Ubuntu on it. Now that a few more days have passed we hear reports that someone has figured out how to load Windows 7 and Mac OS X on it as well.
While it sounds like loading Ubuntu on your Cr-48 has very little chance of bricking the computer, loading Windows 7 or Mac OS X is much more invasive. Both operating systems will require you to flash the Cr-48 with a stock version of the BIOS. That’s not a procedure for the faint of heart since if done unsuccessfully you’ll be left with a brick. The procedure to load Windows can be found at Something Awful while a demo of the Cr-48 booting Mac OS X can be found below.
Read more at Engadget and be sure to check out our hands-on review of the Cr-48.
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