The world of dual-screen devices may soon have a new competitor. Google, it is said, is working on dual-screen Chromebooks, with the company having prototyped a dual-touchscreen unit.
According to this report, the Android maker has started work on this new variant of its Chrome OS machine, as it does not want to get left behind this new multi-display revolution that already has companies like Samsung and Lenovo readying their wares.
This Chromebook prototype is codenamed Palkia, and is being positioned as a direct rival to dual-screen Windows devices.
Including the company’s very own Surface Neo that is powered by the Windows 10X operating system.
Not much is known about this mysterious device, other than the fact that it is still in its very early stages of development. If anything, things are just at the conceptual phase right now, and there is no guarantee that Palkia itself will make it to market.
However, according to the source, this mysterious Chromebook has two touchscreens and a trackpad, even though it retains the conventional laptop form factor.
That said, the idea behind it is that it can’t be used as a convertible or tablet, which is rather odd when you think about it. Two touchscreens working together could substantially improve the available screen real estate.
Microsoft and other hardware makers have done this to notably success.
By and large, it does look like Google simply wants to experiment right now with various ideas before it actually finalizes hardware support for this new form factor in Chrome OS. Solid strategy, as it will take the company a fair bit of time to actually ready something like this.
Which is probably why the existing prototype has no OEM support. An indication that Google has not yet discussed the possibility as mass producing such a machine.
May take a while, this.
But any competition is good competition, as they always say.
