I was FORCED to buy a Chromebook…. - YouTube

- Well, it finally happened.

The thing every parent fears the most.

My son needs a Chromebook for school.

So if we're doing this,

I guess it's up to me

to find the best dang bang-for-the-buck Chromebook...

But wait.

(plastic squeaking)

This is gonna be a lot harder than I thought.

Why can't they just be good?

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If you or a loved one isn't currently in grade school,

I wouldn't you expect you to be aware

of just how dominant Chromebooks have become in that space.

In 2019 there were 30 million Chromebooks

deployed in schools, primarily in the U.S. and Canada.

And in January 2020

Google announced that that number had ballooned 33%

to a whopping 40 million Chromebooks

in classrooms around the globe,

and that is before the COVID techsplosion.

And now my son is gonna be joining the ranks

of Chromebook users whether I like it or not.

But then, maybe that's not so bad.

Like many of you, I've been guilty of dismissing Chromebooks

as glorified web browsing appliances because...

Well, that's what Google intended them to be.

But in the past few years,

they have become far more capable

with Google adding the ability to run Android apps in 2016,

introducing the Linux beta

on all new devices released since 2020

for you developer types out there,

and even allowing enterprise users

to run Windows through Parallels.

Wait. "Allowing"?

Okay, yeah.

The whole point of the schools' Chromebook requirement

is that the kids' machines will be running Chrome OS,

and the two main selling points of Chrome OS

are how easy it is to deploy a locked-down fleet of them

that keeps the kids from doing anything too fun,

and how lightweight it is,

which indirectly makes Chromebooks crazy cheap.

I mean, look at this thing. $190!

That's...

I mean, new Windows laptops

with MSRPs under $200 do exist,

but the ones that we've seen

come from less-than-reputable manufacturers

and I don't think that reputation is changing anytime soon.

I mean, even the options for Windows machines

around the $250 mark make no sense

'cause they're basically just Chromebooks

that have been saddled with the additional cost

of a much heavier operating system.

So it's really in this low price tier

that Chromebooks shine as capable

and cost-effective machines.

But what kinda sacrifices are being made

to achieve these crazy low price points?

Let's go shopping!

Disclosure: I'm an investor in Framework, a laptop company.

They don't make Chromebooks, but I thought you should know.

All right, let's see what we got here.

Too big for a little kid.

Opposite problem.

This one doesn't have any ports.

All plastic.

These suck!

Well, this is a good price.

Wow, is that screen ever tiny.

Not to mention those bezels.

Is this YouTube video running at 720p with the CPU at 100%?

That's just embarrassing.

Ooh!

Look at this tiny thing! That's cute.

Oh, it's a tablet with a detachable keyboard cover. Neat.

(alarm wailing) Oh! Shoot, uh...

Boy, is this keyboard ever gonna be cramped.

Though for a child, maybe.

Touchscreen is nice to have for Android apps.

Maybe some drawing. It is a bit small though.

Oh, okay. It's got eMMC storage.

That's when the essentially embed

an SD card into the motherboard

and then use that as your system storage.

It's really not very fast compared to an SSD,

and this is only 32 gigs.

But it'll be more responsive than a hard drive,

and with tight integration with Google Drive,

I might need that much local storage.

And since we're not doing any heavy computing,

it doesn't need to be that fast, but...

Ooh, the Best Buy demo

doesn't even fit on the screen properly.

I don't think this thing's gonna cut it.

Maybe we should look online for some other options.

Oh, Samsung has a Chromebook.

Look at that. Fiesta Red.

Built-in S Pen. Nice.

A 4K screen.

Okay, the screen size. This is what, 13 inches?

Kinda overkill. Could hurt battery life.

A Core i5!

I don't think we've seen anything with a Core-tier CPU yet.

Feels a little overkill too.

8 gigs of RAM is nice.

But while we love to joke about Chrome being a RAM hog,

I mean, you don't have Windows sucking back

a bunch of your resources.

And there's probably a reason that most Chromebooks

only have 4 gigs.

256 gigs of real SSD storage? How much is this thing?

$1,000!

If I wanted to spend MacBook money, I would get a MacBook.

See ya later, Samsung.

Okay, how about this one? Lenovo Flex 5.

Got a Core i3.

That should be adequate for watching an HD video

and taking notes without being overkill.

USB-A for connecting devices at school.

It's a two-in-one.

That added flexibility could really come in handy.

Screen looks pretty good too.

This is checking a lot of boxes right now.

And it's in stock.

Of course, we can't just buy the first thing

that tickles our fancy.

This one says up to 12 hours of battery life.

And knowing that he's my son,

he'll probably forget his charger,

so a long-lasting battery is good.

Then again, these all claim to have great battery life.

I guess that's another benefit

of running low-end hardware and a lightweight OS.

But this display seems pretty lousy. Is this a TN panel?

You know, we recommend these types of displays

in the past for gamers

due to their super fast response times,

but the colors look bad and the viewing angles are terrible.

It's not something you want to put up with on a laptop,

and especially not in 2022

when IPS panels have become so affordable.

Okay, back to the Lenovo.

Seems durable. Not too big, not too small.

The keyboard didn't wow me, but none of them really did.

