Google already sells a line of devices made by Samsung, LG, and Asus, but a new report from China now points to a Google-branded Chromebook.
Google is committed to the Chromebook, and if the new report proves to be true this move could help the platform gain more traction. The whopping success of recent Nexus products proves that Google can be good at hardware too, and can bring high-quality devices to the market.
According to a China Times report on Monday, Nov. 26, a Google-branded Chromebook is on its way, carrying all the brand weight of the search giant. Chromebooks are essentially laptops that run on the Google Chrome operating system (OS) instead of Windows, OS X, Ubuntu, or other platforms. Basically, Chromebooks boot and shut down quickly, featuring an OS designed mainly around a Web browser.
Google has so far collaborated with Samsung and Acer to release Chromebooks, with prices ranging between $200 and $550. These chromebooks are listed in the Google Play Store, but they are actually sold through retailers such as Best Buy and Amazon. The search giant also worked with Asus, LG, and Samsung for its line of smartphones and tablets sold under the Google name.
The China Times report, however, indicates that Google may be working with Taiwanese equipment maker Compal to produce a new Chromebook. The new Chromebook would be a pure Google device.
Should this be true, it would allow the search giant to have even more control over the hardware, physical design, and price of the devices, than it currently does over the latest Chromebooks.
The Chinese publication further suggested that the new Google-branded Chromebook could sport a touch screen. This idea is not farfetched, especially considering that the Chrome browser can run on the touch-friendly Android OS, as well as Windows, OS X, Linux, and Chrome OS.
The report, however, does not reveal other hardware specs of the purported Chromebook. It offers no information regarding storage, processor, or any other features, so everything else remains shrouded in mystery at least for now.
Chrome OS can run on a range of chips, including ARM-based processors and x86 chips from Intel or AMD. Meanwhile, the storage capacity is also hard to guess. Most Chromebooks so far have shipped with 16GB of flash storage, but Acer's latest Chromebook packs a 320GB hard drive, so it's hard to anticipate what type of hardware a Google-branded Chromebook would feature.
According to the report, Google has already placed the order, and internal components will start shipping to Compal this month. China Times speculates that the product itself will ship at the end of 2012.
