Microsoft accidentally made a great Chromebook
Hey everybody, I'm back,and this is Processor, and I have discoveredthe best Chrome tablet that I have ever used. It has amazing hardware. It runs on an ARM processor, so it has pretty good battery life. It supports LTE, natively, on the device. It actually works in tabletmode instead of the janky fiasco that you usually get on Chrome OS. If web apps don't cover all of your needs, you can also use an, you could also Windows Apps because, yeah, the best Chromebook I've ever used actually isn't a Chromebook, and I'm not actually using Chrome. It's this thing, the Surface Pro X usingthe new Edge browser. So here's a question. Dieter, are you feeling okay? (funky music) Look, let's get this out ofthe way right at the top. It's super important that you understand that I am not tellingyou to buy this computer. I am definitely not doingthat because as specced, this costs more thanseventeen hundred dollars, and even though there are somediscounts on it right now, whatever. It's too expensive. Plus, you know, I've alreadyreviewed this computer and I decided that the appproblem is really serious. It uses an ARM chip, which means that there someapp compatibility hassles. So, why I am I looking at this again?
Well, there's now an officialversion of the Edge browser, and more specifically,there's an official beta of the Edge browser thatuses ARM code directly and of course it has the Chromium engine. See, the ARM chip on this hardware means that a lot of Windowsapps run in emulation, which kind of kills the battery life and it slows down the apps, and some apps don't evenwork at all, like Lightroom. But, now there's a goodChromium-based web browser that runs native ARM code, and so what if I just usedthis thing to run web apps, and what if instead of strugglingwith all of the hassles that come from all thatWindows emulation stuff, I just treated thisthing like a Chromebook and only ran Windows appswhen I really needed them? Well, I'll tell you what if. I did it and I think I learnedsome stuff along the way. So the main thing is thatthis thing runs Chrome, I mean, sorry, it runsthe Edge beta browser really, really well. I regularly have 20 plus tabs open, and it's really not breaking a sweat. I especially love how easythe Edge browser makes it to create apps out of webpages. If you have a PWA like Twitter, there's just a littlebutton right in the URL bar that you can click, and other pages you wanna make an app, there's no weird thing to find. There's literally an option in the menu that says, make this an app, and you just click it and bang, it shows up in your taskbar. Also, the Edge browsersupports Chrome extensions, so all of the stuff thatI'm used to using on Chrome works before, and you can grab those Chrome extensions directly from the Chrome store.
So I went and I grabbed thisextension called Chrometana, which automaticallyredirects all Bing searches to Google searches, which means that you canactually use the Windows key to search Google without having to deal with installing a bunch of extra crap on your Windows computerlike you did before. Last and maybe most importantly, because this Edge betais running on ARM code, it just natively works, it feels faster and I think I'm gettingway better battery life. Like, on the average, itwas, like, two hours more than I was before, which is about where Iexpected battery life for this computer tobe in the first place. Okay, so how does all thatcompare to a Chromebook? In fact, let's compare it to a really high end Chromebook,like my Pixelbook here. Well, instead of thekinda janky Android apps that you use in a pinch, you just get really good Windows apps. Like the Spotify app here actually works, and like the playpause/button actually works. It unlocks with my face, so I don't have to punch in a passcode or use a fingerprint sensor or whatever. And it doesn't suck as a tablet. Microsoft is really goodat managing Windows.
You can put stuff in split screen, you can move stuff around. When you go to the overview screen, everything flies around exactlywhere you expect it to be. It also, unlike theupcoming Galaxy Chromebook, has a three by two screen. Stylus input is way better 'cause Microsoft has been doingstylus input for way longer than Chrome OS has. And, it also has better privacydefaults than Chrome does. It's got a pretty good reader mode that hasn't come to Chrome yet, and Windows also has this Your Phone app, which means that thiscomputer works better with Android phones thana Chrome OS computer does. If there's one major downside to using a Windows computer basicallyas a Chrome OS computer, it's that getting setupon a Windows computer still takes forever. And you gotta wait forChrometana to tell you that she's setting things up,and blah blah blah blah blah, whereas on a Chrome OS computer, you basically can get loggedin and doing your stuff within a couple of minutes. Okay, so this is a lot ofpraise for this computer as a Chromebook, so once again, I really feellike I need to emphasize that you should not buy this computer.
It is too expensive and toolimited for what it does. But, I do think we canlearn from this experience of using it as a Chromebook, together. Microsoft is no longertrying to take over the world with Windows anymore. They're making their software for Android and they're making the Edgebrowser for Mac, and whatever. Basically, Windows now is a platform that wants to run as many apps, as many kind of apps, as it possibly can, and the benefit for Microsoft is that while you're doing thatit might convince you to sign up for some Microsoft stuff, like OneDrive or whatever. So, you know, touchscreen apps? Cool. Web apps? You bet. Legacy Windows apps? Sure, they'll run on ARM. It might be a little bit messy sometimes, but it basically works. And if ARM processorsreally do start taking over Windows laptops and Windows tablets, it could show thatthere is a middle ground between the slow, frustratingARM Windows computers that we've tried before, and the very fast, very elegant but very, very locked down iPad Pro. This is not that. Not yet. I mean, it still doesn't run Lightroom. But it proves that it's possible and that honestly, it mightnot be as hard as we thought. Hey everybody, thanksso much for watching. Now, there is one Chromebookthat I'm really interested in coming up. It's the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook, and even though it doesn'thave a three by two screen, which is the best aspect ratio, yes it is, it's worth checking out. We've got a hands on of it.
