Slashdot Mirror
Hands On With the Samsung Series 5 Chromebook
adeelarshad82 writes "Among some of the coolest things revealed at Google I/O, Samsung unveiled one of the first Chrome OS notebooks called the Samsung Series 5 Chromebook. Priced at $429 for the 3G version and $499 for the Wi-Fi/3G option, the 1280 x 800 display notebook is said to carry a dual-core Atom N570 and a battery that supports 8.5 hours of active use. Unlike the Cr-48, the 480p and even 720p video plays back decently on the 1280 x 800 display, thanks in part to improvements in Flash and the faster chip. Also unlike the Cr-48, the touchpad doesn't require jamming it down to make it work. While no official confirmations were made about what's inside the Series 5; there's clearly a GPU and a solid-state drive. The notebook also includes 802.11b/g/n, which is complemented by a two-year 3G subscription to Verizon with 100 MB/s per month for free."
100MB/s per month for free would quite unbelievebly aweasome, yet it's just a typo :(
Is it easily removed and replaced with ya know, a real OS? something that isn't all Cloudy 2.0 JavaScript based?
The 3G-only version is cheaper than the version that also supports WiFi?
What's a Cr-48?
"Jamming it down"?
Improvements in Flash? Seriously?
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
And the WiFi is complemented by Verizon service with one hundred megabytes per second per month?
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
Chrome OS's coolest features are the quick boot—under ten seconds—and instant resume. There's no need not to simply close the notebook while walking from place to place. The only drawback is that the OS occasionally resumes faster than the Wi-Fi can connect.
My wife has a new Thinkpad with Windows 7 and an SSD. It boots in about 20 seconds and shuts down in about 10. It also resumes from sleep faster than the Wi-Fi can connect.
My 4-year old Macbook with an SSD boots to OS X in about 15 seconds and shuts down in 5-10. It has always resumed from sleep faster than the Wi-Fi can connect, even when it had a spinning-platter drive.
a real laptop is $299 to $500 for the cheap ones. $500 or $600 can buy a real Sandy Bridge CPU or a 2010 Core i CPU. bought a $299 celeron CPU laptop last year as a gift and it shocked be with how decent it was for my father in law in speed and usability.
other than the fast start up time what is the advantage to buying one of these that will send everything you do back to google? and will have less features and usability than real laptops? my ipad 2 has more features and power than these crippled computers
"100MB/s per month" How many MB/s does that equate to per second?
"...subscription to Verizon with 100 MB/s per month for free."
100MB/s/month?
What the heck is that?
What's to say about a Chromebook like the Samsung Series 5, whose hardware is almost embarrassed to exist?
His review is overall pretty positive w.r.t. the hardware, and he says it's better than the Cr-48.
For now, there's something to like in the Series 5 hardware and software--but oh, that price.
What's wrong with the price? Against a netbook, maybe, but I figure Google is positioning this against iPads.
And why complain about getting 100MB/month free? It has WiFi too, it's not 3G-only. I'd love a device that had free 3G. I can't bring myself to spend money on it because I'd use it so rarely, but those few times I'd want it, it would be really, really useful so I'm always going back and forth on whether or not to get it.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
That does not make sense.
100 MB/s ? that's some mighty fast 3G you have there.
"...two-year 3G subscription to Verizon with 100 MB/s per month for free."
100MB/s per month for free? How exactly does that work?
Even if it's 100MB of data per month, which seems more likely, that's still, well, for a notebook that is entirely dependent on 'cloud' services, 100MB does seems extremely stingy.
The last two laptops I bought came with 802.11 b/g/n mini-PCI cards. They were the first thing I replaced, putting in 802.11 A/b/g/n cards.
The spacious, speedy 5 GHz spectrum smokes the pathetic 2.4 GHz for things like streaming video playback. Those 3 non-overlapping channels in 802.11 b/g/n are SO useful...out on the farm. Get into a suburb or city and you get stomped on.
Get with the program Samsung.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
With linux installed instead. Any guesses if they use some whacked out modem so the WWAN will not work if you change the OS?
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
hard to understand why someone will pay $500 for a web browser appliance when they can spend $500 and get a real computer/netbook.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
So they throttle the speed to 100 MB/s. Is there a data cap?
Or was that a typo, and 100 MB / mo was the intent?
For about the same money $468.00 get an Asus 1215n it's a better device in pretty much every way. It can do just about anything you might want and can even run some decent real games like Starcraft II, WOW, and portal.
