Are Chromebooks Responsible For PC Market Growth? (theverge.com)

From a report on The Verge: IDC claims the PC market is "up slightly," recording its first growth in five years. It's a tiny growth of just 0.6 percent, but it's a flattening of the market that Microsoft and its PC maker partners have been looking for after years of decline. While percentage growth looks good on paper, it doesn't always tell the whole story. Over at Gartner, another market research firm that tracks PC sales, the story is a little different. Gartner claims PC shipments declined 2.4 percent in the recent quarter. There's a good reason for the disparity between IDC and Gartner's figures, and it involves Chromebooks. IDC's data includes Chromebooks and excludes Windows tablets, even machines with a detachable keyboard like the Surface Pro. Gartner counts Windows-based tablets as PCs and excludes Chromebooks or any non-Windows-based tablets. Without IDC providing the exact split of Chromebooks sold vs. Windows- and macOS-based machines, it's impossible to know exactly how well Google's low-cost laptops are selling. However, IDC also claims that Chromebooks are doing well with businesses. The US commercial PC market "came out strong mostly backed by growth of Chromebooks," says IDC. Gartner has no opinion on Chromebooks as the company refuses to track them as PCs.

Comments

Re: Depends

[Anonymous Coward]

Makes you think.

No they are not

[redmid17]

tl,dr; No

Hahaha

[Anonymous Coward]

NO

Re: Depends

[Anonymous Coward]

Why such a reliable source as an anonymous coward would be unable to spell properly?
It couldn't possibly be that they are making up stories in order to misrepresent facts, could it?

As Mark Twain said

[Nunya666]

Mark Twain wasn't the first to say it, but he made it popular: There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

All statistics are bogus because they depend on what data you do or do not include, and/or who you do or do not include in the survey that generates the statistic.

Re:As Mark Twain said

[admin7087]

I can't recount how often I've heard this fallacy before. By the same token and for the very same reasons, any statement that anyone ever has made would be bogus, too.

Re:As Mark Twain said

[Anonymous Coward]

Simpsons paradox is not a fallacy. Statistics don't add credibility. Either you already trust the researcher to conduct the research properly, or you don't. If you can't find a way to make the study say what you want it to say, you're no good at statistics. People are 79% more likely to believe something with a statistic when otherwise they would not believe it, hence the saying. That is totally from a study with a large representative sample that was able to achieve 95% significance over the control group. Anyways back to poking rats with needles.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson%27s_paradox

Re:As Mark Twain said

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry to be so blunt, but your post is stupid on many levels. Of course, you have to trust a researcher to some degree if you want to have reasons to trust his research. However, the good thing about statistics is that you can check their assumptions and soundness fairly easily. Try that with 'qualitative research'. Correctly conducted statistics should definitely raise your degree of belief and it is also entirely adequate to more likely believe empirical claims accompanied with proper statistics than empirical claims without any statistical backup. Ultimately analytical models are most desirable, but in lack of those in many areas, what else would you believe? Qualitative pilot studies based on statistically insignificant numbers of surveys among colleagues and college students? As for Simpson's paradox, that's just one more example of a pseudo paradox about which there is nothing paradox at all. Statistics do not become false or lies, just because there are people who don't understand them. They can be used by trained statisticians to lie, of course, but that doesn't tell you anything about statistics either. People can lie with or without statistics.

How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Anonymous Coward]

I often wonder how many Chromebook purchases are made accidentally. They are usually the cheapest notebook looking computers in online and physical stores. Average people probably don't realize that they run Chrome OS instead of Windows, too. So these average people buy Chromebooks thinking they're getting an inexpensive Windows laptop, but instead get something much less than that. I could see people buying them accidentally, not realizing what they are actually getting. At that point it might not even be worth returning the device. It would be cheaper just to gift it to a child as a toy, or even to just throw it on a shelf and forget about it, and to then go out and buy an actual notebook computer running Windows.

Re:How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Waffle Iron]

People who don't realize what kind of computer they are buying might also not realize what OS is running even after they start using it. For those people, the Chromebook probably does what they need, and with fewer hassles.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[BarbaraHudson]

No, what people who don't know what OS they're running need is a web browser for Facebook, Twitter, and email.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[drinkypoo]

'What they need' is usually to 'run Windows software',

[citation needed]

Today, most users spend most of their time in the browser. More and more software is "delivered" "as a service", in the browser. Sure, you can probably still buy quicken on CD or something, or over the net. Or you can buy a subscription and just use it all online. Sure, if you stop paying them, they will take away all your data that you haven't backed up. But if you're paying them every year anyway, having them handle backing up your financial data is kind of a win. Now repeat that same paradigm over every other piece of software.

There are very few apps that can't be implemented in the browser decently. They all involve lots of IO, like video editing. Most people don't do any of those things. And more and more of the things that do require can be done in an Android app, and many of those can be installed on many if not most Chromebooks.

The only sticking point for the average user will be games, and most of them will just play those on a console.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[drinkypoo]

You're out of touch with reality, Espinoza. There's a reason why Windows has 85% of the market,

Yes. It's called illegal abuse of their monopoly position, of which they were found guilty by the USDoJ. You were saying?

Re:How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[ganjadude]

cant tell you how many times my family has asked me about a laptop they find and when i look its a chrome book. for people who live in MS office its not an option (although ive switched most to libreoffice)

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[tepples]

There are very few apps that can't be implemented in the browser decently. They all involve lots of IO, like video editing.

Can high school programming homework "be implemented in the browser decently", particularly if it is to be done in a language other than ECMAScript?

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[drinkypoo]

Can high school programming homework "be implemented in the browser decently", particularly if it is to be done in a language other than ECMAScript?

What? Of course it can. This is twice you have failed to use google today. It still exists.

Re:How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[fibonacci8]

Posting from an Acer Chromebook 11 running GalliumOS (https://galliumos.org/). Much assuredly not something much less than a Windows laptop, unless you mean the price(~ USD $160after tax, new about a year ago). The only accident was I bought it to try out Crouton (https://github.com/dnschneid/crouton) and ended up with more than I'd anticipated. I would be more than happy to gift it to a child as an educational toy if and when I decide to try something else.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[zoid.com]

http://www.chromebookhq.com/fi...

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Cajun Hell]

For the rare case of someone who really needs to run Windows software, they aren't going to buy this accidentally, because they'd already have to check what version of Windows it comes with. People don't just assume "oh, I'm sure it comes with Windows 7, not 10," do they?

