Chromebooks: Google 85, Verizon -50

Google's Chromebooks are quite good. Verizon needs to do a much better job with 3G support for the devices, however.

For the past several weeks, I’ve been using a Samsung Series 5 550 Google Chromebook with WiFi and 100MB of Verizon 3G per month for two years.

By and large, I love it.

What fun!

Here’s a real browser/cloud based system with tons of mostly free apps, real performance and all that with a mere 16GB of flash storage. Still, there are some downsides. Because you can’t run local apps, the limitations of Google Apps become more apparent, resulting in a 15 point loss for Google. Worse, though, is Verizon’s miserable handling of 3G, leading me to ding the carrier 150 points out of 100. Still, I see Chromebooks as good devices for businesses looking to move their clients devices to the cloud.

There are two basic Series 5 systems out there, the Series 5 and the Series 5 550. The Series 5 is an older, less powerful product. You can get it pretty cheaply, but I strongly suggest the 5 550 models. The 550 comes in two versions, WiFi only ($450 retail) and WiFi + 3G ($550 retail). In addition to Samsung, Acer makes a Chromebook. And, you can buy a Chromebox, also from Samsung, selling for ($329 retail). It’s the desktop equivalent Chrome OS device.

Here are the basic specs for the Samsung 5 550.

• 12.1" (1280x800) display
• 3.3 lbs / 1.48 kg
• 6 hours of continuous usage
• Intel® Core™ processor (Intel Celeron_867 Processor 1.3GHz)
• 4 GB RAM
• Built-in dual band Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Gigabit Ethernet, and 3G modem (opt)
• HD Camera
• 2 USB 2.0 ports – [wireless mice and keyboards work fine]
• 4-in-1 memory card slot
• DisplayPort++ Output (compatible with HDMI, DVI, VGA)
• Kensington™ key lock compatible

I know, you’re looking at those specs and concluding that this top of the line Chromebook sucks when it comes to performance. Sure, it would if you were going to run some hefty game or local photo or video editor. But, you’re running pretty much everything on Google’s servers. The servers are sending screens to the Chromebook. So, it’s a whole different ball game. My Chromebook came up and continues to come up in an instant, fully connected to WiFi. And, it flies through Google and other apps at speeds I envy when compared to my Core i7 desktop.

As for apps, most apps for the Chrome browser run on a Chromebook. Of course, I’m using the apps from the Google Apps for Business suite, DropBox, RoboForm and other collaboration/productivity apps, LogMeIn access to PCs and Macs, as well as Netflix, which runs flicker and stop free HD video, and, my game, Angry Birds. Furthermore, there are lots of other apps I want to try when I get the time. But, right now I am able to

The one area of criticism I have for Google relates to Google Apps for Business. Until it is possible to create more complex Google Spreadsheets, and to truly collaborate with Google Word Processing Documents, both Chromebooks and Google Apps for Business on other platforms won’t be ready for prime time business or, in some cases, even personal use. Perhaps there are already apps from other developers that accomplish these ends, but I haven’t found them yet.

I can live with this limitation on my PC because I can always run Office in a pinch. Can't do that on my PC, except if I use LogMeIn to get to my PC, but that's kind of cheating and awkward.

Still, I can get a lot of serious work done on my Chromebook using Google Apps for Business. And, when I switch to my iOS or Android phone or tablet or to my PC, I can pretty much work in the same exact environment, with Google remembering my settings.

We use Microsoft’s semi-cloud-basedOffice 365 for collaborating on Tom’s IT Pro stories. That’s mainly because--using MS Word 2010 Professional--you can check documents out and edit them, with a complete editing history and save them back to the Office 365 servers. But, man, Office 365 and Word feel like a really slow, clunky straight jacket compared to Google Apps for Business.

OK, so Chromebooks rule and could really rule with a few upgrades of Google Apps for Business. Why did I ding Verizon for its handling of 3G? Before I start, for those of you who think I’m a total technical washout, know that what I’m about to tell you is well documented on the web and has been for some time.

As you might expect, you have to activate your free subscription to Verizon 3G. To do that, you have to turn on the Chromebook’s 3G modem and choose to activate. That seems pretty simple. However, try as I might, aside from an “Activating” window that never activated, nothing happened. I looked around the web for an answer. I found two: (1) you need a signal strength of at least -86 dB and the Chromebook’s WiFi and broadband modem must be on at the same time; (2) the ID (“MEID”) of your particular modem must be entered in a Verizon database.

