What is the Google PixelBook?
The PixelBook is the best Chromebook on the market today. Google’s Chrome OS ecosystem finally feels like it’s maturing, and spending £999 on a laptop that’s effectively running a beefed-up web browser for an OS no longer feels like a silly thing to do.
As always, it won’t be for everybody. But if you’re after a premium laptop that offers superb battery life and great performance, the PixelBook should sit on your shortlist alongside the Dell XPS 13 and MacBook Pro.
PixelBook – Design and build
This might be one of the most odd-looking laptops I’ve seen in years: Google has taken the two-tone design from its Pixel smartphones and applied it to this laptop. Unfortunately, I don’t think it works. The casing of the laptop is a weird mix of MacBook Air aluminium and refrigerator shiny white. This works to great effect on Google’s smartphones; less so on the vast expanse of lid on a laptop.
Two-tone turns to tri-tone when you open the lid: grey chiclet keys; a white, slightly rubbery wrist rest; and yet more aluminium. I like the idea of the soft-touch wrist rests, but in practice they’re likely to be a dirt magnet.
Somewhat hilariously, it’s very easy to mistake the base of the laptop for the top, especially at a glance. Both surfaces feature the same proportions of grey and white material, with only the grey rubber grips giving any hint that you’re about to open the PixelBook upside down. Or perhaps it’s just me.
The other slight peculiarity about this machine is the enormous bezel around the PixelBook’s screen. It’s sizeable compared to the bezels on other 2017 premium laptops, and stands out more so because it’s black. The one advantage of this is that the laptop has a larger footprint overall, which in turn means more space for the keyboard and a larger battery.
This svelte piece of kit weighs in at only 1.1kg, which makes it one of the lightest sub-£1000 Ultrabooks you can buy today. Google ditches standard USB ports for USB-C connectors, but this isn’t a huge issue here since Chromebooks are all about online connectivity; I’ve rarely found myself connecting USB drives to Chromebooks. I’m disappointed by the lack of an SD card slot, however – get ready for a life of dongles and adapters.
PixelBook – Keyboard and touchpad
The PixelBook’s inputs are best described as refined. The keyboard doesn’t offer the most travel, but it is responsive and satisfying to type on. It’s also backlit, although this is controlled by an ambient light sensor. I couldn’t find an option turn it on and off manually.
There are a number of layout oddities for anybody coming from a Windows laptop or MacBook. The top row of keys are dedicated to specific functions, while the Windows or Cmd key here is a Google Assistant button. Caps Lock brings up a search bar for your apps or Google, which is actually quite annoying. However, you can turn on Caps Lock by hitting Alt+Search instead.
More bothersome is the lack of a Del key. You can simulate it with Alt+Backspace, and full-word deletion with Ctrl+Alt+Backspace. However, it seems like needless culling of an important key, especially when you consider that Google has added not one, but two ways to open its search engine.
The touchpad is smooth and responsive, and up there with the best on the market. It’s precise for gestures including pinch-to-zoom, three-fingered tab switching, and two-fingered page-forward and backward navigation.
PixelBook – Software
Chrome OS has progressed somewhat since I last reviewed it. For starters, on some devices it now runs Android apps, and the design of the OS has changed to reflect this. It might have come of age, but it isn’t yet fully mature.
Chrome OS is centered around the Chrome browser. All your web pages and web apps – including Google Docs, Gmail, Pixlr, Grammarly, LastPass and many more – will open in standard Chrome tabs. But apps such as Adobe LightRoom, Play Store apps, Files and Settings open in their own separate application windows.
This can leave you in the weird situation of being unsure over needing to Alt+Tab over to a different window or use the three-finger tab gesture to move between browser tabs. This is a moderately annoying workflow issue, especially if you’re a power user. And if you’re buying a £999 Chromebook, it’s likely that you’ll be wanting to have a fair few tabs and windows open.
You can at least set specific icons to open as separate windows by right-clicking on the icon in the taskbar. This means you can set a web app to open as its own app window, instead of inside the regular Chrome browser.
There’s a notification tray on the bottom right, next to the clock, plus Wi-Fi and battery status indicators. These notifications quickly pile up since they encompasses all your Android app notifications, file downloads and media playback buttons. It takes at least two clicks to clear them all, and they look very cluttered.
Beyond that, the ability to run Android apps is obviously great. What’s less great is that there are very few apps optimised for a windowed experience. The Spotify and Twitter Android apps, for example, open as if they’re being run on a phone, stuck in a tiny portrait mode, or a full-screen mode. Some apps, such as the Santander banking app, can’t be installed at all. Others, such as Motorsport Manager 2, can be downloaded but immediately crash. Real Racing will play, but only with clunky motion controls or on-screen buttons. Basically, the experience is best described as being potluck.
The ability to open Spotify as a web app is excellent, but the dedicated play/pause button on the keyboard works only when the Spotify web app is in focus. If it’s running in the background, the play/pause button won’t do anything. I don’t want to labour the point, but again, this wastes a valuable key that could have been used for the Delete key. I’m not bitter, honest.
There are some apps that are optimised for Chrome OS. These include Photoshop LightRoom and Sketch and a basic version of Illustrator. Slack has also been optimised, but it’s inferior to the web app version.
Apps that have been optimised for the stylus are great, offering a lag-free experience that’s about as natural is it comes. But not all are optimised, and if your app is relatively niche, you can bet your bottom dollar it won’t work as well with the pen. The experience will be more akin to using a finger than a proper stylus. That is to say, non-pressure-sensitive and kind of laggy.
No comments:
Post a Comment