Acer C720P - My First Chromebook Review
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
2,432 words · ~12 min read
0:06
with its Factory tuning and data center DNA an Intel 730 series SSD is an
0:11
amazing choice for gamers and performance
0:14
enthusiasts now I've never reviewed a Chromebook for a couple of reasons
0:18
number one is that no one ever offered me a sample and number two was that I
0:22
didn't care about them enough to even bother to ask for one well Acer managed
0:26
to address Point number one for me by offering to send over their P 720p
0:30
touchscreen Chromebook and while I still didn't really care the spec on this $300
0:36
device surprised me it's got a 1.7 GHz dual core haswell-based processor and 4
0:41
gigs of DDR3 RAM on top of that I guess
0:45
I kind of owed them one for being super late on returning some other samples so
0:49
I was like sure what the hey I'll check it out now this won't be a review per se
0:54
since I don't have any other Chromebooks to compare with so it'll be more of a
0:59
disjointed of my thoughts as I fumbled my way through Chrome OS for the first
1:04
time with some specific comments about this exact model but mostly focus on the
1:10
general stuff so first up the build quality of this unit is better than I
1:13
expected it's quite solid but very plasticky and not nearly as sexy and
1:18
slim as Acer's premium offerings booting up is lightning fast the 16 gigs of
1:24
solid state storage takes care of that and the setup process only takes a
1:28
couple of minutes if you already have a Google account I'd say it's even faster
1:31
than Android it logs you into your junk Imports your profile picture and all
1:35
that which is great and yes I know Windows has similar functionality if you
1:40
use Sky Drive and Hotmail I mean uh Outlook but who does so that's great
1:46
speaking of Windows though some stuff feels a touch borrowed there's a status
1:50
tray down here instead of the system tray there's a handy Chrome apps
1:56
launcher in place of the traditional start menu um I wish the launch could be
2:00
moved back and forth on the taskbar like it can on Windows but it's stuck in the
2:03
traditional start menu spot um but other than that it's pretty familiar to use
2:09
the launcher contains all of your apps but not your extensions the distinction
2:14
between which is a little confusing to the user because the list of extensions
2:18
in the browser contains both and the search within the launcher at the top
2:23
actually finds everything too but a
2:26
really cool thing about the search is that it finds stuff that you've installed both both apps and extensions
2:31
and it also finds available stuff and suggests Things based on what's
2:35
available in the store but that you don't have yet all right so navigation
2:40
time let's start with the mouse double click and drag like tap tap tap hold
2:45
drag is not available and the touchpad is generally not super configurable some
2:51
gestures are supported like swiping back and swiping forth in a browser but
2:55
really not much I mean that didn't bother me that much but the absence of a
3:00
hardware rightclick is a big problem for me I use it for everything from uh you
3:05
know right click copy rightclick paste to correcting spelling errors within
3:09
emails and a two-finger soft touch is
3:12
just not as fast as being able to use two hands to operate the touchpad at the
3:17
same time so left hand for tracking right hand for right and left click and
3:22
that's pretty ridiculous to me for the keyboard This Arrow key layout is a pet
3:27
peeve of mine but the keyboard is otherwise actually a very strong point
3:30
of this notebook it ain't satisfying to type on and it sounds really thin and
3:36
kind of crappy but I'm really fast and
3:39
accurate on it even though I can't quite put my finger on why get it put my
3:44
finger on it because it's a keyboard I put all my finger anyway I'm sorry uh
3:47
anyway the F keys are gone and that weirded me out a little bit but if they
3:51
don't have any functionality in chrom OS Beyond being media keys and shortcuts
3:55
then good riddance to the function mod modifier I suppose um immersive mode and
4:00
overview mode are both quite cool and allow you to basically Go full screen or
4:06
um expose style have everything sort of pop up on the screen and allow you to
4:10
select it something that I ended up using the touchcreen for a fair bit and
4:14
there's a couple other interesting things that are gone so uh caps lock the
4:17
scourge of the internet is gone replaced by a dedicated search key but don't
4:22
worry you can rebind search and not only that but control and ALT to other stuff
4:27
if you want so you can bring back caps lock if it's really important to you and
4:31
finally there is no delete key but you
4:34
can use alt backspace if you want I would have personally preferred a
4:38
hardware delete key instead of power up here um and then like a non-keyboard
4:43
based power button but I guess there's always trade-offs and no one's going to be happy with everything so we'll close
4:49
the usability with the killer app of this Chromebook the 1366 X 768
4:55
touchcreen yes it's a TN panel so
4:58
there's nothing really special about it in terms of colors or viewing angles and
5:02
touch screens with plastic fronts always feel a little bit janky to me but at
5:08
this price the plastic front is more solid than some of the ones I felt and
5:12
it's a miracle that we're getting a touchscreen at all let alone a glass
5:15
covered one the main stuff like accuracy is fine and I honestly did find myself
5:21
using it I have a touchscreen Windows 8 notebook and I'd say the experience is
5:25
probably pretty similar unlike Android and iOS it's not like can do everything
5:30
with the touchcreen but for stuff like you know um casually scrolling through a
5:36
list or you know zooming in and out or
5:39
selecting which app you want with the multitasking button it offers um finer
5:43
control than touchpad gestures and it's faster than just using the touchpad to
5:47
point at things so two thumbs up for having that functionality two thumbs up
5:51
so now let's move into some of the general observations I made about Chrome
5:55
OS minimize maximize and then dock left
5:58
and dock right control control could be better you can snap to the sides like in
6:03
Windows Vista onward but pulling
6:06
something up to the top doesn't automatically maximize the window and
6:10
when a window is maximized you have to actually click the little button in the
6:15
