Since last spring, I've gone without cable at home. Initially I had been using the Windows Media Server in Windows 7 and my Xbox360. Not a great solution, but it was cost effective, as it would have cost me more to build my own media centre PC, which I really didn't in the first place. In August, I picked up a Sony Internet Player, which is their latest Google TV set top box. That lead to me selling the Xbox, since I only owned 2 games for it, and simply wanted it for media streaming. I might never have gotten rid of it, and moved to a Google TV based system if Microsoft wasn't idiotic in putting a paid system like Netflix behind it's own Xbox Live Gold paywall. Bad design, bad decisions lead to a lost customer.
However, this isn't about my media streaming solution. This is about life without cable. Netflix, and some direct media streaming from Plex Media server were the early main sources of media streaming, and more recently in the last couple of months, Youtube subscriptions have been becoming my main sources of media and entertainment.
So, now that I've moved to Toronto and am in temporary housing with free digital HD cable until we move into our new home, surely I must be realizing how much I miss cable...right?
Well, not exactly, and maybe not for the reasons I thought. I've probably got about 150 channels of television to pick from every night. I'm finding I'm really only watching sports in the background, while I tap away at my laptop through the night, or maybe playing a solo game of Forbidden Island. Now, you might think that of course I'm just watching sports. I'm Canadian, and the NHL playoffs are on, including a Toronto/Boston series that went to game 7. I do enjoy playoff hockey, but there is more to my decision to watch sports than just that.
The honest truth is, there just isn't enough on the TV channels that I want to watch, and sports simply fills bigger blocks of time. It takes me several minutes to make my way through the aforementioned 150 channels which simply serves to annoy me. Now, a couple of weeks ago, if I wanted to watch something on my GoogleTV box, it took me as long to look through Netflix and Google Play Movies for something to watch. However, the scrolling through the TV listings is so... force fed. I can't simply gloss over the shows and channels i have no interest in. Shows I am interested in aren't grouped together. The fact that I have to scroll through channels is only compounded by the fact that I need to then scroll through timeblocks. I don't care how behind the selection on Netflix is, I don't think I can bring myself to pay for cable when it's distribution method is still so impersonal. Sure, I can search for shows by name. What if I don't know what shows are available? What if I want to try a new show based on my previous viewings that I enjoyed?
Now that Netflix is getting into it's own shows, and they're releasing entire seasons at once, the concept of weekly episodes seems archaic to me. American based television series are seeming to be too slow moving, with too many filler episodes that carry on for seasons that are too long. Give me 10 or 12 episodes a year where the storyline moves. Stop drawing out seasons for 23, maybe even 26 episodes simply to score ratings and ergo advertising revenue. Case in point are previous favourites of Bones and Castle. Both of which have good antagonists in the major storyline, that get forgotten for 8+ episodes in a row in the middle of the season. Don't even get me started on the weeks of repeats between sweeps weeks.
At this point, I can honestly say that the only thing that could possibly bring me back to a cable provider (whether actual cable, or pseudo cable/fibre provider) is going to be a la carte channel selection, and even then, I can't see me going with broadcast channels. Maybe a couple of speciality channels, but even then, unless the model of television show production changes, I'm not sure that will even be enough for me to come back. For now, I'll sit here with my Chromebook laptop, watching youtube videos that are entertaining and recommended for me based on what I watch and like, while in the background plays the sounds of a hockey game.
The truth of the matter is that I have missed my simple GoogleTV box more over the last week, than I have missed cable over the last 12 months.
Wednesday 15 May 2013
Sunday 12 May 2013
Chromebook - Hands on [updated]
I picked up a Samsung Chromebook a week ago due to a variety of circumstances. Primarily due to the fact that I have just recently moved to a new city and won't have access to my actual desktop PC for a few weeks while my wife and I deal with selling our old home, buying a new one, and moving. For those that know me, I am a Google loyalist and live largely within the cloud of Google Apps. I was bringing my tablet (Motorola Xoom Wifi) and my smartphone (HTC One S) and while I love and use both as daily drivers, I knew that I would want something that was a bit better at browsing the web and had a full(ish) keyboard, and so a Chromebook was the obvious choice.
These are my feelings and thoughts now that I'm a week into using the notebook. If you're looking for a detailed review with full hardware specs, you'll be able to find those details in other top quality review websites. Personally, I'm more interested in sharing my user experience.
