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Samsung Chromebook Series 5 550 Review

by Michael A. Prospero on June 6, 2012

 

Design

Click to EnlargeWhere last year's Samsung Chromebook had more rounded edges, the Series 5 550 is slightly more angular, and looks more like Samsung's other notebooks. Both the lid and deck are made of a silvery gray plastic, not unlike its Series 5 ultrabook. Overall, the aesthetic feels less Google-y: To be sure, the colorful Google logo is still on the lid, but it's smaller than Samsung's chrome logo.
It's not as svelte as an Ultrabook, but it's close. Weighing 3.2 pounds and measuring 11.5 x 8.5 x 0.8 inches, the Series 5 550 fits just as comfortably into a messenger bag as other ultraportables.

Heat

After streaming a Hulu video at full screen for 15 minutes, the touchpad was a very cool 77 degrees Fahrenheit, the space between the G and H keys was 89, and the middle of the underside was 90 degrees. All are well below what we consider uncomfortable -- 95 degrees.
However, the area toward the back underneath the system, near the vent, registered a highly uncomfortable 122 degrees. For an OS supposedly this light, that's disconcerting, to say the least. After an hour, even the upper right section of the keyboard became noticeably warm, too.

Keyboard

Click to EnlargeThe island-style keyboard on the Series 5 550 was plenty spacious, and the keys offered plenty of travel, more so than the Series 9 ultrabook, in fact. However, we found the keys slightly slippery, as our fingers would slide off them a little too easily. Also, there's no backlighting, but this is a sub-$500 system, so that's no great surprise.
As before, the left Caps Lock button has been replaced with a Search button. However, pressing it merely opens a new browser window. A neater trick would be for it to search not only the Web, but local files as well, a la Spotlight.
In lieu of function keys, the row above the keyboard has Chrome-specific buttons, including back, forward, refresh and full screen. Also here are buttons to control the brightness and volume

Touchpad

Click to EnlargeAt 4.1 x 2.5 inches, the chrome-lined clickpad on the Series 5 is plenty spacious -- larger than the first edition -- especially for a 12-inch system. While two-finger scrolling worked well, the pad lacks multitouch gestures such as pinch-to-zoom. That's a pretty disappointing ommission.

Display

The matte 12.1-inch display on the Series 5 has a resolution of 1280 x 800, the same as the previous version. With an average brightness of 314 lux, the Series 5 outshone the ultraportable average (234 lux) as well as much more expensive systems, such as the Lenovo ThinkPad X230 (240 lux).
The 1080p trailers for "Battleship" and "The Dark Knight Rises" were crisp, with bright colors and few artifacts in darker scenes. Contrast wasn't as high on notebooks with glossy displays, but it's pretty good for the price.

Audio

Click to EnlargeThe speakers on the bottom of the Chromebook Series 5 550 pumped out remarkably loud and good sound -- so long as the notebook was on a hard surface. While it was on our glass coffee table, streaming Bruce Springsteen's "Badlands" over Pandora rang out, with a decent amount of bass, and higher tones weren't distorted, even with the volume maxed out.
As soon as we put the notebook in our lap, though, the song sounded much more muted, with many of the higher notes hard to hear. The same pattern continued when we listened to Eminem's "Love The Way You Lie." There was just so much more definition when the laptop was on our desk.

Ports

Click to EnlargeOn the left side of the Chromebook Series 5 is an Ethernet port, DisplayPort, USB, and a combo headphone/mic jack. On the right side is a second Ethernet port, a 4-in-1 card slot and a Kensington lock slot. The back side of our system also has a SIM card slot. The power jack is also on the left side; we found that you really had to push the plug in firmly, snapping it into place; otherwise, it would fall out easily.

Webcam

Over W-Fi, a Google Hangout chat produced good images on this Chromebook. While our colleague was slightly pixelated, colors were accurate, and sound stayed in sync.