top right corner in order to un maximize it you can't just grab it and then drag
6:19
it around and have it resize itself the folder structure is simplistic to the
6:24
point of being absolutely infuriating the only file storage on the thing is
6:29
called downloads I mean seriously I get
6:32
you want me to use the included 100 gigs of Google drive storage that I have for
6:36
2 years and get hooked so I can start paying but if unlike iOS I'm going to
6:41
actually have storage that's local and you're going to let me make my own
6:45
folder structure and stuff within it you might as well at least let me change the
6:49
name not everything is a download um apps in the store don't filter according
6:54
to what is compatible so that was a little bit frustrating I mean a great
6:57
example would be the IE tab app that
7:00
gives you better compatibility with some websites on Windows so you can have an ie tab within Chrome is only available
7:06
on Windows where IE is separately installed but it still shows up in the
7:09
store even when you're searching for it on here I mean most people will know for
7:13
that one but this is just a general problem um speaking of compatibility
7:17
playing back video files is pretty hit or miss not much can be done to update
7:23
codec support other than just wait for Google I mean what you could do I guess
7:28
if I was going to give you a solution Google might like is just upload the files to YouTube then watch them on the
7:33
Chromebook from there but that that's not a great solution sometimes it's nice
7:36
to play Things locally like if you're on a plane uh multiple instances of the
7:40
same application pop up in a list down at the bottom when you hover over them
7:44
just like in Windows 7 I don't think the implementation is that great though for
7:48
example the integrated video player nests with your file explorer equivalent
7:52
so that's not that intuitive to me um Google Hangouts on the other hand this
7:56
is the best implementation I've seen of Google Hangouts the conversations uh
8:02
spread out from the right across the taskbar and it's like it's all like it
8:07
doesn't feel like it's just like bolted to your browser you don't have to use a
8:10
third party app video calls are super seamless and uh I love I love Hangouts
8:16
on this device I need an app like that work that works exactly this way on
8:19
Windows um video calls speaking of Hangouts are also seamless and I guess
8:24
this is a good time to comment on the video chat experience I was just
8:28
randomly listening to some music on the unit getting getting a feel for it and I
8:31
was blown away by how loud and clear it
8:35
gets for what is a very inexpensive notebook then I figured it out this is a
8:40
communication device Acer went balls to the wall on the microphone and speakers
8:45
because video hangouts is going to be a huge selling point for a device like
8:49
this uh the webcam is actually decent as well so here's a sample clip of me just
8:53
sitting in front of it so my intention is to use this video clip to give you
8:57
guys some idea of what a voice chat from this Chromebook would look like and
9:03
sound
9:06
like so overall the experience of the
9:10
Chromebook was surprisingly good I wasn't expecting it to be this good but
9:14
it would really take some workflow changes to make a Chromebook seamless
9:17
for me and the biggest issue would be when I'm without internet and Google
9:21
knows this I mean they want you online in the tutorial the work offline
9:26
tutorial bit is at the very end and includes the words got to kick out of
9:29
this for the rare times when you are disconnected from the internet here are
9:33
some offline ready apps for the rare times right okay I guess I never leave
9:38
the house um the list includes offline Gmail Google Docs and calendar as well
9:43
as some cool thirdparty ones and that's fine but there's plenty of basic stuff
9:47
that just doesn't work offline I disconnected temporarily on purpose to
9:52
diagnose something and The Help menu just started behaving strangely like
9:56
clicking on things just didn't really do anything it didn't say hey you're
9:59
offline we can't bring anything up it just didn't do anything and it took me a while to figure out that I was offline
10:04
and it's a live document I mean there's something to be said for live documents
10:08
that are constantly updated but there's also something to be said for locally
10:11
stored ones that update periodically because then you can get at them if
10:15
you're having a problem and you actually need the help I mean neither solution is
10:18
perfect but the biggest challenge for me wasn't what's the experience but rather
10:24
where does this device fit into my digital life it's not a replacement for
10:28
your desktop or your notebook so what is it I don't know like is it a tablet with
10:33
a low price and a keyboard or is it a
10:36
Netbook with solid battery life a usable screen size and an OS that doesn't drag
10:42
it down like a boat anchor maybe it's both and as crazy as this might sound
10:47
while I won't junk my tablet if I'm a very on the Move person I would probably
10:52
go c720p over something like a Microsoft
10:55
Surface if productivity is a priority for me they're both kind of immature
10:59
platforms but at least if I'm going to bet on this one it's only a $300
11:04
investment in a device that might not be cutting edge but does what it says it's
11:08
going to do and in a competent matter and Google has Chrome's ever growing
11:13
market share to continue to drive innovation in the Chrome app and extension developer Community Windows RT
11:18
and Windows 8 Touch we'll see I forgot to do an outro
11:23
guys like this video if you liked it dislike it if you disliked it leave a
11:27
comment under the video let us know you thought about it I do read the comments
11:31
at least I do my best to most of the time if you liked the video and just
11:35
pressing the like button wasn't enough for you you can also support us if you
11:38
check out the support link you can buy T-shirts and give us a monthly
11:41
contribution to help us make great videos for you and you can even there's
11:45
another thing that I completely forget right now that I always mention in the
11:48
Contra all right you can change your Amazon bookmark to one with our
11:52
affiliate code so we get a small Kickback whenever you buy random Jung
11:55
thank you for watching guys and as always don't forget to subscribe for
11:59
more more unboxings reviews and other computer videos that hopefully never end
12:02
as awkwardly as this one did ever again