Google officially announces Chromebooks

it's not a pc. you can't install anything on it. you browse the web with it, and do everything in the web.

not a walled garden. the webapps from google work just as well in every other browser btw. just as all other webapps.

the difference is the assumption that most people don't need a local system anymore. people do about everything in the web today, and this is true even while i am not happy to agree with it sometimes. so a web-only-device can be good enough for most.

if "the whole web" is a walled garden to you, then yes.. but you could actually rent a virtual windows system in the cloud, install your apps on there, and use them (much other solutions exist). the idea is to just not have anything ON the device. everythign in the web (you could dyndns your pc, and access it on the go with that device, as an example)

 

standby.

most people don't understand boot up. they show me their ipad and say "look, INSTANT BOOT", and i say, no, standby, just like your laptop.

 

I mean... it has standby too. The boot time is only a demonstration of the difference in speeds with a SSD and HDD.

Either way, I'm not here to defend ChromeOS. Whether it's a viable OS or not is debatable. I think there's just loads and loads of misinformation out there and people hear things from outdated sources (if you google around you'll find sources from back when you couldn't use it at all without internet connection) or sources that are just plain wrong.

 

No pun intended?
All I'm saying is, for the average consumer and coming from a netbook point of view, I highly doubt most will care about a 30 sec vs. 8 sec boot.

 

i think the boottime of 8 seconds is ridiculous slow for being "on an ssd" and being "just a browser". i mean, chrome boots in <1sec even on a hdd. i could trim down an xp to boot in 8 sec on a hdd including chrome. (done on a p4 system).

so their ssd is not fast at all most likely. more or less an usb stick only, i guess.

but yes, most that complain about it don't 'get' it. i don't like putting stuff into the cloud, and i don't think the hw is impressive at all, but i do 'get' it, means i don't see it as a wallet garden. i see it as a remote device.

 

It could be a "solid state module". I remember reading an article about it. It's a modified SDHC card that can be used as a HDD. I believe it was originally from Sandisk.
The article escapes me at the moment.

 

Because it's not "just a browser" as people seem to think. It has a file system and an OS and a media player and support for external devices.

And yes, remote device is exactly what it is and that's very similar to what google has always called it.

Everyone is free to like or dislike the OS but as I said I just want people to understand it.

I pretty much knew from the beginning it wouldn't be popular on a forum where the majority of users have powerful laptops =p

edit: It's a legit SSD. They've pulled them out before.

 

The most similar thing of the late is that game streaming service. You do not install the game on your system. You have to pay a monthly fee for the service.

The thing flopped big time.

I as well as many other people want the stuff on our computers and no fee's

The biggest factor like I said is everything this netbook does you can do now on your laptop/netbook. Your not gaining anything new your just losing something you already have.

So when your in that situation the only way to bargain for the loss is to have a sort of trade. What trade can they offer to make it worth it to you?

I would think price/cost should be the first and foremost aspect to work on but it seems the price is not good at all making this trade-off very one sided and not very convincing.

I own a googledocs account I am used to all these features that may be brand new to a lot of people, they are great and you can do everything oniline for simple tasks but I do it now I dont need to buy a new netbook to do it and I would not make my first/only netbook one of these either.

BTW google goes down now and then, a lot of stuff is even still in a beta like stage. I have had to resort to local copies of files for work when that happens.

 

a usb stick is a legit ssd, too. it's a SOLID STATE disk. (and was used as ssd before the hightech ssds where popular).

it is just a browser. it has no local file system, just one to browse external devices (which are handled in the browser, just as most browsers handle ftp accesses btw..).

btw file:///C:/ works in any browser

it's just chrome, everything it can do, chrome can do, too. most likely even the direct external storage access will be possible (as this would be useful for the webapps with their "upload extensions").

so in short, it doesn't matter what it's built of. it just needs to be able to let you browse the web, that's it's job. the reason for the ssd is, it's cheaper than the hdd (8gb only, or something?), and rugged.

 

I think the biggest reason for the SSD is its probably a micro ssd so it saves space/heat/power and it will be a bit faster than the hdd as a bonus but its probably slow by ssd standards.

 

if you watched the trailer about it, you'd know what it's selling points are:

no need to do anything on your own. no updating needed, no virus scanning needed, no app installation needed, and all that. people hate that on a pc/notebook/netbook today. they're annoyed by all that manual work one has to do. people are LAZY. the web allows lazy people to be the most lazy ever. cloud is perfect for them.

and people love to give away freedom for having some form of laziness. see apples walled garden. people love it.

