Ok so my wife's laptop is on its last leg. she basically uses it just for email and shopping. When I saw the Acer C7 Chromebook for sale at Sam's Club I thought it might be just right for her. Also my niece just started High School and they are using Google Docs. I thought maybe the Chromebook would be a reasonably priced alternative for her vs. an iPad with Bluetooth keyboard.

When I got it home and opened it up I found that it had a slightly larger screen and keyboard and was much lighter and thinner than  my old netbook, which I never liked. setup was easy. Looked good. I configured it for myself, my wife, and my niece. The wireless network configured easily.

I have to say that I really liked the Chromebook. Even though I use the Chrome browser, I'm not used to using a web browser to manage my gmail and hotmail email accounts. It had a SD card slot which is important for my photography. It had USB ports so I hooked up my external 2 gig drive. That worked fine.

In the end I had four issues 

1. My niece's school doesn't have wireless yet and the Chromebook is very limited without network access. Remember it's basically just a web browser.
2. My wife likes to play games like Candy Crush on out iPad and Video slot machines on her laptop. The web based version of Candy Crush it not as good as the iPad version. 
3. While the Chromebook worked fine on .jg images, it had no idea what to do with my Nikon raw files .NEF. I couldn't find any apps to support raw image formats.
4. i was supposed to get 100 GB of Google Drive free for 2 years but when I tried to activate it said I wasn't eligible. 

So in the end I returned the Chromebook. I just purchased an iPad for my niece and am still in shock over the price. Also I'm a little concerned that she will loose it, it will get stolen, or she will drop and break it. It's an expensive device for a 9th grader. Cross your fingers.

I have to say that I'm still torn. I really liked the Chromebook and still think it would be a good device for someone that has