Providing you with the ultimate chromebook experience, the Google Pixelbook packs in a great deal of power that you don’t see very often in chromebooks. With specs up to an Intel core i7 processor and 16GB RAM, the pixelbook excels the rest of the chromebooks, with a fast and amazing performance. It even has a sleek design, with silicone pads on the keyboard deck which not only give the chromebook a aesthetic look, but also provide you with greater comfort when typing or just resting your palms on it. And so, with the powerful combination of a 7th gen processor and more than enough RAM, the pixelbook allows you to make the most of the chrome os, and get your work done easier than ever, making it the best chromebook in terms of performance alone. But, with a price range of its own, lower priced options like the Asus C302 are also worth considering.
Why We Like It – Google Pixelbook
The Google Pixelbook brings a new meaning to chromebooks, with its high performance configuration and an extremely well built and premium design. Powered by a 7th Gen Intel Core i5 in its base model, and 8 gigs of RAM, the Pixelbook is built to surpass all the other chromebooks with its sheer power. It won’t stutter, and it even provides more flexibility with google assistant. Thus, with its slim, convertible design, and the amazing specs, the Google Pixelbook does indeed stand atop all the other chromebooks, in terms of both performance and design.
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- Amazing specs allows for a fast and responsive performance
- Extremely well built
- Great battery life
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- Sound quality isn’t that good
- Price is still pretty steep for a chromebook
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Performance
Starting with an Intel core i5 processor, 8GB RAM and 128GB SSD, the base model of the chromebook already surpasses the other chromebooks when it comes to performance. It allows the chrome os to run smoother than ever, and without any worry of how many tabs you can open, the pixelbook also offers you with a great display. The 12.3 Inch LCD screen has a 2400 x 1600 resolution (235 PPI) and a 3:2 aspect ratio. Although this isn’t normal, it does benefit you in the sense that you get more vertical space to get your work done, and easily surf the web. Moreover, the display offers more vivid colours thanks to its greater sRGB than the Asus Chromebook Flip C302. And paired with a brightness of 421 nits and wide viewing angles, it surpasses both the Samsung Chromebook Pro and the Asus Flip C302 in terms of display quality.
However, the Google Pixelbook does fall behind the HP Chromebook X2 as well as the Samsung and Asus Chromebooks when it comes to battery life. Withstanding around 9 hours of video streaming, it allows for longer durability, allowing you to get through a day’s work with ease. The keyboard on the Pixelbook is great with 0.8mm of travel, which although lower than usual, is made up for by needing slightly greater force to be pressed. And although the glass trackpad is responsive and extremely great, you can also get the Pixelbook pen. Made specifically for the pixelbook, the pen is a walcolm pen, allowing you to sketch and take notes with ease. It does however, require greater force than Apple’s pen, but even so it also allows you to take advantage of the google assistant with the dedicated button on it.
Speaking of the google assistant, you get a dedicated key for it on the keyboard as well. And along with voice controls, the google assistant allows you to use the pixelbook with amazing flexibility. As for the software itself, the chrome os now has android app support. And so, with a wider range of android apps, the pixelbook can make the most of the power it comes with, allowing you to work seamlessly without worrying about being online. Furthermore, with its easy convertible design and fast responsive screen, the pixelbook allows you to take full advantage of the tablet mode, using android apps with ease and using the pen to sketch and carry out image searches as well.
On the other hand, the pixelbook doesn’t have that great a sound quality with the volumes not reaching very high, while the clarity itself was low. But considering the fact that you may actually be using headphones all the time, it doesn’t matter much. It’s also clear why it is so, which is that the drills we see in the google pixelbook go are simply not present here, preventing the sound from being as great. Finally, the webcam on the pixelbook is a 720p, 0.9mp shooter which really isn’t that great with grainy pictures and not so great blurs.
Design
The Google Pixelbook comes with a pretty sleek design, with a solid and sturdy aluminum build. Weighing just under 2.5 pounds and being under 10mm thick, the pixelbook is one of most compact lightweight laptops out in the market. While the silicone pads make for greater comfort, they also allow for greater grip when using the pixelbook in tablet mode or placing the keyboard as a stand. When using the pen in laptop mode, the hinge wobbles, making writing or sketching ever the more difficult. Moreover, with no space for placing the pen, it makes it harder to keep track of it, increasing chances of losing it.
When it comes to inputs, the google pixelbook does offer a good amount of port availability. You get two usb-c ports as well as a dedicated headphone jack. Even though it’s not much, it’s pretty much what one would expect in a ultra thin laptop. And so, with its slim, solid build, the pixelbook does feel like a premium laptop, but it still has its share of flaws. But, on the plus side, you do still get a backlit keyboard, which although is granted considering its price, is a rare feature in chromebooks these days.
Value
Offering you a great amount of power, an aesthetic and easy convertible design, the Google PixelBook is a great laptop. It works fast and without stutter in both the laptop and tablet mode, with a good battery life. It also offers you a great pixelbook pen as well as a considerable amount of google assistant support. Thus the Pixelbook provides you with more than enough to run the chrome os and get your day to day tasks done with ease without needing to plug in much either. But, in the end, it still runs chrome os. It has limited functions and the greater fact is that at the same price, if not lower than with what you could get yourself the MacBook Pro or even the Dell XPS 13. These are great, even more amazing ultrabooks that have similar amounts of power but also provide you with greater functionality. And so, considering that and the fact that people who are looking for chromebooks are actually also looking for devices with a lower price than their windows and MacOS alternative, the PixelBook is genuinely just priced too high, even to this day.
Google Pixelbook Wrap Up
The Google Pixelbook indeed is a great laptop. It allows for a great performance in the chrome os, and allows you to carry out all the tasks you need. It has a pretty good battery life, a comfortable and still aesthetic design and also great additional features like the pixelbook pen. Overall, it will allow many people to do everything they need with a fast and powerful performance. But, so will other chromebooks which are priced significantly lower, like the Asus Flip C302 or the Samsung Chromebook Pro. And so, if you’re someone who can afford it, and you don’t have an issue with money, it’s a great chromebook, but otherwise, at around $850 it feels like the Google Pixelbook is simply just too expensive for a chromebook.
