Is a Chromebook In Your Future?

[raymac46]

There have been some interesting articles out there recently about why netbooks - and in particular Linux powered netbooks - failed in the marketplace, whereas Chromebooks are poised to be a spectacular success.

Just to summarize some of the points:

• The OEMs did a poor job of selecting a version of Linux to use, and there was no standard distro anyway. ChromeOS is based on Linux but it's really taking over as a standard in its own right.
  
• The original netbooks had wimpy hardware compared to the multicore, larger SSD, better graphics equipped Chromebooks of today.
  
• Back then a laptop buyer only knew Windows and Linux was unfamiliar territory. Today after using iOS or Android, the laptop buyer is willing to try something different.
  
• Microsoft was able to compete with and dominate the Linux netbook by offering XP or XP Starter versions. They can't do that today.
  
• The Cloud is much further along, with better apps - Google has gotten it together, for better or worse. Broadband is more freely available too.
  
• A netbook with Windows XP was just a cheap slow laptop. A Chromebook can boot faster and give much better performance than was possible 4-5 years ago. Now you can even get Haswell i3 chips in a Chromebook.
  

So if you know Linux fairly well should a Chromebook be in your future? Maybe, but maybe not.

• If you've got an old netbook it won't have the latest hardware but you can certainly put on a version of Linux on it that'll look great and work well. Debian Xfce and Linux Mint 17 Xfce are my favorites for this.
  
• Linux gives you far more flexibility. You can choose Firefox. You can have an email program. You can work on photos with GIMP. You can use Libre Office on your machine. ChromeOS will do a lot of the same stuff, but you have to stick with Google.
  
• If you go on a cruise and use the ship's wifi, you won't be able to afford to stay online to do all your work. A standalone Linux machine is better here. You can compose emails offline and just connect when you need to.
  

If you want to compare a fast sleek, modern Chromebook with a brain dead Windows XP netbook from 2009 the choice is obvious. Take that same netbook and install a decent up to date Linux O/S and it's not as clearcut.

Edited September 2, 2014 by raymac46

[raymac46]

Two of the highly recommended Chromebooks are Dell's 11 inch and Lenovo's Yoga 11e. Both of these run Intel Haswell Celeron CPUs and are pretty well built. They are targeted to the education market. The Dell has been so popular you can't get it online at the present time.

[securitybreach]

I would love to have one if I could afford one.

[raymac46]

I have posted before how my daughter's old Linux powered Dell Inspiron Mini 12 is a perfect example of how NOT to build a netbook and offer Linux on it.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2339506,00.asp

It is a nice unit physically, with a 12 inch screen - rare in a netbook. It has a pretty nice keyboard. The Intel Atom processor was typical of the time, and the 40GB hard drive was generous for a netbook, but slow.

However it should never have been sold with Linux as an operating system. The graphics card was a non-Intel design and to this day does not run 3D hardware graphics without a kludgy hack that was unique to the non-standard version of Ubuntu 8.04 the machine came with. The wifi is a Linux unfriendly Broadcom solution.

That said, the Linux version of the Mini 12 was vastly superior to the Windows model that ran - wait for it- Vista. That one took about 3 minutes to boot and you couldn't do much with it afterwards.

The main problem was that the Mini 12 gave you no upgrade path at all - even Ubuntu netbook edition didn't run well on it. It took until about 2012 until Intel had at least a 2D version of its GMA 500 Linux driver available to run Linux on the Mini 12 at its native resolution. Before that your only video driver was Vesa.

Now this little machine is well past its prime as hardware goes, but it'll run a modern Xfce distro very well. I have Linux Mint 17 Xfce on it and it's the perfect long distance traveler.

[V.T. Eric Layton]

Is a Chromebook In Your Future?

 

 

Not unless Santa brings me one.

 

Hey! My birthday is just a couple weeks or so away.