Love me some more Chromebook!

New beta channel release appears to have fixed memory management issues.

For the first time since I've owned my Chromebook I experienced a lot of "He's Dead Jim" out of memory issues.  So far the new update of January 8th seems to have corrected the problem.

New 15.6" Acer Chromebook

Looks like Acer is going to enter the 15" market.  They were giving sneak peeks at the CES in Las Vegas of a new Acert 15.6" Chromebook.

According to the representive they'll have several models including an i3 4GB model.  Lower end models (2GB, lower resolution) will start at $249.  Since it comes in at almost 5lbs I don't think it will replace my current C720 as my go to road device, but the increased screen size will make this a nice addition to the den.

The experiments with crouton and running Ubuntu on my 2GB model were very successful, so I suspect there will soon be an emerging Linux laptop pattern fueled by these Chromebooks.  I'd go with the 4GB model for those contemplating running unity.

Love me some Chromebook!  Can't wait to get my hands on one.  Rumors suggest March...

Acer C720 Demand Sparks Price Increase

Apparently I'm not the only one that thinks the Acer C720 is the best damn Chromebook you can get for the money.  The price and availability this Christmas are moving in opposite directions.

Prices are going up, and the stock and availability are going down.

Yes, I'm pimping this product, because I love me some Chromebook!  I literally use this device every day and yes I am writing this blog on my Acer C720 Chromebook (11.6-Inch, 2GB).

 Full disclosure...I've made about $20 after a year of blogging about this product using the Amazon Associates links - so apparently I'm not very good at it, my blog is not that popular and I'm clearly not making a living at this. Note to self, don't quit your day job. The links are really for your convenience, just in case you feel the urge and need a push. ;-)

Love me some Chromebook!

I may just re-moniker this blog Love Me Some Chromebook!  But honestly, this is an extremely easy product to fall in love with for anyone that wants a low cost, well made device for email, browsing, watching videos and even doing software development in the cloud.  Fast boot, long battery life, and light weight, I take this puppy EVERYWHERE!   No, it doesn't run Microsoft Office, but this is 2014 people!  Stop the MS Office malarkey already!

Google Docs and Google Sheets are absolutely awesome and you are doing yourself and your grand kids a disservice if you continue to pound that damn MS Office drum.  Ever watch a 14 year old write a paper for school on Microsoft Word?  They spend the first 20 minutes adjusting margins, font-size and the font face in order to make 3 paragraphs of drivel expand into a 2 page Hemingway masterpiece.

"Everything is your fault...if you're any damn good!" - Ernest Hemingway

 Buy your kids a Chromebook and teach them to write instead of format.   But that's America these days, style over substance I guess...if they have to hand in an MS Office paper, they can save their Google Doc as an MS Word file.

Still not convinced?  Don't buy a Chromebook, just install Chrome on your Windows machine and play with Google Docs/Sheet/and Slides.  Print to a cloud enabled device (see my reviews and howto's from last year)...and then decide.  It's been a year with my Chromebook and the honeymoon is definitely not over.  It just gets better with every update.  Which happens transparently for me by the way!

As of today (December 4th, 2014), the device is out of stock at Amazon but they claim it will ship in a few days.

I'm still doing some research and will blog on this subject (performance) soon, but I've concluded that the Acer C720 is not just a good Chromebook, it is THE Chromebook.  Why?  I'll summarize my research by saying, it's simply the best value.  It uses the best CPU for the money (Intel Celeron 2955u)  and still delivers exceptional battery life while keeping the cost under $200...well it was under $200 until this morning.  Hopefully as stocks are replenished you can grab one at a lower price.

CAUTION!  Don't be fooled with other Chromebooks that claim higher clock speeds. That DOES NOT TELL THE WHOLE STORY.  Read the reviews.  If it ain't using the 4th Generation Haswell architecture 2955U it's either an ARM processor or an Intel M-series (Baytrail architecture) and the performance will not match the Acer C720.  The exception being the Acer C720 with the i3 processor.  You'll get slightly better performance with that device, but at a higher price point.  

If streaming music and video while you're doing other tasks is important to you, then this C720 will give you the ultimate experience.  I've been listening to Earbits Radio streamed to my iSound Twist Bluetooth Wireless Mobile Speaker (Rubberized Blue) with more than 6 tabs open while writing this blog on my plain 'ol 2955U based C720 with just 2MB.  If you typically run with a lot of tabs open, you might want to consider the Acer C720-3404 11.6-Inch Chromebook (Intel Core i3, 4 GB) Granite Gray version of the C720.   If I get carried away, I have been able to crash a tab or two and run out of memory.

If you are considering a Chromebook, my advice after a LOT of research is that you will not find a better Chromebook for the money right now.  I keep looking, but right now, the Acer C720 is hands down the best Chromebook on the market.  Don't take my word for it though, go try to find one right now!  Good luck.