If they have legacy requirements, they're going to be very focused on getting the legacy part right. They're going to be looking for that part, even harder than they're looking at the price.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[tepples]

For the benefit of others reading this, I'll summarize the top three results for Google c++ chromebook as of right now>:

• The first result, "C++ Compiler for Chromebook", was a soft redirect to "Compile C/C++ on Chrome OS", which states: "You'll probably need to build it yourself," and links to the article "Building and Testing GCC and GNU binutils". This article in turn appears to be oriented toward developing on a GNU/Linux PC and testing on a Chromebook.
• The second result, "Offline c++ editor and compiler for chromebook", has one reply stating: "No compilers will run under ChromeOS. However, there are a number of very good cloud-based programming/IDE sites that work just fine with Chrome." Use of anything "cloud-based" while riding a school bus or city bus requires a tethering subscription, and in the United States, a tethering subscription for the life of a device is more expensive than a Windows license. Another reply recommends use of developer mode, but that's fragile as I've described elsewhere.
• The third result, "Five Best Online IDE's – Making the switch to a Chromebook", mentions several web-based IDE but doesn't mention their support for offline use. This article in turn linked to "Choosing the Best Chromebook for Developers", which an article about Crouton. But Crouton requires developer mode.

So it's either a remote IDE (which fails while offline) or Crouton (which begs to be wiped). Which search terms did you use to find a third option?

Through other searches, I found Trinket, which surprisingly continued to work after I went offline, made changes to the program with Trinket still open, and ran it. But it doesn't appear to work offline after navigating from Trinket and back to it. (This would require use of a Service Worker.)

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[tepples]

Do any of the IDEs listed there support a Service Worker for offline use while riding public transit? Or would that require a cellular Internet subscription?

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are very few apps that can't be implemented in the browser decently. They all involve lots of IO, like video editing.

Can high school programming homework "be implemented in the browser decently", particularly if it is to be done in a language other than ECMAScript?

What percent of computers are used to do high school programming homework?

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many people truly "develop software" on a city bus?

And how many laptop users need to develop software anyway? Is this the yardstick for what makes somethign a laptop.

I have sat on a plane with a chromebook and used offline Outlook web access for work stuff, written stuff in Offline Google docs and used Offline Google Calendar/mail for my personal stuff. I've managed tasks using Offline Google Keep and read books with the Kindle app. No internet required.

I also have a Dell Windows10 laptop from my employer but it's heavier, shorter battery life, has flaky Wi-Fi due to what I'm told is misimplemented encryption, and cannot really be trusted after suspending or hibernating so needs a full reboot every time I switch it off which takes rather longer than opening the Chromebook.

Assuming I have a net connection (which is whenever I'm not on a plane) I can access a company Windows machine through Remote Desktop Gateway pretty easily for any "must use Windows" functionality. And when I need to do things requiring a linux machine I can get to my home machine via Chrome Remote Desktop. Which is not as often as I might have expected.

When people have finished being with the "can you write C++ on it?" snobbery they might find that it's actually a very pleasant experience having a device that always works, starts up in seconds, is totally secure and can have do full OS update (from predownloaded files) in about 10 seconds.

If you're on the hook for supporting a parent's computer it may be a no brainer. Certainly better than supporting a Win10 machine remotely when all they want to use is Web, Wordpad and printing photographs.

I see a lot of stuff opined about Chromebooks that is clearly written by people who've not actually tried to live with one.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[StayFrosty]

Are you logged in to your google account? Search results are customized so others may have more useful results. Did you try any other search queries?

To save some time, here is the solution: Crouton + GCC.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[tepples]

Crouton requires developer mode [...] that's fragile

To save some time, here is the solution: Crouton + GCC.

I'm aware of Crouton. What's to keep others from mindlessly pressing Space then Enter and wiping Crouton?

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Rob Y.]

Well, I hope you are transsexual, BarbaraHudson. Otherwise, your signature would point to a really weirdly specific objection to a particular TV series.

In any case, I think "Transprent" (at least in the first season) is about the best thing on TV. And no, it's not really about the trans-parent. It's about a bunch of bratty, entitled, fucked up kids whose father transitioned in his 70's. Not sure what stereotypes you're talking about, but in any case, the show is a largely autobiographical riff about Jill Solloway's experiences growing up.

And complaining about have a man play the parent's role instead of a trans-woman, is a little odd - unless you can point to a 70+ year old transwoman who can actually act. That would, indeed, have made the show even better.

Now, about Chromebooks...

Re:How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[michael.karl.coleman]

People are going to be pissed, though, when they discover that Chromebooks won't run their viruses...

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're out of touch with reality, Espinoza. There's a reason why Windows has 85% of the market

Or perhaps you are out of touch, as that market is not growing, and with good reason. Most people today are fine with just using their smartphone to read facebook, twitter and gmail.
Just because you need a Windows PC doesn't mean they do.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[BarbaraHudson]

He looked and acted (the walk, that man-walk with the head and shoulders leaning forward, walking clunk-clunk like he still had his steel-toed workie boots on, the unrealistic expectations of going on dates when he wasn't even living full-time as a woman) like a man in a dress, not a successful transsexual, or even one seriously trying. In other words, he looked and acted like a drag queen having a weekend adventure.

Jill Soloway is 51 today, She came out at 44, nor 70+, so wtf are you thinking of. She has never been 70+. The show was a success because it played on stereotypes - stuff people can relate to. The truth is much messier, and for many, alien.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Rob Y.]

It's not about Jill Solloway - except perhaps as a model for the kids. Solloway's father came out as trans in his 70's. And, of course, in the first season, Maura was supposed to be clueless about how to live as a woman. She's more 'successful' as a transwoman in the later seasons. The truth is messy indeed - and I think the show takes that on pretty well.

Have you ever seen Cait Jenner? She's still a little clueless - as if tons of makeup is all it takes. I have a lesbian friend who is outraged at Jenner calling herself a woman ("how dare he usurp my experience"). At some point, you just have to acknowledge that everybody's experience of gender is personal - and you can't always extrapolate from yourself (or from some stereotype) to understand someone else.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Shirley Marquez]

In the first season, Jeffrey Tambor's portrayal of Maura as a woman wasn't very convincingly female, especially not in the first couple of episodes. And it wasn't MEANT to be. Maura was in the early stages of transition; she was still learning how to be a woman. As the series continues into the second and third seasons you can see her develop; she is much more comfortable in her skin and moves and talks in a much more feminine way.

She would still have trouble passing, but guess what? Most people who transition to female at a late age, as Maura did, will have the same difficulty; the traces of a life spent under the influence of testosterone are hard to erase. Applications of large sums of money, as Caitlin Jenner did, can help; Jenner has had facial hair removal, facial feminization surgery, and breast implants. (It's public knowledge that she has had those procedures.) The total cost is probably well over $50,000; that's before she spent a dime on things like her wardrobe, nor have I included the cost of hormone therapy or of the psychiatric examinations that most medical practices require before prescribing hormones or doing surgery.

