Working in the Cloud
About 1.5 years ago I bought myself a Chromebook and although I have a laptop with Windows 10 I love the Chromebook. Basically I use it all the time, it is quick to start, in less than 10 seconds and can do basically everything I want to do.
Having only a browser you can add some extensions to the Chromebook, indeed some Chrome extensions one of the main problems is that adding extensions means that less memory is available to do what you want to do and without memory the Chromebooks becomes slow. But do I need all these extensions? I have a few like Google Analytics, Lastpass and Onetab to move all open tabs into one saving memory.
Looking at setting up your website and adding content, like here at Wealthy Affiliate, there are always some tricky parts to do but searching around you will find sites that you can use for free.
Because I have a Chromebook I have a Google account and you all know that Google has many tools that you can use for free like Google Analytics and Webmaster which I check daily. I make use of Google Tag Manager, Google Adwords, well all Google tools are in the cloud.
With that Google account comes at least 15GB of Cloud space where documents can be stored. It is not necessary, there is also no room, to store documents locally on the Chromebook but with Google Drive you do not need that. As a matter of fact you will get an extra 100GB of storage space although that is temporary.
Then you have of course Dropbox where you can store documents or backups and you will find other places on the internet as well to store documents for free.
Even updating or resizing pictures can be done online, I use https://pixlr.com/editor/ to resize images. But when I need to do more than just resizing or changing a colour I will start my Windows 10 laptop and use Gimp which is free.
Using Google means also that writing in Google Docs is an excellent way not to only write but at the same time have a copy of your text as a backup. Same is with Google Sheet or Google Slide although I have not used that one.
After writing in Google Docs I just copy/paste as plain text into WordPress.
Is there anything I cannot do?
Well, my CV is in Word but that is more because as a contractor I have to send it to recruiting agents and they want Word and not Google Docs but I do not need that for WP or here at WA.
My email is all in the cloud, I use Googlemail but also have a POP account where I can read my email with the browser.
Video editing is what I do with my laptop and that is more because I need the power of the processor. There are sites out there in the cloud where you can edit your video but I rather do that locally.
Are there other disadvantages of the Chromebook?
Oh absolutely, and the main one is the screen, not the size of 13" but more the quality of the screen but that comes with the price I guess of less than £200. So I might go for another Chromebook the Pixel but oops paying around a £1000 for a Chromebook then you might think why not buy a Mac.
Another disadvantage is that without the internet the Chromebook is nearly useless. You can watch a movie, if you have one on USB stick or drive but otherwise completely useless.
Luckily I have a good internet connection at home and being on the internet daily that internet connection is a must and with the Chromebook I am more than happy occasionally using the Windows 10 laptop when I need the power to run certain applications.
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