Maybe I'm overestimating the potential success, but it staggers me that Google only released their Pixel laptops with ChromeOS. I would absolutely buy it if it had Ubuntu pre-installed on it with working drivers (and I think a ton of developers would finally have a legitimate competitor to a MacBook Pro).
I don't think Google is really interested in providing that, though. I doubt they make a lot of money on the hardware - it's all about the software, mindshare for ChromeOS.
I also think you overestimate how popular a machine like that would be. Dell offers Ubuntu laptops and they certainly haven't taken over the planet.
They also do goofy shit like ship a touchpad with a driver that can't be merged upstream because it would have to remove a chunk of the standard driver. Like how the fuck would that work?
Don't get me started on the wifi but that's hit or miss.
I don't think they want to compete with chromeOS, I think they want to sell chromeOS.
The only person who would benefit from that is you which is why people buy them and install ubuntu.
I use a chrome book for my daily driver. I used to want a ubuntu machine with chrome but after a little effort and getting a setup of crouton that works for me, I actually just want a browser with a shell. Which part is primary and which is secondary is really semantics when I get to working. I do everything in the browser or the shell with the exception of password safe which is an android app run inside the browser. I'd also like the android kindle app but that is blocked form working for some reason (I believe on amazon's side).
You are a rounding error. There's not a large enough market. Also, consider how you are comparing a $2000 laptop to a Chromebook. What's the market again?
* OK storage (or ability to dismantle and put my own SSD in)
* Touch screen
I essentially want a MacBook Pro with touchscreen and Linux. I know this... but I'm a really heavy Google user and if I'm not exclusively in Chrome then I'm dev'ing in a debian (with i3wm) I do not want OSX at all.
I could just get a Macbook Pro and blow away the OS, but no.
The Pixel looks perfect, except as a dev machine I'm unconvinced that spending the money just to discover later that it's going to not work for whatever reason is a good idea.
why don't you pick up a c720 or whatever for $100 and mess around with it as far as using a chroot. IT actually works pretty well and you can either run debian chroot and i3 in the second vty or just a cli debian that you can ssh to if most of your tools are CLI.
I do this, am on it right now, except I don't chroot. Just wiped out ChromeOS entirely because it's pretty nasty and installed Linux on SeaBios. I even bought a second one since it worked so well.
I know a lot of the Chromebooks allow swapping out the mSata pretty easily. I've done it with my C720, swapped in a 128gb. I know the new Pixel is more locked down than the last, but haven't looked into it enough to say.
Developers still use a ton of commercial software. As an app developer, I'm still using things like Photoshop, Illustrator, Sketch, Office, etc. So until those come to Linux (or the open source alternatives gather enough traction that designers and such use them too), I don't think a Pixel laptop running Ubuntu would be enough.
I don't know if they fixed it with the later versions, but the first Chromebook Pixel has a nasty issue where the "don't check for google's signature on boot" flag can unset itself if your battery drains.
