Samsung and Google have scheduled an event for a Chrome OS netbook after Google I/O wraps in San Francisco May 11. The companies declined to provide more detail.
Samsung and Google are
hosting an event for their co-created netbook based on Google's Chrome
operating system after Google I/O, eWEEK has learned.
eWEEK received an invitation
on May 5 from Samsung "to join us and Google for a night of firsts
following the conclusion of Google I/O".
The May 11 event begins at 6
p.m. PDT and will be staged at the Contemporary Jewish Museum on Mission Street
in San Francisco, not from Google I/O at the Moscone Center.
Given Samsung's penchant for
releasing Android smartphones, this could simply signal a new Nexus smartphone
to accompany the phone maker's Nexus S and Nexus S 4G models.
However, when eWEEK asked a
Samsung spokesperson if there would be news at the event, the spokesperson
replied via email: "Yes, mobile PC news."
Reached by phone, the
Samsung spokesperson who confirmed the "mobile PC" news declined to
comment further. A Google spokesperson told eWEEK: "We have nothing to
share beyond what's included in the invitation."
It's not hard to connect
some of the dots.
Sundar Pichai, Google's vice
president for product management for Chrome,
said
in December that notebooks based on the Chrome OS, the lightweight Web
operating system the company intends as an alternative for Microsoft Windows
and Apple's Mac platforms, would appear from Samsung and Acer in the second
half of 2011.
There has been some debate
about whether the commercial devices released from those computer makers would
be notebooks to compete with existing laptops or lightweight netbooks for Web
surfing.
However, the emergence of a
Samsung-built Chrome OS netbook has been a foregone conclusion since
Engadget
and several other blogs began reporting that Google's Chromium Website included
a
bug
report referencing specifications for a Chrome OS netbook, code-named
"Alex."
The netbook is reportedly
powered by a 1.5GHz dual-core Intel Atom N550 processor, has a 1280 x 800
display, SanDisk SSD (solid-state drive) P4 of unknown capacity, and 2GB of
RAM, as well as a Qualcomm Gobi 2000 3G card, Bluetooth, WiFi, webcam, and Synaptics
touch-pad.
Moreover, Google is
reportedly
pairing
its Chrome OS machines with Gmail for $10 to $20 a month as part of a
subscription model, in addition to the traditional one-time-purchase retail
model.
Google has certainly stepped
up its Chrome advertising. The company this week extended the Chrome message to
network TV with a
90-second
ad that suggests people can store all their personal content in Google's
Web services and access it via the Chrome browser, supported by the Chrome OS.
What isn't so clear is why
Google and Samsung are waiting until after Google I/O to reveal their
work. Perhaps, they're not.
It could be that the
companies will show off the netbook during the event, with more exclusive
presentations, demos and perhaps even gadget giveaways at a sort of coming-out
party Wednesday evening.
In any event, eWEEK will be
reporting from Google I/O and the Samsung-Google Chrome OS event May 11.
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