
Pixel C - pdknsk
https://store.google.com/product/pixel_c
======
pjmlp
It looks quite nice, but personally I still think Surface still has the upper
hand for (some) developers by offering a full blown OS where I am able to use
Visual Studio and friends.

The tools available for coding on the go on Android like AIDE aren't as
compelling to me.

Maybe that is something for an upcoming Android version.

~~~
Zigurd
Not that I have anything against Surface, but, despite all the effort, it
still isn't a touch-first device. And Windows isn't a touch-first OS. IPad
will vastly outsell it, and despite Google doing a crap job marketing Android
to businesses, so will Android tablets. That's because Windows tablets have
never been touch-first, and a great finger-touch UX is what characterizes
mobile devices.

~~~
djsumdog
It's really cause no one wrote any Windows apps, and a lot of the ones that
were written have been removed because the respective companies don't want to
maintain them. The Kindle reader for my Windows Mobile phone was sooooo buggy.

If it had the apps to back it, Windows would have been okay as a touch OS. But
that whole thing totally failed.

Microsoft should have put the Courrier table into production. It was ready to
go. That one move totally killed any chance at Microsoft making it into the
tablet realm (and really set them back 2 ~ 3 years as a consumer tech company)

~~~
Zigurd
> _Microsoft should have put the Courrier table into production._

Yes, yes, yes. Like iOS and Android it would have been born a touch device.
Killing Courier makes buying Nokia's handset business Ballmer's second worst
decision.

------
msh
Ars dont seem to like it: [http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/12/pixel-c-
review-new-ha...](http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/12/pixel-c-review-new-
hardware-ignores-an-android-tablets-core-problem-software/)

~~~
Analemma_
Dieter Bohn and Walt Mossberg at the Verge weren't impressed either. Consensus
seems to be that the hardware is solid, but tablet Android is still a mess.
Worse, even if Google fixes the problems in the OS, there are ( _still!_ )
virtually no 3rd-party apps that support tablet Android natively; they're all
just blown-up phone apps. Not only does that ruin the experience but-- like
Microsoft and their stalled phone ambitions-- it's not a problem Google can
fix no matter how good their developers are. All the software patches in the
world can't fix the issue of apathetic 3rd-party devs.

~~~
amyjess
> Not only does that ruin the experience but-- like Microsoft and their
> stalled phone ambitions-- it's not a problem Google can fix no matter how
> good their developers are. All the software patches in the world can't fix
> the issue of apathetic 3rd-party devs.

Hell, Google isn't even doing _that_ much. Half of their apps don't have
proper tablet UIs. How can third parties bother to do decent tablet apps if
even the company who develops the platform doesn't care enough to do so?
Google is in a leadership position, which means they have a responsibility to
lead, and not only did they drop the ball, they threw an interception straight
to Microsoft.

~~~
digi_owl
Since they started flogging Material the tablet-friendliness of Google apps
has gone to crap.

Take the latest iterations of the Play store for instance. A while back they
introduced a semi-floating search bar on the front view, that has the
"hamburger" button integrated. Except that if you put a tablet into landscape,
that bare stays fixed width, so now the burger button is suddenly not in the
top right corner.

And i think Hangouts produce a single column down the middle with massive
whitespaces on either side.

Edit: Thinking about it i wonder if this device is Google's attempt at
dogfooding tablet development. Right now it seems that most of their apps are
developed firstly for Apple devices.

------
sanqui
For anybody getting a "The Google Store isn't available here yet" message, you
can append ?hl=us to the url to get past it:
[https://store.google.com/product/pixel_c?gl=us](https://store.google.com/product/pixel_c?gl=us)

------
mmanfrin
This post appears to have been nuked[1] -- any idea why?

[1] [http://hnrankings.info/10698432/](http://hnrankings.info/10698432/)

~~~
jakebasile
I noticed this as well. I can't see any reason for it - plenty of new gadget
announcements stick around for a while on the front page.

------
vessenes
So, this is a device that could easily have been delivered with ChromeOS, but
instead is running Android. In fact, I don't think the Pixel line has ever had
an Android device, am I correct?

My gut is that rumors of ChromeOS's demise were not overblown, which is tough
in my house -- all but one household computer runs on Chrome right now.

We'll see what the future brings, but I don't have faith that Android devices
scaled up to desktop size are going to bring the same quality of experience my
family gets right now with their Chromebooks.

~~~
jbob2000
Android is a hit with youth, and the less technical interface compared to the
desktop is very welcome to older generations and those who are less
technically saavy. Believe it or not, there are many people out there who
still struggle with a mouse. Though ChromeOS supports touch, the apps they run
generally are built around a mouse, whereas Android apps are ALWAYS built
around touch.

~~~
digi_owl
Also note that the 6.0.1 update for Android introduced a slightly different
tablet UI again.

Since 4.3-4.4, tablets have sported a bottom bar with 3 buttons centered. Now
two of them (back and home) are found in the bottom left corner, while the
"switcher" button has landed in the bottom right.

While this seem to be nice when holding a tablet with both hands, it also
works well with "Fitts' law" as corners are easy to hit with a mouse.

------
protomyth
That is a really bad keyboard layout. I really don't like the vertical return
key or how they cut off the end keys.

