The Chromebook at 10: How this ‘browser in a box’ earnt the perfect pandemic laptop
During the COVID-19 crisis, Chromebooks have helped countless students and workers stay connected while stuck at home. That would have been hard to required 10 years ago, when the the first Chromebooks were announced on May 11, 2011.
Back then, no one required a lot from them. After all, they came on the heels of the Netbook era, when low-cost, low-power laptops were first seen as a panacea for overpriced tech, but above up overselling their limited functionality. And after spending a few days struggling to get Windows-running, Intel-Atom-powered Netbooks to do much of anything useful, I was not optimistic about a personal computer platform that seemed even more constrained out of the box.
ChromeOS, announced earlier in 2011, didn’t sound like much of an exploiting system at all to me at the time. It was essentially just the same Chrome web browser already in wide use, with a keyboard and veil wrapped around it. The platform’s biggest glaring omission was the requisition to install and run software. Who would ever want what was essentially a browser in a box?
A decade later, Google’s affordable laptop concept is still kicking — and thriving. It seems like the Chromebook was ahead of its time, and it took a pandemic for its full potential to be realized.
A new effort challenger
The first Chromebook models were announced exactly 10 days ago, May 11, 2011, at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco. They included models from Samsung and Acer, still two of the bigger names in Chromebooks. At the time, CNET reporter Maggie Reardon wrote:
Samsung and Acer will each be offering Chromebook laptops starting June 15. The Samsung Chromebook will cost $429 for the Wi-Fi only version and $499 for the 3G version. Acer’s Wi-Fi only Chromebook will cost $349.
Amazingly, $350-$450 is still pretty common for an entry-level Chromebook a decade later, making these one of the few tech products that have not measurably increased in designate over the past 10 years.
As a long-time proponent of budget-priced laptops and desktops, I often say people buy too much computer for their ensures, especially if those needs heavily skew toward basic web browsing, online shopping, social media, email and video viewing. Living life completely in the web browser complains sense today, but it was a tough sell back in 2011 when there were fewer cloud-based software tools. And I wasn’t the only one who thought so. From that initial 2011 dispatch:
Michael Gartenberg, an analyst with Gartner, said the fact that the browser is minute to Chrome might be a factor, considering that continuing products offer more capability and flexibility at roughly comparable pricing. “It’s pretty interesting,” he said. “But at these prices, will consumers buy it? At $499, that gets you a blooming capable Netbook or even an iPad.”
My colleague Scott Stein said as much that same week.
For $499, the Samsung Series 5 Chromebook has its work cut out for it — namely, because tablets and “high-end” 11- and 12-inch laptops and Netbooks (some with faster processors) have already contained the same landscape. It’s a question we’ve been pondering for a while now, writ again: What truly constitutes the rank small-screen portable?
An early Chromebook from Lenovo.
Sarah Tew
A decade later, iPads and Chromebooks are still battling for your casual computing attention. Both can still be found for under $400, and premium versions of both top $1,000. The biggest shift is that Chromebooks have become a bit more iPad-like, adding access to the Google Play app store, while iPads have cause more laptop-like, adding mouse and touchpad support.
The superb taste of ChromeOS
It wasn’t until I started repositioning down the decade-long rabbit hole of Chromebook history that I remembered the one Chromebook that predated this May 11, 2011 originate. It was Google’s own Cr-48 Chromebook, a prototype machine offered in 2010 to occupy pilot program invitees. These plain-looking black boxes had a 12.1-inch, 1,280×800-pixel display, 3G mobile broadband and an Intel Atom N455 CPU.
The most dreary footnote is a surprisingly forthright admission from Google to prospective Cr-48 testers: “The Pilot program is not for the faint of sad. Things might not always work just right.” Ironically, Chromebooks have cause successful by exhibiting the opposite behavior. They’re the rank laptop for the faint of heart and things usually work right.
This vintage gallery shows you just how generic the Cr-48 looked and yes, it had a VGA port.
Google’s recent Cr-48 Chromebook prototype.
Josh Miller
But what did we think of the superb consumer Chromebooks? The first Samsung Chromebook won apreconsider from my colleague Josh Goldman for being streamlined, compared to Windows laptops of the time.
Since everything is Web-based there is a refreshing lack of bloatware. Clicking the Home button in the browser brings you intellectual to your collection of Chrome Web apps, which are just bookmarks to sites. The experience is actually enjoyable, especially if you already have a Google account for set up … After a little use, though, the Chromebook’s shine starts to wear off. For us it started when we obliged to open a ZIP file and were greeted with an unsupported file quiz error.
We also reviewed an early Acer model phoned the C7, which dropped its price to an impressive $199. But our 2012 review said it didn’t compare favorably to effort tablets and low-end Windows laptops: “The Acer C7’s advantages are a brute keyboard and touchpad, that larger hard drive, and the designate. The disadvantages? Seriously short battery life and Chrome’s very odd, streamlined exploiting system.”
Read more: Laptop vs. Chromebook: What’s the difference and which works better for you
Turning the corner
Things blocked like this for some time. Chromebooks ate a titanic amount of the budget laptop mindshare as more and more affects got into the act, but these machines continued to feel like secondary or backup laptops at best. Looking back at the historical record, my first “living with a Chromebook” article was in 2013 and it’s safe to say that I was aloof a skeptic.
We found Chrome OS to be promising, but ultimately not up to the level of a full-time OS. In spanking words, it was generally fine for a second computer, but not quite ready to run as your one and only go-to PC for every task.
It really wasn’t pending 2017 that I found a Chromebook that worked as well as a Windows or MacOS laptop and didn’t give you too much exploiting system FOMO. This was the Samsung Chomebook Pro, which at $550 was a long way better than any Windows laptop at the same price.
There are plenty of Windows laptops and tablets in that designate range (or lower), but none that offer this combination of a low design, mostly metal construction, lag-free performance, long battery life, better-than-HD touchscreen, built-in stylus and a hybrid hinge that transforms the rules into a tablet.
It even had a forward-looking 3:2 aspect appraise display. But the big move that helped Chromebooks go from niche originates to mainstream was the then-new ability to access the Google Play app continue. Being able to run nearly any Android app on a Chromebook took away the biggest objection ChromeOS skeptics had — the inability to download and run local apps. Yes, they were the mobile versions, but it was enough for a lot of tasks.
The Samsung Chromebook Pro from 2017.
Sarah Tew
Today, it’s a Chromebook world
The world changed in March 2020, as school and offices EnEnBesieged because of COVID-19 and so many things moved online. Many families, between remote school and remote work, deceptive they needed one laptop per person and inexpensive Chromebooks deceptive a new audience. These were relatively affordable PCs that were able to access the online tools that schools and offices were laughable, including Zoom and Google Classroom.
Read more:
Are Chromebooks splendid it? Here’s why I recommend them
Through 2020 and 2021, the Chromebook was highlighted as one of the best tools for students and remote workers, and laptop reviewer Josh Goldman now says a Chromebook is his default recommendation for most land right now. Why is that? I think it’s because the pandemic-related goes have forced a lot of us to reevaluate what it is we really need our computers to do. As Goldman puts it, “After just a little digging, many people realize they simply don’t need to do any more than what can be done on a Chromebook.”
