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So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? They are marketing what is ostensibly a computer for people who seem to not want to

So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? They are marketing what is ostensibly a computer for people who seem to not want to use a computer in scenarios that I don't think even exist. Beyond that, this is a laptop that is running a really shitty, 'apps only, no you cannot do anything useful with this' operating system. I have an awful lot of complaints about MacOS's relatively restrictive use cases, but it's still at least a General Purpose OS. Android on laptop is very much not. This is an overgrown phone with all the trash that comes with a phone, and the very finite use cases that come with a phone, only now it has a keyboard. It's solving none of the problems with Android as an operating system and doesn't seem to even be interested in doing that anyway. The marketing is demoing use cases that don't even exist. So I repeat my question: Who is this for?

bobthepanda 5mo ago
I mean you basically just described a chromebook, though I believe one of the selling points of chromebook is that it's dirt cheap.
- Kadecgos 5mo ago
  Yeah, a Chromebook's killer 'feature' is that it's web browser attached to a keyboard and functional screen for cheap on a platform that you can't otherwise screw up. If you price that up to $1,000 (which some Chromebooks definitely do), then I start to ask a variation of the same question: Why did you buy that?
t0mas88 5mo ago
No idea. The people that have no need to run real software and want a high end device probably have an iPad with a keyboard case. Those that want a low end device have a chromebook. This thing will be killed early 2028...
- throwa356262 5mo ago
  I am old enough to remember the chromebook is dead rumours of ...let me think... every years since it was introduced? I personally would prefer a good chromebook to an ipad+cramped keyboard but I guess people are different
drcode 5mo ago
every large corporation is going to come out with a hardware device in the next 12 months where you don't directly use applications, where the AI acts as an intermediary openai, anthropic, meta, google, all of them even you will want one of these devices, probably (not saying this is a positive development in the world)
- grey-area 5mo ago
  And every one of these ‘AI first’ laptops will be cancelled in a couple of years when generative AI is no longer the hot new thing and end users realise its severe limitations.
  - drcode 5mo ago
    I hope you're right, it would be better for the world if you are but that's probably not what's going to happen
    - grey-area 5mo ago
      Given this is from google I'd say there is a very high probability the project is cancelled in the next few years even if it is moderately popular.
      - drcode 5mo ago
        it's hard to guess who the winners will be in this product category, I would guess openai or microsoft are more likely than google
        grey-area 5mo ago
        I don't think there will be any winners, the category shouldn't exist and is here because of the bubble and them trying to shove AI into absolutely everything before it is actually useful. We don't need AI terminal computers and general purpose computers will do just fine to interface with AI. If anything things like voice assistants in some form are far more likely outcome of better AI than computers you have to type into to get things done.
rstuart4133 5mo ago
> So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? The primary difference between a Chromebook and a Googlebook appears to be the ability to run LLM's locally. The requirements were spelt out at Google I/O. They boil down to a 40 TOPS NPU and a minimum of 16GB of memory. They appear to be trying to match Apple's M series memory bandwidth using software compression. ChromeOS didn't need an NPU and specified a minimum of 4GB of memory. Aluminium OS looks to have the same relationship with its LLM as a Chromebook did with Google Chrome, and needs the hardware to power it. If they pull it off you will get GPT-4 performance, running locally. As for who this is for: your guess is as good as mine. But if their replacement for crostini works (crostini is so hopelessly unreliable it felt like it never got out of beta, so it's a big if), even the minimum specs would be a very good Linux laptop.
- c0rruptbytes 5mo ago
  Do you have a source for this local stuff? i can kinda see it, they spent a lot of time getting Gemma 4 pretty efficient and then seeing everyone buy macs to run them and realize it’s maybe a real moat since Apple doesn’t make any AI Would be an interesting product if it could actually give you GPT performance locally, will be an awful experience if it’s essentially just cloud AI…like a premium laptop where most of the features are locked behind a subscription would be wild
  - rstuart4133 5mo ago
    They are already rolling it out in Chrome: https://www.pcmag.com/news/chrome-is-quietly-downloading-4gb-ai-model-without-your-permission https://www.pcmag.com/news/chrome-is-quietly-downloading-4gb... It won't work on a Chromebook with 4GB of RAM, so they need beefier hardware.
    - utopiah 5mo ago
      Yep, that's the answer. That being said I still imagine their preference is that nothing is run locally, all via their server to get all precious usage data.