 

It's 16GB.

But no, like I said, ChromeOS has a built in media player that works outside of the browser. It does have an operating/file system in there, the GUI is just Chrome.

 

Asus Express Gate already did that like 5 years ago like I said. Let you boot right into a browser in just a few seconds and nothing had to be updated/installed/manually configured.

It really was not that popular, though it didnt have nearly the PR google has nor was it the sole selling point of those machines, just a bonus.

I guess I am old school. I like to have control and do things manually. Having that ability is having power and knowledge.

I still drive a stick shift car, cant stand automatic

Um my current music collection is 250GB

I wonder if it would support FLAC playback and WASAPI output?

No I am not the average person with average needs, but you never know when you may want to become above average and it would suck to have your hardware hold you back. Or rather the OS/Software.

 

ChromeOS is not just a browser... I can boot into my browser on my Vaio but it's useless because there's no decent GUI for accessing files on my HDD unlike on ChromeOS and it's simply not the same thing.

Plus they didn't have the marketing power of Google.

Amazon and Google currently both offer storage for music.

250GB is a ton. Clearly you need a hard drive.

 

na, it's just a tiny browser popup window. the operating system/file system is hidden from you completely, and everything you do goes trough "chrome.exe". media player is no own app, it's just another part of chrome.

my next car is electric. no need for stupic stick shifting, always perfect performance. like an ssd
i don't like to control things manually. but i don't like to put stuff i own into foreign countries into the systems of capitalistic companies that tell me "hey, it's for free". something in me says "no, that can't work well"

but people do that even today (they didn't that much 5 years ago). nowadays, everything's in the web. facebook, youtube, gmail etc.. that's what the typical end user uses today. the local hw is mostly there to transfer stuff to the web.

and yes, google has marketing and a rather trustable backend in supporting and evolving this platform hat asus definitely didn't have back then.

i see (very well) the gains from such a device. and i can see it definitely be used for businesses, if the own apps are mostly webapps by now (which in most companies is true).

if i could host the webapps on an own, local system, then i'd use it in a heartbeat. but i can't. gmail can't be "downloaded and installed on my home server".

the biggest issue is, webapps are NOT webapps. they are webSERVICES.

this'll change a bit with the offline support (angry birds works locally very well, without internet needed). so you only need the server for installation and updates, not for using the app.

well, we'll see i have some few desktop apps i still need, but over time, it reduces more and more.

actually, vicious: for your music collection, a chromebook + a pogoplug would work

 

Automatic updates can be set on windows too. Plus I'd be very curious if google's media player can play all of the formats that VLC can. Instead of being lazy, if people would apply some common sense, and learn just a little, it would help them immensely in the computer world.
Also, I would be concerned about the "no viruses" statement. That is true now, but as it gains more popularity it's a sure bet the virus makers will begin to target chrome, just as apple has been dealt more malware in recent months/years.
I'm not defending vicious (because he doesn't need it ), but I totally agree with what he is saying. Perhaps I am old school too, but I like to have control over my own personal files and my own computer, and I will never ever trust either to a third party.

 

All of apple's new malware is basically tricking users into running it. With a platform like ChromeOS it's not a matter of popularity it's a matter of security features. Writing a virus for OSX/Linux is a pain.

 

hah, best joke of the day. seriously.

chance of virus is much lower as there is much less of a target platform to exploit. but chrome isn't perfect (0day attack was, what, 3 days ago, in the media?). one thing that might be helpful: as the os is so simple, it can be guaranteed quite well, that nothing can write to the system part of the disk, except for the updater itself. that means at least "reboot, and fixed" kind of savety. doesn't help when stealing online identities, though..

so do i. but that doesn't matter. it matters that we all understand what this product does, and what it doesn't. then chose if one wants that, based on that.

writing a virus for osx is no pain at all. always happens very quick at conventions. much more simple than writing one for windows.
now writing a virus for osx has not much gain, as the customerbase is much too low. most virus writers (i'd say >95% or more) only care about the platform that has the highest reach. and that, still, is windows.

now android on the other hand will be in much trouble the following years. it's a very chaotic uncontrolled platform, full of different ideologies, and all. it's, from a security point of view, a mess like windows xp was. attacks onto phones will grow, and android is a likely target there. ios, too. ios is easy to break. ever jailbroken one? each different jailbreak is just another security hole that allows you full acess to the system.

the only system that does not jailbreak trough a security hole is windows phone 7 right now. it gets jailbroken by just telling him "you're a developer phone", and it opens up. a controlled and known place, not some security hole no one knew about.

i think the type of malware most interesting on chromebook would be a rootkit, essentially surrounding chrome os and letting one record all traffic.

