Android Wear is a pretty great smartwatch ecosystem in its own right, but leave it to hackers and hobbyists to bring out the best in any operating system and its devices, whether that’s through optimization to make your device a lean, mean computing machine or deep-level workarounds to make your device do something it was never intended to do. This hack definitely falls into the latter category and then some; this is clearly something that the average Android Wear watch was not only never intended for, it’s something that the smartwatch OS and even smartwatches in general, are pretty terrible at. Nonetheless, a clever YouTuber by the name of Hacking Jules saw fit to bring Windows 7 to the original LG G Watch to replace Android Wear. On the test hardware, sporting the same 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor found in the ZTE ZMax and the original Moto G alongside a measly 512 MB of RAM, Windows 7, incredibly, can boot and be used. It just takes three hours.
While a three-hour boot cycle is cumbersome, it’s among the lesser usability issues facing this unofficial port of Windows 7, most of which mirror the issues faced by users who wanted to take advantage of Windows 95 and Windows XP ending up on similar hardware not long ago. For starters, in order to do anything beyond moving the mouse with the watch’s touch screen, users will have to get the Android Debug Bridge, ADB, up and running on their computer and hook the watch up to it in order to give it the right commands to get the Bochs x86 emulator going. From there, users will need to be familiar enough with DOS to get the files where they need to be and get Windows 7 installed on a virtual drive for Bochs to boot it. Obviously, slow operation and low software compatibility are also issues; although the emulator used is capable of running an x86 command set on an ARM processor, the commands must be interpreted and recompiled, which leaves room for error and makes things extremely slow.
Regardless, there are sure to be a few reading this who want to install Windows 7 on their timepiece of choice. Hacking Jules created a tutorial on exactly how to achieve this act of tech wizardry in the form of a separate video, linked from the demonstration video’s description. Thus, if you’re feeling particularly brave and have the right device and about three hours to spare, head through the source link for your chance to give Windows 7 a try.