This refurbished ASUS 14″ Chromebook CX1400 (2022) sits in a really particular lane: inexpensive, easy, and dependable. At $189.99 on StackSocial proper now, it isn’t making an attempt to compete with premium MacBooks or Home windows ultrabooks. As a substitute, it’s meant to present you a succesful on a regular basis laptop for affordable, with out wanting or feeling disposable. The 14-inch Full HD show with slim NanoEdge bezels retains it from feeling dated, and at simply 3.59 kilos, it’s mild sufficient to hold round all day.

Below the hood, the Intel Celeron N4500 isn’t going to wow anybody with efficiency. It’s a dual-core processor with a base pace of 1.1 GHz that may burst as much as 2.8 GHz. That’s sufficient for net searching, Google Docs, Zoom calls, and streaming, however not for heavy workloads. The 8GB of RAM is definitely a pleasing shock at this worth level—it retains a number of Chrome tabs from slowing the entire system to a crawl. Storage is 128GB eMMC, which is best than the 64GB you often see in finances Chromebooks, however it’s nonetheless flash storage, not a correct SSD. In the event you’re storing quite a lot of recordsdata regionally, it’ll really feel cramped, although most Chromebook customers stay in Google Drive anyway.

It’s a Grade “A” refurbished unit, that means it ought to look near new, and it is a 2022 mannequin that comes with a one-year guarantee. However, after all, you’re shopping for into older {hardware} that received’t obtain ChromeOS updates without end, although help is assured by June 2031—so, six extra years of computerized updates, which is definitely first rate for a finances machine. In the event you want a journey laptop computer, a backup for the youngsters, or only a no-fuss machine for e-mail and streaming, it is a good purchase at below $200. However when you’re hoping for future-proof efficiency or need one thing that may exchange a full-fledged laptop computer for work or inventive initiatives, this one most likely isn’t the appropriate match.