[Graham]

Originally Posted by leaston

Not necessarily, it depends what you're using it for surely? Web browsing, document creation, basic graphics editing, music, movies, occasional casual gaming and that sort of thing is what I had in mind. I still occasionally use an old Acer Aspire netbook with a Celeron processor and it copes fine with things like that for the most part. As a contrast, I've read one or two reviews from end users who level this exact criticism at the Chromebooks; laggy performance and delays in tasks.

At the same price point, you'll find the Chromebook much snappier than the Windows machine for web use. Where you're comparing local applications with heavier requirements to a hosted web app version then the Windows netbook would have the edge, but more and more native Chrome apps are being written which utilise the full power of the device.

Having said that, I do all the things on your list perfectly smoothly and happily on my Chromebooks.

Originally Posted by leaston

..does Chromebook have an offline method of creating, saving and protecting documents via any kind of encryption? With Windows, I can write it offline using some flavour of word processor, save with a password and then encrypt the whole document before backing it up to the cloud. If this isn't possible with a Chromebook, it would probably be a dealbreaker for me.

Your entire profile is encrypted by default on the Chromebook. So, assuming you're comfortable with the security provided by Google's cloud, then yes - by default any document you write on or offline is encrypted before backing up to the cloud.

If you don't trust Google's cloud, then there are a number of third party encryption solutions that can be added to Google Drive, such as CloudLock, which would appear to do what you need, but I've not tried them.

(And to answer an earlier question, yes, you can both create and edit spreadsheets offline.)

Originally Posted by leaston

What are the others?

I'd say the main saving is in time, so it depends on how you cost your time.

Chromebooks are so hassle-free. There seems to be no maintenance required at all - either to the operating system or to the apps. This is compounded when you move onto having multiple devices. I've now got a Chromebox and two Chromebooks, and the desktop, app launcher, toolbar shortcuts, etc. - the whole environment - is synchronised across all of them. That ability to seamlessly switch from device to device - even to have the same document open on both desktop and laptop, and edit it on either - is fantastic. Yes, you could set your Windows machines up to simulate this. No, it wouldn't be as smooth and intuitive.

It's always tricky to convince anyone of this during these discussions. If you can afford it, get a cheap Chromebook (e.g. the Acer CB3) as a secondary device and try one out. Even if it proves unsuitable for you generally, you know it'll be fine as a spare machine to have around the house for email and web browsing.

The bottom line with a Chromebook isn't what it can't do, or what Windows, Mac and Linux machines can do, it's that what the Chromebook can do it does very well and it doesn't bother you with a whole pile of other stuff that you don't really need to be doing.

For me, the Chromebook very quickly became the device I reached for first.

Graham