Well, day 7! 1 full week of using only a Chromebook for all of my computing needs as a technologist. Pictures above is what you see when you hit the tile apps button on the Chromebook keyboard. I found this very useful and it can be found on just about all mainstream operating systems. I did use Beagle Term yesterday to program a new Cisco firewall using a serial to USB cable and it worked great. And I have said before now that you can install Andriod Apps the Chromebook feels more like a full computer. You have to watch because some of the Andriod Apps are written for a phone screen but many will go full screen.
Using this Dell 3380 has been fine. I do wish that they would have put a better screen on this machine. Reading the text is a little looking at the old VGA graphics of the past. But when I connected it to a good monitor I found that the resolution was great and more readable. Everything that you are going to do with a laptop of any maker will be fine using a Chromebook. So why on earth is anyone spending major dollars on other machines? I am still partial to my Macs at home because of my workflow in creating my videos and podcasts. And I still like my MacBook Air for the great keyboard. But workflows can be changed and buy a better Chromebook would solve the keyboard issue. Remember you get what you pay for. But as for the Chrome OS, it will and is a major player in computers. And I have seen in the hands of students they are doing great things with their Chromebooks.
So overall if you have been following this test you can see that the Chromebook is a machine that can be used every day for any type of computing. I will still be testing it out to see if I can use it for photo and video editing? If I come upon something to report about in these two areas I will report it here.
Thanks to Google for giving all computer users another outlet for computer usage. And if you are on the fence about buying a Chromebook, don’t be. Just grab one today you will be happy to live virus and spyware free.