To open the laptop, I turned it over and carefully removed the four rubber pads that act as the “feet” of the Chromebook Pixel. Google put a physical write-protect screw on the motherboard and as long as that screw is in place, Chrome OS is the only game in town. Disable any write-protectionīefore installing any firmware updates to support a different operating system, I had to crack open the Chromebook Pixel.

So it’s not the most secure device for browsing at the moment. This is a perfect candidate for a Linux installation because the last software update pushed to it was Chrome OS 69. So I dug around the closet where good Chromebooks go to collect dust and found the 2013 Chromebook Pixel I bought new seven years ago. I haven’t delved into this type of esoteric but useful project in a while but a CompSci classmate is thinking about switching from Windows 10 to Linux. For several years, he’s been the go-to authority for doing major operating system and firmware changes to dozens of Chromebook models so you can natively install Windows or Linux on your device.

If you’ve visited the Chrome OS subReddit, you’ve surely seen posts by Mr.

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