I'm all in favor of giving transgender roles to transgender actors when possible. But in the case of Transparent it likely wasn't possible, and even if it had been it would have been a less effective program. There aren't many trans actors of that age to choose from; I suspect you can count the good ones on the fingers of no hands. An actor who transitioned long ago would have more difficulty portraying the awkwardness of the early stages of transition than Tambor did. Finally, Tambor's role gains some power from the fact that he is famous, in much the same way that Tom Hanks in Philadelphia did. When we watch Tambor it's not just that some random old person is transitioning, it's as if somebody we KNOW is transitioning because we're already familiar with him from other shows and movies. That would be lost if they had cast an unknown trans actress, and perforce it would be an unknown as there are no famous 70 year old trans actresses.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[ArmoredDragon]

I think it's entirely likely that they needed a male actor for that particular role, and I'd wager that its borderline impossible to find a male actor that would want to take hormones or do anything else beyond just looking like he does. I wouldn't think much of it anyways; Barbara Hudson is a really pedantic asshole.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[Shirley Marquez]

If you transition from male to female as late in life as Maura, even taking hormones has limited effects. Hormones can't undo the differences in facial structure, the broad shoulders, or the narrow hips; bone structure is wired in by then. They don't stop beard growth, though they will slow hair growth elsewhere on the body. They may stop further progress of male pattern baldness, but whatever hair has already been lost is probably gone for good. (Some people do experience modest regrowth.) They will cause some breast development but not as much as in someone who transitioned earlier, so the late transitioner is more likely to want implants..

As an extra added bonus, facial hair removal is likely to be more costly. Laser removal is effective for many people who transition early in life. But it doesn't work on gray hair, including beard hair, leaving only the more expensive option of electrolysis. Most will need some electrolysis anyway for full removal, but it's a hair-by-hair process rather than a bulk one so whatever reduction can be achieved with laser reduces the overall cost.

If you were going to hire a trans actress for the role, you'd want one who transitioned late in life, who hasn't had facial surgery, and who is either not taking hormones or has just started them. (In a later plot development Maura is unable to go on hormone therapy, but that's probably in part a plot device to deal with the fact that Tambor's breasts are not developing.) If they had already had facial hair removal you could probably get around that with makeup, and the actor could wear a packer to produce the proper bulge if it's ever needed for a scene. I don't believe Tambor ever does frontal nudity in the show (you do see his bare butt) so that's not an issue. I'm guessing that the number of actors who could fill that list of needs and who are good enough for a major television production is zero.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[BarbaraHudson]

My criticisms have zero to do with age or taking hormones or facial hair removal, or boobs, or surgery of any sort. It portrays transsexuals as having totally unrealistic expectations - such as going out on a date when you don't even have the guts to go full-time, never mind the experience to no longer be self-conscious. That's a good way to get publicly humiliated, and anyone transitioning is going to be aware of the risks. Encouraging people to go on dates before they've completed their social transition is irresponsible. It might work in California, but it sure as hell won't play the same in Texas.

Go big or go home - in this case, that means transition completely, and make sure you have enough experience so you don't look like a man in a dress, before you try to date someone who doesn't know, because if you haven't transitioned, you'll still be self-conscious of who you are in each roll; it won't be second nature. It's a good way to get the sh*t beaten out of you, or worse. Trying to go on dates when you aren't passable and haven't even finished your social transition is nutzo dangerous. Acting like a woman part-time is not the same as living as one full-time and not needing to put on an act because you've had the time to get comfortable with your real self, as well as unlearning the male mannerisms that get you clocked.

When the only time you even think about being a transsexual is when you go online or see bs like transparent, you've arrived.

There are those who are unpassable, and that's unfortunate, and age has nothing to do with it. In fact, aging makes it easier to pass, because people don't have the same expectations of appearance for senior women. Then again, there are genetic women who are unpassable as women. Same as there are women who are particularly hirsute. Even with hormones, they have to shave. You have to deal with what nature gave you, same as everyone else in the world.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[BarbaraHudson]

Many transsexuals never go on cross-gender hormones, never mind turning the outsie into an insie. For them, the social transition is as far as they can go. It could be because of lack of access to a doctor willing to write the prescription, or they may not be healthy enough to undergo a physical transition, or their spouse draws the line at hormones and they value the relationship.

So no, hormones doesn't enter the picture. Neither does age of transition. But showing someone who hasn't even transitioned going on a date is just encouraging dangerous behaviour. At the very least, there's public humiliation, because you can be damn sure it will make Facebook. And it could cost you your job; every year it gets a few people killed.

Re: How many Chromebook buys are accidental?

[ArmoredDragon]

Notice I said "take hormones or do anything else beyond just looking like he does". And of course, you just stuck to the hormones because you're a pedantic narcissist asshole.

Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[CraigCruden]

Chromebooks are Linux with a very locked down UI that is cloud based with a little local storage -- as such they are actually a "personal computer".

I will personally stick with macOS computers -- but for tracking purposes .... There should probably be more categories so that the data summary is more useful to see the computing trends.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[tepples]

Chromebooks are Linux with a very locked down UI that is cloud based with a little local storage -- as such they are actually a "personal computer".

I consider something a "personal computer" if the person who owns it controls what computing is done. One test for this is as follows: Can one practically develop an app for a Chromebook on a Chromebook? Netbooks from 2008 through 2012 were personal computers because they could run GCC.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[redmid17]

That's not a good definition

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[joh]

It's not a bad definition. The Personal Computer was named as opposed to non-personal computers you used as one users among others. As ChromeBooks are hardly more than terminals to a server (with software running out there at Google) it's pretty much similar to working at a terminal connected to a server back then.

It's just that you own the terminal and can use it elsewhere. "Personal Terminal" would be a better name than "Personal Computer" here.

(But of course you CAN run local software on ChromeBooks if you really want to.)

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[Cajun Hell]

One test for this is as follows: Can one practically develop an app for a Chromebook on a Chromebook?

The Chromebook point of view would be to say, "Yes. You can run my app. It's at .." and then they give you an URL.

It's not what you're thinking, but it's what they're thinking. That is the market for Chromebooks.

I think instead of thinking of them as terminals, people ought to think of them as full PCs, which come preloaded only with a terminal emulator. "WTF do you want that x86 box for? You're just going to hook it up to the VAX anyway. You should have gotten a VT100. Wait, your terminal understands the escape codes for .. OMFG. You have color?! Coool!!"

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with that definition is the computer not the personal part.A computer is a device that can run a program. There is not anything in the definition that is can be changes easy or changeable by a user.

So by that definition any personal device that runs software is a computer. Cellphones, tablets will be include. And everything else with a CPU. A external harddrive and most other PC peripherals has CPU and would be included. More advanced calculator and anything else you have with a microcontroller would be included.

A better definition of what most people think of when you say PC is a computer where the user can easy add and run any new software on it. That would exclude Chromebooks but would induce most android devices.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[mrchaotica]

Can one practically develop an app for a Chromebook on a Chromebook?

Chrome OS apps are glorified web pages, so you can develop them on anything that can run Chrome itself and edit text.

because they could run GCC.

My Chromebook does run GCC, in Crouton.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[tepples]

A better definition of what most people think of when you say PC is a computer where the user can easy add and run any new software on it.

That's essentially the sentiment I was trying to capture. But the way I phrase it ties it more closely to the literal expansion "personal computer": the person who owns it controls what computing is done by adding apps, including self-made apps.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[tepples]

The Chromebook point of view would be to say, "Yes. You can run my app. It's at .." and then they give you an URL.

