[Closed] Chromebooks, any good?

http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/just-had-a-play-with-a-chromebooka-and
http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/psa-samsung-chromebook-bargin

I have two in the house, and all my colleagues in my company use them. If you have any specific questions after reading about the general principles in the other threads, put them in here.

When I tried one the other day the very nice bird from Google said uploading music to google play was very easy and you get 20,000 songs free of charge.
I think they're pretty cool and ill prob get one once I've sold a couple of net books I've got lying around.

and you can then play them on any device without restriction.

However, the google autoplaylists are a pain in the arse as you cant stop them loading songs onto the device and clogging up space.

I'm thinking one of these would be very handy for me for work, now that I swapped over to Three and actually get 3G most of the time around Bath and Bristol rather than limping along on Vodafone's shite network. I can actually order stuff and get it delivered to site next day.

Which is best compromise between price and qualitee. I particularly like being able to update my bookkeeping spreadsheet on google docs while having one of my ten cups of coffee a day. 🙂

DD - the grade A stock of the Samsung (£170) is better than a "new" old stock Acer C7 (£200). But the new HP which isnt yet in the google store looks very tidy.
http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/chrome/devices/hp-chromebook-11/

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/1020869.htm?CMPID=GS001&_$ja=cgid:8710366742|tsid:41408|cid:177975902|lid:54828447053|nw:g|crid:32474624942|rnd:1811412601876615307|dvc:c|adp:1o1

Is this not the same thing new for a tenner more? Seems like the best deal

thats a chromebox

Slightly different
Its a desktop version of a chrombook. Nice bits of kit. I will get some for our office when its ready.

Oops didn't actually read it just got off a price comparison!
seem like it will handle what I need.

Can I upload files directly from a memory card/stick on the chromebook?

Oops didn't actually read it just got off a price comparison!
seem like it will handle what I need.

Can I upload files directly from a memory card/stick on the chromebook?

yes it can read USB and SD without problems. You can copy from stick to SSD. But obv you're not encouraged to put much on the SSD given it's size.
It can also show most movie file types.

Cheers for all the advice.

Samsung or the new Acer seem like the ones to go for.

Bought an Acer C720 the other day. Light, powerful, long battery life. And under £200.

Theres a 14'' HP Chromebook out soon that looks promising.

I've had one for nearly a year and have found it to be a really useful bit of kit.

Important thing is to be realistic about what you want it to do. I'd def go for an ssd rather than the hd version though.

tomatoevousparlour - Member
Theres a 14'' HP Chromebook out soon that looks promising.

It is out here though I think only the 3G version - Wifi only one should be out very soon. I hope as I want one and my laptop's on its last legs...

Microsoft are fighting back hard, so they must be good 🙂

http://www.scroogled.com/chromebook

that's funny. It so misses the point 🙂

RDP client on chromebook?

yes, there's one that sits within chrome itself so if you have chrome installed on your other computer you can simply RDP to it with a PIN. It just works.
So I still have a big ol brute of a PC with MS suite on it that if Im really desperate I can RDP into. I havent had to yet.

The only time Ive used it in anger is to open Windows Media Centre and tell it to record something on TV while Im away 😳

Grips, this one
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chrome-remote-desktop/gbchcmhmhahfdphkhkmpfmihenigjmpp?hl=en

Obviously you dont need a chromebook to do it, any computer runnign chrome will.

I'd get one for the Mrs but she uses a piece of software that is Windows only.

That's what you use remote desktop for...

So many flippin options now though. Home IT capability planning is a lot harder than it used to be 🙂

geoffj - Member

Microsoft are fighting back hard, so they must be good

http://www.scroogled.com/chromebook
br />

Do the Chromebooks not support offline apps then like Drive/Docs on Android, PC or OSX do?

That whole website smacks of desperation from MS. They must be bricking it. A universally disliked desktop operating system, failed tablet and a phone OS which is decent but nobody is interested in.

Edit: Apparently yes [url= https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/3214688?hl=en-GB ]offline is supported[/url]

now posting from my new Acer C720 🙂

Very happy so far cost £180 with my dads discount he gets a currys through a work voucher scheme.

A universally disliked desktop operating system, failed tablet and a phone OS which is decent but nobody is interested in.

A disliked operating system that is nevertheless used by almost everyone
One of the two most popular games consoles plus a fair few hit games
The very best office software that has basically no competition and is even more ubiquitous than their ubiquitous OS

Yeah I'm sure they're crapping themselves 🙂

Well actually I think they are to some extent given that their PC market is crumbling and with virtualised computing a la chromebook coming along that's not going to help.

But the big plus they have and that you missed is that bb are planned to be dropped by several companies in the near future for Windows mobiles given that it means simpler infrastructure and after BB's high profile service failures.

And Fwiw windows isn't universally disliked. I don't mind it and most people don't know any better anyway.

molgrips - Member

A universally disliked desktop operating system, failed tablet and a phone OS which is decent but nobody is interested in.

A disliked operating system that is nevertheless used by almost everyone
One of the two most popular games consoles plus a fair few hit games
The very best office software that has basically no competition and is even more ubiquitous than their ubiquitous OS

Windows 7 adoption is still increasing faster than 8. As far as I know, none of the companies I work for have gone ahead with planned roll outs of 8.

Samsung, Lenovo and others have had to ship their machines with apps similar to ClassicShell to undo the Windows 8 changes because of poor user feedback.

What I can tell you from personal experience is that two companies I work for each employing multiple thousands have both started rolling out iPads to all their staff instead of updating their desktops.
And they have both been previously 100% Microsoft houses. They've even had their legacy web apps rejigged to work better on the iPads screens. I don't know of any which have rolled out Surfaces, nor have I heard of anybody I know buying or even considering buying one.

Last I heard the XBone's sales figures were trounced by the PS4 as well, though that could just be artificial scarcity in action.

On the subject of phones, Microsoft allegedly make more money (5x more!) from their patent trolling of Android, than they do from WPh

Bing is another colossal waste of cash that nobody likes and nobody wants.

The only really successful new product I can think of is Office 365, which seems popular with SMBs.

clubber - Member
But the big plus they have and that you missed is that bb are planned to be dropped by several companies in the near future for Windows mobiles given that it means simpler infrastructure and after BB's high profile service failures.

My experience is that they're giving out iPhones instead.

Windows 7 adoption is still increasing faster than 8. As far as I know, none of the companies I work for have gone ahead with planned roll outs of 8.

It's early days yet in corporate terms.

But we shall see, won't we.

So back on topic, to answer my original question. Yes they are good, also just got my nexus 5 so fully googled out now 😉

I'm tempted by one of these, at least I like the idea of them, network computing realized at a realistic price 20 odd years after the last outing.

Can anyone answer these:

Can you play media (i.e. video too big to upload somewhere) from a network drive on your lan eg using dlna?

How is drive docs / office compatibility in real life? e.g. does the formatting screw up totally, sometimes, or never?