Asus Google Chromebit turns a TV into a Chromebook

Asus and Google are changing that today with the launch of Chromebit CS10 - a small HDMI dongle that's actually a full-fledged PC. You can also hook wired peripherals to the Chromebit.

Because it's a full Chrome OS machine, you can pretty much run any web app on it. It'll let you play movies and TV shows from Google Play, Netflix or Hulu, just like any other Chrome OS device, for example. On the connectivity front, you'll find an HDMI port and a USB 2.0 port as well as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi support. It runs on Chrome OS.

Unfortunately, Chromebit is so underpowered that it can't even handle Flash video without choppiness, which is distracting if not unwatchable. Last month a report suggested Google was about to fold Chrome OS into Android, but Google has since denied this is the case, with the at Google saying there is "a ton of momentum for Chromebooks and we are very committed to Chrome OS".

Things get hairier when you start playing videos, using Flash sites, or juggling more than about 10 resource-heavy browser tabs. For instance, I tried putting the Chromebit through my usual Sunday afternoon ritual of watching NFL Redzone while running Yahoo Fantasy Sports's StatTracker web application, and found that performance was uncomfortably slow.

This is simply a matter of the Chromebit cramming meager components into a small device to achieve a tiny sticker price.

At a price of only $85, the Chromebit is easily one of the most affordable PC options available, and as long as users have their expectations of Chrome OS in check, it can meet a wide range of computing needs. It's a full-blown Chrome OS computer.

Chrome OS

The Chromebit, then, will have a harder time influencing the PC market than Samsung's Chromebook did.

These two attributes make it less nerve-wracking to travel with than a brand-new notebook, and because virtually all Chromebit content is stored and accessed in the cloud, it is less susceptible to malware than a traditional PC operating system. The idea is just as deserving of a few more years to blossom.

The $85 device, which is about the size of a pocket lighter, is powered by a quad-core ARM Cortex-A17 chip, which is based on the Rockchip 3288 system on a chip (SoC) design, and offers 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. The desktop web wasn't really made for these tech specs, and it's most apparent when you're visiting sites that haven't been made mobile-friendly.

 

The original plan for the device was that it would be launched in the summer of 2015, but given that we're nearly towards the end of the year, safe to say that neither ASUS nor Google managed to make the intended summer release.

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