Hisense, Haier and Asus all launching Rockchip powered Chromebooks

Chinese chip maker Rockchip have found some powerful partners in Haier, Hisense and Asus who have chosen the RK3288 SoC to power their new Chromebooks.

The quad-core RK3288 chip from Rockchip is a powerful chipset based on Cartex A17 architecture running at up to 1.8Ghz with a 600Mz Mali T760 GPU more than enough grunt to run a Chromebook which is exactly what will be doing in new devices from Haier, Hisense and Asus.

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The Asus C201 offering will back a 11.6-inch display, and offers 13 hour battery life all for an amazing low $169 price tag. Hisense have also gone for a 11.6-inch panel but with a lower price of only $149 the same as the new Haier Chromebook with built-in carry handle and removable battery.

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Those are some very impressive little laptops at less than $200. Each laptop is headed for the U.S this year with Europe and other destinations in the coming months.

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About the author

Robin Maxwell
Hi, Robin Maxwell here! Mobile technology is my passions, and while I've been known to dabble with iOS devices I'm a firm Android convert, currently waiting for the Oppo Find 5 to launch!!

- iKosh
  April 2, 2015
  Probably will cost $300 until it gets to Europe. I start to search reseller sites.
- iKosh
  April 2, 2015
  I was wrong. The price is the same in the U.S so it sholdn’t cost more in Europe. Unfortunately I’m technically not in Europe.

pa5t1s
April 2, 2015
- iKosh
  April 2, 2015
  Probably will cost $300 until it gets to Europe. I start to search reseller sites.
- iKosh
  April 2, 2015
  I was wrong. The price is the same in the U.S so it sholdn’t cost more in Europe. Unfortunately I’m technically not in Europe.
bobo
April 2, 2015
My Toshiba Chromebook 2 does not lag even with twenty tabs open. I believe Chromebooks are viable mainstream laptops replacements. That’s if you just use a laptop to prepare/type and edit documents, watch movies and listen to music.
- - asd
    April 3, 2015
    - Apply scotch tape to your smartphone camera (both of them)
    - balcobomber25
      April 3, 2015
      Big brother is watching you no matter what platform you use. Apple, M$oft, Google, Samsung they have all had problems with privacy concerns and the NSA over the past few years. The only safe way to masturbate is the old fashioned way with a magazine.

wackenroader
April 3, 2015
- wat
  April 3, 2015
  - - wat
      April 4, 2015
      Thanks for proving yourself wrong. Intel own 20% of two chip manufacturers does not = “Rockchip is now intel”. Rockchip have a deal with Intel, that does not mean they are Intel. This is like saying “Apple is Samsung because they have a deal with them”, or “Wacom is Samsung because Samsung owns 10% of Wacom”.
      - balcobomber25
        April 4, 2015
        Intel and Rockchip are going to develop mobile chips together. They have a new chip planned for 2015 which includes 4 Intel Atom Chips and an Intel 3G/4G modem. So while they may only own a small percentage of Rockchip, he isn’t entirely off with his comment.
        
        wat
        April 4, 2015
        He stated “Rockchip is Intelchip”, no. Intel licensed some of their technology to Rockchip and in return get tto utilise Rockchip as a middle man to Chinese SoC manufacturers. Nothing in any of these deals results in the statement that “Rockchip is intel”. They are still very independent companies.
        
        wackenroader
        April 5, 2015
        I know about this, since Apple have some percents of Imgtec and powervr gpu is not restricted to idevices. I say “Rockchip is now intelchip” and you confirm: “Intel licensed some of their technology to Rockchip and in return get
        tto utilise Rockchip as a middle man to Chinese SoC manufacturers”.
        wat
        April 5, 2015
        That does not mean “Rockchip is intel” just because they have some small deals going on with each other.
        balcobomber25
        April 7, 2015
        Sure they are independent companies but they are co-deveolping chips which will use parts from both companies. Rockchip is not Intel by the technical definition but they are going to being using almost entirely Intel parts. Your just arguing about his choice of words not the actual context.
        
