Today Google announced that they will be releasing a Google Chrome OS for Netbooks & Smartbooks* supporting both the ARM architecture and the x86 architecture. Of course this has generated a lot of press and commentary such as "Clash of the Titans" in the Economist, with a strong focus on the rivalry between Google and Microsoft, but what does it mean to the consumer?

What Computing Power Do You Need?

Traditionally computing has followed Moore’s law in that consumers have followed the increase in computing power. Today this has resulted in incredibly powerful desktops that consume 600+ Watt, but what does the consumer do with that? The simple answer is that for typical use cases consumers do not need this level of performance, unless you are doing very high end gaming or very processor intensive creative tasks such as Photoshop on RAW camera images, or video editing.

3.8GHz Quad Core, 650 Watt, What Do You Do With It ?


Instead consumer today needs compute devices that meet their needs, Moore’s Law is not being used to deliver more unneeded performance but rather in new form factors, better battery life and at lower cost as in the Economist article “Less is Moore”

Now of course what compute device a consumer needs and wants is very dependent on the consumer. It maybe a smartphone, as documented by the New York Times article "Smartphone Rises Fast From Gadget to Necessity", or it may be a Netbook, but with the ARM ecosystem behind them diversity is enabled.

Different Compute Devices for Different Consumer Needs


Google Chrome OS Redefining the Netbook ?

Up until recently there has been a tendency to talk about Netbooks as though they are low cost laptops and have to run Windows (see Jeff Chu's of ARM recent discussion). Instead, both ARM and its partners, and Google, are looking at Netbooks as compute devices that allow consumers to do the things they need to do, without having to worry about operating systems, drivers etc. They will be great devices that will do what they are supposed to do well. Yes, they will be Linux based and not running Windows, but do consumers care that the iPhone is based upon BSD Unix?

So what will a ARM powered Chrome OS netbook look like? I don’t have any inside information but I would make the following educated guesses:

Functionality You Need
Functionality wise a Chrome netbook will offer a great browser experience with Flash Player 10 support allowing consumers to access the content and services that they care about on the web from Facebook to Hulu. It will of course have Gmail support with full offline access, and support Google Docs and PDF. Thanks to the H/W HD video support on ARM powered SoC’s, it will have great multimedia support with 5+ hours playback. Try doing that on your laptop today.

Great UI & Great Mechanical Design
From the look and feel the perspective, physically the device will be very light, and will be a thin form factor. This is due to the fact that the ARM powered SoC’s are complete netbook systems on one chip including dual core processors, HD video, graphics, wireless, memory, system I/O all in one package. Even better because of ARM processors low power these SoC’s do not need a heat sink or fan. Given that these SoC’s will have great graphics performance through OpenGLES 2.0 cores, expect a UI that takes full advantage of the Netbook form factor and not simply be a laptop UI shrunk down.

How Small Do You Want Your Netbook on a Chip?


Always Connected and Days of Use
An ARM Chrome netbook will have battery life that will allow use over days, not hours, and when you open the lid of the netbook it will be ready to use with your email already there thanks to the push technology that you see on your phone today.

In conclusion Google Chrome OS could redefine the netbook and how consumers look at them, just as the Blackberry redefined the email experience, and the iPhone redefined the Smartphone.

What do you want in your netbook?


James Bruce, Mobile Marketing, ARM, is based in Silicon Valley. James is without doubt a gadget guy who is continuously looking at the latest devices and services on them. Working for ARM allows James to see what technology will be on your mobile device in 3 to 5 years time. This view of the future combined with being based in Silicon Valley and having worked on mobile for the last 9 years allows James to have a unique view of mobile technology. At the moment James is deciding which Cortex-A8 phone he will buy this year, and which dual core Cortex-A9 phone he will buy next year.

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* In the territory of the Federal Republic of Germany, the use of the term "Smartbook" in connection with portable computers is reserved exclusively to Smartbook AG, Germany.