Ars Technica: Rumor has it Google is work­ing on a Chromebook Pixel, with a 2560×1700 touch dis­play. That’s an unusual 1.5:1 aspect ratio. If Google is work­ing on a Chromebook Pixel it would prob­a­bly be 2560×1440 (16:9) or 2560×1600 (16:10).

Update 2013.02.21: Google Chrome Blog:

Let’s start with the screen. This Chromebook has the high­est pixel den­sity (239 pix­els per inch) of any lap­top screen on the mar­ket today. Packed with 4.3 mil­lion pix­els, the dis­play offers sharp text, vivid col­ors and extra-wide view­ing angles. With a screen this rich and engag­ing, you want to reach out and touch it—so we added touch for a more immer­sive expe­ri­ence. Touch makes it sim­ple and intu­itive to do things like orga­nize tabs, swipe through apps and edit pho­tos with the tip of your finger.

The Gorilla Glass cov­ered touch LCD is 12.85 inches and sports a pixel for­mat of 2560×1700. I orig­i­nally thought the Chromebook Pixel would fea­ture a 16:9 or 16:10 dis­play; I was wrong. The 2560×1700 pixel for­mat trans­late to a 3:2 aspect ratio. The same year Apple goes from 3:2 to 16:9 on the iPhone 5, Google decides to go from 16:9 to 3:2 for its top-of-the-line Chromebook effort.

With 2560×1700 you can put 1280×1700 side by side. This would be awe­some for the way I work. I agree with Google here: With 1700 ver­ti­cal pix­els we’ll be scrolling up and down a lot less. I like the blocky design, too.

Priced at US$1299 or $1449 with LTE, but keep in mind a full blown 13.3-inch 2560×1600 MacBook Pro can be had for $1499. But if mod­ders hack the Chromebook Pixel to run other oper­at­ing sys­tems the steep price might end up being not so steep.

Update 2013.03.01: via John Gruber. Ian Betteridge:

The show­stop­per fea­ture of the Pixel, and the inspi­ra­tion for its name, is the screen. And what a screen. I was for­tu­nate enough to test the first retina MacBook Pro, and the screen on the Pixel gave me the same kind of feel­ing: that we’re finally at the future of com­put­ing I imag­ined 20 years ago, with screens that have the def­i­n­i­tion of vivid­ness of high-quality paper, where pix­els are some­thing you know exist in the­ory, but never actu­ally see. The next-cheapest machine with a screen this good (the 13in Retina MacBook Pro) will cost you £200 more.

The dis­play is with­out doubt excel­lent, but so are many other parts of the Chromebook Pixel: a track­pad that feels bet­ter than the one on the MacBook Air, and a per­fect key­board accord­ing to Betteridge. The Chromebook Pixel sug­gests Google has caught up to Apple when it comes to hard­ware qual­ity and atten­tion to detail.