A new Google notebook and a new Chrome OS is tipped to be launched shortly according to mounting speculation.
While some say it will happen before Xmas, Acer’s Jim Wong said it will be early in 2011 before we see both new products.
Apparently Wong told a group of reporters at the company’s global press conference this week that Acer would employ the operating system on their netbooks, once Google Chrome OS was made commercially available for use “next year”. He was speaking at the launch of several new Acer tablets and a dual screen notebook.
Several publications claim that Google is still planning to launch their own branded netbook which will be sold online similar to what they did with their Nexus One Smartphone and via key retail partners such as telecommunication carriers.
According to Digitimes 75,000 units are being produced by Google and they will feature a rumoured Intel Atom Pine Trail processor. This has not been confirmed by Intel.
The new Chrome OS, is set to be a serious challenge to Windows in the netbook market it will also help Google promote their hosted enterprise services to new businesses, with several manufacturers tipped to bundle one month of free services as a means by which users who buy a Chrome OS notebook or netbook can sample the new Google services which are designed to compete with Microsoft’s Office and Exchange/Outlook offering.
Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, told last week’s Web 2.0 Conference that the OS would come in the “next few months”. Schmidt also confirmed that Chrome OS was meant for keyboards, while Android was meant for touch.
