Google Pixelbook vs Premium Windows Ultrabook Running Chrome OS (CloudReady) + Pixelbook Review

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Analysis Paralysis by efficient.app (CyberBytes)

6 min readNov 3, 2017

I made a video comparing the Google Pixelbook with my 3-year-old top-of-the-line $1,600 Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus ultrabook which was wiped and replaced with Chrome OS.

Hopefully this video can help those of you who can’t decide between getting a nice Windows laptop or the Pixelbook.

Timestamps

Comparison

1:00 — Technical Specs
2:10 — Bootup Speed Test
4:07 — Brightness Comparison
4:45 — Octane Score Test
7:00 — Gmail Loading Speed Test
7:40 — Asana Loading Speed Test & Scrolling Test
8:50 — Personal Profile & Work Profile Switching + Performance Test
12:00 — Chrome OS Version Comparison
12:30 — Pixelbook Multi-Persona Limitations

Pixelbook Review

14:00 — Build Quality
14:35 — Battery LED Indicators (& Tap Gesture)
16:05 — Default/Tent/Kiosk/Tablet Mode & Preference
16:50 — Full-Screen Apps in Tablet Mode
17:35 — Useful Chrome OS Keyboard Shortcuts & Trackpad Gestures
20:20 — OS Preference
21:00 — Android App Limitations & Workarounds
21:44 — Trackpad & Surface Quality
22:33 — Overall Thoughts

Technical Specifications:

Google Pixelbook

i5 7Y54 Processor (Kaby Lake)
1.2 GHz — 3.2GHz (Turbo Boost) CPU Frequency
(Lower Base CPU Frequency, Higher Turbo Frequency)
8GB RAM
128GB SSD

Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus

i7 4200U Processor (Haswell)
1.6 GHz — 2.6GHz (Turbo Boost) CPU Frequency
(Higher Base CPU Frequency, Lower Turbo Frequency)
8GB RAM
256GB SSD

Summary

The Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus i7 was $1,600 (could probably buy new for $1,300 now?) and a tad bit more performant in certain areas. For the most part, they were identical. You can see the baseline 1.6GHz (Samsung) working better than the 1.2GHz on the Pixelbook in basic scenarios. When you actually do a test though, the Pixelbook picks it up and has the higher clock speed in turbo and is more performant.

The issue I faced was I wish it was a bit more judicious with the turbo mode because I did sense some slowdown occasionally for fairly basic things. Maybe this will be improved via software. Overall, love the hardware of the Pixelbook, it’s such a joy and has so many well engineered facets to it. The double tap to show battery percentage on either LED next to each USB C port. Yes, you can charge the laptop in either port and each have an LED which is awesome.

Boot speed is day/night. Pixelbook is up and going in 3 seconds while CloudReady/Samsung took 15+ seconds.

At the end of the day I really love the Pixelbook and I’m using it more and more. Performance-wise, I’m not impressed compared to my daily being the Samsung ATIV Ultrabook. But it’s an i7 U series and has higher baseline so maybe those results should have been expected. If I were to choose between the Pixelbook or getting a nice Windows Ultrabook to throw CloudReady on it, I’d go for the Pixelbook. Save the $300 and spend it on some Pixel Buds, a nice case, and the Pen.

Now I was very surprised at how well optimized CloudReady really is, I was expecting more out of the Pixelbook power-wise based on performance optimizations I figured existed with Chrome OS and Google having the hardware. That’s where I’m hoping software updates will just make the processor go in turbo more often which will make it perform better because I think that’s all I really want.

Keyboard Impressions

Some background on the keyboard, I’m a mechanical keyboard user on my desktop so nothing will ever do mechanical keyboard justice. Comparing it to the Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus in the video and the Samsung Chromebook Pro (mom’s laptop that I have used many times), the Pixelbook keyboard is much better than both.

Samsung Chromebook Pro feels cheap and doesn’t have much tactile feedback whatsoever. The laptop in the video doesn’t either. They are more like butterfly switches so it’s really just pressing down and quietly coming back up.

The Pixelbook on the other hand, yes, not much key travel but it has a little bit of tactile feedback when you tap it in. I would less equate it to being “mushy” and say that I actually feel the feedback which makes me to prefer it to other slim laptops.

I go back-and-forth on it because my left Alt key which I use a lot feels like it kind of sticks slightly (very very slightly compared to other keys, but I use it a lot so I feel it) but I’m hoping that doesn’t mean the keys are cheap at all. I’m very interested to see how the other keys hold up over time.

The key texture feels great. They feel soft (not in a cheap way) in a good feeling way.

Personally, this is my favorite laptop keyboard to-date. I’ve also used macbooks and the keys just feel plastic on them. The keys on the Pixelbook feel a bit more rubber-like but in a more premium feeling way than the traditional plastic keys feel.

Why Compare a New Chromebook to a 3-Year-Old Windows Machine?

While it is a 3-year-old machine, it was top-of-the-line specs at the time. i7 processor 8GB RAM. Specs that are still quite respectable today. You can buy the machine new right now for around $1,000 — $1,200 and it will be more performant than the other $1k ultrabooks out right now. Many have switched to mobile/tablet processors and the i7 variant will often bring you up to $1,500 — $2k for the Windows laptops available right now.

So this is a more realistic comparison in terms of price for what someone may want to buy.

Now why the comparison? A WIndows-built laptop running Chromium OS, why? Well I, like many others, have re-purposed old machines by installing Chromium OS on them to speed them up and clean them up.

Initially, I had the laptop configured with Dual Boot so at launch I would choose Windows 10 or Chromium OS. And that is a very normal use-case for someone purchasing a premium ultrabook versus just going with a Chromebook out of the gate.

So my reasoning was to show a comparison of speed and performance for those who are thinking about buying a similarly priced Ultrabook and also want Chromium OS on the device (whether they want to dual boot with Windows or not).

I just got to a point where I’m like “wow, I’m not even logging into the Windows partition” after 3 months of use so I decided to wipe the Windows partition on my laptop so that was the current form in the video.

So this comparison is for people like me (I totally understand that it may seem odd to others), but I wanted to know how CloudReady (Chromium OS) installed on a similarly priced/similarly spec’d laptop compared to just going with a top-of-the-line Chromebook like the Pixelbook.

This video was really made to scratch an itch that I had and the question that I had on my mind before purchasing the Pixelbook. Since I pulled the trigger, I figured hey, why not let others in a similar boat benefit from the decision I made.

I understand that for the average person, they may watch this comparison and go “what the heck is the purpose of this..?”. This wasn’t made for the average person. Just as I believe, the average person isn’t considering buying a Pixelbook in the first place so this video is likely to appeal to those who are actually considering the Pixelbook anyway.

Performance

I ran the Octane test in addition to all of the tests available at browserbench.org — Both devices were logged into Guest Mode (no extensions interfering)