Tablet PC Guide

Okay, first things first, HP TouchPad is a discontinued flagship tablet by HP. It runs WebOS which is, to be frank, half-baked cake. It has tiny number of apps (good luck finding useful ones) and very few developers open their hands for it, even though it was a great piece of hardware and software too! It was touted as the game changer from Apple’s iPad but within two months the device was discontinued and sold at prices $99 for 16GB and $149 for 32GB.

Hackers, for all the good reasons, saw this as a perfect playground to experiment Android on. And the people at CyanogenMod started to get into work and brought out an operating system which was not only as abundant in apps but also was a solid platform.

We have Jelly Bean (the latest version of Android in the market) ported on TouchPad (TP, hereon), but it’s not as stable as 4.0 IceCream Sandwich.

We’ll see a step by step process to how to port Android on HP TouchPad along with WebOS in dual boot.

Few things to keep in mind:

THIS INSTALLATION IS NOT SUPPORTED BY HP OR ANY OTHER COMPANY. INSTALLING A CUSTOM OS ON ANY DEVICE VOIDS ALL OF THE WARRANTIES IT COMES WITH. PLEASE PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.

We have done the installation twice by the below mentioned method and it worked perfectly fine for us. But we can still take no liabilities if things go wrong. Just make sure you follow the exact steps, and you’ll be alright.

This installation, if not done properly may result in turning the device dead. We will take no responsibilities for it whatsoever.

This tutorial is done Windows running PCs only. No other operating system should be used to install the Android on Touch Pad.

See it for yourselves, the working Android OS on the HP TouchPad. Watch the video below:

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Okay now let’s get started!

1. Before you do anything, take a backup of all your data from the HP TouchPad. If you want any application to do for you, take the help of Comodo Backup.
2. Install Java on your PC, from here.
3. Install Novacom. Now this is a tricky part. If you can, download WebOS SDK, which already has Novacom drivers or you can install Novacom .jar file from here.
4. After that is done, download these software from the links next to them:

• ACME installer – Download
• MOBoot 0.3.5 – Download
• ClockworkMod Recovery – Download
• OPTIONAL (but you should download it anyway) Default Google Apps – Download
• Last and the most important, latest Android nightly (codename Tenderloin) release from CyanogenMod website – Go to page

Now here’s where you have to hold your breaths and pay attention. Real ATTENTION.

1. Install Novacom.
2. After installation, there will be a folder created here “C:\Program Files\Palm Inc.” or “C:\Program Files\HP WebOS”.
3. Copy the ACME Installer in the same folder as Novacom is in.
4. Now, connect the HP TouchPad to the PC via USB.
5. Select the ‘USB Drive’ from the options in the right hand side corner of the title bar.
6. Once inside, the device will be detected as a USB Mass Storage device in My Computer.
7. Create a folder in the root of the HP TouchPad. In other words, double click the mass storage device in my computer and create a folder named cminstall.
8. Now copy the cm9-xxxxxxxx-NIGHTLY-tenderloin, g-apps, ClockworkMod Recovery and MOBoot zip files in this folder.
9. Turn the TouchPad off.
10. After the device is off, press the volume up button until the screen of the TouchPad shows the USB icon.
11. The PC will detect the HP TouchPad. Once it does, open command prompt. Navigate to the folder until you have the destination like this C:\Program Files\Palm Inc.\Novacom>
12. Once there, type the following command Novacom boot mem://<ACMEInstaller3
13. Now, it is possible that it says “failed to connect to the server”. If this is the case, reboot your PC once and try again. If the problem remains, go to the Novacom directory, run the Novacom by double clicking the .exe file and type the command again and it will work.
14. The screen will show two Tux smiling at you and a series of commands executing on your TouchPad. Don’t panic.
15. The ClockworkMod and MOBoot should be installed on the TouchPad.
16. Restart.

Boot WebOS
Boot ClockworkMod
Boot WebOS Recovery
Reboot
Shutdown

The steps now will be:

1. Use volume buttons for controlling the options on the boot screen. From these options, select boot ClockworkMod and press the ‘home’ button.
2. Once inside, again with the help of volume buttons, go to the option install zip from sdcard -> choose zip from sdcard and navigate to the cminstall folder.
3. From there select the cm9-xxxxxxxx-NIGHTLY-tenderloin.zip file and press home button. Out of many options, select Yes – Install cm9-xxxxxxxx-NIGHTLY-tenderloin.zip, press home button.

If everything was done properly, you will now see a progress bar. Just lay back and relax until the screen reads out ‘Install from sdcard complete.’

Once that happens, select ++++++Go Back++++++ each time to go back to reach the main menu. Select reboot system now.

When that happens, there will be a new option added to the boot screen, and it’ll look something like this:

Boot WebOS
Boot ClockworkMod
Boot CyanogenMod
Boot WebOS Recovery
Reboot
Shutdown

Select boot CyanogenMod, press ‘home’ button and there! Enjoy the CM9 bot greeting you with a wicked smile. >:)