My favorite browser, regardless of platform, is Google Chrome and I wondered how long it would take for Google to release Chrome for Android. Well, the wait is finally over. Sort of.… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

(image courtesy Fotopedia)

Sarah and I have had a busy summer, but the big finale was definitely this past week. We started out Labor Day weekend, where we headed to Virginia, before returning to New Jersey for a day and then heading to Maine for a friend’s wedding. Lots of travel, lots of packing, lots of gear. What did we learn? Read on to see our hard-earned lessons and tips!

Technology:

Let’s start with travel gear. I opted to travel light to VA since we were driving to Richmond, then Virginia Beach for a race, then back to Richmond and then finally home. So all I had with me then was my… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

It is easy to forget in the flood of Android tablets that Google has another operating system in their quiver-Chrome OS. It has been maligned as “too late” and dismissed as just another netbook option, but it is so much more.

If your primary work is in the cloud, especially Google services, and you’re looking for a fast computing option with great battery life, hold off on that tablet purchase. First watch my quick Chrome OS overview video, then consider this: for $499 you can have a Chromebook with wifi and 3G. Plus Verizon and Google will throw in 100mb of 3G free each month for TWO YEARS! Plus any add-on data starts at $20 prepaid for 1GB. That’s a lot cheaper than… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

The other day I wrote about the free offer Rovio was having on Angry Birds for Chrome. Now you can get a fan-made recreation of the original Super Mario Bros for Chrome … also for free! Here are some of the details:

Super Mario Bros. Crossover is a fan game that recreates the original Super Mario Bros. and allows you to play it as characters from other games. It’s a throwback to classic video games and is a nice reminder that games don’t have to be complicated to be fun. It is not intended to inhibit the copyright holders of the original games it is based on in any way. Instead, it is a

I’m not sure I understand the Chromebook pricing model. Acer is introducing an 11.6″ Chromebook [Ars Technica] in June, with wifi-only for $350. Samsung’s 12″ model will come with 3G wireless in addition to wifi, and cost $500. I could buy a Gateway dual-core Windows 7 11.6″ netbook today for $330 [Amazon]. The Gateway has 160 GB of hard drive space; the Chromebooks are limited to a much smaller amount of SSD space (16 GB).

So, where’s the market for a notebook computer which costs as much as (or more than) a notebook with a known OS? Don’t get me wrong, I love my Cr-48, which I call Stealthbook… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

Ok, maybe it’s just me (and Sarah!) We’re tired, it was a long, exhausting weekend. We were watching TV when the new Google Chrome commercial came on. In seconds we were both a bit teary-eyed. It was sweet. It was dorky. It was really, really brilliant. Yes, instead of taking the obvious path and focusing on specific Google services such as Gmail, it showcases the way memories can be saved. Its message, ” This isn’t about Google Chrome it is about you, your life and the stuff that matters!”

It’s ridiculously adorable and worth watching.

I woke up this morning and had 80 emails. My first thought was that my email had been hacked, because why else would I have 80+ emails over the course of 8 hours??? Then I started reading them, and realized someone at Google “helpfully” opened the floodgates on a Chrome OS beta tester Google Group.

The craziest part is that not everyone receiving the emails has a CR-48 netbook. So in addition to 40 emails saying “how do I unsubscribe/why am I getting spammed” and another 20 explaining how to change subscription options in Google Groups, there were a handful of “So am I getting a CR-48?” type emails as well. Maybe 10 of the emails were… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

It’s been just about a week since I received my CR-48 Chrome OS netbook. In that time I’ve turned on my Toshiba netbook (running Windows 7) twice, and only used my Macbook to check my email a few times. Otherwise all my home computer use has been on Chrome, including writing posts for Gear Diary. While it is still quite early in my Chrome experience, and the OS is very, very young, I thought I’d share my likes and dislikes thus far…think of it as a mini-review…a miniview!

Likes:

• Getting started is dead easy. Once I did the initial setup (and activated the built

chrome OS screenshot.png on Aviary.

I pulled into my driveway today just as UPS was driving away. Like everyone else this holiday season, I’ve been on an Amazon spree buying gifts for family and friends, so I wasn’t TOO surprised to see the big brown truck. However, the package on my front porch wasn’t from Amazon. It was from someone I didn’t know, from a place called “Digital 6-10″ somewhere in Kentucky. I ripped it open thinking it was an eBook reader or some other item for review, and Sarah was the first to realize, “Hey, that’s totally a laptop package…did you buy a laptop and forget?”

NOPE! Google sent me a CR-48 Chrome… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

Do you use Google Chrome? How many tabs do you open in a day? Imagine that by simply opening tabs you could donate a charity! From now through December 19th you can do exactly that – simply install the “Chrome for a Cause” extension and open tabs as you normally would, knowing that each time you do a little

Here is a snippet from the Chrome blog:

Whether it’s bug fixes to the Chromium open source project, dazzling apps and extensions arriving daily in our Web Store, or boundary-pushing Chrome experiments — the Chrome community never fails to inspire us with their awesomeness.

This holiday, we wanted to

If you’re a heavy Google user such as myself, then you probably noticed the new mandatory “Everything” bar now located on the left side of your Google search page. Some may not care but me being a daily Netbook user, I need all the screen space I can get. A friend emailed an article from TweakGuides on how to get rid of this new annoyance. I thought I would pass along the information in case anyone else finds this new Everything bar as useless as I do. With a desktop machine or native widescreen it’s not as much an issue because the search results usually don’t take up the entire span of the screen anyway… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

While the Google Chrome browser hasnt been out very long, it already has a loyal following.  More and more Mac users are giving Chrome a shot, to see if it can replace Firefox or Safari. The biggest complaint  thus far has been a lack of bookmark and extension sync.  Well, not anymore.

According to Lifehacker, Google just put out an update bringing extension and bookmark sync to Macs.  Mac users can also join the extension support from Chrome extension gallery.

Chrome for Mac is finally catching up with all the functions the Windows users have had for a while.

For a full list of all the updates, visit the Dev

Photo Courtesy of IslandCrisis

Google shuffles the deck again by letting loose some new information on their own branding of products. A few weeks ago the announced the Nexus One with rumors of selling it carrier free. Now reports are coming out of some Netbooks sporting Google’s shiny new Chrome OS. These low-priced machines has some pretty hefty specs and some appealing price tags. With Google cornering the market in mobile ads, that may translate cheaper prices out the door to the consumer.

A few models are rumored to be released. Google is currently in talks with vendors about pricing and different model options. Some of the $300 spec highlights are an ARM CPU… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

Its only 10 more shopping days until Christmas is here.  Haven’t figured out yet what to get that favorite geek in your life?  How about Google Chrome, the web browser making all the headlines these past few weeks?

Google wants people to know about and use their flagship web browser.  So, they figured out a way to do a tie in to Christmas.  Its a theme for them, starting with the Christmas postcard giveaway they did a few weeks back.

To give the gift of Chrome, go to the Chrome for Christmas web site, choose some themed “wrapping”  paper which gets wrapped around the Google Chrome logo and then is delivered via… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

And just when you thought you’d have to wait until January 2010, Google decides to give another Christmas present to us all by releasing Chrome for Mac (beta), Chrome for Linux (beta) and extensions for Chrome for Windows and Linux.  What a nice surprise!

According to the Official Google  Mac Blog:

73,804 lines of Mac-specific code and 29 developer builds later, we’re excited to finally release Google Chrome for Mac in beta. We took a hefty dose of goodness from the Windows version to build a fast, polished browser for Mac — with features such as the Omnibox (where you can both search and type in addresses), themes from artists, and most importantly, speed. Try