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- Hacker News
- This is not a laptop announcement. This is an attempt at a software announcement disguised as a laptop announcement.
All that's shared about the actual laptop are renders. The website and the video spend much more time and pixels advertising hypothetical software features. The worst part is it's not a hardware announcement, but it's also not even a software announcement since the software is also just conceptual renders and nothing material. It's a website to advertise non-existent software features, running a non-existent google-branded laptop, for the purpose of what exactly?
I can imagine two reasons this website exists today. It exists because someone at Google has seen the possibility of getting a promotion by relaunching Chromebooks, and it was launched today hoping people will hold off a few months on buying the MacBook Neo, to weigh their options once this launches.
by aylmao - Awful branding aside this will be dead within 3 years.
MacBook neo @ $499 and the ability to finance it leaves almost zero room in the US market for an Android laptop.
*edit
It looks like will be a ChromeOS successor and their demographic will be schools?
by 650REDHAIR - People like you doomsayed Chromebooks too. And?
- Not everyone wants an Apple device.by thefz
- Yeah this is going the way of the Pixelbook.by pier25
- Not _just_ being able to finance; the 0% interest and 24-month period is amazing!by kx_x
- Branding is way off. Marketed as an AI laptop sounds like local inference to engineers, but no. The general public are weary of AI. The Neo is selling so well that Apple is running out of the A18 Pro chips. Rumors are that Apple may have 2 steps: mark as sold out, or upgrade to the latest iPhone SOC which comes with an upgrade to 12GB of RAM. I also suspect this is Ternus' first product launch as CEO (not officially until Sept 1).
Anyway, this will be fun to see price point, manufacturer differentiation (surprised that Google isn't building this themselves) and reviews. Hard to see how it competes with the Neo at $499 that can run a full Desktop OS and integrates well with the ecosystem.
- > Coming Spring 2026
What does this mean? I'm in Australia so I would expect Sept-Nov.
But since I've only ever heard of American companies use seasonal typed release dates, my first instinct is to assume this is an American site and therefore American Spring - but Googling 'spring season usa' tells me Mar-May. And we are already in May.
So then I have to scroll to the bottom of the page to see what region this might be in, and it has got Australia selected. I change to UK, scroll to the top, and it has changed to autumn.
So, it is actually Australian Spring. That actually surprises me since most pages like this would not be updated to reflect my region, and so I would never expect this kind of text to be localised.
Let's just all use unambiguous wording and units :)
by Humphrey - Yeah it's region specific which is interesting.
So it does say fall on web archive
by shangofox - I'd say that's bad localisation since people in Australia don't use seasons but instead months or quarters.
I wonder what it says for places which don't really have seasons, like say Singapore?
by daemin - Fwiw in the UK, the page says
> Coming autumn 2026
I would also never expect this kind of text to be localized. Strange.
by MrDOS - I will never buy another google hardware product again after my most recent pixel experience. I was sent a phone with a defective modem that they refused to replace. This is despite having bought 5 other pixels and also using google fi and a bunch of other google products.
I will never trust them with a hardware purchase ever again.
by kommunicate - Mine got a software update that rendered it useless. I bought an iPhone.by nicbou
- As another n=1, I've been happy with my Pixel phones over the years and never had such an experience.by mherrmann
- I bought a skagen with google watch os or whatever was it called. The experience was so so bad, I’m never going back to Google products.by satyamkapoor
- My experience with Google hardware is that they shipped an update for Pixel 4a that crippled the battery. In Australia, they announced a safety recall due to a discovered battery safety issue, but in the rest of the world, it seems they wanted to save money by crippling people's phones of their own volition without much explanation. But no worries, they're offering 3 methods of compensation: free battery replacement to restore it, $50 cash, or $100 credit for another Google phone.
I went to redeem my compensation - free battery replacement unavailable in your country, $100 credit unavailable in your country. I guess I'll take the $50 cash...? I fill in the form with my IMEI, full name, address, etc etc. After a week they send a response saying unfortunately after thoroughly looking into my case, I'm not eligible, and no further explanation is offered as to why. In effect it's as if they hacked into my phone and installed a virus that cripples the battery and there's nothing I can do about it, like this is just a normal way to do business now. You don't really own your phone after all...
by a2128 - Good. Pixel phones are the single most overrated phone you can get today.
