is there a way to completely delete Chrome OS on a chromebook - and install linux (not dual boot)

Question

I'm looking to buy the latest fanless HP or Samsung Chromebooks. However, I want to install linux on it and delete Chrome OS - is there a way to do this ?

I am familiar with Crouton and Chrubuntu - however, they seem only to provide dual boot solutions

many thanks

Answer 1

I had flashed u-boot on Samsung Chromebook and completely formatted the internal MMC. I have archlinux running on internal MMC

Source: Bootloader unlock on samsung arm chromebook.

Please note this method is very risky and can break the device Copying the steps from blog

Steps:

1. Take a backup of all important data. Anything can go wrong. Have a bootable external mmc ready in case if anything goes wrong

2. Open backcover of chromebook. Follow instructions from ifixit http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Samsung+Chromebook+11.6+Teardown/12225/2#s45950

3. Next to usb-3 port lies a round ring shape circuit. Remove the stricker from it which will unshort the connection. This will make spi read-write. Make sure there are no traces of metal around it

4. Boot into chromeos. ctrl+alt+T and enter into sudo prompt $flashrom —wp-disable $flashrom —wp-status

check if write-protection is disabled. If not, go back and clean the circuit. I opened it twice. Download nv uboot image from https://www.dropbox.com/s/6pzvraf3ko14sz9/nv_image-snow.bin.gz (source: Strats’s post at Archlinux forum) gunzip it. You should be having a 4MB bin file. If downloaded bin is corrupt, you might endup with a bricked device. MD5 of extracted binary: CA50D23D315F1378B43E4552D8D441AD

// Take backup and then flash
$flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0 -r orig_image-snow.bin
$flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0 -w nv_image-snow.bin
$sync and reboot

4. Press space on reboot to get into uboot prompt. $setenv bootdelay 1 $saveenv

   $vboot_twostop will boot into chromeos

5. Booting custom OS format mmc in gpt format. Use cgpt/parted create a fat partition for boot, say size 256 MB - mmcblk1p1. Copy vmlinux(or any other kernel) from /boot of chromeos into this partition. Create an ext4 partition for rootfs - mmcblk1p2. copy any linux rootfs. Arch, suse-jeos and fedora worked for me Reboot

   At uboot prompt

   // choose 2nd mmc device. Internal mmc is dev 0 $mmc dev 1

   // ls contents in filesystem. I get lot of dcache warnings. Still works $fatls mmc 1:1 /

   // load kernel to memory $fatload mmc 1:1 ${loadaddr} /vmlinux

   // set kernel boot parameters $setenv bootargs console=tty1 root=/dev/mmcblk1p2 rootfstype=ext4 rootwait rw

   $bootm ${loadaddr}

   Now you have the freedom to boot any kernel without signing it.