It pains be to have to do this but I think I’m going to have to buy myself a computer for work. The school I work for (£££££ fees) don’t provide staff with laptops – first time I’ve worked somewhere that doesn’t this millennium. Classrooms have a desktop (most of which are at least 10 years old and were base models back then and are slow as hell) and apparently this is sufficient. It sucks, but there it is.

Its a (mostly) google environment so thinking Chromebook. My CAD and Adobe stuff will happen on more capable machines – this is a small, light, cheap machine to move between rooms and take to meetings with a nice long battery life.

So where is the best place to buy such – wait for black Friday and Amazon – or is this mainly for the IT dregs?

Ta.

I’m currently going through one of those “helping elderly parent with IT” moments. Last year, we bought my Mum a Chromebook from John Lewis, a shop/brand she trusts. Her old laptop was dying, kept giving error messages, antivirus resubscription notices and it was confusing for her so we thought a Chromebook would be ideal cos she doesn’t need Office etc.

Fast forward to now, it’s never been quite right but she’s sort of put this down to her not being very good with computers etc.

Anyway, she’s been passed from pillar to post at John Lewis. Tech support, passed to HP (it’s an HP Chromebook), back to JL, they’ve been a total nightmare in fixing it, she’s had to go through the same questions, calls not been recorded or logged…
I’ve done what I can with it but it’s just not working properly and JL have been useless in resolving it.

I bought my Chromebook from Amazon, it’s been perfect.

We bought one from https://www.elekdirect.co.uk/

It’s the “returns” from AO.Com

THe one we got wasn’t in an official box but otherwise was mint, and very cheap compare to full price retailers. £145 for an Acer 15.6 Inch Intel® Celeron® 64GB Flash 4GB RAM

If all you need is Google Drive and a broswer, why not install OS Flex on a cheap refurb laptop. It will be like a chromebook but without the Play Store.

Just check wi-fi chip and bluetooth are compatible before buying

We bought one from https://www.elekdirect.co.uk/

It’s the “returns” from AO.Com
THe one we got wasn’t in an official box but otherwise was mint, and very cheap compare to full price retailers. £145 for an Acer 15.6 Inch Intel® Celeron® 64GB Flash 4GB RAM

Damn – they don’t deliver to IV postcodes.

I know this doesn’t answer your question but in my experience the best retailer would be one that doesn’t sell Chromebooks.

We got ours a few years ago but to be honest it mostly gathers dust because it’s so difficult to get most things working on it.
Coincidentally we used it this morning for the first time in ages and we’ve spent all day resetting our Google account passwords on every other device because it managed to do some weird account reset nonsense.

Battery life is really good but that’s about it. Get a tablet or a cheap proper laptop would be my recommendation – our Chromebook is the worst of both worlds.

My has always worked flawlessly. I have one of the best ones available as I could claim back up to £800 from work and wanted a Chromebook with the quality/size of screen being the most important thing. Use it most days for work (Citrix client) and Zoom and it has been great. Also good for all the stuff I do personally via Chrome Browser. Instant startup, battery life of 8 hours – perfect.

If you are trying to do stuff that you can’t do on a Chromebook then you clearly bought the wrong thing…

We got ours a few years ago but to be honest it mostly gathers dust because it’s so difficult to get most things working on it.

Most things you use, maybe, but not most things most people use. It’s not the same thing as a PC or Mac in the same way a tablet or phone isn’t, but it will do a lot of common jobs. If your jobs fall outside that scope, don’t get one. If they do, do.

My Dad’s had them for years, we had one, my kids both have them from school. Brilliant concept IMO.

Get a tablet or a cheap proper laptop would be my recommendation

A PC laptop for the same price as a typical Chromebook will be much worse.

Damn – they don’t deliver to IV postcodes.

They’re in Bolton if you have any family / friends down that way

Ok, connecting to a printer on the same WiFi network – didn’t work.
Accessing my daughter’s online schooling through Adobe Connect – didn’t work.
Connecting devices that need their own app to connect – hit and miss.
We have Android phones and Google email accounts but it didn’t seem intuitive at all.

I’m very happy for all those who had a different experience to me.

Touchscreen was quite good.

On my second chromebook now, the last one cost me £130 in 2015. I decided to buy a posher one this time and £250 with a promotion has got me a metal bodied touchscreen “fold it takes a big tablet” Asus.

I’d get a other one from Argos, same day delivery and there’s a physical shop to return it to if needed.

I got mine from Currys 4 years ago. Less than £250, it’s been really good. It’s recently stopped receiving updates but that doesn’t stop it from working. When I come to replace it I’d want a bit more ram and maybe a better processor but posher ones tend to come with a touchscreen which I don’t want / need.

I get mine (on my second, plus kids had one each for school) from AO but only because I have an account that gives me 0% finance.

All four have been faultless. I use for web, google docs is enough for almost all of what I need, and I can get my work stuff through O365 online.

As per sdb; worth knowing they do – theoretically at least – have an update lifespan.

https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/6220366?hl=en

https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/9367166?hl=en-GB

To update – I bought an Asus flip 3 – £229 plus a bit more off from topcahback. https://www.currys.co.uk/products/asus-flip-cm3200fm-12-2-in-1-chromebook-mediatek-processor-64-gb-emmc-grey-10230194.html

Blown away by how good it is for so little cash. Really solidly made and the 3:2 format screen makes a lot of sense for such a small thing. It’s currently plugged into a 27″ monitor as I write reports at home and handling dual screen mode faultlessly. It can even run Fusion 360 (CAD – the online version), well enough to at least drag a few designs around. Alright, I’d look for a different setup if doing anything serious but for a quick look and tweak -great. Then flip it around and using it with the included stylus as a note pad in a meeting.

When you see how well executed the whole thing is (hardware and chrome OS) I’m struggling to see why more people don’t use them for their none hardcore computing needs.

bumpity bump as im looking to replace my wifes 2Gb ancient chromebook.

i hear 8Gb is quite usual at the mo these days and you can get something decent for under £300.

any recommendations?

ta

I bought mine from Argos as they had a cracking deal on ASUS chromebooks. It’s been great so I cant comment on service beyond decent price and delivery. I went from a 2gb Acer 15″ with 32gb storage to an 8gb, i5 touchscreen with 128gb C433T.

It’s a lovely thing and can work as a massive tablet.

Slight ownsides are its heavier than my old all plastic one (it’s metal and glass!), the shiny screen can be a pain for reflections and the illuminated keyboard always defaults to a brightness thay makes the labels difficult to see! 🤣

just looked on argos and yes theres a couple of likely 8Gb suspects.  will venture into town tomorrow.

cheers