User Interface

Click to EnlargeThe latest version of the Chrome OS (version 19) includes many welcome improvements. The first thing that users will notice is a bona fide desktop, and not just a browser window that fills the screen. This is welcome news not just to us, but to anyone who's familiar with Windows or Mac OS.
Along the left bottom are icons for the Chrome browser, Gmail, Google, YouTube, Google Drive and Apps. The lower right shows the time, the status of your Internet connection, battery level and a little droid icon that, when clicked, lets you adjust settings and log out or turn off the system. We like that you can pin additional apps to the Launcher, but wish you could organize their arrangement.
Any window that is opened in the main area of the desktop can be re-sized or expanded to fill the screen. We wish there was a minimize function, but it's sort of inconsequential, as everything occurs within the browser window.
When you click on the little grid icon, it minimizes the browser window, and brings up a desktop view of all your apps. It's handy to see them all in one place, but there's no way to organize them, such as rearranging their order, placing them in folders, or adding a second page. If you keep adding apps, the icons just get smaller and smaller.

Performance

Unlike the first Series 5 Chromebook, which used a 1.66-GHz dual-core Intel Atom N570 CPU, 2GB of RAM, a 16GB SSD hard drive and integrated graphics, the Series 5 550 has an Intel Celeron 867 processor, 4GB of RAM and a 16GB SSD. These kinds of components will more than suffice for browsing the Web, streaming videos and writing documents.
The Series 5 booted in a lightning-fast 12 seconds. That's half the time of most Ultrabooks, and even about five seconds faster than the MacBook Air. Windows opened quickly, and we were able to stream 1080p videos without any issues.
Compared to the original Chromebook, there's a clear boost in performance. On the Peacekeeper benchmark, the Series 5 550 scored 1,830, where the original notched just 473. The Series 5 550 took just 439.8 miliseconds to complete the Sunspider test, nearly a third of the time of the original Chromebook (1136.4 ms).
Using WebGL Aquarium, we averaged between 45 and 60 frames per second with 50 fish and all the effects turned on. That's light-years better than the first Series 5 Chromebook, which could barely manage 4 fps with just one fish, and no background or sunlight.

Offline Access and Cloud Storage

Connectivity remains the Chrome OS's Achilles heel. Without it, the Series 5 550 becomes much less useful. There are about 150 apps, including Google Mail, Docs, Google Play Books, the New York Times and "Angry Birds" that will work without an Internet connection, but considering there are tens of thousands of apps in the Chrome Web Store, it's clear that this is an OS that's only fully functional with the Web.
Google Drive, Picasa and Google Mail each give you 5GB of free cloud storage. Those who need more space can choose from one of nine different plans, which range from 25GB for $2.49 per month, to 16TB for $799 per month.

Google Drive

Chrome OS now supports a much wider range of formats, including Office files, PDF, ZIP and RAR. You can now view documents offline, though the process is a bit cumbersome. Too bad you can't edit them, and then have the changes sync automatically when Internet access is restored. However, Google says offline editing is being rolled out.

File Manager

Click to EnlargeOne of our chief complaints with the first Series 5 was that there was no easy way to view the files on the notebook itself. Googleremedied that somewhat with the File Manager, which lists all your downloaded files in the browser, as well as any in an SD card or USB device. There's still no way to view system files, such as drivers, though.

Photo Editing

The built-in Photo Editor lets you make basic adjustments, such as crop, brightness, and rotate, and lets you share them with Picasa, but it's pretty anemic compared to Picasa or even Google+, both of which offer a wealth of more options, both in terms of editing and sharing.

App Selection

It's not as robust as Google Play, but the Chrome Web Store has tens of thousands of apps, according to Google. Many popular apps can be found, such as Picasa, Pandora, Netflix, "Angry Birds," NYTimes, and Tweetdeck.

Cloud Print

Click to EnlargeAs with the previous Chromebooks, users can print remotely to cloud-ready printers such as HP's ePrint line, or to older printers connected to a computer running Google Chrome.

