Last time I gave a little background about why I chose a Chromebook 11 to replace my Macbook Air development machine. In this installment I’ll dive into slightly more technical waters and discuss how some of the limitations such a modest machine can be addressed.

Storage

My original post notes that the only limitation of the Chromebook’s hardware that concerned me was the 16GB of internal file storage. If you are using the device under Chrome OS exclusively I don’t think this will ever be a problem, but since we’re running a full-blown Linux installation alongside Chrome OS it was something that concerned me. Fortunately this is easily addressed thanks to Crouton’s flexibility and the availability of tiny, cheap USB flash drives.

Sandisk Cruzer Fit

Nobody wants a big dongle sticking out of the side of their laptop, and it’s also likely to eventually cost you a USB port (when you...

Thirteen days ago I switched from a loaded Macbook Air to an HP Chromebook 11.

Admittedly, software developers are not the target market for Google’s Chromebook and Chrome OS. Most of the developers I know believe that their work requires the most powerful computer they can afford. I was once in this camp as well, and when I purchased my previous machine (even though it was under-powered in comparison to larger notebooks) I made sure that I “optioned it up” so I wouldn’t find myself suddenly trapped without enough processing power to do my daily work. As it would turn out, it wasn’t the limits of the hardware that held me back, but those of the software.

I’ve been a Unix and Linux user for years, and switched from Thinkpads running Redhat to Macbooks when Apple switched to using the NeXT-based OSX, having been a long-time fan of NeXT STEP, but over the last few years I’ve decided to...