Well, there's now an officialversion of the Edge browser, and more specifically,there's an official beta of the Edge browser thatuses ARM code directly and of course it has the Chromium engine. See, the ARM chip on this hardware means that a lot of Windowsapps run in emulation, which kind of kills the battery life and it slows down the apps, and some apps don't evenwork at all, like Lightroom. But, now there's a goodChromium-based web browser that runs native ARM code, and so what if I just usedthis thing to run web apps, and what if instead of strugglingwith all of the hassles that come from all thatWindows emulation stuff, I just treated thisthing like a Chromebook and only ran Windows appswhen I really needed them? Well, I'll tell you what if. I did it and I think I learnedsome stuff along the way. So the main thing is thatthis thing runs Chrome, I mean, sorry, it runsthe Edge beta browser really, really well. I regularly have 20 plus tabs open, and it's really not breaking a sweat. I especially love how easythe Edge browser makes it to create apps out of webpages. If you have a PWA like Twitter, there's just a littlebutton right in the URL bar that you can click, and other pages you wanna make an app, there's no weird thing to find. There's literally an option in the menu that says, make this an app, and you just click it and bang, it shows up in your taskbar. Also, the Edge browsersupports Chrome extensions, so all of the stuff thatI'm used to using on Chrome works before, and you can grab those Chrome extensions directly from the Chrome store.
So I went and I grabbed thisextension called Chrometana, which automaticallyredirects all Bing searches to Google searches, which means that you canactually use the Windows key to search Google without having to deal with installing a bunch of extra crap on your Windows computerlike you did before. Last and maybe most importantly, because this Edge betais running on ARM code, it just natively works, it feels faster and I think I'm gettingway better battery life. Like, on the average, itwas, like, two hours more than I was before, which is about where Iexpected battery life for this computer tobe in the first place. Okay, so how does all thatcompare to a Chromebook? In fact, let's compare it to a really high end Chromebook,like my Pixelbook here. Well, instead of thekinda janky Android apps that you use in a pinch, you just get really good Windows apps. Like the Spotify app here actually works, and like the playpause/button actually works. It unlocks with my face, so I don't have to punch in a passcode or use a fingerprint sensor or whatever. And it doesn't suck as a tablet. Microsoft is really goodat managing Windows.
You can put stuff in split screen, you can move stuff around. When you go to the overview screen, everything flies around exactlywhere you expect it to be. It also, unlike theupcoming Galaxy Chromebook, has a three by two screen. Stylus input is way better 'cause Microsoft has been doingstylus input for way longer than Chrome OS has. And, it also has better privacydefaults than Chrome does. It's got a pretty good reader mode that hasn't come to Chrome yet, and Windows also has this Your Phone app, which means that thiscomputer works better with Android phones thana Chrome OS computer does. If there's one major downside to using a Windows computer basicallyas a Chrome OS computer, it's that getting setupon a Windows computer still takes forever. And you gotta wait forChrometana to tell you that she's setting things up,and blah blah blah blah blah, whereas on a Chrome OS computer, you basically can get loggedin and doing your stuff within a couple of minutes. Okay, so this is a lot ofpraise for this computer as a Chromebook, so once again, I really feellike I need to emphasize that you should not buy this computer.
It is too expensive and toolimited for what it does. But, I do think we canlearn from this experience of using it as a Chromebook, together. Microsoft is no longertrying to take over the world with Windows anymore. They're making their software for Android and they're making the Edgebrowser for Mac, and whatever. Basically, Windows now is a platform that wants to run as many apps, as many kind of apps, as it possibly can, and the benefit for Microsoft is that while you're doing thatit might convince you to sign up for some Microsoft stuff, like OneDrive or whatever. So, you know, touchscreen apps? Cool. Web apps? You bet. Legacy Windows apps? Sure, they'll run on ARM. It might be a little bit messy sometimes, but it basically works. And if ARM processorsreally do start taking over Windows laptops and Windows tablets, it could show thatthere is a middle ground between the slow, frustratingARM Windows computers that we've tried before, and the very fast, very elegant but very, very locked down iPad Pro. This is not that. Not yet. I mean, it still doesn't run Lightroom. But it proves that it's possible and that honestly, it mightnot be as hard as we thought. Hey everybody, thanksso much for watching. Now, there is one Chromebookthat I'm really interested in coming up. It's the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook, and even though it doesn'thave a three by two screen, which is the best aspect ratio, yes it is, it's worth checking out. We've got a hands on of it.
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