iknownothing
Well-known member
There is a positive hardware trade off with Chromebooks as well. Typically Chromebooks have better keyboards and trackpads than similarly priced windows machines, even in the four hundred dollar range. There is the storage trade off as well. If you want an ssd on your windows machine you'll generally need to spend upwards of 600.00. Chromebooks get away with doing it for less because they need less storage to run the operating system. If you intend to use online storage this may be an excellent trade off.
The other thing to think of is that remote desktop works really well. If it's not your only computer it may be a very good solution. It will essentially allow you to use your desktop from anywhere. The latency is all but unnoticable (perhaps in gaming it would be an issue).
If it's going to be your only computer it becomes a little bit more complicated, but here is my take.
Microsoft made a huge mistake with windows 8. They wanted to leverage their PC market share to gain in the mobile space. They therefore made the basis of windows 8 essentially a mobile interface. People don't want that though. People would prefer a mobile system that functions as much like a desktop as possible rather than the other way around. Google got this right. For many intents and purposes Chromebooks act more like windows machines than windows does now. That's what people who've never used one don't understand about Chromebooks. They get all the ux things right, which is a much bigger boon to productivity than you would imagine. Having an actual desktop environment with movable, resizable windows is a big deal. Google is making the case that the browser can be a virtual machine that is lightweight, can live on it's own, or inside a larger environment. It's still a bit limited, but their getting more convincing all the time.
The other thing to think of is that remote desktop works really well. If it's not your only computer it may be a very good solution. It will essentially allow you to use your desktop from anywhere. The latency is all but unnoticable (perhaps in gaming it would be an issue).
If it's going to be your only computer it becomes a little bit more complicated, but here is my take.
Microsoft made a huge mistake with windows 8. They wanted to leverage their PC market share to gain in the mobile space. They therefore made the basis of windows 8 essentially a mobile interface. People don't want that though. People would prefer a mobile system that functions as much like a desktop as possible rather than the other way around. Google got this right. For many intents and purposes Chromebooks act more like windows machines than windows does now. That's what people who've never used one don't understand about Chromebooks. They get all the ux things right, which is a much bigger boon to productivity than you would imagine. Having an actual desktop environment with movable, resizable windows is a big deal. Google is making the case that the browser can be a virtual machine that is lightweight, can live on it's own, or inside a larger environment. It's still a bit limited, but their getting more convincing all the time.