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Chromebook competitors are continually attempting to one-up each other, which makes Chromebooks one of the more interesting and lively areas of hardware at the moment. It doesn't hurt that Chromebooks are also some of the most affordable machines on the market right now, with many available for less than $200.
Lenovo recently launched an update to its Chromebook offerings, the n20 and n20p. I tested the latter, which features a touch screen.
I'll assume you're probably familiar with Chrome OS. It is what it is and you're either comfortable drinking the Google Kool-Aid and living with your life in Google Services or you're not. If you're not, stop reading now.
Chrome OS itself will be the same on nearly every Chromebook you'll ever pick up -- arguably its greatest strength -- so when trying to answer the question which Crhomebook should I buy most of the answer comes down to hardware.
The specs on the Lenovo include a 11.6-inch 1366 x 768 touch screen, a quad-core Intel Celeron processor (two models are available, I tested the 2.16GHz model), 16GB of eMMC storage, and 2GB of DDR3 RAM.
Lenovo uses a proprietary power adapter and you'll probably need the power cable to more than you'd like. The company claims 8 hours of battery life for the n20p, I found it was more like 6, sometimes 7 if you avoid video and dim the screen considerably. That's not bad, but considerably less than the 10 hours offered by some competitors.
The n20p comes in a single color, slate gray, and weighs in at just under three pounds.
These specs are pretty much the current standard in low-end Chromebooks, the exception being the touch screen, which is not widely available. Unfortunately Chrome OS isn't all that great as a touch screen OS -- touch targets are often very small, making it difficult to navigate with any precision.
The screen itself is also not an IPS display so you get all the washed out color and limited viewing angles that come with older, TN panel displays. On the plus side, the 300 degree rotation feature, which puts it in "stand mode", is great for watching movies. It also makes you wonder why Lenovo didn't extend the hinge rotation another 60 degrees for a Chrome OS tablet (the company is reportedly working on such a device, though it will be a more expensive, so-called mid-range Chromebook at $500+)
Lenovo is well known for nice keyboards and for a Chromebook this is no exception. The chiclet keys are comfortable and have a nice "feel" to them, though the keyboard does turn a little spongy toward the center.
Performance is where the n20p's higher price falls apart. It's sad to say this, but apparently today's web really needs 4GB or more of RAM. The n20p is fine to start up -- which takes a snappy 7 seconds -- and continues to be okay for the first 10 or so tabs/app you open. Then it starts to lag, noticeably, especially if you have several tabs with video open the background.
There are a couple ways around this, for example, using a browser add-on that suspends your tabs after a certain period of inactivity, but that doesn't work for things you want to have open all the time, like Gmail or Google Docs. Considering this is one of the more expensive of the low-end Chromebooks on the market, there's really no excuse for the paltry amount of RAM.
Low amount of RAM will be an even bigger concern as Google has started to make it possible to run Android app on Chrome OS. I installed and tested the Evernote app, which worked just fine -- though it would not go fullscreen -- but it exacerbated the lack of RAM problem. Still not convinced your need more than 2GB of RAM? How about [Adobe Creative Suite](http://chrome.blogspot.com.au/2014/09/adobe-joins-chromebook-party-starting.html) for Chromebooks? As any long time Adobe product user can tell you, 2GB of RAM just makes Photoshop laugh.
Currently the best low-end Chromebook is a kind of Frankenbook combining one element from half a dozen models. Since that's not possible, where does the Lenovo fit?
If a touch screen is important to you then the n20p fits the bill (though you might also want to check out the Acer c720p).
If the touch screen is not a priority the Lenovo n20p becomes a bit pricey for the hardware Lenovo is delivering here. At $330 you should really should be getting 4GB of RAM and an IPS display.
Wired:
* "10-point" touch screen
* Nice 300 degree "stand mode"
* Best in class keyboard
Tired:
* 2GB of RAM. Really Lenovo? Really?
* TN display tarnishes the usefulness of "stand mode" by presenting movies in washed out color
* Pricey compared to other options at these specs
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