Intel Dual Core Atom D525 (1.8GHz); Nvidia ION 2 graphics with 512mb dedicated video memory
12.1" WXGA (1366x768) LED screen; 2GB DDR3 RAM (2x1GB), 4GB Max
250GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM); No Optical Drive
Windows 7 Home Premium Operating System (32 Bit)
HDMI out; Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n; 10/100 LAN; 0.3MP Webcam
I like Google quit a bit but this is the dumbest Idea I have ever seen them actually pursue. The only thing dumber I have seen recently was 8.5 billion for Skype. The network computer was a dumb idea and a complete and utter failure and it is still is a dumb idea and will again be a complete and utter failure. People don't want dumb terminals for personal computers we left them behind in the early 1980s.
I just bought a Thinkpad x120e new for $450. Nice form factor dual-boot laptop with 6hr battery life, flawless 720p playback, virtualization, multi-touch trackpad, etc.
It seems unlikely anyone would want to buy a Chromebook for $500.
That is awesome! 100MB/s per month is a total monthly cap of ~ 260TB per month. The probably don't "rollover" megabytes from second to second though :(
It sounds like it should run a full Linux version very well...
.. . which comes with HDMI-out (http://t.co/ivtOtUR) so you can at least do stuff on a big-screen and enjoy movies properly
If he's the Walrus then can I be a penguin please?
I'm not paying $400 for a browser.
Pricewise, these probably aren't being made in huge quantities (which will push the price up) - plus they contain pretty much the same components as a netbook anyway, so why should they be cheaper?
This is the old story with "Network Computers", "Thin Clients", "Dickless Workstations" etc. through the ages: the concept is sound, but they end up costing as much as a full-blooded desktop, and you can't play [video game of the day] on them. They ought to be attractive in business, where the money saved in not having to run around maintaining a fleet of local Windows installs is more significant.
However, the old Network Computer idea was firmly pitched at business and failed to take off (perhaps the people making the buying decisions were swayed by the PHBs who's departments would be 50% redundant if they didn't have to run around fixing Windows installs).
These are never going to take off with slashdotters who like to tinker, and they'll also be held back by the cost/unreliability of mobile internet. However, if sufficient water has gone under the bridge for Google to try and re-sell the (perfectly sound) Network Computer concept they may have a role, and the retail price doesn't necessarily reflect how much hardware/service packages will be offered to businesses for.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
What's needed to a local OS for beginner users. It would reduce clutter but saving things in virtual folder, etc (with out being asked to).
Perhaps by type/time/tags/etc. Also mix in some automatic dropbox-like backup.
(There was talk about WinFS being SQL for Vista but I guess that never happened.)
Will always make me think of this: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Cyberpunk_2020
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
These things are aimed at the friends and relatives whose PCs we are asked to fix, "because the internet is running slow". A significant proportion of these are used for browsing, writing simple letters, email, uploading photos or Facebook. If my mother was still alive, I'd have bought one of these for her in a moment. Once Google release the "local" versions of Google Docs, these will be perfect for that market.
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
I asked the Chrome team (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQZu6azNlA0&feature=player_detailpage#t=514s ) and yes, it runs Gentoo Linux just like the Cr48. The marketing team at Google apparently has a Linux allergy.
~ C.
This concept have a successful past, it was this model that made IBM what it was in the 60 and 70ties, the only new thing is that you don't get to decide what programs the "mainframe" runs and there is no SHARE organization to help you. But you might be allowed to use it with different mainframe vendors offerings.
The reason for this return is that the "cheap" Wintel PC have become a major cost and a huge headache for IT operation while the value of local data processing powers are diminishing.
Really what is wrong with bandwidth in the states? I mean, I live in Romania and for 4 euros/month I get 8GB/moth worth of traffic at 7.2 Mbps. Beyond that limit i get 128kbps. (Disclaimer: It's a corporate sim card but it doesn't get much worse for consumers.)
I can't believe no one has picked up on this yet:
"It will be available in black and white"
I for one, would not by a b/w device in this age anymore. I know the Kindle has it as well, but I think you really need colour for web browsing. Just for this reason alone, I think that this will not sell a lot. (Although I have to admit that I did not look at any videos demonstrating the UI, maybe they found a way of making it look good anyway.)
seriously? thats 3.805e-5 MB/s^2, or 39.9 B/s^2. should i now multiply by Pi, or divide by e?
This only makes sense if it is provided with Google Apps with Unlimited Cloud Storage AND Free WiFi 3G/4G with Unlimited Data. That's the only thing that will make me spend $500 upfront and $30 a month for using a glorified browser. The 100MB data transfer is useless and just a trap and gimmick for people to incur a lot of "overage fees" by Verizon or for incurring charges for more data. Once people start to look at their broadband charges from Verizon for overage fees or better data plans, they will begin to get really pissed off at Google and these darned Chromebooks. When you add the cost of paying for Internet service at home PLUS internet service for your smart phone PLUS internet service for your Google Chromebook PLUS Wi-fi service data charges or overage charges for your Chromebook, we're talking about a pretty penny!