Google, Samsung, and Acer might be waiting until June 15 to launch their new Chromebooks, but that doesn’t mean we can’t take a peek at the new features -- we just switched our Cr-48 to the development channel and tried out the new file manager and media player. Surprise, they work just like a file manager and media player! We will say that the cloud services integration is nice -- we uploaded a picture to Picasa Web Albums with just a single click, and the service even detected our Google account and logged in automatically. A 480p video file played adequately, but the underpowered hardware in the Cr-48 was no match for a 1080p file -- but hey, points to Chrome OS for effort.
Chrome OS file manager and media player hands-on
is editor-in-chief of The Verge, host of the Decoder podcast, and co-host of The Vergecast.
Unfortunately, the Cr-48’s terrible trackpad remains terrible in this build of the software -- and it became totally unusable when we loaded up Angry Birds for Chrome. We’ll see if Google’s fixed this problem when the official Samsung and Acer Chromebooks ship next month. Until then, check out the video below.
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