So I've downloaded the app's source code from said URL, and I've made changes to the app. To test these changes, will I need to get my own URL, which is a recurring cost?

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[Anonymous Coward]

That sounds like a smartphone.

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, within the Chromebook way of looking at things, is that if you modify a program, you store your version somewhere, and that somewhere isn't your PC. You have a VPS or something to do the storage for things like that.

Of course, also within the Chromebook way of looking at things, it's weird that you make changes to the app. The app is supposed to be doing what someone else wants it to do, not what you want it to do. It needs to show you ads, for example. You don't want people using apps without ads, do you? What are you, some kind of hacker?

Re:Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down UI

[tepples]

Yes, within the Chromebook way of looking at things, is that if you modify a program, you store your version somewhere, and that somewhere isn't your PC. You have a VPS or something to do the storage for things like that.

In addition, you need a domain because offline use doesn't work without Service Workers, which don't work without TLS, which doesn't work without a certificate, and the CA/Browser Forum's Baseline Requirements forbid certificate authorities to issue a certificate without a fully-qualified domain name. So would it be reasonable to consider the annual price of a domain and the annual price of a VPS as part of the total cost of ownership of running free software on a Chromebook?

What's a PC? Also, WTF, IDC?

[drinkypoo]

Obviously this depends on how you count, which was my response even before reading the fine summary:

IDC's data includes Chromebooks and excludes Windows tablets, even machines with a detachable keyboard like the Surface Pro. Gartner counts Windows-based tablets as PCs and excludes Chromebooks or any non-Windows-based tablets.

If you are counting Wintel PCs then it makes sense to count windows tablets and not count non-windows-based whatever, definitely including Chromebooks. But whatever else is true, if you are counting PCs, then it makes absolutely no sense to not count Windows-based tablets, which are just PCs with a wacky form factor. That only makes sense if you are counting desktops, but then you also have to exclude Windows notebooks. So, WTF, IDC?

Re:What's a PC? Also, WTF, IDC?

[rickb928]

My Surface Pro 3 is my PC. My only personal PC. I have an Android tablet and smartphone, but the Surface Pro 3 is my PC.

IDC can play that game, but they are not offering the best information. Sad.

All my Surface Pro lacks is dual-boot, which I've avoided just to avoid munging it too much, and I have a VM running Ubuntu for stuff I need to get done. Workd fine.

For those of you who may be confused, the Surface Pro 3 is a PC.

Re:What's a PC? Also, WTF, IDC?

[danomac]

For those of you who may be confused, the Surface Pro 3 is a PC.

Agreed, I have one as well. Some months ago I got tired of the thought of Microsoft spying on me so I shrunk the Windows partition and installed linux, haven't even booted Windows since then. Still have to tweak it a bit to get it to work the way I want, but it works.

Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a PC?

[mykepredko]

In our business (Mimetics), we use Chromebooks a lot and the low end Chromebooks (2 GByte DDR & 16GByte SSD) are excellent for our application (Chrome Extension) as well as a classroom tool for students. I would argue that Chromebooks are better in the classroom than traditional PCs and I can see many applications where ChromeOS devices would be a better solution in a work environment than a traditional PC.

But, I would be reluctant to call a ChromeOS device as a "PC" because:
- They need to have a network connection to access user data
- Local file systems (ie USB drives) are absolutely painful to access and work with (the paradigm is to use GDrive storage and anything else is work)
- There simply isn't enough memory/drive space available for anything other Extensions which are measured in the low tens of MBytes
- Applications are limited to Javascript (although I'm hoping Webassembly will be an option in the near future) with browser built in debug tools with a somewhat convoluted load/test process. A full featured IDE for application development is nothing more than a dream at this point

A surface table, which can operate on its own, generally has many 10s to 100s of Gbytes of storage and can run traditional apps, even without keyboards seems ore likely to match the traditional definition of a "PC".

Re:Dumb terminals shouldn't be considered PCs.

[__aaclcg7560]

You can often spend just a little bit more money, and get a lot more capability and durability, from a low-end real laptop.

Sounds like my inexpensive Dell laptop with Windows 10 that I upgraded the memory to 8GB and replaced the hard drive with an SSD. Enough power to run email and web browser, but my data lives on a file server and I have a Red Hat Linux box for processing.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[drinkypoo]

Very little functionality exists on these Chromebooks (making them dumb).

The amount of functionality included in bundled apps isn't what makes a device smart or dumb. It's the extensibility.

They are nothing more than the modern equivalent of a VT100.

That's completely false. You clearly have never owned a VT100. My first glass terminal (that I owned) was a VT100-AA. It didn't have the ability to run any kind of code locally aside from what is in ROM. The only settings were for tab stops and communications parameters.

Not only does Chromium on ChromeOS have a[n admittedly limited] built in shell, but you can add app-like functionality to it. For example, there is a GUI SSH client addon. And if you enable developer mode then you can tamper with the system, whether installing busybox or a full Linux environment via Crouton. This is not a complete reinstallation, but a chrooted Linux install using the existing kernel.

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[rickb928]

At my work every necessary app is browser-based, and Chrome is becoming the enterprise standard. Even my terminal sessions are usable in Host On Demand. Except for document generation...

A Chromebook would actually serve. Office whatever can be web based.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Bongo]

Maybe "appliance" is a slightly better word.

Like an AppleTV -- the hardware is to support a certain usage, no more and no less, and isn't sold as a general purpose machine.

So a ChromeBook is like the games console of Google cloud stuff.

Are Chromebook sales counted as PC sales?

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

That seems to be the gist of the summary. Two different reports, one counts Chromebook as PCs show mild growth. Another that did not count Chromebook showed continued decline. The headline seems to suggest somehow Chromebooks are boosting the sales of PCs.

Re:Are Chromebook sales counted as PC sales?

[Plumpaquatsch]

That seems to be the gist of the summary. Two different reports, one counts Chromebook as PCs show mild growth. Another that did not count Chromebook showed continued decline. The headline seems to suggest somehow Chromebooks are boosting the sales of PCs.

<sarcasm>Considering the total including Chromebooks is lower than the one without - obviously Chromebooks lower PC sales </sarcasm>

My definition of PC; several devices evaluated

[tepples]

In my opinion, it's a personal computer if the person who owns it can develop and run an application for it. Under this definition:

• GNU/Linux: PC.
• Windows (x86 and x86-64): PC because it can run MinGW or Visual Studio.
• Android with Bluetooth keyboard: PC because it can run AIDE.
• iPhone or iPad: Not a PC.
• iPhone or iPad connected to an Xcode appliance: PC.
• Stock game console: Not a PC.
• Retro game console connected to a PC with keyboard: PC.
• Stock Chromebook: Not a PC. All it can do is view web pages.
• Chromebook with Crouton: PC, but very easy to break. Once a Chromebook's owner installs Crouton, the firmware displays an "OS verification is OFF" screen that begs anyone who turns it on to wipe the drive by pressing Space then Enter.