Build
The build quality for this laptop is pretty good, probably par for what you expect. It's a plastic (or poly carbonate maybe) body which makes it nice and light, but definitely not as nice as an aluminum body. Obviously an effort to keep costs down, which is fine for my expectations. The body does have the slightest bit of give in the right front corner which tends to be the corner that I pick the computer up with when it is opened, and so it creaks once in a while. I wish it didn't do that, but I think it's a matter of sounding worse than it actually feels.
The keyboard is the 'chiclet' style, and feels very nice. The key sizes are nice and I find it very comfortable to type on. I do however miss the Delete, Home and End keys. I don't miss the Function keys though (F1, F2, etc...) which have been replayed by keys like Back, Forward, Reload, Full Screen, Next Application, Brightness and Volume controls.
The touchpad is multitouch, and performs well. Like most modern touchpads, there are no buttons, the entire touchpad itself can be clicked if you prefer that sense of feedback. I tend to find my self just using the old tap method for the touch pad controls.
The screen isn't amazing, but it works well for what it's designed for. The off axis viewing is pretty poor, but no worse than my wife's laptop which cost about 4x as much 5 years ago. Again, it's a cost control decision, and I'm more than satisfied with the laptop's build given it's sub $250 price.
Chrome OS
I want to start off by saying that I 'get' Chrome OS. I could see myself replacing my desktop in the near future with a Chromebox (similar to a Chromebook, but you plug your keyboard/mouse/monitor into it). I'm not sure how many Chromeboxes are out there, but that's neither here not there. I think that if a lot of people really assessed and tracked the amount of time they spend at their home PC, they'd find most if not all of their time was using a web browser, or in an email program. There is a lot of noise about ChromeOS's inability to run local non-web applications. I don't do a lot of photo editing, video editing, or even a lot of document based work, so I can exist on my laptop entirely via a browser. What ChromeOS offers me is speed, simplicity, and cost control. I've covered the cost control piece, but right now I want to talk about the speed. ChromeOS is able to do something that Microsoft has been trying to claim for years, and that is an extreme fast boot. You're talking about seconds from being powered off, to being at the desktop sign-in. Once I put my desktop password in, in less than 2 seconds, I'm logged on and the browser is open and loaded. There is something to be said about how impressive this is, and the benefits of running a lighter OS than Windows, or even something like Ubuntu.
As a completely browser based OS, the browser's performance is key. The browser performance is what sold me on the idea of using a Chromebook rather than just use my tablet while I'm here alone in Toronto. As much as I love my Xoom, the browser experience simply isn't the same as a desktop browser, either in speed or in the rendering of the websites that I use. Some websites treat the Xoom's browser as a mobile browser, and some don't. The Chrome browser on the Chromebook is fast and smooth, and I have experience no issues in terms of flash based websites. The original iterations of ChromeOS had the browser stuck in fullscreen, with alt tab based navigation between tabs, and minimal UI. The current experience gives you a desktop with customizable wallpaper and a quick launch/taskbar along the bottom. You can also resize the browser and run multiple windows on the desktop at once. In my experience, I'm running it full screen anyways, but I can appreciate other users having a choice. It also makes things a little easier for brand new users to feel comfortable in an approach that is consistent with the last 20 years or so of computing.
The expected 'applications' are here. Youtube, Gmail, drive, etc... Blogger wasn't installed, but was easily found in the chrome market, but really these applications are shortcuts to the websites. The Google Docs (word processor, slideshow/presentation, spreadsheets, etc..) all work offline, so you can edit your docs, and they will sync up when you'e online next. Unfortunately, apps like Gmail and Calendar don't seem to work work offline, which is weird to me. I have no problems using Calendar and Gmail offline on my tablet, so I'm not entirely sure what the issue is with them on Chrome. It's entirely possible that it's an issue with the settings and will be something that I need to investigate further. [Updated below] The reality of my usage is that I'm always online with the laptop anyways, and carry my tablet around for more casual offline usage.
Something that I haven't had a chance to test out and play with is the Chrome Remote Desktop. This is a browser extension that allows you to take control of any desktop where you have a Chrome browser and the Remote Desktop installed. This could be the most useful application on the Chromebook, as it could allow me to make my way through rare situations where I need a unique desktop application. The reason I haven't had a chance to use it yet because my desktop is current in storage, so I cannot speak to it's performance.
