Chromebooks?

M

mkrohn

2[H]4U
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Apr 30, 2012
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I was bored last night and did a bit of sniping.... ended up scoring an Atom samsung chromebook for under $200... Now anybody have much hands on with the chrome OS? I'm considering using it with chrome or upgrading the mSATA drive and popping linux on it.

I have a 15" laptop that I do the bigger stuff on but I was wanting something lightweight for backpack travel on the lighter school days that I don't need everything on

While I believe most of the chromebooks are overpriced picking up an atom based one under $200 gives me plenty of options at least. Are these netbooks finally decent or are they the same POS netbooks we all hated a few years back?
 
The Samsung 11" Chromebook looks nice but I'd have to use one for a few weeks to see if I could live with the restrictions of Chrome OS.
 
they look nice and are interesting, worst case I play with it for a few weeks then sell it off... hopefully I sniped it low enough that I can recover all the money
 
mSata + an unbloated version of linux "whatever that means" would serve you well but that seems like the onyl thing you can do with it. I don't consider [H] members to be check email, post facebook type people so for any other type of precessing need you need to do that change. IT would be a cheap nice linux platform though, I must admit.
Currently google's apps are years behind other productivity software and compatability is "ok" at best. Again, if you are writing more than a letter, or sorting data points on a worksheet column, you are going to need more than Chrome OS.
 
Atom powered 12" http://www.ebay.com/itm/Samsung-Chr...FYrAgSZg91dlQWg8z7sf0%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc ended up sniping for under $200 so now windows even is an option but I'll play with chrome first.

Honestly for typing up things like schoolwork the google docs stuff is absolutely fine. Doesn't MS have an online version of office? I'll have to lookup what all was in that 4yr student license I saw on dreamspark... worst case I spend like $50 on a bigger mSATA drive and put windows on it. I'm thinking primarily for the wife really because you know most of those women think the internet is only facebook anyway.
 
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I have an 11.6" Samsung Chromebook. For what it is, it's not bad at all. No fan, good battery life, HDMI output, plays most streaming video without issue.

I just wanted to try out a Chromebook, and I'm happy with it. Never going to replace my main PC, but as a travel internet machine, it's thin, light, etc.
 
kirbyrj said:
I have an 11.6" Samsung Chromebook. For what it is, it's not bad at all. No fan, good battery life, HDMI output, plays most streaming video without issue.

I just wanted to try out a Chromebook, and I'm happy with it. Never going to replace my main PC, but as a travel internet machine, it's thin, light, etc.
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I have a lenovo P500 which is 4.9lbs but has the full voltage I5. I figured it would be a good idea to get something small and cheap to make into a kids and wife laptop that can still actually do what they need.
 
mkrohn said:
I have a lenovo P500 which is 4.9lbs but has the full voltage I5. I figured it would be a good idea to get something small and cheap to make into a kids and wife laptop that can still actually do what they need.
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Yeah, depending on what your wife/kids do, you might be able to get away with just running ChromeOS on it.
 
kirbyrj said:
Yeah, depending on what your wife/kids do, you might be able to get away with just running ChromeOS on it.
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Exactly, so long as you set the right expectations you wont be disappointed. I just recently purchased the Samsung Chromebook and it's exactly what I needed in terms of mobility. My wife has the iPad and while she loves it, I cant stand trying to surf forums and type on the thing. However, the Chromebook is exactly what I need sitting on the couch to surf the web and watch a youtube video here and there. After two weeks I ended up selling my Macbook Air and havent looked back.
 
yeah its pretty nice for biking to and from school when all I need is basic stuff. It's a product without a very well defined niche. I'm considering some of these tablet blowouts and just a keyboard case. It's a product that needs to either be cheaper or do more. Hopefully google will get their stuff together faster on this.
 
robvas said:
There's a new Samsung Chromebook coming out pretty soon.
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I'd be interested to see what they do. I can't imagine they are going to be that drastically different than the current gen of arm chromebooks.
 
I've been a Chromebook user for about 6 months now. Being a bit old skool, I gravitate to keyboard rather than touchscreen. So, after about a month with a Chromebook, I sold my Transformer tablet in favor of a cb as my mobile device. I started with an Atom N570-based cb. Later, I sold that one and switched to a Samsung 550, that has a Celeron CPU and a great screen (1280 x 800). The newest cb's with the ARM CPU look nice as well, but with my older eyes, I much prefer the screen on the 550. Honestly, even though I've got a couple of nice PC builds at home (i3570k, i3220), for gaming, HTPC, etc, I'm sure I spend more time on the cb than my other 2 computers combined. I'm surprised cb's aren't more popular than they are. It's like having a Macbook Air that you don't have to worry about or keep such a close eye on when you're out in the world with it. The only drawback with the cb I see is that, if you want to play around with any kind of code, your options are limited to nil (Unless you want to install linux on it, and maybe a larger mSATA, and then you could do pretty much anything. But if you're going to do that, I'd say just go buy a low-end laptop.)
 
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