333
people found this helpful, as of 2023
ranked #71,776 most helpful
out of 571,544,897 reviews
★★★★★
No Brainer as Kid's Computer
This is my 3rd Chrome OS device (Samsung Chromebook, Acer Chromebook) and was purchased to replace a not-very-old Windows desktop that my kids used for school assignments, web browsing and video streaming. The old desktop had a Celeron processor, but couldn't do full-screen video without a lot of stuttering and had a loud fan that screamed through even a low-def YouTube video. This thing feels like a HUGE step up at a fraction of the price. My 11 year old daughter asked if she could set this up and within 2 minutes from opening the box, she was playing a Flash-based game on the Internet. That is precisely what I love so much about my Chrome devices. My kids just get it...right out of the box and my tech-support/virus cleanup/windows patching time has dropped to nil! I love that my kid's homework and docs are all in the cloud and they can no longer lose them due to hard drive crashes or forgetting where they saved them on the box. They use GDocs exclusively and since their schools are now using Chromebooks also, its seamless for them. I'm a web developer and I guess what I'd call a "power user" and even I find that I get downstairs to fire up my super desktop very rarely these days. The Chrome devices just fit the need.
This sleek little black box is perfect on my kitchen counter, where the kids use it on a 24 inch Samsung monitor. It worked well with a cheap Bluetooth keyboard I had and a wired, USB mouse. I think I'll actually use the mounting bracket that came with it to mount this thing on the wall behind the monitor, just to clear even more counter space. As expected, boot time was just a few seconds and there's just something comforting about signing in for the first time and instantly having all of my bookmarks and settings from my other Chromebook.
If you're even considering this, you seriously need to ask yourself what you do that requires a full-blown, bloated OS like Windows or MacOS. If the answer is iTunes, I pity you (I was there once) and recommend looking into new mobile devices also.
