Gadgetory

the pixel book is kind of like a platypus it's made up of a bunch of different parts that shouldn't seem like they go together but somehow do so as a picture book gets to be about a year of life we're expecting a revamp version to come from Google in the coming weeks but I don't make sense to do a final review a last revisited of a laptop that I've been using pretty much every day for the better part of a year now we did our initial review I was pretty jazzed on it in no way does this computer make sense financially it's $1,000 starting point for a Chromebook and the value is clearly not there this is an extravagant purchase I'm testing the baseline version it's been great for me it's a Core i5 and eight gigs of ram which should be absolutely overkill for Chrome OS you could spec it up up to I believe 1,700 bucks but now is that year starts to tick and the calendar starts to go on there are discounts to be had on the pixel book so initial thought was the thing that it was best at was battery life when I did an issue review I was getting almost ten hours of battery life it's gotten significantly less awesome new battery standpoint over time now I'm hovering almost around half that between five and six hours and my use has not like changed at all all that's really change is software updates and maybe the battery is not as good as I initially thought or it's not aging as well as I would have initially thought so the big drop had the Chromebook for me was I could use it for days and days and days and not really worry about charging it that is becoming less true and as battery life seems to be getting worse the computer itself is becoming less useful to me and things were pretty well inside of Chrome most of the work I do is inside of there and it runs Android apps now as well and it runs almost a full catalog of Google Play apps that's been a nice to have those options but a few caveats often times I found myself dealing with duplicate apps not only which one to use slack for example the Chrome Web App is awesome but the Android app sometimes useful as well especially when it comes to notifications so you end up with duplicate apps you're not sure which I kind of necessarily which that has kind have been confusing otherwise Chrome OS has been surprisingly full-featured so using this computer I have had no issues I've had no slowdown it's played 4k video it's not everything I've needed it to do with speed and alacrity but if you guys can't guess I'm a sports guy I had my fantasy football draft I do it through Yahoo and it's all done through Chrome and I was doing my draft I didn't bring home my laptop serger the Chromebook would be fine when I launched the page to do the draft the computer slowed to a halt I couldn't scroll through players it almost as like the thing absolutely froze it was unusable to me to do this fantasy draft that was the first time I really saw maybe limitations of chromatin that a hardware limitations and it's got a Core i5 in it so not a hardware issue at all is something that was going on with Chrome OS and I tried to look at more research on what Yahoo uses it's not even a flash experience it was just chrome struggled on it that's of one instance and that was really the only time I've had a problem and I won't run into that problem until next year when fantasy football season comes around again but did again give me a little bit of pause about the utility or at least the long-term utility of the pixel book so the software experience aside the hardware is been absolutely awesome it's held up really well I had worries about these sort of silicon pads on the sides getting dirty they look pretty much brand new and again I'm using this thing all the time the screens been absolutely awesome and beautiful I don't have any like dead pixels of things that have happened the bezels are still ginormous on this obviously the bezels didn't shrink over time but I thought I'd stopped noticing them and I'm still very aware of how giant the bezels are but I'm also still aware of how great the keyboard is the keyboard throw has been awesome the shortcuts across the top make things that you want to do a lot easier like volume control even shortcuts for screenshotting Google assistant is here as well a dedicated button for it I've actually very rarely used google assistant on the computer I I'm not sure why this hasn't used as much as I would have thought listen I'm not gonna claim that I use the pixel book pen more than I have I probably used it about four times but it doesn't work it works well it's had software update to make the experience even better battery life is good on Abbott how to replace it but I don't I don't use the thing it's obviously the pics of book one of the big draws behind it crazy thin but it also bends and you do different modes at nth mode of presentation mode I've used that less than I thought I would as well sometimes if I'm showing something to someone or showing a document to my wife I'll put it in tablet mode but honestly I mostly use it as a laptop which kind of goes to show I clearly did not need the pixel book I don't think anybody needs to fix the book there's much less expensive options if you want to get into Chrome OS and a thousand bucks you're in the world of some really good Windows laptops perhaps some discounted Mac books it's very crowded waters you really have to want this nobody nobody needs it so here's what it's boiled down to for the most part my initial thoughts after a few months still ring true the battery life has been a surprising disappointment with the pixel book I still love the speed in which it boots up that's thin with the biggest reasons why I use it turn it on do something quick turn it off and be done people have used it for things like video editing with this Android apps I haven't necessarily pushed it that far if I have to video edit I'll use my regular laptop to do it speakers have been awesome I love the fact it's got two USB type-c ports on it used either for charging it does charge very fast so that's been nice sort of counter the depleted battery experience that I've had at a thousand bucks I cannot recommend this at the top spec model in almost 1800 bucks I can't imagine who that is for there's been rumors that Google might allow a dual boot we could put Windows 10 on it then you could certainly see more utility right now it's been a very nice extravagance I don't think that I'll buy the new version I'm probably just ill stick with this chrome OS seems to be fine but I'm less jazz about it due to that that's battery life so that's been the final review of the pixel book it still does what I thought it was going to do just get necessarily do it as long if you guys like these final reviews we serve the last revisited there's product before they hit their end of life to get in place with the newer version also let us know in the comments and the best way to let us know too is give the video a thumbs up always appreciate that until next time and John render TechnoBuffalo you