Chromebook: One Month Later

We’re one month+ of my last Chromebook blog and I’ve had a chance to use it in a variety of different situations, including:

• Travelling Companion
• Coffee Shop/Mobile Work
• TV ‘second screen’

My verdict? Not bad! But I wouldn’t give up a full-blown laptop to use the C720 as my ‘daily driver’. For comparison purposes, here’s the computer the Chromebook was up against- a Dell Inspiron 11z (1121). The specs are:

• 11.6″ Glossy WLCD screen w/ 1366×768 resolution
• Intel Core i3-ULV processor
• 120GB SSD
• 6GB RAM
• Windows 7 SP1

Here’s why:

Keyboard:

The C720’s keyboard is mushy and has a lot of play. I just don’t find myself using it as efficiently as the Dell’s keyboard. Even my work laptop (HP Elitebook 3650p) has a better keyboard.

Trackpad:

The C720’s trackpad is just OK. It’s responsive, but the clicks just don’t feel ‘natural’. The main issue is that my typing style/hand placement are forever moving the cursor to the middle of a sentence I’ve already written. That is quite frustrating.

Screen Clarity:

The C720 has a 11.6″ matte screen with the same 1366×768 resolution as the Dell 11z. Textlooks much brighter and crisper on the the Dell’s WLCD glossy panel than on the C720. Heck, the non-retina screen on my old iPad 2 looks nicer than the C720’s screen! The C720 just looks washed out and at times makes me think that I should have splurged on the HP 11 Chromebook with its nicer screen. But the performance and price difference of the C720 won that battle.

Performance:

I’ve only had a few minor instances of the C720 lagging and that’s only when I was pushing 10+ tabs on the Chromebook, with Crouton running Citrix in full screen. If I stick to just tabs in Chrome, it’s pretty darn snappy.

One Month Verdict:

I’m lucky that I have the ability to choose which machine to use based on what I need to get done! If I’m going to be typing for a while and really looking at the screen, I’ll grab the Dell. If I need to do some light Citrix with some typing and need other ‘apps’, I’ll grab the iPad 2 with keyboard. If I’m just browsing the web and need to do some emails, the Chromebook would win that one out.

But right now, the Chromebook has surplanted the iPad 2 as my ‘armchair’ tool of choice for now. But I waffle between that and my iPad. More importantly, I have no hesitations recommending the Chromebook for that task, as well as for those who really just need a web browsing machine.