
Next step in the Chrome OS journey - cleverjake
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/next-step-in-chrome-os-journey.html
======
mmastrac
The Google Chromebook is an interesting product to watch. I've been using them
since the Cr-48 days. In fact, two Chromebook laptops were in service in our
household until just a few weeks ago when the Samsung Chromebook broke
(although I hope to repair it soon).

These laptops sit next to our couch in a stack as a set of floater laptops we
use for random surfing. If any of us are just looking for a quick bite of
information, we generally pull out the Chromebook rather than walking over to
the Macbook that sits on our kitchen counter. The Chromebook is also great for
our son to use when building LEGO from PDF instructions.

Browsing is far better on the Chromebook than it is on any Android or Apple
device I've used, hands down. I find the browsing experience to be frustrating
on an iPad or my Galaxy 10", while the Chromebook experience is flawless. The
device is basically ready-to-use for browsing as soon as you lift the lid, in
contrast to the fair amount of time it takes to get logged into the Macbook
(especially if another user has a few applications open in their session).

The hardware itself in the early models was slightly underpowered, but that
doesn't really seem to matter much unless you're playing a particularly
intensive Flash video or HTML5 game. Scrolling is fairly slow on complex sites
like Google+ as well. For what we use it for, the hardware is pretty decent.
The touchpads have also been hit-and-miss in the early models.

What makes these devices a hard sell is the price point. The cheapest
Chromebook experience you can get today is the Acer (@ $300). Considering the
fact that you are buying a piece of hardware that effectively does less than a
laptop, I would find it hard to justify spending that amount if I were looking
at hardware today. Even though I prefer to use the Chromebook when surfing
over the tablets or the full laptop, I feel like the cost is just too much for
a single-purpose device like this.

For Chromebooks to really take off in the home market, I think that a device
with the equivalent power to the Samsung Chromebook 5 needs to be on the
market at a $199 price point. I could see myself buying them at that price. I
don't see the Chromebox being popular in households ever - I believe that
we'll see the decline of the non-portable computer going forward at home.
Alternatively, if we saw some sort of Android hybrid integration with the
Chromebook, I think that this could radically change the equation and add
significant perceived value to the device.

Now, if I were running a business where a large subset of employees could get
by with just web access, I would definitely consider rolling these out. The
Chromebox looks like it could be a real game changer for business.

~~~
saurik
> Browsing is far better on the Chromebook than it is on any Android or Apple
> device I've used, hands down. The device is basically ready-to-use for
> browsing as soon as you lift the lid, in contrast to the fair amount of time
> it takes to get logged into the Macbook (especially if another user has a
> few applications open in their session).

FWIW, this is not a property of the ChromeBook, but a property of how you
choose to use it (which may in turn be a property of its relative cost if
anything). My 11" MacBook Air runs two apps (Chrome and iTerm) and I do not
leave it locked or logged out. At worst I have to apple-tab to Chrome from
iTerm once I open it before I can use it to browse.

~~~
mmastrac
Apologies, that was a typo on my part - I should have said "iOS device" rather
than "Apple device", indicating that the browsing experience was as good as on
a desktop.

~~~
saurik
Interesting... I was looking at the word "Macbook".

------
jiggy2011
I originally thought that chrome OS was a ridiculous idea , but the more I
think about the more I see this as being what more traditional desktop/laptop
systems will look like in a few years time.

The key here I think is an operating system UI built on the understanding that
modern applications have both client and server components that are equally
important and need to blend together seamlessly.

For example , about 50% of the applications I use are on the web/internet yet
my browser is just an application like any other on my launch bar.

------
zmanian
What seems to be needed is a retail channel that can explain what/why and why
of Chrome book? Something like Samsungs Galaxy S3 Popups stores. Google's
staff at the Chrome OS booths in Aiports did a great job of this but you
couldn't purchase a Chromebook there.

~~~
tolmasky
I don't understand what crosses a company's mind when they make a booth where
they explain a product but don't allow you to buy it. Nintendo took over a
good part of the third (?) floor of the mall here in SF last Christmas where
you could play the new 3DS and a bunch of their latest titles (all released).
I asked to purchase one and they then proceeded to think out loud about the
closest gamestop where I "might" find it -- because this booth was for demos
only, not for actually buying anything.

~~~
dannyr
It's because you need to secure business license to sell.

~~~
tolmasky
If some no-name iPhone case stand can secure this at the mall, then surely
Nintendo can too? Why go through the outrageous cost of setting up an
elaborate "Nintendo Winter World" or whatever they called it -- and stop just
short of being able to make any actual sales?

~~~
Steko
The real problem is Nintendo's retail partners will get upset.

At that point just setting up a kiosk can either lead to "we just won't do
sales" or spirals into "lets get our partners involved too" which gives you a
kiosk designed by committee.

------
nsoldiac
Is Chrome OS a stepping stone from Android as a 'stretched-out' OS, or more in
the way of Android trying transitioning bigger screen formats, such as:
[http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-
and...](http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-
Services/DROID-Bionic-Accessories-page/DROID-Bionic-Accessories) I know
they're obvious differences, but I'm focusing in the similarities...does
anyone see my point? Would love to know other's opinions.