        wat
        April 7, 2015
        No, I’m absolutely arguing the context. You’ve blown the whole deal way out of proportion, it’s absolutely insane. Intel aren’t using any Rockchip tech and Rockchip are still producing ARM CPUs.
        balcobomber25
        April 7, 2015
        Go back and read my original comment to you. No where did I say he was right, I said he wasn’t entirely off. Meaning some of what he says has truth to it. Rockchip is designing a SoC that will use Intel components.

bobo
April 3, 2015
My Toshiba Chromebook 2 does not lag even with twenty tabs open. I believe Chromebooks are viable mainstream laptops replacements. That’s if you just use a laptop to prepare/type and edit documents, watch movies and listen to music.
- Dmitry Lupich
  April 3, 2015
  Cloud operating systems are our future!
- Guest
  April 3, 2015
  Big brother watching you masturbate.
- Dmitry Lupich
  April 3, 2015
  Apply scotch tape to your smartphone camera (both of them)
- balcobomber25
  April 3, 2015
  Big brother is watching you no matter what platform you use. Apple, M$oft, Google, Samsung they have all had problems with privacy concerns and the NSA over the past few years. The only safe way to masturbate is the old fashioned way with a magazine.
- +1876™ plus1876.net
  April 5, 2015
wackenroader
April 3, 2015
- Guest
  April 3, 2015
- This comment was deleted.
- balcobomber25
  April 4, 2015
  Intel and Rockchip are going to develop mobile chips together. They have a new chip planned for 2015 which includes 4 Intel Atom Chips and an Intel 3G/4G modem. So while they may only own a small percentage of Rockchip, he isn’t entirely off with his comment.
- Guest
  April 4, 2015
  This comment was deleted.
- wackenroader
  April 5, 2015
  I know about this, since Apple have some percents of Imgtec and powervr gpu is not restricted to idevices. I say “Rockchip is now intelchip” and you confirm: “Intel licensed some of their technology to Rockchip and in return get
  tto utilise Rockchip as a middle man to Chinese SoC manufacturers”.
- balcobomber25
  April 7, 2015
  Sure they are independent companies but they are co-deveolping chips which will use parts from both companies. Rockchip is not Intel by the technical definition but they are going to being using almost entirely Intel parts. Your just arguing about his choice of words not the actual context.
- Guest
  April 7, 2015
  This comment was deleted.
- balcobomber25
  April 8, 2015
  Go back and read my original comment to you. No where did I say he was right, I said he wasn’t entirely off. Meaning some of what he says has truth to it. Rockchip is designing a SoC that will use Intel components.

Natsumi
April 3, 2015
- balcobomber25
  April 3, 2015
  You can easily run Linux on the Chromebook. It is a lot easier with an Intel chip and a HD over an Arm chip and Flash but it is possible on either. Fedora, Ubuntu, Arch, Bodhi, and several others have all been run successfully on Chromebooks.
  - Natsumi
    April 3, 2015
    - balcobomber25
      April 4, 2015
      Google continues to make it easier to run Linux on Chromebooks. Many distros can be run off a USB. I installed Peppermint OS on mine for a while. It offers all the ease and simplicity of ChromeOS but the added features of an Ubuntu based linux. It’s very lightweight too.
      - Natsumi
        April 4, 2015
        balcobomber25
        April 6, 2015
        You can install them directly to the built in hard drive/SSD, Ubuntu is the easiest one to do (google Chrubuntu).

BenShenzhen
April 3, 2015
I would love to use a chromebook, which would be great for most of my laptop use, but living in China makes google based products difficult to work fully.
- asd
  April 3, 2015
  Install linux on it, and problem is solved.
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  Very easy to run Ubuntu on it. It makes an excellent Linux laptop.
balcobomber25
April 3, 2015
After growing tired of windows and its constant problems a few years ago I broke down and bought a Chomebook (Samsung). I have had it for over 3 years now and it runs exactly the same as it did brand new. It still wakes up instantly, never has frozen once, never had any problems with viruses or spyware.
- - balcobomber25
    April 6, 2015
    Due to the fact that virtually everything in a Chromebook is run in the cloud there is no spyware to be installed on the computer. Whereas with Windows everything you download these days is physically stored on your hard drive most spyware runs when you go to install the physical program.