deleted 5mo ago
[deleted]
neonstatic 5mo ago
Wait, there are people there who use computers for more than creating family albums? Gosh, I lived in ignorance all this time.
piaste 5mo ago
> Beyond that, this is a laptop that is running a really shitty, 'apps only, no you cannot do anything useful with this' operating system. I have an awful lot of complaints about MacOS's relatively restrictive use cases, but it's still at least a General Purpose OS. Android on laptop is very much not. Android 16+ offers a built-in integrated Linux VM that can be enabled from Developer Mode, and if this[0] third-party site is accurate, "Android on laptop" will have it enabled by default. So it should not be too different from working on a Windows laptop with WSL2, or on an OSTree distro where you use distroboxes to work with non-sandboxed programs. (fwiw, I would still refuse to have one of these for personal use because Google is a shameless data robber. Unless someone were to de-google Aluminium like LineageOS and GrapheneOS did for Android, but that would probably take years.) [0] https://aluminium-os.com/ https://aluminium-os.com/
mettamage 5mo ago
> So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? You're not the only one asking this. I'm right there with you.
tomrod 5mo ago
GrapheneOS users that need to access their banks but their bank's websites treat users on browsers as second class users by requiring phone in 2fa. Chase.com is an example of this. Android app on Chrome device? No issue.
einsteinx2 5mo ago
> MacOS's relatively restrictive use cases I’m very curious what you mean by this.
- righthand 5mo ago
  A user has to use the CLI to turn off the Apple DRM to install software on an Apple laptop. The CLI is often cited as the reason people won't try Linux. This makes the entire user experience on those machines a restricted use case.
  - sereko 5mo ago
    I’ve used macOS for over a decade and can count on one hand how many times I’ve had to use the CLI to disable DRM. Zero times in the past 5 years.
    - righthand 5mo ago
      You never had to disable SIP and Gatekeeper? Then you’re using a restricted machine.
      - deleted 5mo ago
        [deleted]
  - einsteinx2 5mo ago
    My daily driver for the past 20 years or so has been a Mac, doing everything from software development to music production to general computer use. I’ve never had to use the CLI to turn off Apple DRM to install software. I use the Homebrew package manager to install all types of command line and GUI software and I download and install all manner of software outside the App Store regularly. The only times I’ve had to do anything is if the app isn’t signed which is rare to come across, and even then it is a couple clicks in the macOS GUI to allow installation (I’ll grant you the fact they’ve made it more cumbersome in the past years by requiring you to go into the settings panel and click a button there, but it never outright prevents installation and never requires CLI use). I really have to question if you’ve actually used a Mac or if you’re just repeating something you’ve heard because it doesn’t match my daily experience at all nor that of any Mac user I know (all my coworkers for example).
yabatopia 5mo ago
Without pricing information, it’s hard to the question "who is this for?". Below $500? Same as the cheap Chromebooks market. Around $700? (Or $600 educational) Direct competitor to Macbook Neo, educational market and the middle of the road laptop market. Above $900? No idea, maybe for Google Platform die-hards.
- izacus 5mo ago
  > Above $900? No idea, maybe for Google Platform die-hards. Managed corporate machines. I've worked with all platforms and managing ChromeOS is massively, massively easier than MacOS or Windows.
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
  - prepend 5mo ago
    I’ve never encountered a company that used ChromeOS. Closest was some teacher friends who had Chromebooks for their students, but they’ve all switched to Lenovo or Apple. I don’t think I’d work for a company that made me use a Chromebook. (I prefer a company that lets me choose my own tools).
    - runjake 5mo ago
      ChromeOS is still huge in education and I still see more people moving from Windows and Apple to ChromeOS than vice versa. However, the introduction of the MacBook Neo has generated a lot of serious discussion about the possibility of it being a ChromeOS replacement, which surprises me. Not a lot of people pulling the trigger yet until the Neo can make volume.
      - eitally 5mo ago
        I would virtually guarantee that any Chromebooks for Education versions of these new devices would be hobbled by restrictive data sharing policies forcing the disabling of the Gemini Intelligence features. Also, most schools purchase the most abysmally low quality Chromebooks for students, which cost in the $200-300 range in bulk orders. They're awful.
steve_taylor 5mo ago
It's for Google.
7952 5mo ago
For corporates it could be a good balance between security and being able to spoon feed people AI. It is an alternative to Microsoft and the mess of different products and licences.
jstummbillig 5mo ago
A company that mostly works inside the browser and/or Google workspace. ChromeOS makes sense and just decent devices here are rare.

bobthepanda 5mo ago

I mean you basically just described a chromebook, though I believe one of the selling points of chromebook is that it's dirt cheap.