 

I will only consider chromebook if it meets 2 criteria.
1)It is cheaper than netbooks on the current market with similar specs.
2)It lets me root the machine.
I have no use for a general purpose computing device that doesn't let me mess around with it.

 

I see everyone saying they won't pay as a standard win7 netbook for one. No idea why.

 

I don't get it either. Pay for a device that costs as much as a Win 7 device, but don't get all the extra power you can do with a Win 7 device, yet can do everything the chromebook can on your win 7 device.

Might as well spend the same on a Blu-Ray player that only plays blu-rays but not DVD's or Netflix?

 

"Extra power"

Such as?

edit:

http://chromestory.com/2011/04/samsung-chrome-os-notebook-alex-intel-atom-and-2gb-ram/

That has the specs of the samsung apparently.

edit: Tiny7 is a perfect example of how much can be removed from Windows 7 and how light you can make it if you remove features that are useless to most people and useless on a netbook.

 

Come on Windows 7 doesn't run that slow on netbooks.
It is a very simple concept.
First we factorize out the branding on the systems.(Branding always boggles the minds)
Then we evaluate:

A doesn't let you run anything you want you are stuck with a browser and it cost more than B.
B can run anything you can throw at it and maybe even install the OS of A on it and it is cheaper.

The answer now becomes very obvious.
I don't think it is wise to buy something because of the hype then try to think of doing something on it (wasting your time) rather it is wiser to buy only the things you really need to use.

 

1) They're the same price for the hardware. Since hardware is objective let's stick to pricing that and that alone.

2) You can do almost anything on ChromeOS that you can do on Windows. I realize the "power users" on this forum

2a) won't like this because it's not some uber powerful laptop
2b) won't like this because they can't do their little tweaks (the OS is tweaked as is since it's not meant to run on a million different kinds of computer)

And yeah, Windows 7 is pretty slow by comparison.

Not to mention security. By the time you've made Win7 as secure as it can be (as to try to emulate the security of ChromeOS as closely as possible) you're gonna be using up even MORE memory.

No one is talking about branding.

There are veryyyyyy few things that Windows can do that ChromeOS can't. Torrenting is one thing. But, honestly, this isn't meant to be your only computer. Desktop + ChromeOS netbook is always the way it's supposed to be set up.

 

Extra power was a bad choice of words, I meant extra features. Chromebook comes basically with Chrome browser, that's it. If I can do everything with my Dell Mini that the chromebook can, plus more, and it cost me only $250, I don't understand how the chromebook can be better?

I don't care if you like it, great, but it doesn't change the fact that it offers fewer features and is more restrictive than a traditional notebook/netbook.

I understand what Google is trying to do, but you even have more flexibility and options using Linux than Chrome.

And you keep stating that it's the same price. It is not. It's more expensive. Eee PC's and other netbooks can be found remarkably cheaper, and part of that cost is Windows, so by that fact, Windows netbooks ARE cheaper if you discount the cost of Windows. This tells me Google is charging a premium for their web browser.

You say there's very few things that ChromeOS CAN'T do that Win7 can. What about my vast library of Windows apps and games?

 

I'm asking what more you can do on your dell mini. There are cloud alternatives to basically anything you can do on a netbook.

You still haven't linked to a netbook that's got similar specs for a lower price. Everything I've seen on newegg shows that they're the same price.

N550 + SSD + 2GB RAM. Find me that in a netbook for under 400 and I won't bring up pricing again.

 

The list of applications is limited to chrome apps.
If you actually said that you are not a power users.
Can you turn the chromebook into a fileserver?
Can you run Linux Applications?
Do you get the full performance? Does it have browser overhead?
What if your ISP gets taken down?
Are you sure you are the full owner of your own data?
Can you turn it into a makeshift router?
PowerUsers means we make the computer do all work for us.
The computer is not purely an entertainment device.

If your only application you use is the browser then even a tablet will fit your needs.

 

No SSD but N550 + 2GB RAM is on the market.
Cloud means the fastest you can get is the throughput btw you and your ISP.
Try streaming high quality videos over the network and see it choke.

 

I'm not going to use GOOGLE for you since you seem to be an expert at it, go find the cheaper alternative yourself. This isn't an N550, but it's 12", SU4100 (worlds better than N550), 320GB HDD, Win 7 Home Premium, 2GB RAM, 1366x768 screen for $329, even less with the 10% discount with eBillMe.

