Google is reportedly developing custom processor for Chrome OS devices
Eric Zeman / Android Authority
TL; DR
- Google is reportedly working on its own processors for Chrome OS laptops and tablets.
- Products with the new silicon are expected to hit the market in 2023.
- It is also alleged that Google is “ramping up” its smartphone processors efforts.
Google confirmed earlier this year that the Pixel 6 series will run on the company’s first in-house chipset. The custom tensor processor houses some smart machine learning features and also has a Samsung modem.
Now, Nikkei Asia reports that Google is building its own processors for Chrome OS-powered laptops and tablets, citing three sources familiar with the plans. It is claimed that a launch is scheduled for 2023.
Two sources told the outlet that Google was “particularly inspired” by Apple’s success in developing custom chipsets or smartphones and computers. Apple has been making its own iPhone chipsets since the iPhone 4 in 2010, and also shipped its first custom processor for Mac computers last year.
Read more: The best Chromebooks to buy in 2021
It is believed that Google’s custom Chrome OS processors and smartphone chipsets will be based on Arm designs, which suggests we will see Arm Cortex CPUs and possibly Mali GPUs. We’d also expect these new Chrome OS chipsets to contain machine learning silicon like we’ve seen with the Pixel 6‘s chipset. Dedicated ML silicon enables improvements such as faster image processing, improved security and better speech recognition.
NikkeiGoogle’s sources add that Google is also “stepping up efforts” to build processors for its Pixel phones and other devices. That presumably means the company has sequels to the Pixel 6’s tensor processor in the works, but we’re also wondering if the company is working on mid-range silicon for their Pixel A range.
Finally, the point of sale claims that Google asked suppliers to prepare for 50% more production capacity for the Pixel 6 series compared to the 2019 devices (pre-Covid).
It’s far too early to say if Google can take on Apple on the desktop computing front with custom Chrome OS processors. However, it’s worth noting that Apple is also developing its own CPU and GPU instead of relying on a chip designer like Arm. This means that in theory (and often in practice) Apple has an advantage as it is able to more closely control the performance of its chipsets.
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