Walt Mossberg:
>The Chromebook starts up almost instantly—in 10 to 15 seconds in my tests—much more quickly than most Windows machines. This is partly because it’s really just a big Web browser. In my tests, Apple’s MacBook Air started just about as quickly, but it costs twice as much.
He neglects to mention that the MacBook Air can do far more than twice as many things as the Chromebook. Mossberg spends the entire article trying to like the Chromebook, but ultimately can’t recommend it (no surprise) — what strikes me as odd is that he seems to think this is the way of the future:
>So a cloud-centric computer isn’t a crazy idea.
I agree, but the Chromebook idea is far more than just a ‘cloud-centric computer’ — it is a web-browser-centric computer, and that is a crap idea. Small storage is fine on a computer with a strong cloud offering, but doing everything in a web browser is far from ideal.
For an example of a real “cloud-centric computer” look no further than future iOS devices once iCloud launches, and no I am not joking.