How To Run Android On Mac OS X, Windows & Linux With Genymotion
If you are into development for a particular OS, or just want to test it out without a dedicated device, running it in an emulator on your development or everyday use computer can be very useful. When it comes to emulating Android on a PC, there a bunch of options available, including the official Android emulator that comes with the Android SDK for developers, as well as the popular
that is more focused on letting end users run Android apps on their PC. Though the SDK’s emulator is known for being very slow, while Bluestacks is feature-limited for development scenarios. If you are looking for a much faster full-featured emulation of Android on your computer, your search just might be over with Genymotion. Pronouned Genie+Motion, this new player in the game works by creating a virtual machine through VirtualBox to deliver a marvelous real-time emulation of Android on your Windows, Mac or Linux PC, complete with ADB access and support for various hardware sensors. It works so well, you’ll wish you had a touch screen for a monitor. Wanna explore it further? Let’s get started.First, you will need to download Genymotion for your machine. To do so, visit the Genymotion website (link provided at the end of this post) and create a free account using a working e-mail address, and confirm your registration from the email that you’ll receive. You will need your account information to operate Genymotion later. After confirmation, you will see “Download Genymotion” in the upper-right corner of the website. Click it, and you will be taken to a list of available downloads. Just grab the right version for you operating system and proceed with installation.If you are a Mac user, you will also need to download and install the VirtualBox platform package . It already comes packaged with the Microsoft Windows installer, so you needn’t worry about it on Windows. If you are on Mac and get an error that your file is from an unidentified developer, open it in Finder, right-click it, click Open and then select Co the rest is standard. Just drag both the icons to the Application folder (as you would with any other Mac app) and it’ll be installed. The rest of the procedure is exactly the same for both Windows and Mac. After installation, you should have VirtualBox as well as Genymotion Shell and Genymotion icons. RECOMMENDED FOR YOU
Once everything is downloaded and installed, launch Genymotion. You will be taken to a window with Play, Add and Settings options on top. At this stage, the emulator itself is good to go, but there are no virtual devices configured, and that’s exactly what we’ll be doing next.Click Add and you will be taken to a Virtual Device Creation wizard that will guide you through the process of creating and configuring a new virtual Android device.In order to download and use virtual devices, you’ll need to provide your Genymotion account credentials. Click Connect and enter your username and password to sign in, and you will be shown a list of available virtual devices that you can download and use.Select the device you want to install and continue clicking Next till downloading begins. For the sake of this guide, we will be installing the Galaxy S4 &# however, the procedure is identical for all other device. A progress bar will keep you updated as the virtual device is downloaded and installed for you.Once the download is complete, you will be taken back to the main window where your downloaded device can be seen.At this point, the virtual device is ready to start, but in order to get the most out of the machine, you might want to consider the following steps as well.Open VirtualBox. Here, you will see your newly installed device, with the “Powered off” status. Make sure it is selected, and click Settings from the the top toolbar.You will be taken to a list of possible settings for this device. We only need to be concerned with the Motherboard and Display. First, select Motherboard and drag the slider on Base Memory to 2048MB. Keeping it lower than that might not give optimal performance and if you have more to spare, there is no harm in increasing it further, but 2048MB should be all you really need for most purposes.Next, go to Display and drag that slider to 128MB. If you have the option to take it further, you may do so, but do keep it at 128MB at minimum. You may also choose to Enable 3D acceleration if you have dedicated graphics on your machine, but that is not a critical step.You can also go to Storage and set the storage dedicated to the virtual machine to a value of your choice. It may vary based on your requirements, but 4 GB should be a safe and adequate bet for most users.Now press OK and close VirtualBox. Launch Genymotion once more, select the virtual device of your choice (in case you have downloaded multiple ones), and click Play. There you go, you have an Android emulator running on your computer in all its glory, and much, much faster than the SDK one.Short of making actual calls, it does just about everything. It will share your system’s connection and use it as WiFi, and will also use your webcam (if installed), Mic and Speakers (if available) for any any apps that may require them.As of the latest version of Genymotion, devices that come preinstalled with Google Apps (GAPPs) are not supported due to copyright issues. However, since all devices come packaged with rooted Cyanogen ROMs, , and it will work for all virtual devices. You can even install a Custom ROM!So, try it out and don’t forget to let us know how your experience goes.
