Windows 7 hacked to run on the ASUS ZenFone 2

By Jared DiPane
published

A member of the XDA forums has taken the ASUS ZenFone 2, an Intel-powered Android smartphone, and booted Windows 7 on it. Surprisingly, the OS runs quite smoothly, with no major bugs. The video has Windows 7 booted, though it is said that Windows 8 and Windows 10 could be installed in the same fashion, and should both work equally as well.

The process is a bit complex: first you will need to unlock the bootloader, then flash a specific kernel, partition the SD card, and then get down and dirty with a number of terminal commands. While this process is certainly not for everyone, it is still interesting to see this Intel-powered device running a full version of Windows rather well.

Is it possible we may see an Intel-powered Windows Phone in the future, or will Continuum be enough? Be sure to let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Check out the Android Central review of the ASUS ZenFone 2

Source: XDA

Jared DiPane
Jared DiPane
Jared started off writing about mobile phones back when BlackBerry ruled the market, and Windows Mobile was kinda cool. Now, with a family, mortgage and other responsibilities he has no choice but to look for the best deals, and he's here to share them with you.
31 Comments
  • W10 on my S5 Active please!
  • this is not windows phone running on the zen phone. This is regular OS and this only work because the zen phone has intel hardware S5 active is ARM and will never run windows
  • Windows 10 will have support for ARM. Not saying it's going to happen, but it's not unlikely either.
  • Nope Windows 10 don't support ARM anymore. Microsoft killed windows RT that means its the end of Windows 10 for ARM(existing devices in the market will only get some feature of windows 10 but not windows 10 itself).
    although the only device microsoft support is the rasberry pie 2. apart from that windows for ARM is dead. so the above request is very unlikely to happen
  • They created Windows 10 to work on both processor architectures. They are just not calling it Windows RT anymore. Posted via the Android Central App
  • You're such a pessimist, never say never
  • I am not pessimist. I am just being realistic. the whole reason this phone runs windows is because it has intel processor.
    with most phones being ARM it is impossible to run intel x86 software on ARM. it would have been possible to run windows 10 on ARM if Microsoft has not stopped developing for RT devices
  • Okay, I'll settle for 8.1
  • How video editing? Can it run Crysis? Posted via the Android Central App
  • Lol Crysis was my first thought too. Posted via the Android Central App
  • I benched it. Crysis 3 runs at 120hz at 4K with 8X MSAA. Flawless Posted via the Android Central App
  • Damn cool :-) Posted via the Android Central App
  • they are just running it in an emulator, it's not really that impressive
    sure the kernel needed to be patched to allow the emulator to run but still.
    It's not like they are booting it natively, that would be impressive.
  • Gotta crawl before you can run!
  • I suspect it's more in the area of a virtual machine since it is actual Intel hardware.
  • I just read an article that 5.1.1 will be starting testing in India for ZF2. I'm surprised AC never mentioned this. That is more important that Win 7. However if they get Win10M running I will be first to test. Posted via the Android Central App
  • Presumably while this is running, the actual phone functions are disabled.
  • Woah!! That's COOL Posted from my "Jack Of All Trades" LG G4
  • It's through a VM Posted via the "None-Ya" app
  • So?
  • And if someone could be bothered to do it,it could probably be done on an old htc hd2 as well.
    It ran everything else that folk could be bothered to try with,i cannit remember exactly hiw many different os's could be made to run on it,i think it was 11,before folk moved on to newer,more powerful devices.it had got as far as ms xp,and could probably still run android l and m as well,just slowly,not bad for a device designed and built to run winmo 6.5.
    It would be nice if someone could build a modern equivalent,easy to totaly unlock,powerful and nice to use.
    At one point i had mine capable if running ms 98,winmo 6.5 and any flavour of andriod upto jb,and could boot any one of i think 9 different andriod roms just with a simple restart/reboot !!!.
    In the days when htc took notice of what users on xda forum had to say,since they stopped listening/reading to xda,its been downhill for htc,they will get bought out soon if they do not get it right soon...
  • The zenfone2 does have laptopish specs... 4gb ram, intel processor, 1080p screen. The only thing that's missing is a 15.6 inch display Posted from nexus 7 2013 or nexus 5 (stormtrooper)
  • This comment made me giggle. Posted from my Asus ZenFone 2.
  • +1 Posted via the Android Central App
  • So does my N6 with a 2.7 Gh processor and 3 GB ram
  • Not bad specs, but Windows requires an x86 processor, which the N6 lacks.
  • MHL adapter?
  • ..
  • can we get Ubuntu desktop running on this?
  • I'd be more impressed if it was running natively.
  • ePicness...