Dieter Bohn on Google Pixel Slate: ‘Slapdash Software Ruins Good Hardware’

Dieter Bohn, writing at The Verge:

Other bugs are just sort of infuriating. When the keyboard is attached, moving windows around feels relatively fast and smooth, even with a few Android apps and well over 20 tabs or web apps open. But switch the Pixel Slate into tablet mode and start using the swipe gestures, and it turns into a stuttery, laggy mess. Input with the Pixelbook Pen is similarly unpredictable: sometimes it’s fine; other times, it lags so badly in Google Keep that I have to quit the app and try again.

Chrome OS is an operating system designed for laptops that has enrolled in an adult education class for tablets and hasn’t even understood its assignments, much less done the homework.

Pretty scathing review. I had the same impression after just a few minutes playing with a Pixel Slate: decent enough hardware but very unpolished software, especially the Android apps thing.

Also, the thing I wrote the other week about looking forward to a future where you don’t have to worry about CPU options for MacBooks applies in triplicate to the Pixel Slate — there are way too many CPU options. It’s ridiculous.

★ Thursday, 29 November 2018