http://www.google.com/chromebook/



Do you guys think it will be popular or a failed product?

 

Why would you have an internet-only appliance?

 

This is the perfect computer software to give to grandma, or a kid, or just about anyone else who dosn't know much about computers... It's low maintenance, easy to use, easy to recover because data is stored off-site, low power, long battery life..



Google's apps allow you to save to the cloud, or USB, in office format and print to a printer, connect to your network, run any network game, use flash... You name it... The only thing it really doesn't do is hardcore gaming.



This makes another operating system I'd recomend to keep around in case of a windows crash. For 99% of computer users, this is all you need. It's the other 1% that actually run custom software at home.



HTML5 is comming out soon... If you didn't know that's a programming language which allows powerful, cross-platform programming. Once it becomes more widely used, you'll be perfectly happy with a Chrome Book.

 

There are many reasons to have an internet only appliance. That's essentially the same role as an iPad or Android tablet and there's a good market for those. The price seems steep though, I would expect it to be less than a netbook.

 

another benefeit is that the computer wont bog down... On a Windows computer, every manufacturer has an updater which downloads crap that includes another updater which downloads crap. Nothing is downloaded on the ChromeBook. 5 years from now it will be just as fast as it was today... The HTML5 standards have been written. It may require an update to Flash, but seriously... It's a good idea from a security, training, and financial aspect for a home user.



It's not an internet appliance btw.. It's perfectly capable of interfacing just about everything. It runs Linux and it's been designed so that it doesnt need to be updated. You can put software on it, but then you risk ruining it. Software doesn't get installed on the device.... Which is a sales point.

 

This is a different market. The pads are viewers. This is a full computer, running a featherweight operating system that offloads storage and apps to the internet. The difference is that this actually has a keyboard and you can be productive on one, wheras with apple products, productive is simply a buzz word they use when they're not screwing around. You can't type efficienty on a pad. You can't input data as well on a pad. You wouldn't want to write software on a pad. You wouldn't want to do spreadsheets, word processing, or database access on a pad. These are all things this netbook was designed for.

 

For typical home users they would be highly likely to cross shop these two categories for the same purpose. Screwing off on the internet. All other capabilities or lack thereof don't matter to most people. It will come down to "Do I want a keyboard or a touch screen?"

 

sounds like a good idea for a computer, no hassle, no programs to install, no storage space to worry about, but id rather just use my iPad for something like this. if the computer is just for email and post whoring.... my iPad is perfect !



what OS does this run ?





edit:



just read what DTN had to say about the pad ... you can get a keyboard for the pad, and write pretty nice documents using my ipad. i take it to school every day and voice record the professor as I take notes.



its customizable, Im not stuck to a certain framework of apps. I cant speak on the chromebook yet, i have to see it in action.



my battery lasts for 5 hours with consecutive use, even with internet streaming using the wifi. 10 hours or more consecutive if just listening to music.



the iPad is the perfect internet, web surfing tool as of right now IMO

 

Its not the same as a pad though.... This is a completely different thing. It's not an ipad. it's actually a production machine.





this is aimed at a different market. Its likely that all computers at your work could be replaced by one of these running an HTML5 app on a private LAN using a private cloud.

 

It reduces operating costs, data loss, security risks and downtime



It runs linux.



I don't know if you guys have heard of it before, but this is what "Cloud Computing" actually is.