13 or 14" Chromebook(s) for my 10 year olds
Discussion
I have 10 year old twins and am looking to buy them each a Chromebook for schoolwork (mainly), plus no doubt a bit of browsing and YouTube. I would prefer something around 13" (which seems rare) or a 'small' 14". 11" is too small. Budget is £300 each, but I would prefer to be below that.
I've looked at the Asus R13 and Acer Chromebook 14 which both look reasonable. Although I find this area of the market a minefield because a) there are many model variants that are not easy to distinguish and b) at this end of the market they all have weaknesses. This is despite the fact that I run a software development organisation and use a Dell XPS 13 myself! The Acer for example has lots of sub-codes, none of which are very obvious in most adverts....
Recommendations based on recent experience would be very helpful.
Thanks!
Charles
I've looked at the Asus R13 and Acer Chromebook 14 which both look reasonable. Although I find this area of the market a minefield because a) there are many model variants that are not easy to distinguish and b) at this end of the market they all have weaknesses. This is despite the fact that I run a software development organisation and use a Dell XPS 13 myself! The Acer for example has lots of sub-codes, none of which are very obvious in most adverts....
Recommendations based on recent experience would be very helpful.
Thanks!
Charles
i have the older Acer 4GB. They are pretty cheap now circa £200. Works just great. Id imagine for school it would be fine... internet browsing and bit of word processing / spreadsheets. Google docs work fine and so do the microsoft apps. Battery lasts forever. bear in min tho it has a shelf life where it becomes unsupported (june 2022)..... so you may wish to buy the newer version which i think £300 up.
The acer model numbers really don't make much sense, it is an absolute minefield, but they are pretty nice laptops.
I just don't understand why when you've given a laptop a generic model name then a model code, you can't just have a unique code every time you change the specs.
The old acer chromebook 14s
Some came with 2gig ram 16g storage 1024 x 768 display
Others had 4g ram 32g storage 1080 x 1920 full HD display and some (possibily not all) had a more powerful quad core processor.
All were known as the acer chromebook 14 and had the code 14 CB3-431, I think there was also another even older acer chromebook 14 that you used to occasonally find for sale which has now been phased out.
They were a really nice form factor in an all aluminium case, the 2gig ones were too weedy for anything, the 4 gig ones were really nice, although a bit limited by the cpu.
Now they've been updated you get an acer chromebook 514 with model codes CB514-1H or CB514-1H Touch
The form factor is pretty much the same but they now have usb 3 and usb-c ports (previously they had round charging port), they have a thinner bezel and possibly a back lit keyboard, so they really do have the look and feel of a high end laptop.
The specs again seem to be all over the place though
In PC world the non touch has still only has a 1024 x 768 display but is otherwise the same, both 4g ram 32g storage and same celeron processor.
But the touch on in Argos has 64g storage.
On the acer website both now have full HD screens and a more powerful quad core celeron processor.
The non touch ones are in pc world for £189 and if you can cope with the low res screen I think you'll struggle to get anything as nice for under £200
I just don't understand why when you've given a laptop a generic model name then a model code, you can't just have a unique code every time you change the specs.
The old acer chromebook 14s
Some came with 2gig ram 16g storage 1024 x 768 display
Others had 4g ram 32g storage 1080 x 1920 full HD display and some (possibily not all) had a more powerful quad core processor.
All were known as the acer chromebook 14 and had the code 14 CB3-431, I think there was also another even older acer chromebook 14 that you used to occasonally find for sale which has now been phased out.
They were a really nice form factor in an all aluminium case, the 2gig ones were too weedy for anything, the 4 gig ones were really nice, although a bit limited by the cpu.
Now they've been updated you get an acer chromebook 514 with model codes CB514-1H or CB514-1H Touch
The form factor is pretty much the same but they now have usb 3 and usb-c ports (previously they had round charging port), they have a thinner bezel and possibly a back lit keyboard, so they really do have the look and feel of a high end laptop.
The specs again seem to be all over the place though
In PC world the non touch has still only has a 1024 x 768 display but is otherwise the same, both 4g ram 32g storage and same celeron processor.
But the touch on in Argos has 64g storage.
On the acer website both now have full HD screens and a more powerful quad core celeron processor.
The non touch ones are in pc world for £189 and if you can cope with the low res screen I think you'll struggle to get anything as nice for under £200
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