Acer Chromebook C720-2800 Pro Reviews

A cheap, compact, practical Chromebook with a good level of performance

Devoid of the flashy exterior and attractive screen of the HP Chromebook 11, the Acer C720-2800 Chromebook might look just like every other Chromebook that’s come our way to date. In some regards, it is: the case quality is lower tier (and slightly flimsy in certain spots), the screen is uninspiring but capable enough, and the keyboard is hardly even mentionable in the same breath, with clattery operation and a thoroughly budget feel. Other minor complaints also apply, such as the quality of the audio in comparison to the HP. But beyond first impressions, the C720 Chromebook gets it right. Spend a little time with it and you’ll begin to appreciate the all-day battery life, snappy general performance and smooth video playback capabilities, and easy maintenance. It’s also quiet in spite of its active cooling design, and it does a reasonably good job of managing temperatures under most conditions. In other words, forgiving the build quality, disappointing keyboard, and unremarkable screen, the C720 begins to look pretty enticing indeed. There is still the question of purpose, however, and if the C720 is meant to replace another machine, users might find it difficult depending on Chrome OS for all of their needs. Despite great strides made to reach this point in its development, the operating system is still purely in its infancy, and certain aspects of it are incredibly bare in comparison to Windows and Mac OS counterparts. Perhaps, then, it would be better off viewing the Acer C720-2800 Chromebook as an alternative to a tablet or netbook than a replacement for a full-blown computer. Approached from this perspective, it serves as a logical candidate for someone who is in need of a basic web browsing and word processing device, but who prefers the luxury of a physical keyboard and touchpad to the popular modern alternative of touch input. Judging by those requirements, it makes a lot of sense for just $249.

Chromebooks have typically been looked at as secondary or even tertiary computers. Often ghettoized as “the computer for my living room couch,” most Chromebooks have not been able to replace a Windows PC or Mac. They’re just cheap, and Google and its partners hope we’ll forgive their performance, battery, and feature set flaws in the name of frugality. They’re popular for the ultra price-conscious, but not the serious computer shopper. The $249 C720 bucks that trend. It’s perfectly capable of taking the place of a Mac or Windows PC in most people’s lives, and it comes at a price that’s hard to beat. The Chromebook Pixel did a lot for legitimizing Chrome OS as a serious platform and the HP Chromebook 11 brought its style downstream. Now the C720 is bringing the Pixel’s performance to the mass market, and even improving on the Pixel’s primary flaw: battery life. Despite its bargain-bin price and mostly uninspired design, the C720 doesn’t deserve to be relegated to the couch or thought of as a single-purpose word processor. There are lot of things that you can forgive on a cheap computer, but if it doesn’t work well or work for very long, it doesn’t matter. Fortunately, despite its cheap display and basic design, the C720 just works, and works all day. You still have to buy in to Google’s ecosystem to get the most out of Chrome OS, but for the millions of people that already use the Chrome browser, it’s a pretty natural transition. There are better computers on the market than the C720, but not for under $250, which ultimately seals the deal. Google may be calling the HP Chromebook 11 the “Chromebook for everyone,” but the C720 is the Chromebook for me, and probably you too.

The Acer C720 Chromebook left us a bit torn. With some budget-priced, touch-screen-enabled Windows 8 laptops taking up residence in the high $300s, and the Chromebook competition in the $200-to-$300 range getting hotter, we suddenly find ourselves a bit fussier about Chromebook aesthetics and component quality. Before, prices this low for any laptop made up for a lot of sins. Now, killer-cheap Windows 8 machines like the lustrous Asus Transformer Book T100T tablet/laptop hybrid, starting at $349, bring great battery life and surprising pep for not much more money. If we see many more machines like that (and we're pretty sure they're coming), most Chromebooks will have to find new homes even closer to $200 to stay viable for users who are buying on price.The C720 Chromebook is an improvement over 2012’s C710, with good pep for a Chromebook and great battery life. But the budget-laptop market has shifted a bit since that Editors' Choice machine came out. Unless you’re an inveterate multitasker, we prefer the feel and build (and more subtle branding) of the HP Chromebook 11 to this machine’s less inspired body. Some Chromebook buyers may disagree, but we tend to see Chromebooks as single-function, task-driven machines, best for basic productivity work using one or two apps at a time, and for Web/media consumption, not heavy-lift content creation. As a result, we see the ability to handle loads of open tabs as only a secondary strength; the idea of the “Chromebook power user,” with apologies to those hardy souls out there, is a bit of an oxymoron.

The Acer C720 Chromebook is a speedy, sharp Chrome OS laptop that has a simple design and boasting rights in the performance department. The laptop is a step ahead of many other competing Chromebooks, and is more than able to hold its own as an everyday laptop for those who do basic tasks: media, email, Internet, chatting, word processing, and such. The price point holds steady at $249 USD, meaning though you’re getting a performance boost via the use of Haswell, you’re not paying out more than what you’d spend for other Chromebooks.Unless you’re dead-set on having a design that stands out — a la the HP Chromebook 11 — you’d be hard-pressed to find a Chromebook alternative at the moment that holds up to the performance of the C720, and though the design does feel cheap in terms of ample plastic, there is nothing overtly unsavory or bad about Acer’s latest offering.