As reported here Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich is now available for x86 platform. The very same mobile version has been ported to x86 machines powered by Intel and AMD processors. With .iso available for download you can either clean install Android 4.0 on your netbooks (prefered) or install it on Windows or Mac PC using virtualization software. And when talking about virtualization Virtual Box is the best freeware out there than can load almost any OS virtually.
Installing Android 4.0 ICS on Windows or Mac using VirtualBox is the best way if you don’t want to dual-boot and mess up with your already existing boot files. Using VirtualBox create a Virtual Disk Image and then boot the Android 4.0 .iso file to run without installation or install it to virtual hard disk. Follow the steps mentioned below to boot ICS on your laptop or netbook now.
Steps to install and run Android 4.0 ICS on Windows/ Mac using Virtual Box:
1. Download and install Virtual Box [link].
2. Now download Android 4.0 x86 version for the project download page [link].
3. Launch Virtual Box and hit ‘New’ button to start creating a new Virtual Machine. Enter a name for Virtual Machine and select OS as Linux with version 2.6. Click Next.
4. Select ‘Create a new disk’ and hit ‘Next’.
5. Select the amount of base memory (RAM) in MB (500 MB preferred) using the slider and hit ‘Next’.
6. Now using the virtual disk creation wizard select the file type as VDI (VirtualBox Disk image). Hit ‘Next’.
7. Choose whether the new virtual disk you created should be allocated storage space dynamically or fixed. Hit ‘Next’.
8. Now choose the location to store newly created .vdi file. Also set a maximum size for virtual disk in the case of a dynamically allocated disk storage. Hit ‘Next’ and wait for it to create the file.
9. Now from the VirtualBox Manager select your virtual disk. Here in our case it’s ‘Android ICS’ and click start.
10. Now the virtual instance will start running in a new window. Head over to ‘Devices’ menu and select ‘CD/DVD Devices’. Choose a virtual CD/DVD disk file and point it to the Android 4.0 x86 file downloaded in step 2. Go to ‘Machine’ menu and select ‘Reset’.
11. Android 4.0 .ISO image will now load and will be greeted with a screen where you can choose to either run without installation or install it to hard disk (virtual disk in our case).
If you choose ‘Run Android-x86 without installation’ VirtualBox will load Android ICS from .ISO image stored on physical hard disk and you will soon be able to start using it. Enable or disable mouse integration accordingly to capture mouse and start navigating.
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