After announcing its Chromebook Flip in April, Asus is nearly ready to start delivering the product.
Several retailers are taking pre-orders for the $249 Chromebook Flip with stock expected in the next three weeks according to Brent Sullivan on Google+.
As an active member of the Chromebook community there, Sullivan routinely checks in with retailers for new device details. Note that Asus hasn't officially announced a release date, so any pre-orders could quickly turn into backorders.
Asus provided most of the information about its new Chromebook two months ago, so there aren't any surprises here.
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For $249, you get the now-typical base Chromebook configuration with 2 GB of memory and 16 GB of flash storage for local files. The 10.1-inch display has a 720p resolution; again, standard fare for low-cost Chromebooks.
What makes the Flip unique, however, is that the display flips around, turning the device into a Chrome OS tablet of sorts.
Also different with the Chromebook Flip is Asus's choice to use a Rockchip 3238 processor. Being ARM-based, it won't likely offer the performance of a Chromebook with an Intel chip. I've tested around 20 Chromebooks over the past several years and while the ARM-based ones are sufficient, those with recent Intel chips are generally faster while also providing similar battery life.
Regardless, I'm looking forward to giving the Chromebook Flip a spin. I've long wanted a Chrome OS tablet based on the simplicity of the platform and because I tend to work in a browser for 90 percent of my computing activities.
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