I need a new laptop ASAP but don't have a clue.
I will be using it mainly just for messing about on the net so I don't want to pay OTT for something I don't really need but I certainly want it to be quick enough.
I asked a few people who know far more than me and they suggested I'd only have to spend about £300 to get what I needed but when I look at the reviews for laptops around that price some customers complain that they are not quick enough.
Any advice appreciated and recommendation of specific offers would be great.
I'll try to give an unbiased explanation of Chromebooks. I've owned 3 and my partner has had 3 as well. I 'have' a pc and a mac as well and several tablets (my job requires me to test things, so they aren't mine...) - I'm pretty tech savvy and I choose to use my Chromebook for 95% of the time. Since lockdown I've not opened the PC aside from to test if something worked and only used the Mac to edit some video (I could have done it on the chromebook, but was in a rush and needed to do it quickly with software I was familiar with)
Pros:
Start up VERY quick. All the time. The way updates work mean you NEVER get 'hang on Window/MacOS wants to install an update, come back in a week' messages. Ever.
They're very simple machines. Every one I've bought has worked till the end of it's reasonably expected life and could have been fixed if it was worth it. I.e. the ribbon connecting the innards to screen gave out on one. I could have replaced it but it was seven years old...
Because they are cloud based, you don't need a lot of storage. This means when you get a new computer, you just log in and all your old stuff is there. If storage is a concern, you just pop in an SD card (I bought a 256gb one for £25 quid t'other day...)
Google Apps are generally very good. I really like them. I never, ever use Word, PPT etc anymore. I can see why someone writing a very specialist document might need them but I write a lot of stuff and find absolutely no need. They are 100% free - all you pay for is additional storage in Google Drive and tbh, if all you need to store is documents, you won't need it. I have it, but I've got lots of audio and video files in mine.
You can install Android apps on them. This isn't perfect, but you can usually find an app to do what chrome OS doesn't do. OR a browser based task. I've recorded music, edited video and so on, things that people say 'Chromebooks 'can't do'' - they can. I've recorded music I on a £200 chromebook and it's been fine. Not as good as a £2500 macbook pro, but for what I needed... perfectly fine. I've got Lightroom for photos, Pixlr for Photoshop type stuff and so on.
They are so simple. That sounds bad. It's good. I was a massive fan of Apple stuff and I think Chromebooks have the vibe that mac stuff had back in the day. You open the box, plug it in. Log on and then it's ready. Nothing else. No maintainence, no installing anti virus software, no defragging hard drives etc.
4gb of ram will go further on Chromebook. The operating system is much lighter than MacOS and Windows. I have an 8gb i5 chromebook (a fancy one) and it is lightning. It is WAY faster than the equivalent windows machine with same hardware as the OS asks virtually nothing of the ram/processor. It also comes with a stylus and touchscreen that is almost perfect.
They don't slow down. It will work at the same speed the last day you use it as the first.
If you have an issue 'a powerwash' can sort it out in about 5 minutes. So much easier than reinstalling on other systems.
Cons:
Don't get an old one! Some old ones were underpowered and you only get 6 years worth of updates (8 with newer ones)
At the lowest end, don't expect amazing build quality. Then again, that's as true of anything other than a Mac and they don't have a low end. You get what you pay for in build quality. As I say, I've had 6 and only one has not been budget. All of them lasted well beyond my expectations and if you can look after it, it will last.
There are times I go 'I wish it did that...' - one is running Audacity (sound editing software) - but that's fairly niche. Occaisionaly the simplicity of the OS is annoying. (file browsing/storage is VERY basic) - however, again, these are occaisional things.
If you don't embrace the cloud then they are confusing machines. I know people who had a chromebook given to them at work but refused to store files in the cloud because 'it's not secure' - that's a nonsense, (if you do it properly) but people are set in their ways...
The bottom end price is perfect for browsing and a bit of youtube or music in the background. Asking it to do a lot more will make it slow. It'll try but it won't be smooth experience. Mine is £600 and I've never experienced any lag and I often have literally about 45 tabs open in multiple windows and doing lots of stuff.
You are signing up for a 'google life' and all the data stuff that means. To be honest, lots of people use google on their PC anyway and I don't think that using it on a Chromebook is particularly worse.
Can be limited in how they support peripherals. So if you have an old printer, your Chromebook might not play with it. New stuff is usually fine.
Overall:
They're perfect if you don't have specialist usage needs (i.e. a pro photographer or specific software needed for IT stuff or something like that) - they're dead cheap and simple. I'm not on commission - It's just what I use and I use a lot of computers.