One of the common complaints is that you could spend a little more money, get a windows based laptop, install the Chrome browser and get the same access you have on ChromeOS, PLUS the option for desktop/windows software. However, my experience with ANY Windows based PC (and any Ubuntu system) is that they simply do not age well. As apps get installed, and drivers get updated, the system runs relatively slower. I say relatively for a very important reason. The CPU doesn't run slower, but the bloat and increase in size of operating systems makes for more overhead. If you have a PC from 1997 running Windows 95, and have never installed OS updates, new drivers or software, realistically it should run as fast today as it did 16 years ago. My father, in fact, has a PC from the late 90s, running Win98 that isn't connected to the internet. He ran the same accounting software and original printer on it until just this year, with no problem. Meanwhile the main family PC running Windows XP and connected to the internet provides a much more negative experience for the end user.
While ChromeOS is ALWAYS up to date (OS updates are automatic in the background, and the OS needs to be verified in order to boot, making it very secure) the relative lightness of the OS and focus on simplicity gives me every reason to believe it will have a longer life in terms of relevance. Remember, all of the 'apps' installed are pretty much links to a website with minimal impact on the OS itself.
There is one thing that I am disappointed in is that the games available on the Chrome Web store aren't filtered to exclude games that won't run on ChromeOS. Now, I'm not under any delusions that this is a gaming laptop, but I did expect that if I can see games in the Chrome Web store that they would run on the ChromeOS. Basic games like Mahjongg play fine, and the required Angry Birds is there too, of course. You can even install Angry Birds locally to play offline. I haven't played much of the games, so I can't give you a feel for how well, or how many of the games work. I simply know that I ran into a few that did not.
Overall, I've been very VERY pleased with this laptop, and will likely miss it when my wife joins me in Toronto. Right now, she has a full fledged laptop for gaming that doesn't leave the desk because of it's size/weight, and an HP netbook that she takes with her when she's working outside of the house. Right now the plan is that she inherits the Chromebook to replace the netbook, and that a new desktop will replace her laptop.
If you're looking for a PC to surf facebook, twitter, or any other websites and aren't looking for something to install your accounting software or games onto, I think you would be well served by this nice, light, fast laptop. As we come up to Google I/O (their annual developer conference and generally full of product announcements) I'm very interested to see what else is coming from ChromeOS.
[update] I have confirmed that the Calendar and Gmail do work properly offline, I just hadn't set it up properly (and in the case of Gmail, installed the Gmail Offline app).
Build
The build quality for this laptop is pretty good, probably par for what you expect. It's a plastic (or poly carbonate maybe) body which makes it nice and light, but definitely not as nice as an aluminum body. Obviously an effort to keep costs down, which is fine for my expectations. The body does have the slightest bit of give in the right front corner which tends to be the corner that I pick the computer up with when it is opened, and so it creaks once in a while. I wish it didn't do that, but I think it's a matter of sounding worse than it actually feels.
The keyboard is the 'chiclet' style, and feels very nice. The key sizes are nice and I find it very comfortable to type on. I do however miss the Delete, Home and End keys. I don't miss the Function keys though (F1, F2, etc...) which have been replayed by keys like Back, Forward, Reload, Full Screen, Next Application, Brightness and Volume controls.
The touchpad is multitouch, and performs well. Like most modern touchpads, there are no buttons, the entire touchpad itself can be clicked if you prefer that sense of feedback. I tend to find my self just using the old tap method for the touch pad controls.
The screen isn't amazing, but it works well for what it's designed for. The off axis viewing is pretty poor, but no worse than my wife's laptop which cost about 4x as much 5 years ago. Again, it's a cost control decision, and I'm more than satisfied with the laptop's build given it's sub $250 price.
Chrome OS
I want to start off by saying that I 'get' Chrome OS. I could see myself replacing my desktop in the near future with a Chromebox (similar to a Chromebook, but you plug your keyboard/mouse/monitor into it). I'm not sure how many Chromeboxes are out there, but that's neither here not there. I think that if a lot of people really assessed and tracked the amount of time they spend at their home PC, they'd find most if not all of their time was using a web browser, or in an email program. There is a lot of noise about ChromeOS's inability to run local non-web applications. I don't do a lot of photo editing, video editing, or even a lot of document based work, so I can exist on my laptop entirely via a browser. What ChromeOS offers me is speed, simplicity, and cost control. I've covered the cost control piece, but right now I want to talk about the speed. ChromeOS is able to do something that Microsoft has been trying to claim for years, and that is an extreme fast boot. You're talking about seconds from being powered off, to being at the desktop sign-in. Once I put my desktop password in, in less than 2 seconds, I'm logged on and the browser is open and loaded. There is something to be said about how impressive this is, and the benefits of running a lighter OS than Windows, or even something like Ubuntu.