Re:My definition of PC; several devices evaluated

[drinkypoo]

Android with Bluetooth keyboard: PC because it can run AIDE.

The a Chromebook is also a PC, because it can also run AIDE, which I found out with Google. You could have, too.

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[BarbaraHudson]

Acer's Chromebook R has 4 gigs of ram and 32 gigs of local storage. Just store your stuff locally. You can fold the keyboard underneath so that it works as a 10-point touch tablet. You get what you pay for.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[drinkypoo]

So a ChromeBook is like the games console of Google cloud stuff.

That's not true at all. The ChromeBook is not even close to being as locked down as a games console. You don't need to give anyone money or even get anyone's software blessing to put your ChromeBook into developer mode, at which point you can load whatever you want onto it. You just have to [effectively] do a little dance, which is slightly annoying but not prohibitive. And since you can run Android apps on a Chromebook, and those apps include more than just gaming or audiovisual entertainment apps, it's clearly a general-purpose computer.

Reminds me of "Wagon" vs "SUV" vs "Crossover"

[enjar]

Vehicle sales have similar weirdness. There are some legal/regulatory terms of what constitutes a "light truck" versus a "car" and so on. Not to mention that the term "station wagon" became a death sentence for a vehicle. So you end up with a PT Cruiser being a truck for fuel efficiency standards but as a car for others. Subaru markets their Outback as a SUV, but it's really a wagon, or as they call it, a Crossover/SUV, and it's also a "truck", but never, ever a "wagon" ... which calls up memories of giant domestic precursors of minivans that stylish people want to avoid.

Nowadays you have the laptops, convertible laptops, tablets designed to replace your laptop, tablets that are nearly laptops, etc. There's some really nice thinking going on out there in the laptop space. My wife went from a traditional laptop to a HP Spectre and is really enjoying the convertible aspect of the thing and the touch screen. Sure she doesn't use the touch screen much in laptop mode, but when she's watching videos she uses it all the time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
http://www.subaru.com/vehicles...
http://www.thecarconnection.co...

Re:Reminds me of "Wagon" vs "SUV" vs "Crossover"

[tepples]

Subaru markets their Outback as a SUV, but it's really a wagon, or as they call it, a Crossover/SUV, and it's also a "truck", but never, ever a "wagon"

When Subaru first started selling the Outback in the mid-1990s, its commercials on U.S. TV referred to it as a "sport utility wagon".

Battery + fixed screen and keyboard

[tepples]

Traditional PCs include Desktops, Notebooks, and Workstations and do not include Tablets or x86 Servers. Detachable Tablets and Slate Tablets are part of the Personal Computing Device Tracker, but are not addressed in this press release.

if you are counting PCs, then it makes absolutely no sense to not count Windows-based tablets, which are just PCs with a wacky form factor. That only makes sense if you are counting desktops, but then you also have to exclude Windows notebooks. So, WTF, IDC?

It makes sense if IDC is defining notebooks as "battery-powered computing devices with a permanently attached screen and alphabetic keyboard suitable for touch-typing". This would include a Windows laptop, a GNU/Linux laptop from System76 or Dell, a MacBook, a Chromebook, or a Remix OS notebook. Is your WTF the fact that IDC treats "mains-powered PCs with a display UNION notebook computers" as worthy of counting?

Re:Battery + fixed screen and keyboard

[drinkypoo]

It makes sense if IDC is defining notebooks as "battery-powered computing devices with a permanently attached screen and alphabetic keyboard suitable for touch-typing".

That's a dumb definition. A convertible notebook is still a notebook. And as long as the keyboard peripheral is available for sale, then the user has simply elected not to purchase the keyboard that they're not using.

Re:Battery + fixed screen and keyboard

[StayFrosty]

That would make an iPad, an android tablet, or pretty much any smartphone a notebook...

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. These Chromebooks are dumb terminals.

Crouton is fragile

[tepples]

And if you enable developer mode then you can tamper with the system, whether installing busybox or a full Linux environment via Crouton.

Until your roommate turns on your Chromebook in developer mode, presses Space as prompted at the "OS verification is OFF" screen, and then presses Enter as prompted. This begins a wipe, which causes you to lose all work that you haven't yet committed to external version control.

Re:Crouton is fragile

[mrchaotica]

I haven't actually tried it yet, but I'm pretty sure that if you don't care about Chrome OS you can flash the firmware to standard CoreBoot and run a normal Linux without any developer mode warnings.

Re:Crouton is fragile

[Anonymous Coward]

Until your roommate turns on your Chromebook in developer mode, presses Space as prompted at the "OS verification is OFF" screen, and then presses Enter as prompted. This begins a wipe, which causes you to lose all work that you haven't yet committed to external version control.

How is this any different than your roommate entering the BIOS on a regular PC, or for that matter pulling the hard drive?

Re:Crouton is fragile

[Mal-2]

Yes and no. Distros that require NVRAM still don't work without modification because the UEFI implementation still doesn't have any. (I talk to the guys doing the firmware on pretty much a daily basis.) But Windows runs now on machines you wouldn't have expected. I had a CB3-111 "Gnawty" and was one of the first to attempt to run Windows 10 on it. It didn't so much run, as walk with a limp. It was a very unpleasant experience. Nine months later, they've got all that sorted out and it runs fine (up to the limits of a 16GB eMMC), but I already sold the Gnawty and bought a Peppy (C720), which was well-supported even then, including OS X on the i3 model. since the lead developer of the Chromebook coreboot project said "get a C720, they just work", then I figured just maybe I should get a C720 rather than fighting with "free" hardware. I have no regrets, except that the Peppy is not fanless like the Gnawty. It rarely makes enough noise to matter, though.

Here's one of the places they hang out.

Re:Crouton is fragile

[tepples]

It's a matter of accident vs. intent.

How is this any different than your roommate entering the BIOS on a regular PC

For one thing, entering the BIOS typically involves F keys, which are less "inviting" than commonly used keys such as Space and Enter that are easily reachable from a touch typist's home position.

or for that matter pulling the hard drive?

That takes a screwdriver, which shows intent.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down

[Anonymous Coward]

VT100 had processors, therefore they were a PC.

happy convert

[Anonymous Coward]

My wife and I recently converted over to chromebooks from pretty nice PC laptops. mine was reasonably high end WRT display, CPU, RAM and storage when I got it (i5,8gb/1tb/FHD 5+ years ago) and my wife's was of the thin and light category. I'm a software engineer and have always had pretty powerful PCs both at home and work.
when the time came to replace my Wife's I looked at what she used it for and came to the conclusion that a $200 chromebook not only could do everything she needed, but that I was able to get one that was physically much nicer than I could get for $800 if I went with a PC (acer 13" FHD/4gb/32gb/brushed metal/thin and light)
shortly after hers arrived, my laptop shit the bed and I again looked at what I used mine for (lately... I no longer do any heavy duty work on my home PC) and decided I could get the same chromebook and be perfectly happy rather than spending $1200 on a new high perf laptop.

so we replaced $2k worth of laptops for $400 and are both very satisfied.

