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Google is reportedly developing a new Pixel laptop computer and a Nexus tablet featuring an operating system that will be a hybrid of its Android and Chrome operating systems.
The devices are slated for delivery in the third quarter of 2017, the 9to5Google and Android Police blogs reported this week.
The new Pixel laptop, code-named Bison, will apparently be based either on an Intel M3 or i5 Core microprocessor and support up to 128GB of storage and 16GB of RAM. It will likely incorporate a fingerprint scanner, a touch keypad and several of the other accouterments that are standard in laptops in its class, Android Police said, quoting two unnamed sources.
Meanwhile, 9to5Google described Google as working on a Nexus tablet based on hardware from Huawei that is also due out in the third quarter of 2017.
Both new devices will reportedly feature Andromeda, a new Google operating system that melds the features of Android and Chrome.
Google did not comment on the company’s reported plans to launch the new devices next year. In a brief emailed note, a Google spokesman said the company doesn’t comment on rumors and speculation.
The latest reports resurface previous speculation about the company’s plans to combine the best elements of Android and Chrome into one operating system that will run on both mobile and laptop devices.
Earlier this year, The Wall Street Journal claimed that Google engineers have been working for more than two years to combine the two platforms into one. Google apparently wants Android running on even more devices than it is on presently, The Journal said. Google also wants to merge the two operating systems because company officials think it can attract more developers to a unified operating system, according to the newspaper.
Google will continue to support an open-source version of Chrome but most likely under a different name, The Journal had speculated.
Google has admitted that it is looking to cherry-pick the best features in both Chrome and Android and combine them into one OS. However, the company has insisted that it has no plans to fold Chrome entirely into Android as some have speculated.
The company has reiterated its commitment to stick with the Chrome OS for the foreseeable future and has pointed to several planned upgrades for the technology this year and next.
The new laptops that Google is apparently developing will not be sold as Chromebooks, according to the two blogs that broke the story this week. Instead, it will likely be positioned as a more full-featured alternative to Windows- and Mac OS X-based systems. No information is available on Google’s planned pricing for the two systems.