As a completely browser based OS, the browser's performance is key. The browser performance is what sold me on the idea of using a Chromebook rather than just use my tablet while I'm here alone in Toronto. As much as I love my Xoom, the browser experience simply isn't the same as a desktop browser, either in speed or in the rendering of the websites that I use. Some websites treat the Xoom's browser as a mobile browser, and some don't. The Chrome browser on the Chromebook is fast and smooth, and I have experience no issues in terms of flash based websites. The original iterations of ChromeOS had the browser stuck in fullscreen, with alt tab based navigation between tabs, and minimal UI. The current experience gives you a desktop with customizable wallpaper and a quick launch/taskbar along the bottom. You can also resize the browser and run multiple windows on the desktop at once. In my experience, I'm running it full screen anyways, but I can appreciate other users having a choice. It also makes things a little easier for brand new users to feel comfortable in an approach that is consistent with the last 20 years or so of computing.
The expected 'applications' are here. Youtube, Gmail, drive, etc... Blogger wasn't installed, but was easily found in the chrome market, but really these applications are shortcuts to the websites. The Google Docs (word processor, slideshow/presentation, spreadsheets, etc..) all work offline, so you can edit your docs, and they will sync up when you'e online next. Unfortunately, apps like Gmail and Calendar don't seem to work work offline, which is weird to me. I have no problems using Calendar and Gmail offline on my tablet, so I'm not entirely sure what the issue is with them on Chrome. It's entirely possible that it's an issue with the settings and will be something that I need to investigate further. [Updated below] The reality of my usage is that I'm always online with the laptop anyways, and carry my tablet around for more casual offline usage.
Something that I haven't had a chance to test out and play with is the Chrome Remote Desktop. This is a browser extension that allows you to take control of any desktop where you have a Chrome browser and the Remote Desktop installed. This could be the most useful application on the Chromebook, as it could allow me to make my way through rare situations where I need a unique desktop application. The reason I haven't had a chance to use it yet because my desktop is current in storage, so I cannot speak to it's performance.
One of the common complaints is that you could spend a little more money, get a windows based laptop, install the Chrome browser and get the same access you have on ChromeOS, PLUS the option for desktop/windows software. However, my experience with ANY Windows based PC (and any Ubuntu system) is that they simply do not age well. As apps get installed, and drivers get updated, the system runs relatively slower. I say relatively for a very important reason. The CPU doesn't run slower, but the bloat and increase in size of operating systems makes for more overhead. If you have a PC from 1997 running Windows 95, and have never installed OS updates, new drivers or software, realistically it should run as fast today as it did 16 years ago. My father, in fact, has a PC from the late 90s, running Win98 that isn't connected to the internet. He ran the same accounting software and original printer on it until just this year, with no problem. Meanwhile the main family PC running Windows XP and connected to the internet provides a much more negative experience for the end user.
While ChromeOS is ALWAYS up to date (OS updates are automatic in the background, and the OS needs to be verified in order to boot, making it very secure) the relative lightness of the OS and focus on simplicity gives me every reason to believe it will have a longer life in terms of relevance. Remember, all of the 'apps' installed are pretty much links to a website with minimal impact on the OS itself.
There is one thing that I am disappointed in is that the games available on the Chrome Web store aren't filtered to exclude games that won't run on ChromeOS. Now, I'm not under any delusions that this is a gaming laptop, but I did expect that if I can see games in the Chrome Web store that they would run on the ChromeOS. Basic games like Mahjongg play fine, and the required Angry Birds is there too, of course. You can even install Angry Birds locally to play offline. I haven't played much of the games, so I can't give you a feel for how well, or how many of the games work. I simply know that I ran into a few that did not.
Overall, I've been very VERY pleased with this laptop, and will likely miss it when my wife joins me in Toronto. Right now, she has a full fledged laptop for gaming that doesn't leave the desk because of it's size/weight, and an HP netbook that she takes with her when she's working outside of the house. Right now the plan is that she inherits the Chromebook to replace the netbook, and that a new desktop will replace her laptop.
If you're looking for a PC to surf facebook, twitter, or any other websites and aren't looking for something to install your accounting software or games onto, I think you would be well served by this nice, light, fast laptop. As we come up to Google I/O (their annual developer conference and generally full of product announcements) I'm very interested to see what else is coming from ChromeOS.
[update] I have confirmed that the Calendar and Gmail do work properly offline, I just hadn't set it up properly (and in the case of Gmail, installed the Gmail Offline app).
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