(Credit: Google)
Upcoming Googlebook laptops will be powered by a range of hardware, including chips from Intel, MediaTek, and Qualcomm.
"We're thrilled to partner with Google on something we've been building with them—Googlebook. Premium, powerful devices designed for Intelligence. We can't wait to get it into your hands this fall," Intel tweeted on Tuesday.
TechPowerUp suggests this will include Intel's Core Series 300 "Wildcat Lake" processors aimed at budget-friendly PCs. John Maletis, VP of Product Management for ChromeOS, also tells ChromeUnboxed that Google is working with Qualcomm and MediaTek, too, for "incredibly powered devices."
On Instagram, Qualcomm confirmed its involvement. "We’re partnering with Google on powerful, premium devices built for intelligence. This fall, everything changes," it wrote.
Chromebooks have primarily been low-cost, low-power devices, designed to maximize performance without sacrificing battery life or cost by using leaner hardware. Googlebooks appear set to do much the same, but with a more smartphone-integrated, AI-first design focus, rather than the browser-like experience of ChromeOS.
But that will mean greater hardware demands, and Intel's Wildcat Lake chips could be up to the task. Although there are fewer cores than the main desktop and laptop chip lines, Wildcat Lake still leverages cutting-edge process nodes and architectures. Its twin Performance cores run at up to 4.8GHz, and paired with up to 48GB of LPDDR5X at 7467 MT/s, or up to 64GB of more typical DDR5 memory at up to 6,400 MT/s, could deliver solid entry-level performance.
Combined with an onboard neural processor that delivers around 20 TOPS of local AI performance and some Xe graphics cores, Intel-powered Googlebooks could be impressively capable little systems, especially if they're as optimized as Google is promising.
Maletis said Google is tightly controlling the types of hardware Googlebook partners like Dell, Lenovo, Acer, Asus, and HP can offer their customers. "If we're going to put the Google brand on a product like Googlebook, we need to make sure that it's got a really high bar of quality and polish against it," he said.
"At the same time, one of the things that our OEM partners have really been asking for and we want to meet...is how can they actually move faster from a differentiation perspective on our platform? It's a very fine balance," he adds. "We want that consistent look and feel, but we also want our partners to be able to shine as well. So, you'll see examples of that both on the hardware and on the software."
Google is also bringing back the light bar that Google used on its own Pixel Chromebooks to show charging status. In this case, Maletis suggests Google would use it to mimic some of the workflows that you're doing, as well as help the new line stand out from existing laptops.
This is part of a major branding effort. Although the "Google" moniker means a lot of things to a lot of people, Google clearly believes that moving away from the budget-oriented, more limited capabilities of Chromebooks is worth the jump. Decent little CPUs that deliver impressive power for the money could go a long way toward that goal.