Natsumi
April 3, 2015
- balcobomber25
  April 3, 2015
  You can easily run Linux on the Chromebook. It is a lot easier with an Intel chip and a HD over an Arm chip and Flash but it is possible on either. Fedora, Ubuntu, Arch, Bodhi, and several others have all been run successfully on Chromebooks.
- Natsumi
  April 3, 2015
  Thank you, now I only need much more SSD space….. XD
- balcobomber25
  April 4, 2015
  Google continues to make it easier to run Linux on Chromebooks. Many distros can be run off a USB. I installed Peppermint OS on mine for a while. It offers all the ease and simplicity of ChromeOS but the added features of an Ubuntu based linux. It’s very lightweight too.
- Natsumi
  April 4, 2015
  I wanted gnu/linux inside, as an OS. Maybe I try in the future…
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  You can install them directly to the built in hard drive/SSD, Ubuntu is the easiest one to do (google Chrubuntu).

Guest
April 3, 2015
I would love to use a chromebook, which would be great for most of my laptop use, but living in China makes google based products difficult to work fully.
- Guest
  April 3, 2015
  Install linux on it, and problem is solved.
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  Very easy to run Ubuntu on it. It makes an excellent Linux laptop.
Andrawid
April 3, 2015
These will be DOA as Microsoft is planning to unleash an assault on Chromebooks with Netbooks/Convertibles featuring full Windows and slated to start at $149.
- Those already exist, search HP stream 11, 13 or 14.
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  M$oft already tried that this holiday season with the Stream. Amazon had sales on the Stream all season long, every Chromebook outsold it. For the the third straight year Amazon’s top selling laptops this holiday season were Chromebooks.
  - April 6, 2015
    Who wouldn’t prefer a chromebook to a stream? Sure the stream cost less, but windows is nothing but a headache to maintain. I use Avast on my windows laptop and there’s no way of turning off the pop ups that Avast creates to convince you that you need to upgrade your plan to protect you from this or from that and how much junk you have and connection being insecure and so on. My wifi is wpa2, the password is around 18-20 characters long and I’m the only one using it. I can also switch to Ubuntu at startup.
    - balcobomber25
      April 7, 2015
      Yea the problem with a $149 laptop is it still runs Windows. Whether it is Windows XP, 8 or the new 10 it is still Windows at heart.
balcobomber25
April 3, 2015
After growing tired of windows and its constant problems a few years ago I broke down and bought a Chomebook (Samsung). I have had it for over 3 years now and it runs exactly the same as it did brand new. It still wakes up instantly, never has frozen once, never had any problems with viruses or spyware.
- +1876™ plus1876.net
  April 5, 2015
  No spyware to your knowledge.
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  Due to the fact that virtually everything in a Chromebook is run in the cloud there is no spyware to be installed on the computer. Whereas with Windows everything you download these days is physically stored on your hard drive most spyware runs when you go to install the physical program.
Andrawid
April 3, 2015
These will be DOA as Microsoft is planning to unleash an assault on Chromebooks with Netbooks/Convertibles featuring full Windows and slated to start at $149.
- +1876™ plus1876.net
  April 5, 2015
  Those already exist, search HP stream 11, 13 or 14.
- balcobomber25
  April 6, 2015
  M$oft already tried that this holiday season with the Stream. Amazon had sales on the Stream all season long, every Chromebook outsold it. For the the third straight year Amazon’s top selling laptops this holiday season were Chromebooks.
- +1876™ plus1876.net
  April 6, 2015
  Who wouldn’t prefer a chromebook to a stream? Sure the stream cost less, but windows is nothing but a headache to maintain. I use Avast on my windows laptop and there’s no way of turning off the pop ups that Avast creates to convince you that you need to upgrade your plan to protect you from this or from that and how much junk you have and connection being insecure and so on. My wifi is wpa2, the password is around 18-20 characters long and I’m the only one using it. I can also switch to Ubuntu at startup.
- balcobomber25
  April 7, 2015
  Yea the problem with a $149 laptop is it still runs Windows. Whether it is Windows XP, 8 or the new 10 it is still Windows at heart.

Robin Maxwell

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