Suddenly, Google is making great hardware

Suddenly, Google is making great hardware

 

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Google, known historically for its Web products, is now making popular gadgets
• Over the last year, Google has released a string of incredible hardware products
• The Chromebook Pixel laptop and Chromecast TV-streaming device are big hits
• To endure in the tech world, a company can't just rely on doing one thing well

Three years ago, Google was where you turned to look up a recipe. To check your e-mail. To chat with your friends when you were supposed to be working.

But in the tech equivalent of a blink of the eye, things today are much different. Throughout the last year, Google has released a string of incredible hardware products, not just a bunch of virtual services you use through another company's device.

Google really kicked it into gear in July 2012 with the Nexus 7, its first-ever tablet, that was priced at just $199. Reviewers went nuts. It wasn't just a great tablet because it was so cheap, it was simply a great tablet. Even the iPad mini, which came out a few months later and sold for $130 more, wasn't as good.

Then came another string of winners: The Nexus 4 smartphone, which you can buy unlocked and without a contract for just $299. The Chromebook Pixel, a beautiful laptop with a stunning high-resolution touchscreen. And more recently, the Chromecast, a dongle that plugs directly into your TV and lets you beam video from your Android device, iPhone or iPad.

And finally there's the Moto X, a new smartphone from Google-owned Motorola that's one of the most accessible and easy to use Android phones I've ever tested.

As Apple keeps its head down and works on iterative (but great) updates to its iPhone and iPad line, and as Microsoft struggles to find a way to make Windows 8 devices like its Surface tablet resonate with the public, Google is releasing some of the most interesting and innovative hardware we've seen recently.

As a high-level executive at a very large tech company recently told me, no company can hope to be successful these days unless it can offer an ecosystem of software, services, and great devices to run them all on. Yes, that's the Apple model, but it's a model that's been proven to be a hit with consumers in the new mobile computing era

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