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[mykepredko]

That 32GBytes local storage along with the difficulty in working with additional (USB or SD based) storage is the killer for me in terms of thinking of a Chromebook as a PC.

I have no issues with the "thin client" concept and I think the ChromeOS provides the necessary infrastructure to make a ChromeOS device useful, I just don't think they can replicate the expected functionality of a PC.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[ArchieBunker]

I'd hardly call something that can play 1080p video a VT100. You sound angry at their very existence. What a sad individual. They cost 1/3 of an iPad and come with a full keyboard. Perfect for someone to browse, email, and watch videos.

Many pre-2017 Chromebooks aren't

[tepples]

From the article "Chrome OS Systems Supporting Android Apps":

we won't be able to bring Android apps to every Chromebook ever made

Chromebooks listed in that article or made since 2017 are PCs by my definition. Pre-2017 Chromebooks not on the list aren't PCs without the fragile developer mode.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[mrchaotica]

My Chromebook runs Debian and I use it for software development. How is that not "general purpose?"

If anything, my Windows 7 desktop is the "appliance" since I pretty much only use it for gaming.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[zoid.com]

Chromebooks are perfect from many situations. I recently replaced my dad's Windows PC with a chromebox and it's made both of our lives much better. Twice a year his PC would be a bogged down mess even with malware / anti virus software. No longer an issue. It's been 6 months and all is good.

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[CraigCruden]

- They need to have a network connection to access user data

So do bigger computers that store their data on a SAN....

Running Mate on a Core i3 w/ 4G and 1080p

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm running Ubuntu-Mate on a Core i3 w/ 4G and 1080p on a 13 inch display. It is a chromebook. 11 hours of battery.

But you are correct, it isn't the most powerful computer. I don't use it to transcode videos, but I do use it as a web-app developer running multiple VMs on the same chromebook for a completely self-contained development machine.

The base linux OS uses about 8G with all the bloated software included. With the invention of streaming media, I don't find the remaining storage limited.

Perhaps your idea of a "computer" has been warped by Microsoft CPU/RAM/Storage requirements? I couldn't say. We probably use computers in completely different ways. I have about 20 windows open on my chromebook now - but most are remote ssh shells into other systems.

BTW, a raspberry pi is also a "computer" capable of being a server for most homes. Windows doesn't run on it either, so perhaps you've never heard about it?

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[chill]

ChromeBooks support many offline apps. The app just has to rely on the Chrome browser for the interface. Considering that includes JavaScript and Flash, not to mention full HTML 5, that isn't much of a limitation at all. Caret is one of my favorites.

Anyone who claims they are the computing equivalent to a games console has not seriously looked at what they can do.

I love them, and am chomping at the bit for Samsung to release the Chromebook Pro.

Changing Definitions

[kamaaina]

Lines are getting blurred and definitions of things need to be rewritten.

Like how couple other bodies in our solar system were discovered and we had to redefine Pluto.

So maybe the chrome book is a "Dwarf PC", netbooks aren't really notebooks. Still my Wyse terminal has 4GB of RAM and dual boots to Windows 7 and Mint. Is it still just a terminal?

Definitions seem to matter though, it has real life implications in accounting and record keeping. For example, I can't claim my dog as a dependent but he depends on me.

Works for me!

[mspohr]

A year ago I was facing the decision to replace my aging MacBook Air with one of Apple's expensive but pathetic newer models and decided to get a Chromebook (Asus Flipbook) instead for much less money. Best decision ever!
Not only is the Asus faster than my MacBook (which seems to have gotten slower with every Apple update) but I have access to my Android apps plus apps written for the Chromebook. I use Google docs for all of my wp, presentations and spreadsheets (and great collaborative workspaces).
I've installed Crouton for the times when I need Linux for programming, etc. Just a tab switch from ChromeOS to Linux. Remarkably fast.
Couldn't be happier.
For my uses, it's definitely a PC and does everything I need.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down

[ColdWetDog]

My toaster has a processor. It is NOT a PC.

Data loss by default

[tepples]

My Chromebook does run GCC, in Crouton.

Imagine I am your roommate. I turn on your Chromebook. At "OS verification is OFF", not knowing what that means, I press Space. At the next screen, not knowing what that means, I press Enter. Now how well does it "run GCC, in Crouton"?

Data loss by default through a prompt very much like this has happened to me years ago. The pixel art editor in The Print Shop for Apple II offered to "initialize" a floppy disk every time the user chose to save. While I was taking a shower, my little brother didn't know what that meant and said yes, causing me to lose all pixel art already on that disk.

Re:Data loss by default

[Anonymous Coward]

So again, you are saying that a Chromebook is just like a PC.

Re:Data loss by default

[tepples]

The Print Shop and Chromebook firmware are outliers. Most other systems that I have used do not make it that easy for a novice to accidentally wipe an entire drive.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down

[Anonymous Coward]

Does your toaster have a keyboard too?

Void your Chromebook's warranty

[tepples]

Reflashing the firmware would probably cause the manufacturer to deem the warranty void, leaving me with a paperweight if, for example, the power jack breaks. I have had a laptop's power jack break in the past.

Re:Void your Chromebook's warranty

[mrchaotica]

I void warranties every day of the week... and twice on Sundays!

But seriously, I don't care. I can't remember the last time I used a warranty, especially since half the stuff I buy (especially mechanical things, rather than electronics) is bought used long after the warranty expired anyway.

Now, you do have a larger point, which is correct: Chromebooks are certainly not an ideal choice since Google's intent is for them to be locked-down. I agree, it would definitely be better if they were designed to run arbitrary traditional applications by default. However, I am not convinced that they're any worse than the average Windows 10 laptop since there's no guarantee that the malware that is Windows 10 would be allowed to be removed at all. At least with a Chromebook it's guaranteed that the damn thing runs Linux and that it's possible to remove the untrusted stuff (give or take things like IME, anyway).

Re:Void your Chromebook's warranty

[Mal-2]

You can re-flash it back to stock with a Raspberry Pi and an SOIC clip, even if it is not functional enough to convince it to flash itself.

Re:Void your Chromebook's warranty

[n329619]

warranty? I voided them the moment I got home. And I un-void them within the limited warranty period when it's clearly a manufacturer defect.

Also, breaking the power jack is likely not covered in the limited warranty, but an extended warranty would cover it. In that case, you might as well spill coffee all over the device since having an extended warranty means they're going to help you replace the whole thing anyway.

I'd call them "Personal Terminals"

[joh]

You can try to define "Personal Computer" this way, but historically the name "Personal Computer" just meant a computer that you use alone, instead of being one user of a computer at the university or the company you're working for. Which then was not your PERSONAL computer. That was the major reason for calling a computer you use as the only user (and that sits on or under YOUR desk) a Personal Computer.

ChromeBooks are mostly Terminals, even if you own them the applications run elsewhere. Surely not dumb terminals, but still terminals, just personal terminals that you can own and carry with you instead of going to where there are.

