[Discussion] Do you think older Chromebooks will be obsolete? Is ChromeOS spiritually dead?

Hardware Hub Laptops & Netbooks
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I have what I like to think is a pretty nicely balanced machine for casual use, and covers about 95% of my academic needs as a post-secondary/undergrad student. It’s an Acer Chromebook R13 with a MediaTek M8173C SoC (big.LITTLE A73/A53 quad-core), 4GB RAM, and a 1080p IPS panel. I picked it up as an online refurb for dirt cheap and overall have been pleasantly surprised with the capability of these devices.

I guess my primary concern is software bloat - while Android support brings some much needed functionality, it’s a serious bog whenever I have an android app running. Also, I’m not entirely convinced 4GB is sufficient for heavier browsing and multitasking. And with Linux support and an ever increasing media heavy internet, I’m starting the question how much longer will ChromeOS be suited for some of these older Chromebooks. And furthermore, what is the point of ChromeOS today? I’m noticing boot up is taking up some time, so much so that I’m not noticing a discernible difference compared to my ThinkPad A485.

I mean bringing it back, it is nice to have a device that is fully mobile without being Android (i.e. 10hr+ stamina, touchscreen/mobile apps, but able to provide a native desktop browsing experience), but I also feel like that’s an awfully small niche.

I don’t know if my thoughts make any sense, but I’m having concerns about the viability for these devices as Chrome/ChromOS gets more bloated. Thoughts? Do you use a Chromebook?

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A question on a side note,
Those Chrome books aren’t upgrade-able?

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Not really - you can add a microSD card for storage expansion; they’re basically mobile phone/tablet hardware in a notebook chassis, so I suspect most everything to be soldered on the mainboard. I suppose in theory I could upgrade to 8GB as the SoC does technically support it, but even if possible, I wouldn’t call it feasible.

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In my opinion, Chromebooks are probably dead or dying at this point. The main reason to get one was the insane value proposition, but that has melted away with sub 300 dollar PCs that are relatively powerful. Now that chromebooks are hitting the 1000 dollar mark, it simply doesn’t make sense when there are options like cheaper lenovos and dells floating around that do everything, offer windows and also offer great performance in linux without having to do weird things to the bootloader.

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