Wow that's ugly, all the bad memories of the netbook era just came flooding back....
But even worse, these devices have practically NO local storage. At least netbooks came with 120GB hard disks!
$149 Chromebooks
401–410 of 425 posts
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#402This thread is being totally astroturfed by Googlers, or people actually like the specs of that thing? I don't get it. People, you can buy machines that have a proper os AND a browser ... but you're ready to spend money on a glorified browser?
Agreed!
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#403The ChromeBit looks pretty cool though. Entire computer in a flash drive.
You can buy the chromebox which is somewhat similar but not as compacy as a chromebit http://www.amazon.com/Asus-CHROMEBOX-M004U-ASUS-Desktop/dp/B...
Still has a dependency on an external mainframe though; better to buy an Intel NUC perhaps?
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#404Earlier quoted context omitted.
$149 is ridiculously cheap and I don't think Microsoft wants, or should want to operate in that market. At the $200-$300 price range there are many Windows choices - most with significantly better hardware and features. Microsoft: Leave the sub $200 market to others and leverage your online services to sell to those consumers.
I agree. Microsoft should ignore this because there's no money in it. Still, it's nice that a couple billion new people will be able to afford their first computer.
Yes, but it's a tethered computer with a dependency on a mainframe.
Do these poor people that this device is targeting also have sufficient money to pay for constant network access? The total cost of ownership for one of these suddenly becomes very high when you factor that in.
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#405Where is the $149 Windows-Based laptop with SSD, 2-4GB RAM, and moderate graphics, that can run your usual Office to Minecraft software? The Chromebook-killer from Microsoft should be here, but all I hear about are the Surfaces. Honestly, the only reason my kids don't have Chromebooks is because they don't easily run Minecraft or downloadable games. Sure they can do their school work on them, but they also like to pl…
There are Windows tablets at that price range that can run office. Not idea if they can run Minecraft, considering its a horribly unoptimized java application. The HP Stream 7 and 8 has an x86 1.8ghz atom chip in it. BYOK. The Stream 11 has a keyboard but chimes in at $199. Games using DirectX and native libraries work. There are a lot of Stream 7 and 8 youtube videos showing gaming performance. If anything, the Chro…
Very true, those HP Stream devices look competitive compared to these Chromebooks.
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#406Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Chromebooks in Q3 2013 had at best a 1.2 percent share of the PC market and a 0.76 percent share of the combined PC-tablet market." Latest IDC figures show Chromebooks continue to struggle http://www.zdnet.com/article/latest-idc-figures-show-chromeb...
Q3 2013 is a long time ago. According to NPD, Chromebooks had 14% market share in 2014, counting retail and commercial (read: education) channels. Growth was up 85% year over year, too, which is amazing in the context of a stagnant/declining laptop market. http://betanews.com/2015/02/24/2015-is-year-of-the-chromeboo...
NPD is a less reliable source covering a much smaller market (not that any of them are reliable).
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#407Earlier quoted context omitted.
The "PC market" refers to current sales. "Installed base" is the term for the metric that includes the languishing WinXP machines.
Ah yeah you're right. The 1% came from some guy extrapolating Samsung's sales of Chromebooks to mean the whole Chromebook market...
Some guy being a professional journalist who actually made some effort to analyze the numbers.
I appreciate from the downvotes above that some people prefer to believe what they want to believe ;-)
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#408Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've never understood this argument. You need a connection for web-based use-cases. You don't need a connection for non web-based use-cases (document editing, etc works offline). The same is true of any OS.
But it's true that with ChromeOS the entire usability of the product is massively different without Internet access. All of the "apps" don't work as well without an Internet connection. This doesn't happen with an ordinary machine (if you open Word whilst offline, it isn't crippled). I think storing all of your data online is foolish, basically as it means that offline you're scuppered.
[deleted]
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#409Just not the greatest for programmers... But cool for everyone else!
I disagree. If you're not doing hardware-level hacking, a cloud IDE like Cloud9 ( https://c9.io ) beats any fragile client-side workspace I've ever used.
It doesn't just have to be hardware level hacking. c9 is great but, anywhere that you want a decent amount of control over web server(apache, tomcat) configs, graphics acceleration for games, or storage of large local files, you're going to need something more. I'd take Ubuntu any day. Given the choice, what are some reasons to actually choose Chrome OS over Ubuntu?
Re: $149 Chromebooks
#410Earlier quoted context omitted.
The touchpad on the Chromebook Pixel (the annoyingly expensive one) is high end. Large glass multitouch touchpad. I doubt you'd be satisfied with the keyboard though. So I think the answer is probably "No." The most expensive one available doesn't have a good keyboard by 60-series era Thinkpad standards, so I would be surprised if any do.
The most expensive Chromebook doesn't cater to Thinkpad users. The Lenovo Chromebook might.
I seriously doubt it. I have never seen a non-Thinkpad branded Lenovo laptop that would satisfy somebody who liked the R60's keyboard.