Google reveals its Chrome OS cohorts
Update: Google has since added Toshiba to the list of partners.
Though many PC makers were quiet about Chrome OS earlier Wednesday, Google has now named the companies it's working with to bring its operating system to Netbooks next year.
We may see an Eee PC running Chrome OS next year.
(Credit: Asus)In a post to the Chrome blog Wednesday afternoon, Google vice president of product management Sundar Pichai said the company is working with a variety of PC and chipmakers, and another software company. Those include Acer, Adobe, Asus, Freescale, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba.
CNET News reported earlier Wednesday that Asus and Lenovo were thought to be working with Google on Chrome OS. Asus was an easy one to guess since it's the pioneer of the Netbook category and has shown its willingness to work with other operating systems outside of Windows.
Acer also sounds right since it's the fastest growing laptop maker, and has shown a lot of flexibility in pricing models to move Netbooks off store shelves. HP, of course, is the world's largest provider of PCs and should be part of any conversation about consumer computing OSes.
The one that is notably missing is Dell. Dell is the second-largest PC maker in the world (though Acer is close at its heels), but didn't indicate it was actively working with Google on this when contacted earlier today. The company would only say that "Dell constantly assesses new technologies as part of managing our product development process and for consideration in future products."
Erica Ogg is a CNET News reporter who covers Apple, HP, Dell, and other PC makers, as well as the consumer electronics industry. She's also one of the hosts of CNET News' Daily Podcast. In her non-work life, she's a history geek, a loyal Dodgers fan, and a mac-and-cheese connoisseur. E-mail Erica. 
Since Moblin, Ubuntu, Android, Chrome OS, etc. are all Linux-based & open source, there should be some interesting opportunities to mix & match some of the concepts & technologies, between the different initiatives.
I think X86 and ARM are the two big targets right now. Anybody know what runs on the new Sony PSP?
TI, Freescale, and Qualcomm all provide ARM based processors for Smartbooks. I think Android and Chrome will be closely related....
It will be interesting to see if there will be opportunities for the PC vendors to "customize" the Chrome OS, to differentiate their products, much like what smartphone vendors have been doing with Android.
Seriously...
Google's new slogan - Live your life - we'll market and sell it to our ad partners. Not interested at all. Besides, Google is flailing here to try and protect their search heap. Bing was a nice canon over Googles bow now Google is trying to release an OS? Give me a break. I will say this though - Search is easier to get at then building an OS and trying to market the crap out of it. All it takes is a few eyes to open up about how Google treats your confidential search information... sorry - Google and confidential - that's an oxymoron. Sorry about that.
This could be good for the open source community - maybe Adobe will create their applications for the open source community? They are the darlings but honestly - they have very few successful projects (outside of search.) At the end of the day this is an attempt to try to strike back at Microsoft for actually digging a bit into Google profit center - search. Just remember at the end of the day - nothing is free.
Google is the biggest, greatest procurer of intelligence on people and corporations the world has ever seen.
But who cares?
As long as you give the people convenience in exchange for a "promise" of security and confidentiality, the vast majority of people (and corporations) will always take convenience.
We're a planet full of lazy SOBs and that is how we are built. We'll trade anything for whatever it is that will make things easier for us or for what we think will make us famous.
And if you think Google would never do that you might want to ask people in a certain Far Eastern country...
And so what if it records patterns or individual actions? The same data will be used to... guess what? Target ads to sell crap to you. How do you actually think Google makes its money, genius?
I spend my time finding ways NOT to deal with ads. Why would I adopt a platform that will almost certainly be ad-driven?
Again I say, no thanks.
A portable device with a web browser. I have one of those in my pocket right now.
This is a waste of time and will be a total flop. Funny thing is that Windows will not kill this, smartphones will.
Trouble is, it isn't very compelling to anyone who does more than basic web crap. I have a powerful laptop for content creation and a very capable smartphone... why would *I* need such a limited platform?
I travel several times a year and dragging around a full sized 15" laptop sucks. And while I love my smartphone, I do want that middle device when traveling, mainly for the screen and keyboard.
Ultimately, Google hopes these cheap netbooks will become like disposable devices. You'll buy them as presents for your young children, they'll be bought for schools that want to save money. When you go vacation, why not throw one in the luggage or purse for you and the kids. It's the extra secondary computer you'll buy for the family to use and to keep them away from your main computer. And a new generation will be raised as used to using the Chrome OS and it's associated applications as we were to Windows.
In the future, the older generation will be defined as using hard drives and keeping data offline and running proprietary programs accessing proprietary APIs. The new generation will just use the Cloud on all manner of devices.
Anyway, I use Windows currently, but I spend most of my time using Chrome and Web apps.
Admittedly I use Dreamweaver and Photoshop, but how hard is it to make an equivalent online version.
Why do I need $200 worth of Windows to load Chrome and Cloud services?
I donīt.
Bring it on Google. The next generation and Web savvy older people are ready for something better than Microsoft Windows.
- by Lekidos July 19, 2009 5:13 PM PDT
- @619
- Reply to this comment
-
(31 Comments)"personally the more choices we have for an OS the better..."
Really? Like there already aren't enough Linux distros. available? openSuse and Ubuntu are among the most pupular. Check out the GNOME or K Desktop Enviroment and tell me what you can find is lacking.
To be honests, I'm a Microsoft fan. I absoultly love Bing, and the new IE8, the accelerators is what makes it better than Google's Chrome browser.
I see Google's Chrome OS proposition to be as others have said, not for the interest of making a free, open source OS alternative to 'mainstream' OS's, but more of an aim to bundle the OS with properitary influences.
The OS seems to be marketing twoards moblie platforms (including notebooks), as you can read on other CNET articles about Google partnering with Texas Instruments to make microprocessors much as Intel makes "for" Windows mobile platform. Sure, architecture is supposed 'agnostic' but do we forget that Mac. pre OSx would not function on anythign but an IBM chip.
Also, I agree with the notion the Google Chrome OS will be another advertising outlet. Fitted on to mobile devices with usually more than 50% internet connectivity time, Chrome OS will be a moblie, intutive and updating advertising platform. Oh yea, with a browser-based OS running on the side. (You really think Google isn't trying to make any money on this?)
I can also see Google making money on Chrome OS on the properitary side by contracting bundled software of a PC manufacturer to distribute Chrome OS on their mobile devices ( yes notebooks are actually mobile devices). Much like HP or Dell with Windows-Based PCs (at least I'm assuming. the last PC I purchased was a P4 Sony Vaio, littlered with sony-ware)
In all I agree with Gates in a CNET interview; "There's many, many forms of Linux operating systems out there and packaged in different ways and booted in different ways[...] In some ways I am surprised people are acting like there's something new." (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10286308-56.html?tag=mncol)