~~~
drivebyacct2
I don't know, but why Google and Asus don't release a Transformer that dual
boots Android and Chrome OS is beyond me. Yes, Flash already has ARM ports
working anyway.

~~~
trotsky
They are working on an arm port for an unnamed device but it seems like it's
still under heavy development. One reason you likely won't see something like
the transformer running chromeos is their upstream first policy, which
suggests that they won't ship chrome on devices that don't have their driver
base included in the base linux kernel. There are exceptions, but I get the
feeling they aren't interested in core drivers like graphics being one of
them.

~~~
drivebyacct2
Ugh. That makes an unfortunate amount of sense, I hadn't even thought through
the embedded device drivers problem. Extremely frustrating across devices and
OSes. :[

------
splatzone
I dunno about the Chromebox. I can't see many of my friends setting up a
monitor, mouse and keyboard for a computer that only runs Chrome OS.

It's interesting, though.

~~~
fidotron
What's really curious is that in a way it's up against Raspberry Pi, but
literally an order of magnitude more expensive. Obviously it's more powerful,
but . . .

They really need to get the cost of the Chrome devices way down from where
they are.

~~~
georgemcbay
The Raspberry Pi is pretty neat but good luck using it as a general purpose
HTML5-display box. Way too slow for that.

I agree that the cost of Chrome devices needs to be lower, but they need to be
priced closer to midrange Android tablets (~250-300$) than Raspberry Pis.

~~~
wavephorm
It does have an h264 chip which might make HTML5 video usable.

~~~
mtgx
RPi is good for video, but I think he meant overall browsing performance. RPi
will be pretty slow at that.

------
mtgx
ARM versions for half the price, please (preferably based on the latest Cortex
A15 CPU and Mali GPU).

~~~
ajross
The cheapest option is $350 (a Cedar Trail board, the $450 one says "Intel
Core" which probably means Sandy Bridge). What makes you think you can build
an ARM board (with a core that doesn't even exist in the market yet!) for
$175, much less sell it for that? The only device in the market that even
comes close is the Kindle, and that's heavily subsidized by content revenue.

~~~
mtgx
I meant half the price compared to the latest Chromebook from Samsung which is
$450. They need at least a few models in the $200-$250 range, even if they
have to make them "lower-end". But I think Cortex A15 will be a great match
for that, unless they totally messed up the cross-platform optimization, and
ChromeOS will be slower on ARM than on a similar-performance x86 chip. Plus,
you'll get at least double the battery life - which is kind of necessary for a
Web-only/mobility device.

~~~
ajross
OK, where are you going to find a $225 non-subsidized ARM box? Same logic
applies. I see nothing even close to that range. A tablet or smartphone with
these specs is going to run you $500+.

And you need to check (or better, run) a few benchmarks before making
pronouncements like that. Per-clock, SNB beats the A9 in my OMAP4 phone by
about 2x on stuff that fits in the L1 cache, and a bunch more on things that
spill out (the phone SoC has absolutely nothing like the L3 cache on SNB).

~~~
jff
<http://www.genesi-usa.com/products/smartbook> $200.

It's not very good when you're running Ubuntu, but then again even my nice i7
laptop can really suck under Linux sometimes. ChromeOS might help.

------
nickpresta
The CPU on the Chromebox is listed as 1.9 GHz Celeron B840. Can this play
1080p MKV? If so, this could my WD Live, Patriot Box Office, etc. Add a BT
mouse/keyboard and I'm set.

------
swah
Will it ever be distributed like a linux distro?

~~~
lunarscape
You can download Chromium OS builds [1]. There are a few differences compared
to ChromeOS [2].

[1] <http://chromeos.hexxeh.net/> [2] [http://www.chromium.org/chromium-
os/chromium-os-faq#TOC-What...](http://www.chromium.org/chromium-os/chromium-
os-faq#TOC-What-s-the-difference-between-Chromium-OS-and-Google-Chrome-OS-)

------
DannoHung
Wonder how the box would work as a set-top (goodbye Google TV?)

------
n-gauge
Can a Chromebook / box run webGL?

~~~
mtgx
It's probably using a very old/low-end integrated graphics chip from Intel, so
it might run WebGL, but probably not the most advanced demos.

~~~
bd
It seems to use Intel HD 3000 [1] and runs WebGL surprisingly well [2][3]
(actually better than Macbook Pro with the same GPU [4]).

[1] <http://www.chromestory.com/2012/05/samsung-chromebox-price/>

[2] <http://twitter.com/Tojiro/status/207604697073324032>

[3] <http://twitter.com/Tojiro/status/207607126716198914>

[4] <http://twitter.com/thespite/status/207618510443134977>

------
iRobot
Where are the ARM based Chrome books ?

~~~
nsoldiac
Maybe they're trying to focus on a single architecture...so NOW they're
worried about avoiding fragmentation, jeez.

~~~
mtgx
Why would there be any fragmentation? You're running the web on it...the web
is architecture agnostic. This is why it never really made sense for me why
they went with Intel and x86, when they could've started from day one on ARM.
They are not bound by legacy software on a specific architecture, like Windows
is with x86.

