Tech Review

Chromebooks V. Laptops?

Chromebooks or laptops? I bet that’s been a question in the back of your minds for a bit now. It certainly has been for me! In this article we will go in depth into the differences between chromebooks and laptops and try and give a comprehensive review on which we think is the best for school use, the main category we will be reviewing. We are going to compare 2 of the respective industry standards in their both respective categories, The MSI GL 75 and the Dell Chromebook 3100, which will both be linked at the bottom.

To give a bit of context to you the reader, I was tasked with taking a look at the upgraded school chromebooks, more specifically for you folks that want to do a bit of research into it as well, the Dell Chromebook 3100. How I wish they came up with a better name. Alas, we can’t have everything. So this specific model I am going to use for the Chromebook category (the school issued chromebook) has an Intel celeron 2 core processor, and Intel integrated graphics. I am not going into Intel integrated graphics today, but rather durability and accessibility of the chromebook itself.

So to drift over a few main points that I noticed with using a chromebook is the fact that most chromebooks are slow. They are very slow. I will not find myself using chromebooks for anything other than school related tasks and maybe internet surfing. The main points that the chromebook manufacturers focused on here is making a long lasting durable frame meant to survive the biggest impacts, whereas the MSI GL 75 Leopard (the laptop) had a frame more focused to aesthetic appeal and moderate scratch resistance. A big thing that is noticeable with the chromebook is how cheap it feels to the touch, to how cheap the key caps feel. Which I personally feel degrades the overall structure of the entire machine. A few noticeable positive points with the Chromebook 3100 is how it could take some pretty major hits where the MSI would have most likely broken. So in terms of durability the chromebook takes that right up home base. I see really no real difference in terms of accessibility besides battery life, which the MSI has only about 4-5 hours in battery saver mode. The thing is a literal beast, with the charging brick being almost the size of the entire screen of the chromebook. What is nice about the chromebook is how it lasts for 7-9 hours of battery life not plugged in, kudos to Dell for making the chromebook so efficient. A big up with having a powerful machine like the MSI GL 75 is that being that it has 16gbs of ram you opening too many tabs causing it to crash will virtually never happen, as it often happens to a chromebook. A key point is that the MSI GL 75 is almost 4 times the price as the chromebook, clocking at a whopping $1200 whereas the chromebook is only $300. In this review I am not talking about stats or performance but rather using it as a benchmark for all types of laptops. What is important to keep in mind is the chromebook is marketed as a small portable machine that you can take with you practically anywhere, whereas the MSI is suited for gaming and more rigorous tasks.

The MSI performs well under things like input lag and gaming, which is something relatable to most people reading this article. If the chromebook was a bit faster and it didn’t crash as much, for sure I would be praising it a lot more than I am currently. So overall with the chromebook I feel performance is a place where it loses most of its appeal for me as a consumer. So overall, I feel the editors pick for school work would be the laptop, being it excels in many places the chromebook does not, and I feel it picks up where the chromebook does not. If you have any questions whatsoever about tech problems or questions and what not, be sure to Email me at 26AM1260@wwprsd.org and make sure that you write the subject as Tech. Thanks for reading and as always, I’ll see you on the next one.