When Google first announced that they were going to invest in an operating system of their own, the focus was on a cloudcentric OS. Known as Chrome OS, Google’s operating system had the look and feel of the Chrome browser with several quick launch icons added.
Today, development on the OS continues but it is apparent that Google is looking for something a little more substantial out of their OS. Available now in the developer channel is the latest rendition of the the OS and the first impressions of a number of developers is that the new version is a mix between Apple’s OS X and Microsoft’s Windows operating system.
There are some questions as to why Google is looking to move away from their original plan regarding this OS. Could it perhaps be due to the fact that the Chromebooks just haven’t taken off as well as Google had hoped? Alternatively, could it be that consumers are demanding an OS that they are a bit more familiar with and lets face it, Windows is the most used operating system in the world. Like Windows, Chrome OS has a built in hardware accelerated Windows Manager which they call Aura. As such, Aura has the ability to utilize GPU cycles instead of the CPU for resource intensive processes.
It’s nice to see the new changes in the operating system, but customers that have purchased the first Cr-48 Chromebooks will be out of luck when it comes to an OS upgrade as these devices just don’t have the hardware to power the OS.