Remote Desktop

Currently, a beta app in the Chrome Web Store, Remote Desktop lets you access a computer remotely from your Chromebook. Both must be running the Remote Desktop app in the Chrome Web browser, and both must be logged into your Google account. After that, it's a fairly easy setup process that took only a few minutes. Then, after setting up a PIN, which was used to authenticate our connection, our desktop's screen showed up in the Chrome 5's browser window.
Over the same network, there was very little lag as we typed in a word processor, and opened and closed windows and apps. However, you can view only one monitor of your remote desktop at a time, and there's no way to zoom in, so text can appear rather small.

Battery Life

The Series 5 is rated for six hours of continuous use, and 6.5 days on standby. On the LAPTOP Battery Test (web surfing via Wi-Fi with the screen at 40 percent brightness), we were down to 44 percent of our battery after four hours and 17 minutes. If we extrapolate that, it comes out to about 7.6 hours of endurance. That's very good battery life.

3G

Click to EnlargeOur version of the Series 5 550 came with a 3G option through Verizon, which comes with 100MB of free data per month. After that, the connection simply cuts off, instead of charging overage fees. At the very least, we wish it was 4G.
For those who crave everywhere-connectivity, Verizon offers an unlimited day pass for $9.99, and three monthly passes: 1GB for $20, 3GB for $35, and 5GB for $50.
Two-year contract plans include a 2GB/$30 per month, 5GB for $50 per month and 10GB for $80 per month.

Configurations

As mentioned, Samsung offers two versions of the Series 5 550. Our model, which has a 1.3-GHz Intel Celeron 867 processor, 4GB of RAM and a 16GB SSD, as well as a 3G radio, costs $549. The non-3G version, which otherwise has the same specs, costs $449.

Verdict

Click to EnlargeThere's no doubt that the Chrome OS has improved by leaps and bounds. And Samsung's Chromebook Series 5 550 is a pretty slick vehicle for the platform, especially for those who have basic needs. The comfortable keyboard and bright screen are as good as what you'll find on some Ultrabooks, and this machine is certainly faster than its predecessor. However, $449 is a lot to spend on a machine that has limited offline capability.
While it's a different breed of laptop, it's hard to justify spending this much dough on an ultraportable with a Celeron processor and just 16GB of storage when you can get a Dell Inspiron 14z with a second-gen Intel Core i3 processor and a 500GB hard drive for the same price. If the price drops, the Chromebook Series 5 550 will be worthy of stronger consideration, but right now we wouldn't choose this clamshell over a traditional notebook or the iPad.

How To Improve Laptop Battery Life: Bloatware and Automatic Updates by jerry jackson

