- Hey guys, this is Austin!
Chrome OS, ever since I got to take a look
at the very first developer model,
the CR48, all the way back in ye olden 2011.
The promise was absolutely there.
Get rid of all the legacy stuff,
of Mac OS and Windows,
in favor of something which is,
cleaner, simpler, which just works.
I feel like I'm tryna say that like,
Chrome OS is like the vegan option of laptops.
It's hard to argue with in theory.
You've got a clean build of Linux,
with just the Chrome browser on top.
And realistically, you can get a lot of
what you need done inside of Chrome.
Especially considering that most of these Chromebooks
have very low end specs.
We're talking Intel Celeron processors,
or Rockchip processors.
And you don't need a lot of power,
to simply just run a web browser.
And then there's the idea of having a more
locked down system, can actually be a real benefit.
I mean, sure, you probably know that you shouldn't
really go visit sketchy site .org.
But there are tons and tons of Chromebooks in schools.
Kids might not necessarily have that same level of,
of forethought and thinking behind not opening every
attachment and downloading every weird emoji pack
that you can see.
Oh I guess they do it on their phones, so, you know.
And really think about it.
Back in 2011.
- Hi I'm Rebecca Black of 2011.
This year was a huge year for YouTube.
- There were a fair few things
you could do inside a web browser.
These days web apps have gotten much more powerful.
I know personally, I can pretty much do everything
on a day to day basis, purely just inside a browser.
So, things like Spotify, Google Docs, Gmail.
All these things run just fine on Chrome OS.
And arguably, that's sort of the main selling point.
Chrome really is simple, clean and elegant.
It's the vegan option of PC's.
But of course the question is,
can you actually do everything you need,
inside Chrome OS?
(upbeat music)
I've gone on and off with Chromebooks
over the last few years.
In fact, I originally started working on
this video last year, with this Asus Chromebook.
However I didn't actually, finish the video.
But today, with the brand new Pixelbook Go coming out,
is Chrome OS good enough, or should you just ignore
your plant based diet and go straight to being a carnivore?
A.K.A a Windows user, or a Mac user.
I like that this metaphor went from like,
a little joke to like, the entire purpose of my video.
And I'm kind of okay with that.
Honestly just stay off the internet,
that's really the best advice.
And Chrome OS is the exact opposite way
that you wanna do that.
(upbeat music)
Lets start with the Pixelbook go itself.
This is the first time that Google has
brought out their own first party laptop in a couple years.
If you don't count the Pixel Slate, and you shouldn't.
And the nice thing here, is that this hardware feels
very very premium.
Now, the nice thing about this, is a lot of the cheaper
Chromebooks feel, shall we say, cheapy?
Where as this is still super thin, and super lightweight.
But the important thing here is that, in a hand it feels
like a solid piece of laptop hardware.
I feel pretty confident in this lasting quite a while.
It's made out of a finely painted magnesium,
which is one of the things that helps it to be
not only lightweight.
One of the interesting things here,
is that it's got this sort of washboard texture.
You're also getting an excellent keyboard,
with great travel, and honestly it's actually one
of the quietest laptop keyboards I've ever used.
And around on the side, you actually get
a pretty solid selection of ports, for a Chromebook.
A pair of USB-C ports, which can not only handle power.
They can also do data as well as each can handle
a 4K display.
Which I tested, and it actually works.
Not that lots of people with Chromebooks,
are probably using multiple 4K displays.
Is that a little unrealistic of a use case?
No, it is certainly not perfect.
The specs are shall we say,
not exactly blisteringly fast.
Now I have the base model here,
which comes with a dual-core, Core m3 processor.
Eight gigs of RAM as well as 64 gigs of storage.
And considering that we're just web browsing,
it's fine, but at $650, you're definitely paying a lot
for this design, and you're not really spending a lot
of money on the actually spending money on the
actual spec inside.
The screen is also fine, it's a 1080p 13 inch touchscreen.
And while the brightness and the viewing angles are fine,
the bezels are a little bit thick on this guy.
And something I really miss from the original Pixelbook,
is the ability to actually use a full two in one design.
This guy just does, I mean.
(upbeat music)
It's fine, it's a normal laptop.