Acer C720 - Best Selling Laptop on Amazon!

I just took a look on Amazon's website and the Acer C720, 2GB model is now only $149.  Wow.  This is probably the best bargain in laptops today.  I'll say it once more...this is one amazing machine.  For those that think they HAVE to have a Windows or Mac machine, you really should try this.

Google Docs has a come a long way and while you may not have the exact same features as Microsoft Word, I have not missed MS Office one bit.  Some places where some might have problems: Widows and orphans, formatting the header/footer, tables. In practice these have not been a show stopper for me. Creating even complex spreadsheets with advanced formulas is supported and I've done some really complex pro-formas with Google Sheets.

I've been using Google Hangouts to do some offshore collaborating and the Hangouts experience on the Chromebook is fantastic.  Audio and video quality are very good and I have had no problems talking to people across the globe.

I recently attended the Amazon re:Invent in Las Vegas, and The Acer C720 came along for the ride.  The battery life is fantastic and paired with my free Gogo inlight wifi coupon I got when I purchased the device I was able to work the entire 4 hour trip!  I received 12 free coupons (value = $12).  Not sure if that promo is still valid, but when you consider the free 100GB of storage I got as well, the C720 was practically free.

The light weight and long battery life make this device a must have business travel partner.  The lost cost of the device alleviates the fear of loss factor.

I still love me some Chromebook!

Acer C720 - One Year Later

Well, it's been a year and it's time for a Chromebook blog...

I gave away my C720 4GB and C720 2GB models but not because I didn't love them.  The former to a colleague and the latter as a gift.  I miss me some Chromebook!

After being without my Chromebooks for quite awhile (I was primarily using my Mac-book Pro) I decided to see if there were any new Chromebooks out there and if so, if there was a compelling reason to pick something up other than a C720.  I'll cut straight to the chase...there is no compelling reason to purchase anything except the Acer C720.

After reviewing several alternatives, including the new Acer model that uses the Intel i3 CPU, I can confidently say that the original C720 is every bit as hot "sh*t" as  I thought it was when I reviewed it back in 2013.

The fact is, unless you really feel like spending more money or need a bigger display, this Chromebook is about as big a bang as you can get for your Chromebook money.  You might want to go with the 4GB model if you typically roll with lot's of tabs open, but in practice I have not had issues with performance.

I've researched a bunch of different models (HP, Samsung, Asus), read the reviews read the specs and checked them all out at Best Buy (don't ever ask their sales people questions if you want to get the correct answers).

It can be confusing, especially when sales people give you wrong information and are generally ignorant about Chromebooks to begin with.  Bottom line is that the Haswell architecture is going to give you the best price, performance, battery life of all of the Chromebooks.  If you want to sacrifice a bit of performance for battery life (and we're talking a little more, not a lot more battery life) then the new models with the NVIDIA Tegra K1 chipset should be considered.  The new Acer 13.6" model sports the new chipset and a higher price, but might be best for those looking for a little more screen real estate and as I mentioned, increased batter life.  The other features are pretty much the same (same number of USB ports and interfaces).  The new model supports MIMO Dual-Band 2.4Ghz & 5GHz wifi.

According to the Acer specs, you'll enjoy 13 hours of battery life for their HD (1366x768) and 11 hours for the Full HD model (1920x1080).  I'd probably cut that down by 10-20% depending on how bright you like your display.  It also adds about 1/2 pound to the weight over the original C720 (2.76lbs vs 3.3lbs).

Throwing a C720 on my coffee table is a no brainer.  It's cheap and powerful and I can browse, check my email and even run SSH to do some Linux development.  As a first or second laptop it works for me.  When I travel, I'm not taking my $2k Mac-book Pro, I'm throwing my C720 in my messenger bag and heading to the airport.  One of the great comforts of this is, if I lose the Chromebook, there's nothing on it that someone can steal.  If I do lose the C720, it wasn't all that expensive in the first place.

I love me some Chromebook!

Chromebook - Acer C720 A Month Later

After a month of using my Acer C720 I can say that I am one darn happy customer. Apparently I'm not alone.

Chromebook - Acer C720 Day 20

Still loving my Chromebook!  No change on my VPN woes yet, but I'm fairly confident my network ninja at corporate will figure it out.  In the mean time I continue to read the Google Chromebook forums trying to learn about it and what potential issues people have.  I was able to help someone who thought they had a Chromebook issue, but it was more than likely a problem with their Comcast router.

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/chromebook-central/chromebook/KrJeHbucaMg

Most of the problems I see that people have are because they do not understand what a Chromebook is.  There have been some reported hardware issues, but I suspect that those are few and far between and easy to spot and correct (send it back to Amazon if you we smart enough to order it from there!)


As mentioned in the forum link above my Linksys router DNS caching bug was vanquished by using Google's nameservers which is an option in the Chromebook's network setup.