Uninstall Bloatware
Right out of the box, almost all notebooks have superfluous software installed by the manufacturer to add "value" to your new PC. Translation: most new PCs come loaded with bloatware (AKA crapware) which doesn't need to be installed on your computer. While some of these applications aren't causing any problems (other than wasting storage space on your hard drive) some of these applications are setup to automatically run in the background when you start Windows and in some cases they use your wireless network to check for updates and download alerts.
Bloatware can be a touchy subject since some people like having these extra applications that check for updates to DVD playback software or checks for the latest accessory deals from the laptop manufacturer. It's ultimately up to you to decide whether you want to uninstall the "extras" that came pre-installed on your laptop.
A Few More Changes To Windows
In addition to the typical bloatware, most new PCs come with the following processes running in the background ... all of which eat up precious CPU cycles and trash your hard drive. You might find some of these processes helpful, but if you are trying to squeeze out every possible minute of battery life from your laptop then keep reading.
Automatic Updates: You should keep your system up to date with the latest Windows updates, this should be done at your own leisure if you care about battery life. The best time to update Windows is obviously when you're connected to a power outlet. To disable automatic updates, go into your Control Panel and click on "Windows Update". In the next window click on "change settings" on the left side, and make your way to the next screen. Now change your selection to "Never check for updates", and click OK. Please note that this may make your system vulnerable if you don't manually check for updates on a regular basis.
Windows Indexing: Windows disk indexing helps to reduce search times when trying to find a particular file on your hard drive, but will wreak havoc on your battery life in the process. To disable indexing, open "My Computer" and right click on your hard drive. On the first screen that shows up, uncheck "Index this drive for faster searching". You will need to proceed through a few prompts, as well as clicking "ignore all" if prompted. This may take quite a bit of time depending on how full your drive is.
Anti-Virus Software: AV software is a huge performance hog both when searching for viruses and when updating virus definitions. On the other hand, your AV software can also be a life saver depending on what type of sites your visit or what sorts of files you encounter. If you are a very careful and savvy PC user then you can steer clear of harmful sites and files and may not need any AV software. Be warned that removing AV software from your system is risky and should be done at your own discretion. If you've had a number of virus problems in the past then do NOT consider removing your anti-virus software.
If you are running anti-virus software then you might want to make sure the automatic updates and virus scans aren't scheduled to take place when you're running on battery power.
The next step of this guide requires you to use the Task Scheduler and disable a few services that your computer runs in the background while you are using your laptop. This can be accessed by going into your program list, then Accessories, then System Tools, finally clicking Task Scheduler.
In the list of Active Tasks, the following items cause the most unwanted activity in the background. To disable any of these items, double click the selection which will take you to another screen listing more details on that activity. Now all you need to do is right click the item, and click disable to stop it from bothering you in the future.
Consolidator: This runs in the background for the Customer Improvement Program. Not a major power draw but it's something you can turn off
Scheduled Defrag: Defragments your hard drive, and will bog down your system in the process. I handle this at my own leisure instead of letting the system schedule it weekly.

Conclusion
You can extend the amount of run time on your laptop's battery by hours in some cases simply by following this guide and being mindful of the software you are using on your laptop. Even when not increasing battery life, many of these tweaks help improve system performance, and many times make your old laptop feel like a speed demon again. You can keep that old laptop and save it from the landfill for another year.
Your laptop is more like you than you might think: The harder you work, the more energy you lose. If you can find the right balance between resting (being idle) and doing all the things you want to do with your laptop you'll be amazed at how long your battery will keep running.

Performance:

The 1GHz TI OMAP 3630 chipset does a respectable job at making sure MeeGo keeps up with everything we throw at it. At times we opened in excess of 17 apps with little in the way of stuttering. At other times however, with 2 or 3 apps open the Nokia N9 hung, froze or took its sweet time to open a new application. Inconsistencies in behaviour remind us that the MeeGo is still in its infancy. This doesn't kill the Nokia N9 experience, but does sully it somewhat, especially when considering the uncertainty behind support for this platform over the coming years.

Call quality on the Nokia N9 wasn't the crispest we've experienced, though is by no means poor. The active noise cancellation does its job, and the person on the other end sounds audible, if ever so slightly soft. The feedback we received from the other end when talking on the N9 was that a good sound was produced, volume and clarity are all above average. With good reception, the Nokia N9 confidently offers both solid smarts and acommendablephone.

With the non-removable 1450 mAh battery stated to last 11 hours while talking and 16 days standby, the Nokia N9 manages to put other smartphones to shame. While real-world results produced a full day to day with chat logged in, if you need to preserve juice, switching off connections can get the handset through two days - something most smartphones can only dream of.

Conclusion:

Is MeeGo a viable OS? Is the Nokia N9 design up to scratch? Is the new camera good enough? The resounding answer is yes, bittersweet though it may be. MeeGo ordains Nokia's impeccable hardware with a form fitted OS, one that could even challenge the major players on the usability stakes and before we can celebrate, we must commemorate. For any Nokia fans out there considering this, you get our recommendation. However, from a practical stance, for a day to day consumer who wants to buy into an ecosystem rich in apps and development, the grass may well be greener on the other side. If you, like us, have fallen in love with the Nokia hardware, but the N9 won't be available in your market, you may want to consider an upcoming Nokia Windows Phone, which would eventually spor a similar chassis and Microsoft's better-supported OS. 

Nokia N9 Video Review: