Are Chromebooks the future of laptop computers?

A HP Chromebook.

 

Are Chromebooks the future of laptop computers?

Chromebooks, marketed as a cheap alternative to traditional laptops, especially for students, are rising up in popularity. These lightweight and affordable laptops run on ChromeOS, a cloud-centric operating system where the user's data will be stored in the cloud instead of local storage devices, which Windows and MacOS rely on. Recently my secondary school has purchased a number of ASUS Chromebooks for students. They are rugged, splashproof and touchscreen. Yes, you read that right, there's touchscreen on that thing. Normally, a lightweight laptop with touchscreen support or a "2-in-1" laptop is much more expensive than a traditional laptop. But when I look online, most Chromebooks cost around $1000-4000 HKD which a regular "2-in-1" windows laptop costs well over $10000 HKD. So, what's so special about Chromebooks that made them much cheaper and more importantly, are Chromebooks going to be the future of laptop computers?

The answer, as you may well have guessed, is that most Chromebooks run on mobile SoC platforms, which means that instead of a big strong intel core i7, most Chromebooks run on low power intel Pentium or Celeron mobile processors that can really struggle with more demanding tasks. (There are a few Chromebooks with more powerful processors, but those tend to be much more expensive, and the choices are pretty limited.)

But are Chromebooks going to replace all windows and mac laptops in the future? I highly doubt it. Chromebooks are ideal to everyday users like students or the elderly. But if you're going to edit videos or play overwatch on a Chromebook, it's probably not going to work due to the limited processing power. 

But hey, maybe someday Chromebook will be much more powerful and affordable, but until then, Microsoft and Apple don't have to worry about it XD.

So, what do you think about Chromebooks? Let me know by leaving a comment below!