There are so many different types,processors,memory etc only looking
for something to surf net and view videos online.

Anyone have a particular favourite they use?

Netbook?? Are you sure? Netbooks have pretty much gone now since the introduction of tablet computers which have taken over that part of the market. There are however still plenty of ultraportable laptops out there but you’ll be paying at least £400, whereas netbooks you could easily get under the £200 mark…..

nobody really makes netbooks anymore. The 11.6″ chromebook is a close cousin though.

I have a couple of old acer aspire ones I used to use all the time and am holding on to them to run linux for the boys to wreck as they grow up now that Ive got my own £200 chromebook.

ultrabooks are nice, but can be v v pricey.

rather depends what you want your laptop for?

With the recent price drop on the Microsoft Surface RT tablet they may be worth looking at instead of a netbook,depends what you want to use it for?

Thanks for replies, really only for surfing net and video’s online. I like the portability of them and the fact they still have a traditional keyboard, and obviously the cost.

Samsung ARM Chromebook is cheap and tough, the software almost impossible to break.

I find it a little glitchy on HD YouTube vids though, it’s just not quite powerful enough. IF it were my money I’d hold out for the version 2 of it, seeing as what you want it to do.

But overall I wholeheartedly recommend them 🙂

Not being the techy type, what is the chrome operating system, can I still use internet explorer? [it’s what i’m used to]

Nope.

Chrome OS is effectively the Chrome browser and a logon/file system.

When you turn the machine on you get a logon window, after that you get a desktop and taskbar. The only “Program” ie fixed-function application on the machine is Google Chrome, the browser. All other applications are actually webpages that run in a tab or window. For example pixlr – this is a photo editing webpage that behaves like a small photo editing program. The only difference with these web apps vs traditional apps is that they appear in a tab or window. [try pixlr for 5 minutes, you’ll see what I’m getting at].

There is a file system browser, you can navigate to a memory stick or external hdd much as you would on Windows/OSX/etc.

If you truly want a machine for web-use it’s going to do you fine, if you want something else it’s variable – you can for example edit Office documents using Google Docs, but that’s not where the strengths of the machine lie – you need to be online for that, and it’s just not quite as fast and efficient as having a copy of Word running locally on your machine and saving it’s own native files back to it’s own hard disc.

Another big advantage is security – Chrome OS is built to be very secure, it’s modern software so no old bugs, it employs several layers of anti-hacker technology and every time the machine is switched on it checks to see if any of the operating system has been changed in any way from what it should, be and if there’s any changes it just reverts to fresh install of the OS [which takes about 20 seconds].

That’s it in a nutshell, and don’t worry about using Chrome as a browser. With browsers [as with so many things] all the best innovations/features are copied by all the other vendors. IE/Firefox/Chrome/Opera all work pretty much the same and the switch will take you 5 minutes plus looking a little thing up every now and then. It’s not like a Minority Report Interface or anything 😉

EDIT – Surface RT, dunno man, dunno. Not tried one, might be nice, but I surely do hear about that platform being on life-support….. Even if Microsoft continue to expand their ARM software, I’d personally expect them to make radical changes to it that cut the support from the early generation machines. That’s just my guess.

I am also quite curious as to what Google are going to do to merge ChromeOS and Android. I am convinced they will do, but I just don’t know how.

are chrome apps the same as android apps? just trying to figure out what the advantages of a chromebook or android tablet are.
are chromebooks faster/better than say a nexus 7 for watching video?

Review of the Samsung Chrombook Series 3 ARM

I think the Android devices are a little better for video, just because they are not running the video decoding WITHIN a web browser, but with a native app [so AFAIK it’s a little more efficeient]. As I said the Chromebook stutters with HD YouTube videos, but then the screen is 720p-ish anyway, so there’s not a lot of point getting worried about full HD.

They’re different beasts, the keyboard/trackpad is the main deciding factor.

EDIT: RE Apps, see my first post. Chromebooks run web pages, not native apps. Android apps will not run directly, though there may be a version that does.

Two Weeks With A Chromebook

It is also possible to install Ubuntu on the Chromebook, giving you a whole series of possibilities of running any native Ubuntu applications, which means almost all the Unix/*nix applications ever made. This however is not worth it unless you want to hack it into something it was not meant to be, it works fine for what it was designed for.

Typing all this on my Chromebook reminded me how much I like the Keyboard on it!

thanks for info gofasterstripes, im swaying towards a refurb nexus 7 gen 1 from tesco for £135! im sure i can live without a KB

I also have this problem. I need to use MS Office so need a computer but do a lot of travelling so want a netbook. I had a Samsung NC120 which was perfect but I’ve killed it by spilling a load of water over it. Can anyone suggest?

I had a netbook for a while, I really can’t see the point anymore, iPads and android tablets are so good and cheap that a netbook looks a bit old fashioned.

If you really want a physical keyboard there’s loads of keyboard cases for tablets that get decent reviews. I wouldn’t bother with a really cheap android tablet though, I tried one of the £50 ones at Christmas and it was junk. There’s some decent ones from about £100 obviously the more popular tablet you get the more accessories you can get for it.

iolo – you tried open/libre -office?

You can use Ubuntu/libreoffice on Ubuntu, if you feel like experimenting. Otherwise I’d get a late edition Samsung NCxxx secondhand.

Gofaster..lots of sound advice there,think I will be heading out this morning to get the chromebook. Thanks

http://hexus.net/business/news/system-builders/58757-asus-says-will-abandon-windows-rt-tablet-market/

Just purchased the Samsung Chromebook, so far so good, already noticing the speedy start up time and ease of use. Just need to get my head around the google Chrome side of things. Thanks for the advice..

🙂 best of luck to you, and feel free to bug me for anything.

Am I a dope or is there a way to list activity by last reply on STW?

I only just thread noticed this down the list somewhere!

Chromebook and get Linux loaded on == netbook (a lot of the early netbooks in particular ran Linux)…

Cheers

Danny B

chromebook is running linux, in a fashion 🙂

Well yes, it is but I mean full Linux so you can actaully do stuff outside of the world of Google… 🙂

So what would folk recommend to those to whom a kb and wordprocessing suite (Word) is essential? Long battery life, light, cheap.

I’m still using a Samsung NC10 but it’s nearing the end of its useful life. Can’t see the need for endless apps etc, though could consider a tablet with kb attached, as long as it had very good wp software. For academic uses especially, the tablets just come across more like toys!

If the NC10 is powerful enough, I’d replace it with an AMD E2 chip, or a very low end Pentium [22nm series chip] Notebook. Both are faster, but still cheap. Personally my money is on AMD for an Atom replacement.

Watch out for larger notebooks having the same resolution on the screen – 1366 on a 15″ is just silly.

dannyb – you can always use Chrome Remote Desktop if you reallyreallyreally need to run word 😉