Hannspree SN12E23BUP212 Hannspree HannsBook Notebook PC - Intel Pentium Dual-Core ULV SU4100 1.3GHz, 2GB DDR2, 320GB HDD, 12.1" Display, Windows 7 Home Premium (Black) from mwave.com

Throw in a 32GB SSD for $50 or so, and you're golden.

Still cheaper, and I only spent two minutes looking.

Also, what about the point of the cost of Windows? Deduct the premium cost for Windows, and the hardware is definitely cheaper. So again, Google is then charging the same price or more for ChromeOS as for Windows.

edit: ok here, many N550 netbooks for < $300. No SSD, but it's not common for netbooks at this point to include them. Take into account adding your own 32GB at even $60, it's still less than $360, and you're paying retail markup on the SSD. A slow 16GB SSD is hardly a selling point either. It's there mainly because they needed cheap storage and 16GB flash drive is very cheap.

 

I am scared to think about those people (myself included) who pay for traffic while using 3g internet and the like.

Also 3g internet isnt even fast enough for streaming a game from internet or uploading pictures (even if its 3mpx camera)

 

Not an expert. Not even a fanboy.

So from what we know it's basically the same price. You pay slightly more for the google notebook ~60 dollars (the Acer, ~120 if you're talking about the Samsung) and you get 3G capabilities and the SSD built in as well as the N550. I don't know how those two CPUs compare.

So possibly a small premium, hard to say.

 

it's fast enough to do all that. people take a lot of time for such stuff with ease, if they like their devices. and the idea of webapps is that they store/cache their stuff locally.

and, most of the time you're not in 3g, but at some place with wlan. this is true for most users.

 

Su4100 is about twice as powerful as the N550 in benchmarks. Your point on SSD in chromebook is moot. It's a 16GB FLASH drive, not traditional SSD NAND with the controllers that are what make all the difference in the world as far as performance. I would bet to say a notebook 7200RPM drive has better overall performance than the 16GB in that netbook. It's like the memory in a smartphone. Not very fast, but power efficient.

I am? I can hardly ever find a WLAN hotspot when I need to. I don't use 3G either because it's just a dog for the price you pay.

 

It's obviously not for you haha

And it says it's sandforce in the link I posted I believe.

 

well, then you are a minority. most people still use the laptop only on their desk at home (see this very forum). most use it in their home and maybe during holidays and when visiting parents or friends to show photos.

it differs per situation. but remember, for most what the iphone delivers is enough. that in a laptop-form is great for them. and that is what this device provides. about the same connection capabilities. about the same functionality.

 

Oh, I was thinking you meant with regard to the chromebooks, and using it wherever you go. For home use and family, yes. But in general no.

 

home use and family is "the general use of a notebook". so, in general, yes.

i seriously never see anyone taking his notebook with himself regularly except some geeks. and you, sir, have a home server. you ARE a geek you're an exception by default, thus.

 

It said "SanDisk" which is like USB or SD cards. Same stuff used in the original EEE PC's and they were slower than snot. I know because I owned the original EEE 701 and EEE 900.

 

Whoops must have misread.

 

I thought that the whole idea is that this thing is super mobile and fast.
Lan isnt mobile.
Wi-fi is rare when you are on the go.
3g is slow and expensive.

As for "fast" — google documents sometimes take quite some time to load even on my mbp through ethernet if i choose to open it directly from mailbox. I still cant think about those cool apps that fit on 32gb ssd or uploaded directly from the net.

I dont think we are talking about desktop replacement with 12 inch display here.

p.s. i am not in denial. Sure if they create super dooper cool aps and office will work smooth — why not. Still not much advantage vs netbook — application are automatically updated? Ye, thats new.. and price isnt exactly lower.

Now if we think a bit further — will those "applications on the internet be forever free" — i doubt it. That just sounds like software as service, you get starting package for free but then you pay for everything. Except for starting package isnt free here and cost quite on par with other mini-books.

All my data is stored on their servers and in case my notebook crashes i can just get it back from there? Thats sweet but i d rather backup on local hdd else it may take me days downloading my data back.

 

Wifi is rare? Maybe where you live. It's freaking everywhere in NYC -- parks, buildings, wherever. They're even putting it in the subways soon.

3G is fine. I just used 3G for the last 5 hours to post here (and in a few other forums) while my internet was out.

