At first, I thought the idea of the Chromebook was stupid. I mean.. Who would want a computer that can only run a browser and nothing else? Who would want it if its entire usefulness depends on being connected to WiFi? WELL I went out and bought one. Here are my thoughts on the Chromebook after having had it for a couple months:
- It's AMAZINGLY affordable. $249 USD is a really nice price for a laptop.
- It's VERY portable. Its form factor and even appearance is very comparable to MacBook Air.
- It's FAST. Boots in seconds. Literally, after having powered it down and closed it, I open it and it automatically starts booting. I don't even have enough time to unravel and plug the charger in the wall before it's at the login screen. It wakes up from shutting the lid after like a half second. win.
- The keyboard is very good. It has great support for input languages and layouts. I was VERY HAPPY and even a little surprised to see the Dvorak layout supported. (Why I am weird and use Dvorak among other things in another post.)
- The trackpad pretty much just reminds me of Mac except it pretty much only recognises up to two finger gestures. That's all I need really.
- It really IS useful. Two words: Web Apps. And some of them have capability to work offline. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Google Drive + Docs/Sheets/Slides works without an internet connection after going into my Google Drive Settings and enabling that feature. So I can write documents, edit spreadsheets or presentations offline. At this point, for me, this thing is literally every bit as useful as my netbook. Which honestly isn't super useful outside the internet. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it has a file manager pre-installed and that it works nicely with NTFS external hard drives. I was able to watch videos and look at photos on the hard drive easily. And there is a torrent app (JSTorrent).
- The battery life is good. I can use this when I'm out throughout the day without even worrying about running out of battery before I get back home.
So basically, for $249 this thing does everything I need it to do. (Especially since I used a cool little script Crouton to install Ubuntu. More on this later) And it basically just runs Google Chrome. I'm surprised at how much I can do with a browser. It's for most consumers basically a functional laptop. The only programs I miss from my netbook were Skype and TeamSpeak. Google+ Hangout has been working ok as an alternative, but not everyone has Google+... Cool thing is, a friend of mine sent me his used netbook, so I actually have one again. :)
So yeah, if you are looking for a cheap laptop and you're on the web a lot, look no further than a Chromebook. If you already have a Chromebook, I suggest checking out the following links if you have not already. (From the Chromebooks Community on Google+)
So yeah, if you are looking for a cheap laptop and you're on the web a lot, look no further than a Chromebook. If you already have a Chromebook, I suggest checking out the following links if you have not already. (From the Chromebooks Community on Google+)
