We’ve got our hands on Google’s Chrome OS test hardware, the CR-48 (you can apply for one yourself at http://www.google.com/chromeos/pilot-program.html). This netbook won’t ever be released to the public and is purely for testing Chrome OS, but it can give us a good idea of what to expect from future Chrome OS devices. Namely, a huge battery, 3G built-in, a somewhat altered keyboard from what you might be used to with Windows/Mac OSX, and not much more power than what’s necessary for basic web browsing. Have a look at our overview video:

We’ve also done our usual photo shoot with the unit so you can get a nice detailed look at the hardware. See an excerpt below, or swing by the gallery for all of our CR-48 photos (note: the slate being used for size comparison is the Onkyo TW317). More coverage to come, stay tuned.

This won’t take long. What we’ve got here is a Moblin build that has picked itself up from being stopped-dead in it’s tracks buy a huge corporate direction change. I imagine that partners that were working with Moblin before MeeGo was announced are pleased that they can finally get back to work in optimising their builds for end products. The core build has been changed and there has been some re-working of the user interface. Chrome has been added as the browser. What is also clear though is that the pace of development appears to have picked up and the MeeGo teams are committing to a six-month cadence meaning that those partners can re-write their roadmaps now and that the products promised last September, can now move forward.

I installed MeeGo 1.0 ‘Netbook User Experience’ on a Medion Akoya netbook (an MSI-Wind clone) last night and it was a smooth experience. First-boot was fast at 27 seconds including my usual 10-second BIOS-lag. First login was simple although there were no options to set up contact syncing or online accounts which are core to the MeeGo experience. The ‘netbook user interface’ is almost exactly the same as on Moblin and is modeled around the ‘home zone’ and other zones that can be activated. People and Internet being the two most important. As before, the UI is fast and bubbly.

It’s a Chrome OS!

Chrome (Chromium, the open source version is being tested here but there’s a true Chrome version available too.) is the major change for the end user and I have to say it’s a good one. It appears to be a recent build because it’s flying through the Sun Spider Javascsript tests. 1.8s is a very respectable time. Full-screen works and Flash is integrated meaning you can expect to operate just as you would on a normal desktop. I used Google Docs to edit a spreadsheet and Flickr to upload some photos without any problems. Facebook works as expected too. If we look to MeeGo on Moorestown, you’ve got the basics of a product that could be the best and one of the most productive smart-books or ‘cloud’ books to date. Add the Intel AppUp store and you’re starting to solve that problem too although Chrome’s Web Application store will be interesting to see working on this.

Basic Applications

There’s an email client (Evolution), a messenger, a reasonable media experience (certainly the Banshee media player seems to be quite feature-rich although I haven’t tested video support yet) and there are a number of other basic apps available through the application manager and ‘Garage,’ a slightly more end-user-friendly application installer although nothing seems to be working in Garage right now.

Photo and screen-grab. Image top-right is also from testing.

Other notes

• Sleep works (Using sleep button on keyboard)
• Gmail contacts sync working (uses SyncML)
• Home screen still somewhat limited. 6-tweets on a 1024×600 screen is not exactly efficient use of space!
• Chrome Browser crashes occasionally
• AppUp store install fails
• Media player fails to play imported MP3s
• No GMA500 (Menlow, Poulsbo) support.
• Read/Write to USB sticks and SD cards is no problem.

It’s a shame that MeeGo 1.0 hasn’t moved forward from Moblin 2.1 in terms of end user experience and there’s no way that it will challenge XP or Windows 7 in terms of productivity and flexibility (printing, network shares, application quality, etc.) however when you combine the thought of an efficient Chrome-based Web-focused OS and MeeGo’s future compatibility with the ‘always on’ Moorestown platform combined with a layer of ‘finishing’ you can see some nice possibilities for ‘smart’ productive devices. Certainly the full-internet experience is a major advantage with MeeGo compared to Android. Apps are needed though and until a nicely designed and well-marketed, polished MeeGo product hits the floor, developers aren’t going to be that interested. Maybe that changes after Computex.

