Dell has finally made its entry into the Chromebook market official, as it follows in the footsteps of many other PC OEMs who are looking around to shore up flagging Windows machine sales. Dell’s aims with Chromebooks and Chrome OS are pretty specifically targeted, however, as Dell is creating its Chromebook 11 specifically for schools and students.
It should be available starting in January of next year for under $300, and will be sold through Dell.com in the U.S. and the U.K. It’s an Intel-powered device with a Celeron 2955U processor (interesting choice), 10 hours of battery life, 16GB of onboard flash storage, and two configurations of RAM, including a 4GB and a 2GB option. The screen on the new machine is a 1366×768 display, and there’s a 720p front-facing webcam for video conferencing. It has 802.11n Wi-Fi, and is under an inch thick, weighing just under 3 pounds. I/O includes two USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI port, and Bluetooth 4.0.
Google Supports Devices for a Maximum of Eight Years
This whole concept of an expiration date tied to your Chromebook may be annoying. But if you do your market research prior to purchasing a Chromebook, you could be enjoying auto-update support for as long as eight years. But remember, eight years is not standard for all Chromebooks.
Google extended its AUE for newer Chromebook models that have platforms launched in 2020 or beyond. Starting from the device platform release date, all Chromebooks using that platform will receive auto-update support for eight years. To be exact, the support will end in the month of June, following the completion of those eight years. So the exact AUE date may be a bit more or less than precisely eight years. The lines do get a bit blurry, so the only way to know for sure is to refer to the Google Auto Update policy page or the Chromebook’s settings.
What a Chromebook can do
Option # Finding the AUE date using the “Settings” app
The first method that can help you dig up where exactly an AUE date is displayed on a Chromebook pertains to the native “Settings” system application. All you have to do is head over to the “Advanced” section on the panel, click on “About ChromeOS,” and proceed toward opening up a different part of the device to help you unearth its AUE date.
Let’s go over the procedure with the following steps, so you’ll find them easier to implement on your end.