You can see signal strength by opening a terminal session on your Chromebook. Yep, and the terminal session looks just like the ones I remember from Unix and Linux. Type in “modem status” and, among other things, you see the strength of the signal coming into your modem. In the canyon of medium rise buildings our condo is located in, my signal strength ran as low as -96 dB, substantially lower than -86 dB, but never stronger than -86 dB. Because the instructions said WiFi had to be turned on and working, I couldn’t just go anywhere I could get a stronger signal.

So, it seemed time to call the Verizon support number that came up on the Chromebook each time 3G activation failed. First I got someone who said they couldn’t help, but promised to connect me to someone who could. After 15 minutes of the same boring elevator music, on came this guy with Verizon’s “Chromebook 3G Connectivity for Dummies” electronic guidebook wide open. He listened to the instructions I’d found and everything I had done. Then he bumbled around trying to find something in that guidebook. Finally he mumbled something about IDs and Verizon databases.

Hearing something familiar, I said maybe that’s it. Could he check to see if my MEID was in the database? He read pretty well, but his guidebook didn’t seem to say anything about getting the MEID into the database.

So, he fell back on the last refuge of Verizon employees. He said I needed to escalate the whole thing. OK, but, how and where? Not inside Verizon, it turned out. No, I had to turn to a Google Chromebook Ninja. Seriously, that’s what they call them. He gave me a number, which I called. It was after hours for Ninjas, but I was switched to a very efficient automated system that let me set an appointment for a Ninja to call me the next morning at 9:30.

As 9:30 am approached, I mulled over in my mind how I was going to really cream Google if the Ninja failed to call, let alone solve this vexing problem. Precisely at 9:30, the phone rings and it’s the Chromebook Ninja. I tell him what I read and what I’ve done and his first comment is, you can’t activate with WiFi on. In fact, Chrome OS should have turned off WiFi when you turned on 3G. We checked and it didn’t. But, he said with signal levels like I was getting, the thing would never activate.

So, I told him I could go out in front of our building where I was sure to get an adequately strong signal. But, not wanting to waste my time, he said he would first check to see if my MEID was indeed in the Verizon database and if it wasn’t he get it entered. Because it could take hours to get this done, another Verizon fiasco I presume, I should just hang up and wait for a few hours. If I didn’t hear from him telling me the MEID was already in the database, then I should wait several days and try to activate out in front of our building. Why several days? It takes that long for the MEID to penetrate fully into the Verizon system. I guess it’s kind of like the propagation of DNS information across the Internet.

Long story short, after four days, I was able to activate Verizon 3G. It took three tries, but it worked. And then, here’s the stinky part, I brought the Chromebook into the house while it was still connected to 3G and the connectivity remained. In the days since activation, I’ve had the Chromebook in some pretty isolated, low 3G signal places and it has always connected perfectly. My Ninja told me as he closed the case that the problem was indeed that the MEID was not in the database. This in spite of the fact that my Chromebook was manufactured in late June when this issue should have been resolved at Verizon.

So, here’s my take.

If a really weak 3G signal is enough to consistently and reliably use 3G, then it should be enough to activate it. And, if Chromebook broadband modem MEIDs are not getting into Verizon’s database when they should, then it’s my guess that Verizon is doing everything it can to make it extremely difficult to activate the Chromebook’s 2 years of free 3G service. It’s only 100 MB a month, not bad for a cloud client, but not all that much either.

If there’s a more Verizon friendly explanation for all of this, I’d be most happy to hear and publicize it. But, I’ve tried to get Verizon’s side with no luck at all. I have to wonder whatever happened to that Verizon service guy who was followed by a crowd of Verizon employees all pointing out that with Verizon “It’s the network.”

Barry Gerber is Editorial Director for Bestofmedia USA, publisher of Tom’s IT Pro (TIP). He managed the Tom's Hardware site for several years, and oversaw creation of the site that is now Tom's Guide. Barry is the spiritual father of TIP, having devoted three years to its development. Barry spent many a happy year as in IT pro in finance, insurance, health and education. Also, he has written for a number of IT publications and published a number of IT related books.

See here for all of Barry's Tom's IT Pro articles.

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