We’ll be connecting with Intel’s software group at Computex next week so stay tuned for more information on the future of MeeGo, netbooks, handhelds and Intel’s ‘smart’ platforms. In the meantime, take the time to have a look at MeeGo 1.0 with the netbook user experience in the video below.

MeeGo V1.0 announcement

The internet was abundant yesterday with news that Google had announced Android 2.2 or Froyo. Whilst a new version of Android with extra speed and flash support is certainly an exciting thing, for me it was over-shadowed by the news of Google TV.

I know, I know, why would another box to go under the TV and complicate the already muddy waters that are TV, cable, satellite, DVD, Blu-ray, etc get someone who loves innovative technology excited?

There are two reasons why;

Firstly at the heart of the Google TV set top box or new LCD is an Intel Atom processor. Intel have been making plenty of noise of late that the Atom can power Android, the operating system on which Google TV works and this has been the first real taste of this marriage which many have speculated about.

Secondly and more importantly, Google announced the full internet experience on your TV. Not Android’s standard mobile browser, the full internet experience including flash. To achieve this they will use Chrome.

Why is this significant? Just think about it, Android running Chrome, a full internet experience browser on an operating system that I think is going to be one of main two used in the emerging ‘smart’ devices market.

Chippy has posted his review today of the Compaq Airlife 100 ‘smart’ device (full specifications);

“The mobile operating systems are built with short-term use in mind and although they offer new and interesting features that you don’t get on your desktop, they don’t offer the full internet experience that we all expect. If you use the Airlife 100 as a traditional laptop, as one might expect from something that looks like a traditional laptop, you will run into issues inch

Imagine how the review would have gone if the Airlife 100 had Chrome, the several day battery life and instant on of Android and the full internet experience and browsing prowess of Chrome.

Will it happen? I don’t know and there is certainly no suggestion that Chrome will come with Android on these new bread of ‘smart’ devices. We also have to remember that Google announced its ChromeOS for this emerging market.

MeeGo gets an outing in China this week as Intel takes its developer-focused conference, IDF, to Beijing. As I write this, Intel’s Lynn Wang, Strategic Relationship Manager and Rao Yeleswarapu, a Product Marketing Manager have just finished their talk on MeeGo Technology and Benefits. Danny Zhang, Senior Engineering Manager and Horace Li a Software Engineer with Intel have also given a technical overview talk.

Update: MeeGo 1.0 for Netbooks is now available.

As always, Intel publish the slides from the talks and they contain some great new information. I’ve picked out a few interesting slides from the first presentation which also include the first images of MeeGo’s handheld reference UI for smartphones.

Netbooks.

First off, lets look at the Netbook feature list for MeeGo (we assume 1.0) which confirms a previous tidbit that I picked up from DevMob (that apparently, shouldn’t have leaked.) Mozilla’s browser will be replaced by Chrome (or Chromium, the open source browser.) Quite how significant that if for Mozilla I don’t know but it’s something that should generate quite some discussion.  [Sidenote: There’s been a lot of Google/Intel/Android/Chrome rumors lately. Relationships are definitely good and don’t forget, Intel is part of the OHA. Stay very closely tuned to the Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit which starts tomorrow and runs for three days. Intel, Nokia and Google are all there. I wish I was too but i’ll be glued to the live stream as much as I can.]

You’ll also see that the social messaging app is to be redesigned (the application on Moblin 2.1 very very thin indeed) along with the camera application,email and calendar and date/time app. Best of all, the media application will get an overhaul. Again, the media app on Moblin was extremely basic. Remember that what drops out of MeeGo is not necessarily what you’ll see on netbooks. These code drops (starting with 1.0 in May) are for 3rd partys to take and build on so what you see in V1.0 is not what you’ll see in a final, retail build delivered on a netbook.

