Any ideas on replacing Android OS with Linux?
 

I'm desperately trying to make a media player. There are a ton out there and all of them seem to fall short of XBMC. I've thought about building a PC (mini-ITX form factor) to make a set-top box but it really isn't practical since it can't be done for under $400 where I am.

I would like to pick up an inexpensive media player (I found a Chinese version running Android 2.2). From there I would like to wipe off Android and put on a XBMC Live (which is ubuntu based).

Anyone have ANY ideas on how I can accomplish this? If it would work it would mean XBMC with 1080p for under $50.

Please help if you can.

Android itself has many apps that can do media center based things. With that said, which media player as some I'm sure by now have ports, as do many phones (see xda-developers) and tablets running android. So it's possible depending on the device and what developers and community members have done to it.

I don't think you want to replace Android wholesale with a traditional Linux kernel, etc. That's probably far more work than you might imagine.

On the other hand, you might be interested to know there are many folks that have managed to install Ubuntu/Debian inside an Android device. As far as I understand it, it's not a "dual boot" setup, but more like (very loose analogy here) a virtual machine running inside Android.

There are how-tos sprinkled across the web if you search for "run linux under android"

Indeed, I even found an app on the market (requires root as most, if not all these approaches likely require):
Linux Installer

By all representations, these should be full-fledged linux installs which should allow access to repositories, and therefore, XBMC through said repositories.

EDIT:
All that said, I am not going to speculate as to performance. Though, to be honest, I think you're overly optimistic if you're hoping for any $50 device capable of streaming full 1080p video. I bought an Acer Iconia tablet for $400+ which was advertised as including the ability to play 1080p content. Playing the content on the device was choppy (and that's being generous) at release. Only after an OTA update or two did it get to the point that 1080p video playback on the device itself was acceptable. And again, that was with arguably top-of-the-line specs when released. I can't see a $50 tablet having the horsepower to push 1080p locally much less via a wireless network connection... and then through a virtual Linux environment

But here's hoping you make an unjustifiable cynic out of me :)

It's not a tablet it is a dedicated anroid media player that I want to convert to XBMC.

There are guides to jailbreak the Apple TV 2 ($119 CAD) and install XBMC on that but it wasn't working, I kept getting error after error.

I have my old xbox running it right now which runs perfect, but I just wanted to get something a little more compact.

As for the 1080p media, that's fine, I don't have any 1080p media anyway.

I never said it was a tablet. Though, I'm not sure what point you're questioning by saying that your device is not a tablet:

I mentioned my tablet as a comparison. A $400 tablet advertised as playing 1080p content should have as much or more multimedia horsepower as a $50 dedicated media player.

The links I provided aren't tablet-specific as far as I know. Most of the how-tos or walkthroughs may use a tablet in the process, but the instructions are for android--not tablets specifically.

Anyway, good luck with it.

The last sentence of your post I understood as you thinking it was a tablet.

However, thank you for the links, I'll take a look into it.

Android IS a linux operating system
replace android with android

http://www.cyanogenmod.com/

Indeed I did. An unfortunate use of that word given that I said "$50 device" earlier in that paragraph. My apologies.

Wait a bit and get a Raspberry Pi Model B, that will get you XBMC at 1080p for $35, no hacking required:

http://www.thepowerbase.com/2012/01/...-running-xbmc/