But I just kind of expect a little bit more.
Especially considering just how thin and light
this laptop is.
You actually could legitimately use it as
a pretty useful two in one, but you can't.
Honestly, my biggest problem with this hardware
is just the price.
At $650 for the base model, that's a lot of money
for a Chromebook.
And this thing gets incredibly expensive as you start to add
upgrades like a Core i5, more storage.
there's a 4K display option which is like $1400.
Like it just doesn't make a lot of sense.
- Wait it costs $1400?
- $1400, okay no, the entire laptop costs $1400
when you upgrade, but its very expensive.
There are other Chromebooks on the market
which have very similar specs for far less money.
Take the $650 option and compare it to this
Asus Chromebook, which only costs a little less than $400.
The same Core m3, same memory, same storage,
slightly bigger screen.
It's kind of hard to justify.
Don't get me wrong, this is still probably the nicest
Chromebook that you could buy, but with this kind of money,
you're not just competing with
two and three hundred dollar Chromebooks.
You're competing with full on Windows laptops,
which really begs the question,
if the hardware's largely there, is Chrome OS?
Spoiler, it's complicated, and it depends on your use case.
And whether or not you need to do real work.
The easy answer is, actually a lot of people can use
a Chromebook everyday, provided you do have
one with at least, sort of, decent specs like this guy.
Now, in addition to the fairly wide range
of web apps out there, you also do have access to most
Android apps using the Play Store.
Now of course, these are still Android apps
running on a Chromebook, which means that
the quality is maybe not quite as nice as say,
oh I don't know, a native Mac, or Windows app.
Twitter's a really big offender, it looks fine
when you have it sort of squished to the side of
the screen, but the second you go full screen with it,
it looks ridiculous.
There are a few examples of apps which do run really
well on Chrome OS.
I know Adobe's Lightroom in particular has been
designed, obviously it's based on the Android app.
But there are a lot of optimizations specifically
for a large screen, keyboard track pad for Chrome OS.
Then you've got some other stuff which is nice.
So there's a full file browser, and there's even
a fairly rudimentary version of Linux which you can install
which while not full blown or anything is definitely
a nice little feature.
Sometimes though, there are just no ways
around the limitations of a Chrome OS device.
Now, sure, if you can do a lot of basic tasks
on Chromebook, more power to you.
But, I think the issue here is that a lot of people
can do a lot of this stuff on mobile devices.
Such as, phones and tablets.
Really when you come to a PC, a lot of times that's because
you need a specific feature.
Whether you're doing CAD or video editing,
or you're doing Photoshop.
All these things generally speaking,
require a fairly beefy PC.
This is where your specific use case really matters.
It isn't 2011 anymore, and Windows and Mac
but specifically Windows 10, has made a ton of strides
towards sort of, fending off the Chromebook onslaught.
Windows has absolutely filled a lot of the void that
Chromebook started to pick up in those early days.
I mean, when Chromebooks first came out,
when the major advantages, and even to this day
has been in the price category.
Put simply, you could get a very very cheap Chromebook,
because all it needs you to do is run a web browser.
Nowadays though, Windows 10 laptops
have actually come down a lot in price.
And while a lot of the laptops have
pretty crappy hardware, and not much in the way
of screens or specs or anything.
But the important thing is, is they're about the same
price as a Chromebook.
And generally speaking, of course you're getting a full
version of Windows, as opposed to a more limited
operating system in Chrome OS.
Speaking of things that you can't do on a Chromebook,
this video was actually part of an editing challenge
between a Mac and a PC.
And between Justine and Linus.
And as of recording this, I have no idea who
actually won and who was the edit that
we used to post this video.
I'm actually very curious to see how this video came out.
And if it sucks, you can blame them.
- Justine will probably win though.
Because Final Cut's better.
- Final Cut is better.
Oh wait no, I can't say that.
Goodbye!
Thanks for editing my video.
Hopefully it wasn't that long.
And I believe in you, you're gonna win this.
You've definitely got this, I believe in you.
- Justine.
- No, I'm talking to everyone who's watching this.
Whoever actually ends up editing this.
I have no idea.
And make sure to make me look good.
(upbeat music)