30 minutes with a Chromebook

Best Buy was a pain in the ass as usual.  The had no cases for the chromebooks despite being the #1 retailer.  No one wanted to help me with the chromebook and it’s fortunate they had them right there below the display otherwise I doubt I would have gotten one.  Walking up and down the mall was fun, the chromebook is light, but without a proper case it stuck up out of my makeshift ipad case that I was using and was pretty annoying the whole time (just clicked on the touchpad and got knocked back a word).  Mission failed again at Starbucks because it was crowded, small with no seats with plugs and I later learned this laptop had no starting charge.  Returned home and time to start reviewing.

Boots up quick, sets up with my name and I’m off and rolling in Google Docs.  Almost got distracted and started installing the Offline Options, but went straight to the typing.  Keyboard is pretty great response and it feels thin on the desktop like there’s hardly a laptop under me.  The touchpad makes a slight clicking sound as do the keys, but the main issue here is I can type faster than the thing can display it.  Especially when it’s saving which it seems to be doing most of the time.  Not sure if new versions or offline docs will fix this, but there’s definately some lag.  And making corrections through this lag is very annoying.  (4 tabs open, no other apps)

One tab open.  Can I still type that much faster than you?  No.  Not as much.  So single tab is better, dunno if the google drive tab would count much, but I think I had two docs open before and I think that was bugging it.  But that could be an issue.  (saw the mouse flickering while I was typing, but then it went away).

Screen Brightness at max already as I try to put it up a bit.  Pretty dark room though.  And junk on my glasses.  

Clicky touchpad seems to work well.  Two finger scrolling, alt-click for menu.  Alt button is nice and big, no windows button between them, just control and alt.  

Looks like an update available icon.  Not surprising.  Running the defaults.  Bit of an issue with my hand dragging across the touch screen while typing.  Just happened again.  

Time for some music.  

Neat random collection of covers leads me to The Rentals - It’s time to come home.  Sounds pretty good, playing in a second tab, doesn’t seem to affect typing like having a second doc open or having 4 tabs up.  Still see the cursor flicking around as my hands touch the touch pad.  

Really impressed with the keyboard.  No extraneous keys, no pgup or any of that function nonsense.  The top row is all useful stuff ala apple and everything else has been removed.  The word Samsung stares out at me from the center.  I long to cover it with stickers.  But this is still my trial book and I need to try to keep it nice incase I decide to return it.

Time for bluetooth headphones.  Looks like it’s not time for Bluetooth headphones.

“Bluetooth audio is not currently supported by Chrome OS. It currently is there primarily for Bluetooth mice and keyboards. Google has not said when or if they will add this.”

Well that’s some lame sauce.  So I’d have to wear wired headphones.  Gonna give that a try.  

Also weird to go back to Ctrl-V for paste instead of the mac’s Alt-V.  

Mute button is fast, but pushing mute again does not unmute.  

Headphone jack is small and tight.  Looks very similar to the power plug port which is near it, but on the back.  

Activated Auto-hide taskbar by alt clicking on it and now it’s gone.  Already was checking at Best Buy, Gdocs has full screen and so does chrome browser.  

Bit disconcerting that the keys don’t glow like my mac book and still a bit of key lag when typing fast (and I just got track pack messed up again).

Listening to music while typing, with headphones on, pretty cool.  Wonder if they’ll add bluetooth audio support to later versions.  Would help people who want headphones and a better mic for video conferencing or phone calling.  (course a lot of that stuff can be done through the iphone or ipad too)

12 tabs open, seems fine.  Lag must have mainly been from the 2 docs open and the dual saving.  

One more note, walked up and down the mall.  Went to sears and tried an 11.6 case that had handles, but no strap, no only did the laptop not fit all the way in the case, but the zipper broke right off as I was closing it.  Not a good demonstration.  Was only 14 bucks, but damn some things are cheap.  Might buy a case off Amazon or carry it around in a tote bag or something.  Felt very purse like at the mall, but this is a pretty neat computer to carry around in such a sml size.

Typing text seems a little small (and it is, set to 11 for some reason).  Might crank that up to 14 or 16.  

Looks like some of my Rentals albums uploaded, but not their studio ones.  Gotta fix that.  Wonder if my mac is still uploading.  

Wow.  Chrome remote desktop is really neat.  I might use this to do tech support on my parents computer.  Seems really easy to setup and you just send the “access code” to the other person so they can help you.  Says it works for chromebooks, but only control worked for me, not controlling a chromebook.

So far, so good.  1000 words.

Really impressive chrome sync.  Typed in my passphrase, brought down not just my bookmarks, but my extensions.  Truly a pleasure not to have to reinstall those.  Gonna update the blog now and start a spreadsheet for my word count (in google docs of course).