 

I think most european cities only got wi-fi in cafes. Cafes are mostly situated in the city center. Sure not just there but then they are rare.

Still just cant understand why would i want everything stored elsewhere rather then on my hdd.
Thats like replacing your SSD with 100RPM HDD (comparing SSD r/w to 3G DL speed )

 

It's a 16GB SSD not even 32GB. And yeah web based apps, I see monthly or annual fees galore.

NYC is an exception. NYC is not everywhere else. You won't get half the technological "luxuries" or resources in most other cities, even larger ones. Heck we don't even have regular public transportation here. Just surprising in this day and age that people can't think beyond their own needs or location.

 

well, then don't understand it. people like not being tied to the device. at school they can their school pc, at home their tablet, their netbook, when working their pc. when at a friend, they can just log in quickly on their system. always everything with you.

others have everything on their usb stick because of that.

to each it's own.

stuff works fast enough for a lot of people on 3g (as i said, people are happy with their iphones, which are tiny, slow clumsy to use computers with only 3g)

and wifi is mobile. how often are you outside of a building? at home, you sure have wifi. at most schools, they have wifi. at most workplaces, there is wifi.

mobile == not wired, not fixed. a laptop is mobile, too. most laptops only have wifi, no 3g options at all (mine has ).

 

I think 3G is fine for regular web browsing, just it's expensive for what you get and ping is horrible so anything ping sensitive is out of the question.

 

btw, one nice thing about chrome os compared to android or ios (or winphone7, too *crying to myself*) is the openness of the app framework.

Angry Birds works just fine on any modern chrome or ie9 browser. haven't tested yet on firefox.

i don't like {html5 + javascript + css + other languages + serverside languages + everything then compiled on the fly everytime} as an app platform (very inefficient for both developers to learn (lots of languages, each different, reducing code reuse), and slow for systems to handle (having to parse and compile all that). a binary standards platform would be much better.

BUT

it works across all sort of systems. that is a big +.

as it's a web-app only device, i guess the apps will be (are already) made for this situation. they take that into account.

 

Imo thats a trick marketers are playing with you in that "everything" word.

You can already store personal data on the internet there are numerous services. People dont do it because its SLOW. (or they do it if it works for them). I sync my "projects" folder with our server for example to access it from everywhere.

What else are we talking about with this "Everything"?
Will i have my photoshop / 3dmax / MS Office professional? — hell no. You will have some cut to 10% functionality things that you will pay monthly to use and will need to download every time you are logging in from a new place.

Now think about it like this — you are getting to your parents without your laptop and logging to your google os. And basically... you have that ripped of office that you will need to download in order to use — but why do so if your parents already have full func office installed on their windows7?

Their netbook in itself is a useless device in your bag. Carrying 12 inch device and not carrying your data to instantly access it? — why do so if 12 inch device can have 1tb of data on it?

[edit] I am not even talking about applications that will hardly match even games of year 2000. Well, probably they wont.

 

See the file system in action:

<width='560' height="349"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/gC9R0EURy6c?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/gC9R0EURy6c?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width='560' height="349" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

 

Yes I've played angry birds on my cr48.

edit: and by played I mean opened the page haha

I just updated to 12 today

 

you know what? tons of people USE those services. dropbox has millions of users, so has skydrive, and other platforms. and yes, all of those are what chromebook is about.
i have tons of friends who have all they care about all in dropbox, for example.

and another thing you might not understand about "dogslow". the idea is to not download the stuff, ever, but to keep it online. if you have an online photo editor app, and your photos are online, you don't care how long it takes to download them. aviary is one such app which i never used myself yet.

aviary is a photoshop replacement, and quite high praise. no clue how good it is. good enough to edit family fotos it is for sure. 3dsmax, well, 3d in the web is VERY young, but webgl will result in such apps. ms office, depending on your needs, is in the web. do you need all that professional has? again, most don't.

because you get the same environment you always use. consistency, it's important for people (remember how everyone cried about office2007? that was not because it was bad, but because it killed all their knowledge, their consistency of everywhere the same since years)

when do i need 1tb of data? my laptop has a 160gb ssd, half full at max. my data (4tb right now) is stored on my home server, accessible trough davepermen.net (click 'logon'), when i need it. i have my stuff consistent over several devices, and get access to it from where ever i want, when in need and not having one of my own devices with me.

it's AWESOME.

i just don't like to store my stuff anywhere else but where I can access it. that's the only thing i really hate about the cloud.

other than that, having all stored in one place, accessible everywhere from what ever device, that's great.