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Related ReadingAndroid开发人员都知道，原生的模拟器启动比较慢，操作起来也不流畅，还会出现莫名的问题。当然很多人都会选择直接使用android手机来开发，但是有时候需要在投影仪上演示程序的时候手机不太好做到吧。这里我给大家介绍一款很好的android模拟器——。
网上可以看到很多介绍Genymotion模拟器安装及使用方法的博文，我这两天也在自己电脑上进行了一些实践，经过一天的捣腾才装好，遇到了不少的问题，所以写下该博文做个记录。
一、Genymotion介绍
1、Genymotion安卓模拟器其实不是普通的模拟器，严格来说，genymotion是虚拟机，被网传定义为模拟器，加载APP的速度比较快，操作起来也很流畅。
2、Genymotion依赖于VirtualBox（著名的开源虚拟机软件，轻巧、好用！），就是说Genymotion跟VirtualBox要一起使用（Genymotion调用了VirtualBox的接口）。
3、Genymotion可作为Eclipse、Android Studio的插件使用，很方便。
二、安装Genymotion所需要的软件
1、genymotion-2.4.0（不带virtual box）和VirtualBox-4.1.20-80170-Win的下载地址（我自己整理的哦！）：
2、当然你也可以直接去Genymotion官网下载：（需要注册，注册的注意事项就不多说了），官网提供了两个版本，带有virtual box的genymotion整合包和不带virtual box的genymotion安装包。之前我下载的就是整合包，安装之后一直报错，后来在网上看到原来是整合版中提供的virtual box版本高了，下个低版本的即可。
三、安装说明
1、确保你系统之前没有装过虚拟机或者已经卸载干净，或者你懂关联genymotion和你本身安装了的虚拟机；
2、安装VirtualBox4.1.20,一路点击next；
3、安装genymotion-2.4.0；
四、使用说明
1、启动genymotion，并使用自己在Genymotion官网注册的账号密码登陆；
2、如果要关联自己本地的SDK就需要进行配置：在genymotion主界面，依次点击settings—&ADB—&Use custom Android SDK tools,在Android SDK框中选择你电脑上sdk文件夹路径，如我电脑上就是E:\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-\sdk；
注：这个过程中我遇到过一个问题，只要进入到settings中的ADB界面，随便一点击鼠标程序就会卡死，每次重新打开都是这样，即便重启电脑也没有。后来偶然一次我进入settings中的ADB界面点击一下Use custom Android SDK tools选项然后不再点击，随它，过会儿发现程序选择了Use custom Android SDK tools这个选项，也就是说这一步可能很卡，不要在点击选项发现没反应继续点击，稍微等会儿就好了。
3、在genymotion主界面点击add即可添加你想要的模拟器型号，选择一个，让他下载好就可以用了；
4、模拟器下载好后双击模拟器将其启动；
注：这步我也遇到了问题，启动模拟器报错，然后在virtual box中启动模拟器报cannot access the kernel driver错误
解决办法：（1）先关闭自己的防火墙跟杀毒软件（最好先断网），不关闭的话直接运行有可能会出现未知错误的提示;
2）进入C:\Program Files\Oracle\VirtualBox\drivers\vboxdrv文件夹（具体看自己的vbox程序是安装或者放什么地方了），找到vboxdrv.inf这个文件，鼠标右键点，然后选择安装;
五、安装eclipse下的genymotion插件
（电脑配置较低，所以还是用的eclipse开发android –!）
1、打开eclipse，依次点击Help—&Install New Software…—&add，在弹出的Add Repository对话框中Name框输入：genymotion，Location框中输入：/eclipse点击ok后面进行下载安装即可。
2、安装好后可以在eclipse中看到如下的插件图标
3、还需要在该插件配置Genymotion的安装路径：依次点击Window—&Preferences—&Genymobile—&Genymotion，在Genymotion directory框中选择刚才装好的genymotion的路径，如我这里是默认安装路径：C:\Program Files\Genymobile\Genymotion
六、API版本问题
运行程序发现找不到genymotion启动的模拟器，如图：
进入DDMS界面会看到如下情况：
这个问题主要是因为genymotion模拟器的API版本太低了，换个高版本API的模拟器即可。
七、看看自己的成果吧
1、在eclipse中点击插件图标：
2、选择模拟器并启动：
3、然后选择一个android项目将其运行吧！(你会发现操作起来比原生模拟器流畅多了…)