And the speakers are... (tinny techno music)

Well, they're speakers. (tinny techno music)

But at 370 U.S. dollars, I think this is our best deal.

Let's buy it.

But wait, Shopper Linus.

You aren't ready to make a decision yet.

You forget to get hydrated.

LTTStore.com.

And you forgot another big thing: long-term support.

Did you know that the support window

of your Chrome OS device

is determined by when it was released?

I mean, that makes sense.

Newer item is gonna have more life left in it.

But there is a big gotcha in there

because devices made in 2018

are gonna get automatic update support until 2022.

That's a period of four years.

Meanwhile, a device released in 2020

is gonna be supported until 2028!

This is because in 2020,

Google promised that all new Chromebooks

would receive eight years of automatic update support,

but they didn't bother to extend that eight-year guarantee

to devices that were already released,

even if they were only a few months old.

So look closely and double-check

on Google's Chromebook support site,

which we're gonna have linked down below.

It's really easy to make a mistake here.

Like, look at this Acer Chromebook 14.

It doesn't look all that different

from this Acer Chromebook 514,

but that first device is only gonna be supported

for seven more months

while the 514 will be supported for seven more years.

My Flex 5 here is theoretically good until 2028,

meaning that my son will be enjoying

this mediocre computing experience

until he is well into high school.

Or will he?

Darn it! ("God Save the King")

This is Linus Tech Tips. ("God Save the King")

We don't take kindly to computers

merely doing what they were designed to do.

Which is why we're going to break out of Google's sandbox

and see what this Chromebook can do

from a gaming standpoint.

They are actually quite a few options these days.

We could use a game streaming service

like GeForce Now or Google Stadia,

and if triple-A games are your priority,

then this is gonna be pretty much the only option.

And it's actually a surprisingly solid experience,

though I would strongly recommend a USB Ethernet dongle

for a more stable connection.

If you're after lighter games...

Man, Android has a lot going on these days.

Everything from SNES and PlayStation emulators

to indie hits like "Stardew Valley."

That's honestly all that most people will need

or even want,

but we can go deeper.

Chrome OS, like Android, is based on Linux,

and some very clever people have developed a nifty way

for us to install Linux on our machine called Crouton.

It lets us put our own Linux install in chroot,

a self-contained directory

that is separate from the rest of the system,

but this is essentially an exploit.

Whoa! What are you doin'?

Didn't you know Google has added

their own implementation of Linux on Chrome OS

through a project called Crostini?

Trust me, it is way simpler to set up and much more secure.

The catch is that you need a Chromebook

from 2020 or later to use it.

So if you have a newer Chromebook,

we've linked a simple tutorial down below for you.

But note that due to the implementation,

Crostini runs Debian in a VM,

the performance will take a hit.

So if you want to be running your games on the bare metal,

then keep following along because Crouton

is your best option for now.

That requires to activate developer mode on your Chromebook,

which will not only wipe all of your local files

but it also makes your device more vulnerable to attacks.

And if the unit was loaned to you

by your school or workplace,

this will for sure get you in trouble.

Not to mention that there are numerous other caveats

that you can pause and read here.

Now, I'ma just fast forward us

following the instructions on the GitHub page.

We're gonna have that link down below as well.

As you can see then, in Crouton,

while we do have access to games via Proton,

with this low tier of hardware

it is not a super smooth experience.

Like "Rocket League," for example.

It's a relatively lightweight game,

but it's modern and requires a modern system.

And as you can see from just loading into the menu,

it's not gonna go very well.

The game's barely runnable.

So let's lower our expectations and try out "Half-Life 2."

Hitches, but it's not half bad.

How about "Broforce?"

This is a 2D game.

It's an action side-scroller that is crazy fun,

especially when playing with friends.

And honestly, it's a pretty good experience,

which means that while Linux gaming can be a challenge,

I'm hopeful that as that continues to improve,

this is gonna be a viable way

to unlock an even greater library of games.

At least those that are light enough to run.

But there's evidence showing

that Valve is working with Google

on a Chrome OS-native version of Steam

that would allow games to run via Proton on Chrome OS itself

with no workarounds or VMs required.

The project is under the codename Borealis,

and some users recently spotted

flags for it in Chrome's settings,

meaning we could potentially see

an optimized gaming platform for Chrome OS

later on this year.

Stay tuned.

But for now I'll have to settle for running

unoptimized software on the suboptimal hardware

in the Lenovo Chromebook Flex 5.

By "I," I mean my son.

Which raises a key question:

"Linus, surely you could've afforded

a premium Chromebook like the Pixelbook Go.

Why did you cheap out then on your only begotten son?"

I'm really glad you asked,

and it's because an expensive Chromebook

is still a Chromebook,

and the way that I see it,

no matter how much money you have to throw around,

if you're spending more than about

500 U.S. dollars on a laptop,

you're gonna be getting hardware

that's not gonna be dragged down by Windows anyway.

So you might as well have something

that can run Windows natively

without a whole bunch of hackery

and hassle in order to get running

because Windows is still a lot more flexible

in terms of what you can do.

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If you guys enjoyed this video, go check out our video

"Running Windows on a Chromebook."

It's a pretty fun adventure.