But people easily forget that once computers were something you had to go to to use them as one user among others. You didn't own them and you could not carry them home (or to your office) and use them just for yourself. Both the "Personal Computer" and the "Home Computer" changed that in this way ChromeBooks are a kind of Personal Computer.

Of course then the IBM Personal Computer (PC) became the standard Personal Computer and then what once was a description became nothing but a name ("PC") for a certain kind of computer (a computer with an Intel CPU running Windows or Linux that is and has to be fully cared for by the sole user). Since then people think a "PC" is exactly that. And they're somewhat right, because meanings of words change over time.

An iPad is a "Personal Computer" (you can carry it home and use it as the sole user), but it certainly is not a "PC". A ChromeBook also is a Personal Computer but maybe not what people came to think of a PC (some people not even call a laptop a "PC", they call only desktop PCs "PC").

It's murky, but quite easy to get to the bottom of. Fighting about "is a ChromeBook a PC?" is pointless though when everyone uses a different definition of what the name or description of a "PC" or a "Personal Computer" is supposed to mean. Most people who fight over words only do that because this is often the first time they even thought about what the word means at all and then they're already invested in having to win an argument they started without even knowing what the word they are fighting about actually means and where it came from.

(And actually a "computer" once was something you used to compute things with. The name "computer" was a descriptive name like "screwdriver". Even earlier "computer" was a job description before robots started to do the job... But just as "PC" it became a name instead over time and is not a description anymore because most people don't use them to compute anything. As a name it immediately loses any sense as soon as you start to wring any meaning from it because it has long stopped to be used in the form of a description for what you do with that thing. So don't fight about names, it's useless. It's like asking someone to mill your wheat just because his name happens to be "Frank Miller". At some point in the past one of his forebears certainly did that, but now it has just become a name attached to him through inheritance and is not a description of what he does anymore. Maybe he's a butcher and then people use the name "Miller" as an argument on /. to claim that meat actually is a cereal...)

PC market saturation

[Tony Isaac]

The PC market started to fall for several reasons:
- the market was saturated (everybody who wanted one had one)
- PCs began to be useful for longer than 3 years
- many people started buying tablets instead of PCs for Web surfing and email

Now, however, all those trends have stabilized. We've reached a new normal, and are now in a normal growth curve, as with other mature markets such as cars.

Chromebooks have very little to do with the recent growth of the PC market.

Que Divertido

[drinkypoo]

I was not expecting this to be the comment that caught the troll mod.

Re:Que Divertido

[phantomfive]

I think there's a little non-sequitur there, inasmuch as you need to acquire a monopoly on a market before you can abuse it. Certainly Microsoft did without a doubt abuse their monopoly once they had it, but it's not how they grew their monopoly in the first place.

Re:Que Divertido

[drinkypoo]

Certainly Microsoft did without a doubt abuse their monopoly once they had it, but it's not how they grew their monopoly in the first place.

They had a de facto monopoly position before they had a literal one, which they gained through anticompetitive business practices.

Re:Que Divertido

[phantomfive]

Nah. They had a good market position thanks to IBM (and they also had 'sharp' business practices, and other times completely unethical business practices), but Apple and Commodore made strategic mistakes, too.

Re:Que Divertido

[drinkypoo]

The USDoJ agrees with me, and was in a position to ream Microsoft. Then John Ashcroft, Bush's lapdog, declared that Microsoft would not be reamed. Then the Gates Foundation happened, and made a bunch of investments which, hey... just coincidentally happened to make Bill Gates personally a whole lot of money due to his investments in Big Pharma. And now Gates is sitting on top of that particular cash hoard. From bad to worse: Gates got to put his ill-gotten gains (remember, they are ill-gotten according to the USDoJ, this is not something I made up) in the form of a hammer with which he can club the world periodically.

Re:Que Divertido

[phantomfive]

The USDoJ agrees with me, and was in a position to ream Microsoft.

No, the USDoJ agrees (or agreed) that Microsoft abused their monopoly once they had it. That's not how they got their monopoly in the first place.

And I agree with you on that point, too.

Chromebooks Are Coming Of Age

[Anonymous Coward]

About four months ago my Dell XPS13 crapped out. It was going to be out of comission for about a month getting warranty repair. The day that happened, I got a notice for a refurbished Acer 15 Chromebook for $100. I had a $20 coupon off with that vendor. Got it delivered for $80.

The Chromebook has a better trackpad and browses the web better, and has like a 12-hour battery, so I really end up using it for just about everything. Migrated some of my stuff to the web versions, and it's been great. Got the $1500 laptop back and I just don't see the point unless I need Photoshop, to program something etc. For banking, web surfing, word processing, commenting, etc the Chromebook is faster, works better and has better battery life and I have to worry less about malware, the registry getting slow, stupid add-on programs, stupid Windows 10 updates forcing reboots, etc. It's just so much more hassle free that it feels liberating....really looking at a higher end ($400) Chromebook to upgrade this one since "It Just Works"(tm).

Re:Chromebooks Are Coming Of Age

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. Also -- my Chromebook has *gotten faster* since I first bought it two years ago. It's still faster than when new. Google's optimized it some and I get better benchmark scores all around and it browsing is noticeably snappier and it doesn't drag with cruft like other systems seem to. Added in a high-speed SD card and can drop into Linux when needed. What's not to love?

Re:Depends

[Anonymous Coward]

They would be free to redistribute the code again, but why would they?

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[AvitarX]

Even that usage is as a thin client at worse.

I can view and play local files, that's more than a dumb terminal.

Chromebooks fit some users better than others

[tepples]

How many people truly "develop software" on a city bus?

At least one: myself. No two user stories are identical; let me share mine:

I have two jobs, one of which involves working from home developing software in assembly language for the Nintendo Entertainment System, a computing device with a 6502 CPU, as well as software in Python to convert graphics and other resources to a data format that the NES can read. In the course of my work, I need to test said software by running it in an NES emulator. The only emulators I'm aware of that allow stepping through code are FCEUX and Nintendulator. These emulators are distributed as free software, and though they're for Windows, I use FCEUX in Wine. And I like to get some work done while riding the bus to and from my day job, which is at an office.

And how many laptop users need to develop software anyway? Is this the yardstick for what makes somethign a laptop.

"Laptop" is a form factor. But the ability to make and test a computer program is my yardstick for whether a computer is a personal computer, where the person who owns it controls what computing it does, as opposed to an appliance that runs only web applications.

Assuming I have a net connection (which is whenever I'm not on a plane)

Let me guess: Your user story differs from mine because you drive. Others may happen to live in a city that provides Wi-Fi to riders of its buses, or they may have an employer that subscribes to cellular Internet for is employees' use. I happen to neither drive, nor live in such a city, nor have such an employer.

all they want to use is Web, Wordpad and printing photographs

I fully agree with you that a Chromebook is useful for someone with that user story. My personal user story differs.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down

[Anonymous Coward]

>Twice a year his PC would...

>It's been 6 months...

