32GB Windows laptop

[Aoligei]

Who still remember the netbook era? These low spec smallish laptop before iPad were all over the place. These machine are sluggish piece of crap. You know what, these type of PC are resurfacing now. The market are flooded with sub 200 dollars Windows laptop with Intel Celeron Processor with 32GB storage.

To be honest, these laptops are far better than netbook. At least, these machine runs Windows 10 perfectly fine, i mean for light tasks. However, 32GB storage isn't enough anymore. Windows update won't install, you can't even factory reset because low storage space.

So if you are shopping for cheap Windows laptop, stay as far away from 32GB windows laptop. At least get these laptop with Pentium processor with 64GB eMMc storage.

But, if you are Linux users, like myself (and hackintosh user). These can be great machine for light task. Fresh install Linux Mint is about 10GB and update would actually install.

What are you thought about these low priced laptop? Do you have one? If yes, what is your impression? If no, would you buy one?

 

[Erehy Dobon]

They are likely intended for very specific audiences like elementary school aged children or some emerging market nations.

I actually own a $180 Windows SFF/HTPC style desktop with a 64GB eMMC drive, about the size of a Mac mini. It is useful to me because I primarily use it to run Fidelity Active Trader Pro on a 1080p television.

I don't have a personal usage case for those ultra-cheap "netbook revival" type notebooks but for sure there is a segment of the market that could make use of them.

Cloud computing is something that exists today that really didn't exist during the original netbook era. This includes things like streaming media services so these devices don't need to storage media locally.

If I really needed to run desktop Linux (which I despise passionately), I'd do so on a Raspberry Pi (why yes, I own one) rather than buy an Intel powered Ghettobook.

I own an Acer Swift 3 notebook with 256GB SSD running Windows 10. I bought it about nine months ago for $750; it was a credible replacement for my MacBook Air 2019. With COVID-19 lockdown policies where I live, it gets little use right now.

One thing for sure, there's no way I'd spend hours and hours staring at a tiny notebook screen. Notebook computers have terrible ergonomics whether the screen is 13" or 16". Bad for your eyes, neck, shoulders, back, arms, wrists, etc.

If you are working from home (like many are these days), the last thing you'd want to do is spend hours in front of a notebook.

 

[ian87w]

Yea I remember those things. I had those eeePC netbooks running winXP. Believe it or not, Windows 8 runs alright on those. Good times. Crappy low res screen (so low that some setup screens are impossible to use due to the short height of the resolution), itsy bitsy trackpad, but the compact size is quite nice in the days of heavy laptops.

Today, at $200, imo most people will focus on getting a smartphone first. Despite the tiny screen, a $200 phone today can do a lot of things, even office related stuff, with decent speed and always-on internet through cellular. It will be definitely be more productive for people who are really strict on their budget. I mean for $180, I can get a Samsung Galaxy M21 with 4GB RAM and 64GB UFS storage (faster than eMMC storage).

As for buying a laptop, I probably wouldn't buy a $200 laptop, but simply spending around $300 can net a decent machine, albeit with minimum (4GB) RAM. And I'm already seeing $300 laptops with 256GB SSD, so I don't see why one should go with anything less.

 

[maflynn]

The market are flooded with sub 200 dollars Windows laptop with Intel Celeron Processor with 32GB storage.

I haven't come across that type of laptop, but just my initial thinking, I wonder if its classification that is trying to compete directly with chrome books, which at this point I think its won't

 

[Aoligei]

I haven't come across that type of laptop, but just my initial thinking, I wonder if its classification that is trying to compete directly with chrome books, which at this point I think its won't

Well, the whole point of these machines is that you can run full Windows experience.

But 33GB is simply not enough. Microsoft should rethink its strategy. This is no competition with Chromebook nor bass iPad

 

[Moakesy]

I rolled out Chromebooks to a organisation of 1,000 users last year. They use virtualised Windows environment and for that, Chromebooks proved ideal. There was a lot of resistance at the time, as people wanted full-fat laptops, but once Covid came along and working from home went to 100%, the Chromebooks have proved stable and very easy to support remotely.

Using a similar spec'd machine to run Win10 natively I would expect to be pretty poor. It sounds like they'd forced something far too big into a device that hasn't got the guts to keep it going. It might be fine for kids / education purposes, but not much more than that. I think other devices have done a better job at targeting the 'cloud first' market.

 

[ian87w]

I rolled out Chromebooks to a organisation of 1,000 users last year. They use virtualised Windows environment and for that, Chromebooks proved ideal. There was a lot of resistance at the time, as people wanted full-fat laptops, but once Covid came along and working from home went to 100%, the Chromebooks have proved stable and very easy to support remotely.