~~~
Huggernaut
Closer to British keyboard layout

~~~
protomyth
Yeah, also the original IBM PC which inspired a lot of complaints,
replacements, and a change when the IBM PC AT arrived.

------
r00fus
Hmm - no SD port, and single USB-C and only comes in 32 or 64GB... I assume
Google isn't intending for you to be offline with this device for extended
periods.

~~~
Numberwang
Well you really should not be surprised about Google pushing for online all
the time, app store, cloud services. It's the same business model as them,
Apple, Microsoft and Amazon all set their sights on a few years ago.

------
Fastidious
"Run powerful apps and the latest games. Pixel C has an NVIDIA X1 processor
and loads of graphics horsepower. Under the hood, you’ll also find over 10
hours of battery life to keep you going strong."

How much graphics horsepower does ChromeOS needs? On the 10 hours of battery
life, I would have expected more for a, more or less, one application OS.

 __Edit: __Oh, did not know it was Android. Thanks!

~~~
digi_owl
This is Android, not ChromeOS.

Its just that unlike the Nexus series, the Pixel series of devices are
designed by Google rather than a third party.

------
ojiikun
A premium 10" Android slate sounds nice enough, especially with multi-window
on the way, but that keyboard breaks the deal. No pipe key or escape? Good
luck doing any serious programming. Also, if running a lightweight OS, I would
really expect 2-day battery life for the big price.

------
gkya
Would I be able to put a linux distro on it (I know that Android is linux,
but...)?

~~~
criddell
What's a good touch-first window manager? I know Unity was exploring touch
UIs, is there anything better?

~~~
gkya
Gnome was exploring touch too. For my use case, though, a window manager is
superfluous, as I'd use this machine as my portable emacs. At 150 bucks it's
way cheaper than any other option. All I need is Emacs and Firefox anyway.

~~~
criddell
Which $150 machine are you talking about?

If all you want is a portable emacs, why not just get a bluetooth keyboard and
use your phone or buy one of those $50 Kindle tablets?

~~~
gkya
Oh I've looked at sth else's price on the page, sorry :)

------
throwaway000002
_Oh dear_... the Nexus Q reborn in tablet form as the Pixel C.

From the moment they mentioned it was Android a few months ago [1] I had my
doubts about the "vision" driving this product, and now after reading what
Arstechnica and the Verge have to say I feel genuinely bad for the engineers
who worked on this. It looks like a lot of love was expended, and then maybe
schedules pushed out whatever the heck this half baked thing is.

Pixel C, _I really wanted to like you_...

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10298410](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10298410)

------
ninjakeyboard
If you're considering such a thing, remember our friend Benson Tested many USB
C Cables on Amazon for you too.
[http://www.computerworld.com/article/3002159/computer-
hardwa...](http://www.computerworld.com/article/3002159/computer-hardware/usb-
c-benson-leung-laughingman-google-amazon-itbwcw.html)

------
Keyframe
Where is Google Store available outside of USA? What's the point of them
selling anything if it's in limited markets for so long?

~~~
eridal
could anybody w/ access post images?

~~~
kuschku
Here: [http://imgur.com/a/rpQqP](http://imgur.com/a/rpQqP)

------
rocky1138
Who, exactly, is this device for?

~~~
tdicola
Google employees (although I have to imagine even they would be very
frustrated with an Android tablet right now).

------
yami
I looked interesting until I read it runs Android...

~~~
melling
What's wrong with Android? I mainly use iOS these days but I'm still holding
out hope that Android becomes a real option on the "desktop".

~~~
notacoward
Lack of software. Or at least lack of high-quality software for getting real
work done. I had an Android tablet for a while. It was nicely portable, had
good battery life, could do a lot of things well, but I just couldn't find any
apps I liked for two things I do often: ssh and creating presentations. One
ssh app could do tunnels, but got all confused if I tried to open multiple
terminal sessions. Another handled multiple sessions OK, but couldn't do
tunnels. Then the two would interfere with one another if I tried to run both
simultaneously. For presentations, many couldn't do something as basic as keep
track of where my cursor was, and would add text at the wrong place. Others at
least worked, but couldn't do anything more complex than a bullet list. A real
email app would have been nice, but I had to use both home and work webmail
(which are very different) instead. From what I can tell, all of this has only
gotten a tiny bit better in the last couple of years. It would be great if
there were more Android developers coming from the desktop space instead of
the phone space, producing more desktop-like apps, but that doesn't seem to be
the case. As long as that continues to be the case, using Android on one's
primary machine will continue to be frustrating.

ChromeOS, on the other hand, seems to be in better shape. I'm seriously
debating with myself about whether to get a regular Pixel (not Pixel C) as my
next main computer.

~~~
tracker1
ChromeOS needs a good general mail client as well, there's been some work in
this space, but from what I've seen it's still not there yet. I actually like
GMail for general email... though account switching with more than 2-3
accounts is a pain.

