Small cheap laptops? I thought we’d all already decided that Netbooks weren’t a particularly bright spot in the industry back in the late 2000s. Chromebooks have come a long way since their inception they’ve seemed to revive interest in the cheap laptop by offering a simple new OS, minimalist design, and fantastic price points. On top of that, Chromebooks have become known for great battery life due to their performance and software limitations.
Plenty of these Chromebooks have done a couple of these things well, but almost none have done them all. The Toshiba Chromebook 2 is the company’s second shot at nailing the Chromebook formula and just may have found the right balance in terms of features, specs, and price point.
Let’s start by digging into the new hardware on this laptop:
Hardware
The original Toshiba Chromebook was impressively thin, but it suffered from having some questionable build quality and a pretty lackluster display. All that has changed with Toshiba’s late-2014 Chromebook.
The original Toshiba Chromebook wasn’t particularly chunky compared to a lot of other Chromebooks from both 2013 and 2014. However, Toshiba has taken that same design and slimmed it down in pretty much every way possible. The 13.3-inch display is the same size, but Toshiba has cut down on the bezels to make for an overall smaller laptop. Most importantly, Toshiba also cut down the weight and thickness here, bringing it down to a size that’s closer to a 2014 Macbook Pro in comparison.
The body of the laptop is covered in a textured plastic material that isn’t my favorite, but it gets the job done for what it is. There still has not been a Chromebook as eye-catching and unique as the original 11-inch HP Chromebook, but the Toshiba Chromebook 2 makes up for its modest looks with solid build quality and practical design. It won’t leave fingerprints and dust all over your laptop like the matte plastic of other laptops and is fairly grippy for easy portability.
Unfortunately, the trackpad also has a slight texture on it, which means it’ll take some getting used to coming from glass trackpads that are used on MacBooks and higher-end Windows machines. The larger size of the trackpad helps though and I found that I got fairly comfortable with it after 15 or 20 minutes and some sensitivity adjusting.
Let’s get to the biggest upgrade of the Toshiba Chromebook 2: the display. It comes in two versions: the “Full HD” $329 model and “Standard HD” $249 model. The Full HD version has a really impressive 1080p IPS display with excellent color reproduction and viewing angles. This is one of the best displays that’s ever been squeezed into a Chromebook—and in my book—that makes the higher price point definitely worth it. The 720p display on the Standard HD version isn’t terrible thanks to the fact that is an IPS display, but as 1080p screens become more and more common in Chromebooks, you may find yourself regretting your purchase in six months or so. The tradeoff you do get with the Full HD model is 8-hour battery life, compared to the 11 hours you get out of the cheaper version.
Overall, there is a lot to like when it comes to the hardware and industrial design of the Toshiba Chromebook 2. It’s thin, light, and has an excellent display—all really impressive feats when you consider the price point.