Using a similar spec'd machine to run Win10 natively I would expect to be pretty poor. It sounds like they'd forced something far too big into a device that hasn't got the guts to keep it going. It might be fine for kids / education purposes, but not much more than that. I think other devices have done a better job at targeting the 'cloud first' market.

I agree that in an education/enterprise IT perspective, Chromebooks are superb. Managing them are much easier than Windows. Wish Google is more serious in pushing Chrome OS to consumers.

 

[I7guy]

I agree that in an education/

For sure windows is more difficult to manage, I agree with that.

enterprise IT perspective

Yep Windows is more difficult to manage, but which major fortune 50 companies are pushing the chrome books to their employees, and how can they work in an offline environment?

, Chromebooks are superb. Managing them are much easier than Windows. Wish Google is more serious in pushing Chrome OS to consumers.

 

[ian87w]

For sure windows is more difficult to manage, I agree with that.

Yep Windows is more difficult to manage, but which major fortune 50 companies are pushing the chrome books to their employees, and how can they work in an offline environment?

Of course, it will depend on what the company needs. Having said that, I have worked with companies where everything they do is on the web. For these companies, investing in Chromebooks might make more sense vs Windows laptops, especially if they use GSuite.

Chromebooks can work in offline environments. Offline Google Docs etc are possible, even on regular Windows as long as you use Chrome. Then again, it depends on what apps the company needs or uses. I don’t think everybody need to use Chromebooks, but they can be a perfect fit for some.

 

[Moakesy]

Chromebooks can work in offline environments. Offline Google Docs etc are possible, even on regular Windows as long as you use Chrome. Then again, it depends on what apps the company needs or uses. I don’t think everybody need to use Chromebooks, but they can be a perfect fit for some.

I agree with that. The lack of off-line mode was probably the biggest resistance point on my project, but the reality is that it was by a handful of people who wanted to use it on the train.

Given the nature of the organisation, it wasn't really ideal that people had their laptops open on the train anyway (some sensitive content on screen) so in the end a negative was actually used as a positive!

Overall, the 'no offline' issue has largely proven to be a false one. Much like the 'I can never do my job from home' comments, COVID has pushed these issues to one side overnight. Without doubt, some people have had issues with Chromebooks that they wouldn't have had with a laptop, but the number of these is far, far less than was suggested before we rolled them out.

 

[Erehy Dobon]

Well, the whole point of these machines is that you can run full Windows experience.

But 33GB is simply not enough. Microsoft should rethink its strategy. This is no competition with Chromebook nor bass iPad

It is not Microsoft's decision to install Windows on these systems. It's the OEM's choice.

In the end it's really the notebook manufacturer's responsibility to offer the proper hardware at the a satisfactory price-performance balance for that specific customer.

Netbooks lost popularity because those manufacturers failed to do so. There was nothing wrong with Windows itself which continued to grow in user base.

Remember that during the netbook era, the first ones to be discontinued were the cheapest ones with the smallest screens. Toward the end the only ones left were nearly as large as the smallest conventional notebooks and priced closer.

The abysmal customer satisfaction of netbooks was essentially a hardware user experience failure not Windows itself.

 

[Aoligei]

This is Windows SKU chart. When you see WW Entry Notebook, you see requirement of obtain Windows license. You see the requirement is pretty low. No bigger than 4GB RAM, no bigger than 32GB storage and low end CPU.

When we are talking about sub $200 laptops, Windows license cost is significant. Therefore, OEM choose to buy these WW Entry Notebook license. These license cost less than 30 dollars.

I am pretty sure Microsoft is the one to blame. Microsoft wants to be competitive with Chromebook or iPad, they needs to create these ultra-cheap devices. But they failed to recognize by limiting hardware to bar minimum, these machine cannot offer similar experiences.

I have no desire with Chromebook, it is not for me. I would rather get iPad. But these ultra cheap Windows laptop, they need to disappear or they need at least provide 64GB storage.

 

[maflynn]

I'm thinking these are a connected device, i.e., cloud storage. I'm not terribly worked up over these, I think they're gunning for a pretty small demographic and the market will decide if this is a good or bad thing

 

[Erehy Dobon]

This is Windows SKU chart. When you see WW Entry Notebook, you see requirement of obtain Windows license. You see the requirement is pretty low. No bigger than 4GB RAM, no bigger than 32GB storage and low end CPU.

That chart appears to be four years old maybe older if it was a forecast for the future.

Curiously doing an Internet search for "ost final sku windows" results in no relevant matches. All of the search results seem to be for non-related things.

At this point the provenance of this chart is highly questionable.