Kadecgos 5mo ago
Yeah, a Chromebook's killer 'feature' is that it's web browser attached to a keyboard and functional screen for cheap on a platform that you can't otherwise screw up. If you price that up to $1,000 (which some Chromebooks definitely do), then I start to ask a variation of the same question: Why did you buy that?

t0mas88 5mo ago

No idea. The people that have no need to run real software and want a high end device probably have an iPad with a keyboard case. Those that want a low end device have a chromebook. This thing will be killed early 2028...

throwa356262 5mo ago
I am old enough to remember the chromebook is dead rumours of ...let me think... every years since it was introduced? I personally would prefer a good chromebook to an ipad+cramped keyboard but I guess people are different

drcode 5mo ago

every large corporation is going to come out with a hardware device in the next 12 months where you don't directly use applications, where the AI acts as an intermediary openai, anthropic, meta, google, all of them even you will want one of these devices, probably (not saying this is a positive development in the world)

grey-area 5mo ago
And every one of these ‘AI first’ laptops will be cancelled in a couple of years when generative AI is no longer the hot new thing and end users realise its severe limitations.
- drcode 5mo ago
  I hope you're right, it would be better for the world if you are but that's probably not what's going to happen
  - grey-area 5mo ago
    Given this is from google I'd say there is a very high probability the project is cancelled in the next few years even if it is moderately popular.
    - drcode 5mo ago
      it's hard to guess who the winners will be in this product category, I would guess openai or microsoft are more likely than google
      - grey-area 5mo ago
        I don't think there will be any winners, the category shouldn't exist and is here because of the bubble and them trying to shove AI into absolutely everything before it is actually useful. We don't need AI terminal computers and general purpose computers will do just fine to interface with AI. If anything things like voice assistants in some form are far more likely outcome of better AI than computers you have to type into to get things done.

rstuart4133 5mo ago

> So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? The primary difference between a Chromebook and a Googlebook appears to be the ability to run LLM's locally. The requirements were spelt out at Google I/O. They boil down to a 40 TOPS NPU and a minimum of 16GB of memory. They appear to be trying to match Apple's M series memory bandwidth using software compression. ChromeOS didn't need an NPU and specified a minimum of 4GB of memory. Aluminium OS looks to have the same relationship with its LLM as a Chromebook did with Google Chrome, and needs the hardware to power it. If they pull it off you will get GPT-4 performance, running locally. As for who this is for: your guess is as good as mine. But if their replacement for crostini works (crostini is so hopelessly unreliable it felt like it never got out of beta, so it's a big if), even the minimum specs would be a very good Linux laptop.

c0rruptbytes 5mo ago
Do you have a source for this local stuff? i can kinda see it, they spent a lot of time getting Gemma 4 pretty efficient and then seeing everyone buy macs to run them and realize it’s maybe a real moat since Apple doesn’t make any AI Would be an interesting product if it could actually give you GPT performance locally, will be an awful experience if it’s essentially just cloud AI…like a premium laptop where most of the features are locked behind a subscription would be wild
- rstuart4133 5mo ago
  They are already rolling it out in Chrome: https://www.pcmag.com/news/chrome-is-quietly-downloading-4gb-ai-model-without-your-permission https://www.pcmag.com/news/chrome-is-quietly-downloading-4gb... It won't work on a Chromebook with 4GB of RAM, so they need beefier hardware.
  - utopiah 5mo ago
    Yep, that's the answer. That being said I still imagine their preference is that nothing is run locally, all via their server to get all precious usage data.

deleted 5mo ago

[deleted]

neonstatic 5mo ago

Wait, there are people there who use computers for more than creating family albums? Gosh, I lived in ignorance all this time.