In other news, a number of companies have just re-affirmed their support for MeeGo as it transistions out of the Maemo brand. Note that Canonical isn’t in the list. That’s what happens when you move to an RPM-based distro I guess!

Note that the promised touch and gesture support is in there although I don’t see sensor support yet. That’s important for GPS. (It is, however, mentioned in other parts of the presentation.) Also missing is any mention of an application store. Intel’s AppUp is available for Moblin, OVI for Maemo so I wonder if this is simply left out of the core and left up to the OEMs. Remember that happened with Skype on Maemo 5, hopefully that particular relationship, optimisation and integration will spread over to netbooks.

As for netbook eye candy, here’s a snip from the presentation. I don’t know if it’s the proposed 1.0 UI though.

The center column has been dropped from the home zone and filled out with social network tiles. Having used these on Moblin, all I can say is inefficient. 13 status updates on a 1024×600 screen is not an efficient way to use the device for anyone remotely familiar with making friends on the Internet. Let’s hope that the MeeGo UI teams offer an ‘advanced’ front end. Again, it’s not clear if this actually is the UI for release 1.0 though. Update: It is!

Handhelds.

It’s not clear whether this is Intel’s proposal here of if this is 100% agreed between Nokia and Intel but this is what Intel have to say about handhelds using Intel architecture.

As you can see, Fennec, the mobile browser from Mozilla, has been chosen to present the Web. You’ll also get Flash support. Contacts and dialer functions will be integrated (as you’d expect) and there will be VOIP (it will be interesting to see if carriers want that ripped out) and instant messaging. I’m happy to see that the social networking ‘integrated experience’ is mentioned because this is an excellent core feature on the Maemo 5-based Nokia N900. Data sync is also provided along with an LBS app indicating that at least GPS sensors will be supported.

And now for the smartphone eye candy, including cute doggie!

Portrait mode support. N900/Maemo fans rejoice! Note the interesting activity stream in the first picture.
One would assume that emails, tweets and other network events can be included in that stream.

This is typical understated European styling and I bet Nokia were heavily involved here. Personally I love the design but remember, once again this is just a reference design. It’s the sort of UI you’ll see if you take the 1.0 build and drop it on an Aava Moorestown reference design (which I’m trying hard to get hold of) and possibly, the N900. As I said before, I’m not sure if this is Intel’s proposal for the handheld UI or an agreed, across-the-board Nokia/Intel final reference design. We’ll see in May when V1.0 drops.

Timescales.

I mentioned the roadmap on my MeeGo journal a few weeks ago and Intel have re-affirmed those in a nice easy-to-understand slide.

The key date for me is the v1.1 release in the latter part of October. That’s when the MeeGo Summit is likely to occur and it’s right in the Q4 timeframe for product availability. LG GW990, Nokia Nxxx and who knows what else we’ll see. Interestingly, the U.S-based Intel Developer Forum will be in the middle of Sept so it will be interesting to see if Intel and partners have products to announce. October will be a very exciting time and wherever that MeeGo Summit is, i’ll be there!

MeeGo Developers.

You’ve got your very own PDF to browse through too but this slide just smacks me in the face…

‘Cross  App Store Developement’ is something special for devs to consider. The diagram doesn’t actually do the feature justice because it omits to mention the Intel app-store framework that can be used to make branded 3rd-party app stores. One API, many stores, many devices. In a separate presentation on the AppUp store I saw this… line. “World’s largest potential TAM (for a single API) ” When you think of the opportunity there, the mind boggles. Smartphones, Netbooks and the many many devices in-between including home, car and TV.

For more (very) detailed information on the MeeGo stack and the development toolkit, download and read SFTS010 from the content catalogue. (I can’t directly link as it’s a one-time URL used for statistics and tracking.)

all the above slides were taken from the publicly available PDF file SFTS009 available through in content catalogue.

Stay tuned to that catalogue over the next 48 hours as more PDF’s feed in. Particularly interesting could be the Moorestown presentation.

