When Google formally announced they were developing an OS intended to rival Windows for netbook market share, they boasted that they already had a laundry list of big-name industry backers. Although initially silent on the matter, it\'s been revealed since that there are indeed several large companies involved, such as HP and now Intel. Speaking to The Register, the chip maker confirmed that at least on some level they are working with Google in the development of Chrome OS.

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netbook os?

Guest, Intel joined many others to back Moblin for the Netbook OS.

http://software.intel.com/en-us/videos/moblin/

I don't think that there's any conflict of interest in them assisting Google on Chrome OS as well. Intel often plays the roll of a bridge, joining hardware to software.

Google has some serious competition. I think they are dumping money into a dead end. Short of them coming out with some miraculous OS. Windows, MAC, and Linux will continue to hold the share of the OS market.

I don't think its that much of a dead end. As far as netbooks go, i don't see any real decent OS to throw on them because they're generally very low spec-ed machines. Windows might run on them but on the bare minimums, Mac's OS.... i don't even think that Mac's have netbooks do they? And Linux? well they are good on netbooks but people still fear them...

Still, you're part right. Google will have to try and maybe at least run windows apps in order for it to be still considered imho... if not its just another linux

Hamsteyr, no; there is no Mac netbook.

Google does, clearly face resistance in this market, Linux doesn't want to get pushed off its server and other specialist application market and OSX doesn't want to lose its "cooler than PC" factor.

Google has a hope because of the name, people know google. The google OS is unlikely to replace Windows for businesses or gamers unless they add some serious windows emultation, however, as the linux netbooks showed, most users do not require anything except word processing, browsing and speed.

Pretty much any OS can provide that, most people are just more familiar with windows and so don't try the alternatives.

I speak as a windows user, not a linux evangelist (though I have used Gentoo and Ubuntu linux and OSX)

I wouldn't be to surprised if it ended up being a variation of Linux. I can't see them building an operating system from scratch.

Closest thing to a netbook Apple has is the MacBook Air. OS X, at least Leopard is too heavy to really run well on netbooks.

A perfect OS to run on them would be Windows 2000, but I don't see Microsoft bringing that back to life.

I can't see what's the big deal with Chrome OS. I mean it will just be another Linux distro with some Google software preinstalled.
DSL, Puppy, and probably other light Linux distros that I don't know, seem good to run on a netbook.

Linux based, yes... Just Linux with Google apps? Not a chance, it's an OS they are integrating at the core level, not just some little top layer slapped on and branded with a trademark. If it was just Linux with Google apps, it would be hitting the market now, not taking a year to develop and perfect.

Sure there are Linux distros out there on netbooks, but people are scared of them, and typically they only get the love they need from people who are familiar with Linux a big part of why the Linux based netbooks are a severely shrinking market, even though the OS is free.

Get a name like Google behind the platform, and a nice slick optimized OS that is not bloated, and you'll have a machine that flies with the limited hardware present in a netbook... And the clout behind Google will help push the Linux platform from the fringe technophile arena into the mainstream. Even if it's not a massive success, at least there's another alternative to the MS slave wagon, and someone to push competition to make good products, rather than just releasing bloated crap to create a new revenue stream (Vista anyone?).

The only down side I see to Intel getting their fingers into this is their seeming love of putting up arbitrary boundaries and fabricating "allowed specs" for netbooks. Intel and Microsoft already worked together to create a limited scope that they are saying defines what a Netbook can be, at a maximum. Forcing manufacturers into little boxes tends to restrict pushing the limits and stagnates progress, but it helps the big corporate giants to increase their profit margins by enforcing their own iron will over an industry.

I'm a tech in training but I want to put my 2 cents in here- I think it would have to be something more ingenious than Windows and be, like the user above said, easier and more efficient, the GUI in windows is as user-friendly as it gets. Perhaps voice recognition software that can speedily keep up with speech variants and doesn't strain the user, combined with a 3d background such as Vista has that isn't sucking up the CPU usage. Maybe users might want to say 'write a report' and a word processor would pop open or 'surf internet' I mean this is just ideas, where do you take the next OS?