piaste 5mo ago

> Beyond that, this is a laptop that is running a really shitty, 'apps only, no you cannot do anything useful with this' operating system. I have an awful lot of complaints about MacOS's relatively restrictive use cases, but it's still at least a General Purpose OS. Android on laptop is very much not. Android 16+ offers a built-in integrated Linux VM that can be enabled from Developer Mode, and if this[0] third-party site is accurate, "Android on laptop" will have it enabled by default. So it should not be too different from working on a Windows laptop with WSL2, or on an OSTree distro where you use distroboxes to work with non-sandboxed programs. (fwiw, I would still refuse to have one of these for personal use because Google is a shameless data robber. Unless someone were to de-google Aluminium like LineageOS and GrapheneOS did for Android, but that would probably take years.) [0] https://aluminium-os.com/ https://aluminium-os.com/

mettamage 5mo ago

> So, I'm only slightly trying to be a smartass here, but... Who is this for? You're not the only one asking this. I'm right there with you.

tomrod 5mo ago

GrapheneOS users that need to access their banks but their bank's websites treat users on browsers as second class users by requiring phone in 2fa. Chase.com is an example of this. Android app on Chrome device? No issue.

einsteinx2 5mo ago

> MacOS's relatively restrictive use cases I’m very curious what you mean by this.

righthand 5mo ago
A user has to use the CLI to turn off the Apple DRM to install software on an Apple laptop. The CLI is often cited as the reason people won't try Linux. This makes the entire user experience on those machines a restricted use case.
- sereko 5mo ago
  I’ve used macOS for over a decade and can count on one hand how many times I’ve had to use the CLI to disable DRM. Zero times in the past 5 years.
  - righthand 5mo ago
    You never had to disable SIP and Gatekeeper? Then you’re using a restricted machine.
    - deleted 5mo ago
      [deleted]
- einsteinx2 5mo ago
  My daily driver for the past 20 years or so has been a Mac, doing everything from software development to music production to general computer use. I’ve never had to use the CLI to turn off Apple DRM to install software. I use the Homebrew package manager to install all types of command line and GUI software and I download and install all manner of software outside the App Store regularly. The only times I’ve had to do anything is if the app isn’t signed which is rare to come across, and even then it is a couple clicks in the macOS GUI to allow installation (I’ll grant you the fact they’ve made it more cumbersome in the past years by requiring you to go into the settings panel and click a button there, but it never outright prevents installation and never requires CLI use). I really have to question if you’ve actually used a Mac or if you’re just repeating something you’ve heard because it doesn’t match my daily experience at all nor that of any Mac user I know (all my coworkers for example).

yabatopia 5mo ago

Without pricing information, it’s hard to the question "who is this for?". Below $500? Same as the cheap Chromebooks market. Around $700? (Or $600 educational) Direct competitor to Macbook Neo, educational market and the middle of the road laptop market. Above $900? No idea, maybe for Google Platform die-hards.

izacus 5mo ago
> Above $900? No idea, maybe for Google Platform die-hards. Managed corporate machines. I've worked with all platforms and managing ChromeOS is massively, massively easier than MacOS or Windows.
- deleted 5mo ago
  [deleted]
- prepend 5mo ago
  I’ve never encountered a company that used ChromeOS. Closest was some teacher friends who had Chromebooks for their students, but they’ve all switched to Lenovo or Apple. I don’t think I’d work for a company that made me use a Chromebook. (I prefer a company that lets me choose my own tools).
  - runjake 5mo ago
    ChromeOS is still huge in education and I still see more people moving from Windows and Apple to ChromeOS than vice versa. However, the introduction of the MacBook Neo has generated a lot of serious discussion about the possibility of it being a ChromeOS replacement, which surprises me. Not a lot of people pulling the trigger yet until the Neo can make volume.
    - eitally 5mo ago
      I would virtually guarantee that any Chromebooks for Education versions of these new devices would be hobbled by restrictive data sharing policies forcing the disabling of the Gemini Intelligence features. Also, most schools purchase the most abysmally low quality Chromebooks for students, which cost in the $200-300 range in bulk orders. They're awful.

steve_taylor 5mo ago

It's for Google.

7952 5mo ago

For corporates it could be a good balance between security and being able to spoon feed people AI. It is an alternative to Microsoft and the mess of different products and licences.

jstummbillig 5mo ago

A company that mostly works inside the browser and/or Google workspace. ChromeOS makes sense and just decent devices here are rare.