Laptop Confusion

[Deleted User]

A second hand Chromebook at around £100 makes a lot of sense. There is very little to go wrong with these things and they certainly will not have any malware and carp you could get with windows or mac.

benson1980

I!!!8217;m not saying the one I got was the best value necessarily if you just look at specs.. What it looked like was a quite robust design which is what I needed for the kids. So the fact that it was marketed as such (kids/education etc) was a bonus for me hence why I went for that one.

That said it!!!8217;s quicker than my core i5 ssd macbook for pretty much everything I use it for- browsing, streaming, casting, downloading torrents, printing and apps. Not by much but definitely noticeable. And it was almost a quarter of the price. The only things I prefer with the MacBook is it is lighter and the backlit keyboard

And another thing. The battery lasts for ages on chrome books which is another massive benefit for us.

EveryWhere

benson1980 wrote: »

I!!!8217;m not saying the one I got was the best value necessarily if you just look at specs.. What it looked like was a quite robust design which is what I needed for the kids. So the fact that it was marketed as such (kids/education etc) was a bonus for me hence why I went for that one.

That said it!!!8217;s quicker than my core i5 ssd macbook for pretty much everything I use it for- browsing, streaming, casting, downloading torrents, printing and apps. Not by much but definitely noticeable. And it was almost a quarter of the price. The only things I prefer with the MacBook is it is lighter and the backlit keyboard

And another thing. The battery lasts for ages on chrome books which is another massive benefit for us.

My argument is mainly about the price. It does less, so it should cost less.
But if it does everything that you need it to do, then why not?
For me, I also do not like the idea of Google having access to my data and tracking my every move on-line.
But perhaps that's just me.
Everything you state, I can do on my nine year old laptop(so it is clearly robust as is my ten year old Netbook), for which I paid £240/£130 at the time.

It also helps that you have an alternative for when you need one.

Perhaps a compromise would be to refurb current laptop, if there is one, then to buy a second hand Chromebook.

that

Deleted_User wrote: »

A second hand Chromebook at around £100 makes a lot of sense. There is very little to go wrong with these things and they certainly will not have any malware and carp you could get with windows or mac.

They have a limited update life of over 5 years, and after no longer receive updates. Spending £200+ on a device with a 5-ish year lifespan not good in my mind. At lease with a PC you can put linux on it if windows support stops.

I can easily see EveryWhere viewpoint, but except for weight and battery life, a PC offers more longevity and more uses, plus the price difference is just too little to be of benefit. Great for kids though, as they cant put their own s/w on it and mess it up, or hack the school network, plus it is light, but robs them of vital computer life-long-learning-lessons. Then you get the Google Pixelbook at £999 - Why?

ballyblack

but robs them of vital computer life-long-learning-lessons.

I would gladly be robbed of those experinces :T

EveryWhere

ballyblack wrote: »

I would gladly be robbed of those experinces :T

Do you mean like learning to spell? Sorry

EveryWhere

Why waste money on a Chromebook? Repurpose an old laptop or Netbook; https://www.neverware.com/freedownload/

that

ballyblack wrote: »

I would gladly be robbed of those experinces :T

Thank you for not robbing me of those experiences then, as they kept me off the streets and out of the dole (or what ever it is call now) queue. The 'can do' attitude is fading and 'Oh shoot, what do I do now?' seems to be replacing it.

I dont have an axe to grid, and for the price of around a tablet, a chromebook would have been a good device, but not at £200+ and definitely not at £999

benson1980

Funny how the people who have never owned a chromebook just go on about how rubbish they are. Yet the people who do actually own one, having come from owning windows devices, and prefer them to windows get shot down and told how they've wasted their money. Sub £200 isn't going to get you anything great whatever platform you choose.

Oh well hopefully the op got the advice they wanted.

EveryWhere

benson1980 wrote: »

Funny how the people who have never owned a chromebook just go on about how rubbish they are. Yet the people who do actually own one, having come from owning windows devices, and prefer them to windows get shot down and told how they've wasted their money. Sub £200 isn't going to get you anything great whatever platform you choose.

Oh well hopefully the op got the advice they wanted.

More funny that you appear to not comprehend that a Chromebook is often just a poorly specified laptop with a polished version of the Chromium operating system installed. Ridiculous to spend nearly £300 for a perhaps £200 device.

No need to spend that on one, as you can simply re-purpose an old device by installing a Chromium OS build. That costs nothing.

So your repeated claim that I haven't owned a Chromebook is wrong. I just have never purchased a Chromebook.
I already explained it to you earlier, but that seemed to go right over your head.

The difference with a purchased Chromebook is that the hardware and software are more closely matched.

But then I already have a laptop, so paying for a Chromebook for an extra function or two that I can already attain with my Windows laptop makes no sense at all.

So, let us remember that this is a 'money saving' website. So instead of suggesting the OP goes out to spend £280 on an overpriced device, why not suggest that they re-purpose an old machine to try it out in the first instance?