Hasta La Gadget!

We heard rumors about the Chromebook Pixel earlier this month in the form of a pretty big leak. While many of us were skeptical, it seems that it was all quite true. Google officially announced the Chromebook Pixel today, with pre-orders starting right now. The laptop will begin shipping in April, and it’ll cost you a pretty $1,299.

This specific Chromebook looks to take on Apple’s MacBook Pro lineup, instead of just being an affordable option like past Chromebooks from HP, Acer, Dell, Samsung, etc. The Chromebook Pixel sports a 12.85-inch display with a staggering resolution of 2560×1700, making it a higher resolution than the Retina MacBook. Although, it has a 3:2 ratio, which is fairly odd in this day and age.

The Pixel comes with an Intel Core i5 dual-core 1.8GHz processor, 4GB of RAM, and two SSD options: 32GB or 64GB. Of course, that’s not a lot of storage for all those media files you have, so Google is throwing in 1TB of Google Drive storage with a purchase of a Pixel, which will be free for three years.

You can pre-order the Pixel right this second on the Google Play store, and it’ll cost you a crazy $1,299, which is right on par for what you’ll pay for a MacBook Pro, but we’re certainly not used to seeing this kind of price for a Chromebook, since most of them have been price in the $200-$300 recently.

Chromebook Pixel coming in April for $1,299 is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

With that glorious high-res display on the Chromebook Pixel, it only made sense that Google released a brand-new photo app to go along with it. In collaboration with the G+ Photos team, Chrome has worked on a new Photos app from the ground up so that it’s super-easy to upload, view and share your photos. All you have to do is plug in your camera’s SD card into the Chromebook and it’ll automatically recognize your pics and immediately start uploading your full-resolution photos to your G+ account — turns out there’s a really good reason the Pixel comes with one terabyte of Drive storage for three years.

Of course, the app is designed with the touch interface in mind, and they’ve built in social elements like G+’s plusses and comments into the UI. What we find particularly intriguing is that the app also has intelligent photo selection. It will look through your snapshots and will try its best to figure out which is blurry or has bad exposure. When you’re ready to create a G+ album of your photos, it’ll automatically select what it deems to be your best shots so you can set it up instantly. We talked to a Google representative here, and she said that while the app will be available to Pixel users initially via the Chrome Web Store, it’ll eventually roll out to all Chromebooks in the future.

Filed under: Laptops, Google

Comments

Only yesterday we were being teased with the idea of a touchscreen Chromebook. Well, good news for people who hate waiting — it’s here, it’s called the Pixel, and you can pre-order today. The all-Google laptop is aimed at those who live in the cloud, but want a little more from their machine. Built from the ground up for the web, the 12.85-inch 3:2 ratio display claims to offer 18 percent more vertical space than 16:9 does. The screen the Pixel has is — as you can imagine — one of its proudest features, sporting a 2,560 x 1,700 resolution, giving a PPI of 239, and offers a brightness of 400nit. Oh, and of course, it’s touch-enabled so whatever your input preference, you’re covered. On the inside, there’s a dual-core 1.8Ghz Core i5 processor, 4GB of RAM and two SSD options — 32GB or 64GB. If that’s not enough, Google’s ahead of you, and is throwing in 1TB of Drive storage with every Pixel for three years — what it expects the life of the machine to be. You won’t be basing your choice just on storage though, as the smaller capacity model is WiFi only, while the 64GB comes with Verizon LTE baked right in, and a choice of plans.

As for the rest of the features, the Pixel also has a triple-microphone configuration — with one under the keyboard — which helps improve noise cancellation, including the rattle of your typing during excited hangouts. This is also where the speakers are hidden, so it will be interesting to see how those play nice together. Other features include an “HD” camera, a custom keyboard action for less finger-fatigue, and an enhanced smooth glass trackpad. As for ins and outs, there are two USB ports, a mini displayport, a mic / headphone jack and an SD card reader — notably, no Ethernet. Wirelessly, you have WiFi a thru n and Bluetooth (plus that LTE if you opt in). Wondering what effect that display might have on the (59Wh) battery? Well Google claims its open-source test (available for criticism online) has rated the Pixel at five hours. If you want to get yourself some touchscreen Pixel action, you can order starting today from the Play store, or Best Buy starting tomorrow. The WiFi-only model will cost you $1,299, rising to $1,449 if you want some LTE (currently US / Verizon only). Not enough info for you right there? Why not head over to our minty-fresh hands-on.

Update: The WiFi model is available now from the Google Play store and will be on Bestbuy.com starting tomorrow. You’ll have to wait until April before you can order the LTE version.

Filed under: Laptops, Google

Comments

Developer François Beaufort gave us a peek at a new notification center in Mountain View’s browser last week, and now he’s given us a glimpse of what rich notifications could look like in Chrome OS. In the screenshot, a pop-up sprouts from the lower menu bar and packs a collection of notices regarding missed calls, new messages and notifications from Google+. Beaufort playfully says he doesn’t know what the toolbar icon made up of four word bubbles is, but we wouldn’t be surprised if it were a unified messaging app. Here’s hoping Beaufort drops some more clues or Page and Co. confirm our suspicions soon.

Filed under: Google

Comments

Via: The Verge

Source: François Beaufort (Google+)

Remember last week when HP leaked a 14-inch Chromebook on its own site? That was a big surprise, to say the least — the company has never put out a Chrome OS system before, and we weren’t aware this was even that popular a category. Well, HP just officially announced the Pavilion 14 Chromebook, and pretty much the only surprise is the availability date: we had heard it would go on sale February 17th, but it’s actually available today for $330.

Suffice to say, that’s more than what you’ll pay for Samsung’s Chromebook ($249) or Acer’s C7 ($199). For the money, it offers similar specs as the Acer C7, but the design appears considerably more polished. Meanwhile, with a 1.1GHz Intel Celeron 847 CPU and 2GB of RAM, it should perform a bit better than the Samsung model, which has a nice design, but chugs along on a lower-powered ARM processor. Like most other Chromebooks, this one has 16GB of built-in flash storage, along with a 1,366 x 768 display. Users also get 100GB of Google Drive space (free for the first two years).

All told, this 14-inch system weighs about four pounds, making it not only the biggest Chromebook on the market, but the heaviest. At least that 0.8-inch chassis makes room for a good selection of ports: HDMI output, three USB 2.0 sockets and an SD reader. It even has an Ethernet jack, something that Samsung’s removed from its latest Chrome OS device. Unfortunately, though, a bigger footprint doesn’t mean a bigger battery: the Pavilion 14 Chromebook is rated for four hours and 15 minutes of runtime, putting it behind Samsung’s model. So, are a sleek design and stronger performance worth the premium? We’ll tackle that in our eventual review, but if you buy today you’ll just have to make that call yourself. Check the PR after the break or Google’s Chrome Blog (linked below) more info.

Filed under: Laptops, Google, HP

Comments