Canadians are used to our friendly neighbours to the south getting their hands on tech toys well before they migrate north, and Google’s Chromebook is no exception.
Though Americans could use the Samsung-built laptop that was given Google’s seal of approval since early in 2012, Canadians had to wait until nearly the end of the year to buy it. That cloud-centric 12.1-inch notebook is still hard to find, with many retailers being sold out of them. But now Canadians will be able to get their hands on HP’s version of the Chromebook coming to Canada near the end of the month, according the Palo Alto, Calif.-based firm.
HP’s lightweight notebook will have a larger, 14-inch screen. It will offer several ports including HDMI, USB 2.0, Ethernet, a Web cam, and a headphone/microphone jack. The notebook weighs in at under four pounds and you’ll get 100 GB of cloud storage on Google Drive for one year packaged with it. Credit goes to HP for keeping the Canadian price the same as the US price, at $329.
Google’s Chromebook offers a different take on computing in the mobile era that draws extreme viewpoints from either end. Some describe the notebooks as overpriced and glorified netbooks that are underpowered with cell-phone chips (though HP’s has a Celeron chip that is used with other laptops). Others celebrate the simplicity and lightweight OS of the notebooks, that use Google’s Chrome OS and rely on cloud apps.
HP Chromebook offers a 14-inch screen and a Celeron processor.
Do you think you could work well with a Chromebook? Tell us why or why not in the comments.