Sounds like you're due for a tech support call...

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[Solandri]

But, I would be reluctant to call a ChromeOS device as a "PC" because:
- They need to have a network connection to access user data
- Local file systems (ie USB drives) are absolutely painful to access and work with (the paradigm is to use GDrive storage and anything else is work)
- There simply isn't enough memory/drive space available for anything other Extensions which are measured in the low tens of MBytes
- Applications are limited to Javascript (although I'm hoping Webassembly will be an option in the near future) with browser built in debug tools with a somewhat convoluted load/test process. A full featured IDE for application development is nothing more than a dream at this point

My first PC (an Atari 800)

• Stored user data on a cassette tape drive (the floppy drive was too expensive for me to afford as a kid).
• You think USB drives are painful? How about having to play a tape for 5 minutes to load a program? And if your schoolmate is fooling around with the cord and accidentally unplugs it halfway through, you have to start over again.
• Had 32 kB of RAM.
• Applications were limited to BASIC and assembly. No IDE, no browser. You typed BASIC code line by line, or you switched it to assembly mode and typed in raw CPU instructions. Single-threaded I should add.

It worked fine for writing reports and playing games.

A PC is a personal computer. A computer you can use for personal computing tasks. As opposed to a mainframe which was shared by multiple people. Or a workstation which was used for tasks at work. Or an embedded system which was made to control a specific object. That's it.

A Chromebook is a PC. A tablet is a PC. A phone is a PC. Heck, a smartwatch is a PC if it's got a decent way for you to input data to it. The phone in my pocket is many times faster than the fastest Cray supercomputer from around the time I owned my first PC. 160 MFLOPS for the Cray vs 718 MFLOPS for a single thread on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800. The definition of "PC" you've crafted means PCs didn't exist until the late-1990s.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[erapert]

The ChromeBook is not even close to being as locked down as a games console.

For now.
Once it actually starts to gain traction (marketshare) they'll lock it down tighter than a duck's ass.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Anonymous Coward]

sounds like your dad is a retard.

Chromebooks are to PCs as ATMs are to bank tellers

[TheRealDilbert]

The whole argument about whether chromebooks are PCs is pretty stupid. Both are tools. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. For the large part of society that basically does everything computer related in a browser, a chromebook makes a lot of sense. For the smaller group that needs more functionality, chromebooks are not a good choice. I've bought 4 ChromeOS devices for family members and they all love these tools without any complaints. I can't use a chromebook for work, but use my chromebook for anything not work related at home. Windows PCs and MacOS PCs sales are getting smaller, mostly because a huge number of people who used to buy these things to get on-line are now simply using their phones. ChromeOS devices are still a tiny part of the market - but the number of them hooked up to the web is getting bigger every day - mainly driven by use in schools.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Anonymous Coward]

sounds like your dad is a retard.

Just like most consumers when it comes to Windows PCs. My Mom is the same way and so is my girlfriend.
The fact of the matter is that you need to be geek to run a Windows PC without running into serious issues, and if you deny that, well then you probably live in a very small world indeed.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Anonymous Coward]

The ChromeBook is not even close to being as locked down as a games console.

For now.

Once it actually starts to gain traction (marketshare) they'll lock it down tighter than a duck's ass.

Sweet!

What are the winning lotto numbers going to be next week?

Re:Dumb terminals shouldn't be considered PCs.

[nomadic]

I really wanted to like my chromebook but the Chrome OS is just too annoying. The filesystem is accessible -- sort of -- but if they could just go to the standard Win/Mac/Linux directory system and enable click-and-drag it would be so much more useful. I mean, you would still have the annoying everything-runs-in-the-browser part but the system would be significantly less annoying.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[nomadic]

Because what you have is not a chromebook anymore.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[Mal-2]

You do have to track down firmware to flash onto it, and open it to remove the write protect screw, but neither is that big a deal -- except some Braswell Chromebooks can only be flashed once and will refuse to flash themselves again. You can still flash them with an RPi and an SOIC clip, the same procedure as used for un-bricking them when a flash goes wrong.

There was some time when Chromebooks were PCs in every sense. They just came with a little different keyboard layout, or in some cases just different keytops on an ordinary layout. The Acer C710 was a laptop in every sense, with a full SATA drive bay and SODIMM slots. The C720 did away with the SODIMM slots and moved to an M.2 slot instead of a drive bay, and got slimmer as a consequence. The C740 had a similar setup. Unfortunately, later ones have gone to soldered storage too. Even the pricy Pixel 2 has a soldered-on 64GB eMMC. This doesn't mean it's not a laptop, and 64GB is actually adequate for Windows 10 and a Linux distro to coexist on their own partitions, but it does limit the usefulness as a non-ChromeOS computer. The latest releases have been uniformly soldered storage, usually 16GB and occasionally 32. You can shoehorn Windows 10 onto a 16GB drive, but expect to store everything else on flash drives and SD cards.

I like my C720, running Windows 10 and GalliumOS, but the golden age of Chromebook hacking was unfortunately quite brief and that ship has pretty much sailed.

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[Mal-2]

I had a Gnawty with 2 GB and a 16 GB eMMC. GalliumOS ran just fine on it. Windows was extremely painful, even for a Big Guy, but a lightweight Linux distro that Just Worked straight out of the box was quite pleasant. It was easy to forget it wasn't a normal notebook.

An i3 C720 or C740 can even run OS X. The Broadcom network card in the C740 is not reliable in OS X, but it can be swapped for one that is. I'd say those are PCs, at least when running a full OS. Drawing a "PC/Not PC" line based on OS may make sense today, but it is going to be an ever-shifting line in the sand. Hardware form factors change too, but not quite so fast.

You can't say "eMMC soldered on = appliance, not PC" because the Macbook Pro would be "not a PC" by that definition even though it can run Windows just fine.

Conditioning

[n329619]

My toaster has a processor. It is NOT a PC.

Therefore,
If my toaster doesn't have a processor. It is a PC!

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[Anonymous Coward]

You're stretching the definition of "multipurpose" to include a smartwatch for sure. If the computer in question isn't under your control, it's not a personal computer, it's effectively a terminal plugged into a mainframe- in this case, some web server that dictates its everything. Certainly a tablet straddles the line, but phones and watches do not.

Re: Not a dumb terminal - Linux with locked down U

[jareth-0205]

The ChromeBook is not even close to being as locked down as a games console.

For now.

Once it actually starts to gain traction (marketshare) they'll lock it down tighter than a duck's ass.

Oh piss off. They *have* gained traction, and they've been about for years. And there hasn't been any locking down

Chromebooks, like everything Google...

[Anonymous Coward]

...are yet another part of Alphabet's massive surveillance engine. Selling you personal data is Google bread'n'butter.

Chromebook

[Anonymous Coward]

My Chromebook runs perfect with no issues.

Regards,
jimmy
http://sisimarketme.com

Re:Interesting Philosophical Question: What is a P

[BarbaraHudson]

Fret no more. External hard drives are supported by chromebooks.