Toshiba’s first Chromebook is also the first Chrome OS laptop to ship with a 13.3 inch display. But that’s just about the only thing that sets it apart from similar offerings from HP, Acer, and others… with one possible exception.
Still, with a $280 price tag, the Toshiba Chromebook could be a decent option for folks looking for an inexpensive, portable notebook that will be used primarily for web browsing and running web apps.
I got to spend a few minutes with the Toshiba Chromebook recently and while there’s no mistaking its plastic design for a premium notebook, the laptop seems pretty zippy and should offer a decent Chrome OS experience.
The Toshiba Chromebook features an Intel Celeron 2955U Celeron processor based in Intel’s Haswell architecture, sports a 13.3 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, 2GB of RAM, and 16GB of storage. It has 2 USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI port, SD card slot, and WiFi and Bluetooth.
The full-sized keyboard and touchpad feel decent, and the screen is pretty bright. But this laptop doesn’t have any premium features such as a backlit keyboard or touchscreen.
What Toshiba says the Chromebook does have is long battery life. The company is promising up to 9 hours of run time. That would make it one of the longest-lasting Chrome OS laptops. The last few models I’ve reviewed have gotten 5 hours of run time or less.
Toshiba’s Chromebook should hit the streets around February 16th for $280.
Wow! A 13.3 inch Chromebook for under $300? Way Cool! The 11.6 inch screen on my Samsung Chromebook is too small for me. 3.3 lbs with 5 hours of battery life sounds good too. Does it have a USB charger like the HP Chromebook? Sounds like a great deal. I’ll be checking ToshibaDirect.com in a month or so.