Android x86 review – Runs great on the EEE PC!

Frankly speaking, I was a bit reluctant and was not excited at all when I thought of running Android on my EEE PC. Primary reason could be the bugging fact that I was going to install an OS that was actually meant for a mobile phone. So, how was my experience? Read the full review to find out!

How did I install it?

First, I downloaded file by the name of “android-x86-1.6.iso” from here. Then, I used unetbootin to burn it onto my flash drive.

Installation

Instead of dual-booting with XP, I decided to force myself to use Android whole day. The Android takes mere 20MB of space! Yes, it is that small.

Just a word of precaution: to get the grub working, I had to use ext3 partition. For some weird (unknown) reason, the grub was not getting installed on my EEE 701 when installation was done on an ext2, FAT or NTFS partition.

By the way, the installation time is somewhere around 30-40seconds! Have you ever seen a whole OS installed on your computer with that speed?!

Booting

Booting up takes around 30 seconds. Shutting down takes less than a second. I’ve never seen an operating system shutting down that quick.

Takes 3-4 seconds to get out of standby mode.

Web Browsing

After all, what is the main purpose of a netbook: surf the net, right? Well, this passed the test with flying colors. I was amazed by the speed at which it loaded websites! Even a heavy website like engadget was loaded so quickly. It loaded every single web-page faster than my Acer Aspire D250 which was running Firefox 3.5 and Windows XP as its OS.

Everything just works, including email. I set it to download my email after 5 minutes and it worked without a problem. It is definitely the MOST RESPONSIVE OS that I have ever used on my netbook so far.

Android Market

To be honest, I had no expectations that this module would even work on EEE. But, Appstore ran beautifully just like all other apps. I was able to install any application from Appstore with absolutely no problems at all.

Running below an app that I downloaded from Android market: Swift

The Android built that I have been testing has been tweaked for EEE PCs, so even the Fn combo functions work. Again, very very quick, it is!

The webcam works under its camera app, but you will need an SD card to save the pics as Android does not like saving pics in the main memory.

Glitches

Its browser does not support flash. Although HTC has managed to bring flash to HTC HERO, it has not been implemented in this built.

When I plugged in the mouse, it did not recognize it. But, a quick reset solved the problem and the mouse was working without any problems. The right click open up the menu and I must say that Android was a pleasure to use with a mouse. It never occurred to me once if I was using an operating system that is meant for the mobile phones.

Bottom Line

Boy! I had underestimated Android so much. It is wonderful to use on a netbook. Also, there is no harm in keeping an OS that occupies just 20MB of storage and provides the fastest browsing experience.

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