Here is a short demo of chromeTouch, a Google Chrome extension which enables touchscreen and inertia scrolling within Google Chrome. Works great if you’ve been waiting to find an alternative to Firefox and the Grab and Drag addon!

Find chromeTouch here.

I also mentioned another extension that I added to increase the smoothness of the scrolling, that is called Chromium Wheel Smooth Scroller.

On the 7th July, Google announced that they are developing an operating system called ‘Google Chrome OS.’

“Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010.”

“…redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS so that users don’t have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates”

“..Google Chrome running within a new windowing system”

“…Google Chrome OS will run on both x86 as well as ARM chips.”

The world of Internet journalism went mad and Techmeme lit up as a result of the announcement. Thousands of blogs responded too. It was quite an interesting response for what is essentially another Linux distro. Perhaps it reflects the desire for a real consumer-level alternative out there. It certainly proves the power of the Google brand and that could be the most important aspect of the whole product.

Read the full story

Welcome to this week’s netbook roundup. In this space every Monday I’ll highlight netbook news items from around the web.

• Netbook Cover Fashions Itself in the Likeness of an NES Controller This handcrafted netbook slip case has a cool retro gaming style to it as it is designed to look like an NES controller. Looks as though the person who made it uses it to protect their Acer Aspire One [Portal page].
• Broadcom demonstrates video accelerator for netbooks Broadcom has developed a part for inclusion in netbook platforms called Broadcom Crystal HD which works to accelerate video processing, apparently enough that a Mini 110 [Portal page] can play back 1080p video at full framerate, which is pretty impressive.
• Instant-On OS Makers Respond to Chrome OS Makers of instant on pre-OSs Splashtop and HyperSpace response to the news that Google plans to release Chrome OS which will initially be targeted toward netbook users.
• HP Mini 110 Netbook Gains $30 HD Display Option Speaking of the Mini 110, Kevin C. Tofel from jkOnTheRun let’s us know that the unit can now be configured with a 1366×768 resolution display, up from the previous 1024×576 option. Along with the aforementioned Broadcom Crystal HD option, you are getting real HD playback (1280×720) from a netbook!
• Asus Eee PC T101H touchscreen netbook coming later this year Asus UK has confirmed the specs of the Asus Eee T101H [Portal page], the bigger brother of the T91 [Portal page]

In the same way that Google Wave is being designed, in a way, to represent what email would look like if it were invented today, Google’s just announced operating system is Google’s attempt to re-think what operating systems should be. Google says that the operating systems that we use today were fundamentally developed before the consumer web was around, and thus aren’t conducive to the activities and goals of computer usage that is expected in this day and age.

The Google Chrome OS, which is set to be released on netbooks in the second half of 2010, is an open source operating system that will run on both x86 and ARM based architectures, and Google hopes to initially target netbooks, but the OS will definitely be used elsewhere as well.

As the name implies, the Google Chrome OS is going to be like booting right into a browser in just a few seconds. This puts Google’s suite of web applications in a favorable position as Google brings more and more users into the cloud. Google also makes the point that developers who create new web applications will be developing for the largest computing platform, as web apps based on web standards will run in any browser, giving that application access to a user-base which extends to Mac, PC, and further.

In case it wasn’t clear, the Google Chrome OS will be completely free, and open-sourced later this year so that the open-source community can contribute to the project. We mentioned that the Google Chrome OS will start showing up on netbooks in the second half of 2010; Google says they are working with a number of technology companies to bring Chrome OS equipped devices to market, including: Acer, Adobe, Asus, Freescale, HP, Lenovo, Qualcomm, and Texas Instruments.

Google seems to be very transparent about this project, as it seems to benefit consumers enormously. Consumers are going to get a quick booting, free OS. Netbook and other hardware producers have a solid choice in a free open-source OS which means consumers won’t have other OS license fees passed on to them. Additionally all of this is going to create good competition in the instant booting OS space, which means innovation and better products.

Read the official announcement from the official Google blog.