They've managed to convince people to pay $800 (usually with some discounts to be fair) for what's essentially a $400-450 mid range phone. Even if nothing was defective and customer service was "perfect", it's still a midrange phone priced like a flagship.
by elxr - >I was sent a phone with a defective modem that they refused to replace
To be fair, how would they even verify this? Unless it's outright broken (eg. no cell reception), someone with a "defective modem" is basically indistinguishable from the 99 other people with a perfectly fine phone, but nonetheless want their phone replaced for various nonspecific issues about cell reception.
by gruez - I think if I wanted a cheap laptop I'd probably get the macbook neo, and if i wanted a non-gaming expensive one i'd get a macbook pro.
I really don't see the market fit for this, I guess the android integration. But my god, I'd die of cringe if someone asked me about my laptop and I had to say "googlebook". Believe it or not, these things matter a lot, particularly if you're trying to target a young audience.
by jerojero - It's sad that the M5 Apple chips don't support Linux better. I'm in the market for a laptop, and I'd buy a MBP in a heartbeat if I could wipe it and put Debian on it.
My 2013 MBP was going strong with Debian until the battery started puffing up last year, and I finally had to recycle it.
I get it, I know I'm not their market, but it still pains me because it was a great laptop.
by jlarocco - I thought Microsoft had the market cornered on terrible product naming but "Googlebook" is extremely awful.
My suggestion, if they really want to go this route, is to shorten it to "gBook".
by wvenable - At this point, if you want a laptop, get a mac and be done with it.
Until other manufacturer step up their game, there will be years and years.
- I'm a happy Apple ecosystem user. However, there are many more Windows and Android users worldwide.
I think that the appeal of this product is that the Wintel monopoly of years ago is dying. If the Googlebook is well executed (as the Apple M1 line was), it can be an option for Android users who wish to move away from Windows but are not knowledgeable enough to use Linux. I think the only problem here is Google's track record of abandoning product ideas. A new product like this requires multiple iterations to get it right, but if Google abandons it as soon as the results are not what was expected, it will not have the time to mature in areas like gaming or app support.
by diegof79 - You might be surprised how good cloud gaming has gotten. I play AAA games at max settings on my MacBook Pro through GeForce Now, and with fiber internet it's nearly indistinguishable from native.by pants2
- Gembook or Geminote would've been cooler. But no one asked me unfortunately.by beemboy
- I think it's a successor to the Chromebook. In the vast majority of modern K-12 public schools, the school district owns the hardware, not the students.by troymc
- Chromebook users.
I loved my Pixelbook, fantastic piece of hardware. When that ended, I went with an Acer Chromebook. Works fine, just not the same.
I would go for a Mac Air or Neo, but only if I could install ChromeOS.
I will most likely get a Googlebook, and would be more likely to do so if it was not named Googlebook and did not have Gemini built in.
by whodidntante - Gross. This is just more proof that corporations simply don't know how to market AI. Everything is an ad for an ad at this point. The very first thing they show this new machine doing is helping people shop for clothes using AI.
No one is doing that, these people don't exist. No matter how hard corporate America wishes they did. This is why AI doesn't sell. This is why companies like Microsoft and Dell are pulling back on their AI claims and why Apple has nearly wiped it off their site all together, seriously go check out apple.com, not a single mention of Apple Intelligence.
At this point I'm convinced that marketing has been completely taken over by shareholder shills, marketing to customers they wish they had instead of the real customers that exist.
by Jzush - > No one is doing that, these people don't exist.
Unfortunately, they do. "Normie America" loves that shit. It's why they've been pushing it so hard: it's one of the few areas they're getting serious traction in day to day life.
by parl_match - I’ve shopped with Claude a few times in the past month alone. It’s really quite good at finding brands I wouldn’t have otherwise.
It’s amazing how confident you are while being completely wrong. A pristine internet rant.
by tyre