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The chromebook I'm trying to install Ubuntu on is a Google Pixelbook, with the i5-8200Y and 8 GB of RAM.

The Chromebook model name is EVE.

One cannot install Ubuntu in a Chromebook in the regular method, because default settings of Chromebook do not allow booting from a USB drive.

The official tutorial for installing Ubuntu in chroot using the Crouton installer is for Ubuntu 16.04, and is outdated. I'm not too sure on the version of Ubuntu, I would assume 16.04 though as I'm using the crouton installer. So, I asked this question initially on Reddit, about running into trouble on one of the steps. The redditor was able to help me partially, guiding me to the updated crouton install guide.

My problem currently is that I left it to install after typing

sudo crouton -t xfce

and it did a bunch of retrieving and validating, but then after a while, when I returned, it had thrown this error at me.

Compiling CRAS (i386)...
gcc: error: unrecognized command line option '-Wundef-prefix=HAVE_,CRAS_'
Failed to complete chroot setup.
Unmounting /mnt/stateful_partition/crouton/chroots/xenial...

Basically, I've just started coding, so I don't understand any of it. Thank you.

Archisman Panigrahi
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Joonte Lee
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1 Answers1

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Check out the other answer for ARM chromebooks.

This guide is for the full installation of the latest version of Ubuntu (dual boot/single boot). Installing Ubuntu will necessarily remove ChromeOS. If you don't want to do that, Set up Linux on Chromebook instead. It will create a Debian virtual container inside ChromeOS.

Also, the sound repository mentioned below works in Ubuntu 24.04, but not with 22.04.

This answer is applicable to almost any chromebook with amd64 processor.

I have used these methods on three Chromebooks (Acer C731 RELM and HP x360 14b BLOOGUARD, and Lenovo 500e 2nd gen PHASER360), and they work perfectly. I have tried Ubuntu, Ubuntu MATE, Kubuntu, and Arch Linux in them, and all the hardware (touchscreen/camera/audio) work.

You will have to use the MrChromebox.Tech ROM

These instructions are based on this webpage.

First, find out the Chromebook model name. Then, ensure that your Chromebook is supported. I checked that EVE is indeed supported.

  1. Fully update your Chromebook and enable developer mode. After enabling developer mode, the computer will show ChromeOS is missing, but you can press ctrl+d to boot into ChromeOS. If you do not press, it will automatically boot into ChromeOS after 30 seconds.

  2. In Google Pixelbook and most other recent chromebooks, you need to temporarily detach the battery from the motherboard to disable Firmware Write Protect. See this page for more details about different devices. In older Chromebooks, you had to remove a screw from the motherboard instead of detaching the battery. Another user's experience: On a Lenovo Thinkpad 11e 4th generation Chromebook "PYRO", even though all the resources I checked stated that the battery must be disconnected, I didn't do it, and when I got to step 4 in these instructions, it showed Fw WP: Disabled already. I do not know why. Updating the firmware worked as stated below.

  3. Open a ChromeOS terminal with Ctrl+Alt+T. Enter the command shell (you cannot do this without developer mode), and enter the following command.

cd; curl -LO mrchromebox.tech/firmware-util.sh && sudo bash firmware-util.sh

Note: In recent versions of ChromeOS, you have to use the VT2 terminal ( ctrl + alt + f2 , and login with chronos) instead of the regular terminal.

image

Steps for Single boot

  1. Install Full UEFI. It will install a custom FOSS bootloader, that will turn your chromebook into a normal laptop.

  2. Reboot, and boot Ubuntu from a live USB. Install Ubuntu in the same way you would install it in a normal laptop.

  3. In case sound does not work, setup sound with

git clone https://github.com/WeirdTreeThing/chromebook-linux-audio
cd chromebook-linux-audio

The sound script does not natively support Ubuntu, but it works with Ubuntu 23.10 and above.

Then, run

./setup-sound

And reboot.

  1. Here is how to set the Chromebook keyboard layout to enable the media keys.

Steps for Dual Boot

Warning: For dual boot, you will have to use RW_Legacy, which does not support touch screen and audio in many recent chromebooks. But almost all hardware is supported if you install the full ROM and install Ubuntu as the sole operating system.

  1. If you want to dual boot, choose 1) Install/Update RW_Legacy firmware.

  2. Since chromebook has little internal storage, you should install Ubnuntu in an external drive (USB drive/SSD/microSD). You will need two USB drives (or a USB drive and a microSD card), one with Ubuntu installation image flashed, and the other drive is where you will install Ubuntu.

  3. In case you opted for RW_Legacy firmware, reboot, and press Ctrl+L to choose external booting media (e.g. USB/microSD where you have flashed Ubuntu). Then, install Ubuntu on the other USB drive (or you can install ubuntu in the microSD card).

  4. Afterwards, press Ctrl+L to boot Ubuntu from the USB drive/microSD card where you installed Ubuntu, or press Ctrl+D to boot ChromeOS.

See the points above for setting up audio and sound.

Tips and Tricks:

  1. Here is how to enable automatic screen rotation, if your Chromebook has the appropriate sensors for that.
  2. Here is the screen rotation tutorial for chromebooks without a rotation sensor.
  3. Here are some tunings to make Firefox run faster on low-end Chromebooks.
  4. In case your chromebook makes a continuous, loud beep sound while playing music/video, check out this post.
Archisman Panigrahi
  • 38,814