Dell Chromebook 11 (2015) review

Meet the toughest Chromebook

 
 
 

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OUR VERDICT

Dell packed some of the best features from its more expensive business notebooks into a compact design that's built to survive daily use in the education market.

FOR

• Rugged, military tested design
• Loud speakers
• 180-degree barrel hinge

AGAINST

• Touchscreen not standard
• Small keyboard
• Large footprint for screen size

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INTRODUCTION AND DESIGN

Specifically built to withstand the abuses inherent to an education environment, this year's Dell Chromebook 11 features a solid build housed in a boring design. The Chromebook 11 ($249, £170, AU$320) looks more like a business laptop with its understated looks, but Dell claims its purpose-built design means that this notebook should survive drops, water spills, dirt and dust and most things that the harsh academic K-12 environment throws at it.

Direct competitors in this rugged space include Acer's 11-inch Chromebook C740 ($249, £170, AU$320) and 15-inch Chromebook C910 ($299, £200, AU$385). Dell's new Latitude 11 ($299, £194, AU$386), which swaps Chrome OS for Windows in a similar form factor, is also an excellent rugged candidate for the education segment.

Those who don't need the rugged design and choose form over durability will find the Samsung Chromebook 2 ($249, £154, AU$282), Toshiba Chromebook($279, £167, AU$309), and Lenovo N20p ($329, £210, AU$380) to be solid choices. The recently announced all-metal Asus Flip ($249, £167, AU$327) comes with a hybrid 360-degree hinge, allowing it to transform into various form factors, including use as a tablet.

Home users who may not have budget constraints can find more powerful systems elsewhere. The 11-inch MacBook Air ($899, £605, AU$1,155) is a compelling choice given its small footprint, solid aluminum construction, and portability. Apple bundles its free productivity software with OS X, and unlike Chrome OS, the Air can be used as a regular notebook without requiring a constant tether to the internet.

Design

Unlike Asus, which is trying to reinvent the Chromebook category with its 360-degree hinge on the Flip, Dell is taking a more measured approach in creating a durable product that will survive daily student use and abuse.

Because of the rugged construction, Dell's Chromebook 11 ends up slightly larger and heavier than the competition. Compared to Toshiba's Chromebook 2, a device with a larger 13.3-inch panel that measures 12.6 x 8.4 x 0.76 inches (32.0 x 21.3 x 1.9cm), the Chromebook 11 occupies almost the same footprint at 11.69 x 8.57 x 0.83 inches (29.7 x 21.8 x 2.1cm). Acer's C740 with a similar 11.6-inch display is slightly more compact than the Dell model at 11.3 x 8 x 0.79 inches (28.7 x 20.3 x 2.0cm).

With a touchscreen, the 2.91-pound (1.32kg) Dell Chromebook 11 is heavier than the Acer C740's 2.87-pound (1.30kg) weight. Without a touchscreen, Dell's model is only 2.74 pounds (1.24kg). The Chromebook 11's weight is about on par with the 11-inch category, and is still light enough for students to carry around all day.

What sets the Dell Chromebook 11 apart from others on the market is its rugged design. Dell claims that its new Chromebook 11 passes US Military Standard testing for durability, dirt, dust, pressure, temperature, humidity, shock and vibration "so it can handle student life."

To meet those durability claims, Dell cloaks its Chromebook 11 in a solid, matte black plastic case, a design choice that hides scratches, dirt and fingerprints well. A rubber bumper along the edges of the Chromebook 11 helps shield the notebook in case it's dropped.

Acer's education-centric Chromebook offerings come with reinforced hinge designs and strengthened corners, but lack the full rubber bumpers and the sealed keyboard and trackpad of the Dell Chromebook 11.

On the Chromebook 11, the touchscreen is an optional upgrade, and it allows students another means to interact with the content on their Chromebook beyond the keyboard and trackpad.

Another feature that sets the Chromebook 11 apart from the competition is the reinforced barrel hinge. Not only does the barrel hinge allow the lid to be opened up to 180 degrees for better peer-to-peer collaboration, Dell says that it is also extremely sturdy. As students would often grab and carry the Chromebook by the lid, the barrel design helps to reduce stress and prevent the hinge from breaking.

The hinge also houses loud, forward-firing stereo speakers.

The non-backlit keyboard is surprisingly pleasant to use. With almost full-size keys - the keys are about 1/16 inches more narrow than the keys on a 15-inch MacBook Pro - typing is comfortable. The keys are extremely springy, but lack the key travel of a full-size laptop keyboard.

There is a dedicated row of standard Chrome shortcut keys on top of the keyboard. The trackpad on the Chromebook 11 is extremely responsive, and I found cursor tracking to be accurate.

Rugged durability

In addition to the reinforced barrel hinge, the Chromebook 11 comes with a waterproof keyboard and trackpad - features that are typically found on more expensive business laptops, like the Lenovo ThinkPad T450s ($881, £591, AU$1,131).

The waterproof keyboard means that the Chromebook 11 can be used in science labs and other hazardous education environments.

For those opting for a touchscreen model, the Corning Gorilla Glass NBT screen helps to protect the display from scratches.

The Chromebook 11 is available in two color options. Dell is selling the black version at $249 (£170, AU$320), with the blue version commanding a $10 (£7, AU$13) premium. Both versions start with 2GB of RAM and a 720p HD non-touch display.

Here's how the unit sent to TechRadar for review was configured.

Spec sheet

• Processor: 2.6GHz dual-core Intel Celeron Bay Trail-M N2840
• Graphics: Intel HD for Intel Celeron processors
• Memory: 4GB RAM (DDR3L, 1,600Mhz)
• Storage: 16GB SSD
• Screen: 11.6-inch HD, 1366 x 768 touchscreen
• Camera: 720p webcam
• Wireless: Bluetooth 4.0; 802.11ac (B/G/N), dual-band Wi-Fi
• Ports: HDMI 1.4, 1x USB 3.0, 1x USB 2.0, memory card reader, secondary memory card reader with lock, 3.5mm combo jack
• Battery: Three-cell
• OS: Chrome OS

If you can afford the $70 (£47, AU$90) premium, the touchscreen version of the Chromebook 11 starts at $329 (£210, AU$380) and provides a future-proof computing experience, especially if you're looking to hang on to the Chromebook for several years. Google is starting to port Android apps to Chrome OS, and a touchscreen makes that experience better than using a keyboard and trackpad.

Additionally, a touchscreen can also help increase classroom collaboration. By laying the screen flat with the barrel hinge, students can tap on the touchscreen to share, collaborate, and interact with their content.

Performance

While the dual-core Celeron Bay Trail-M processor doesn't quite have the raw performance of the Intel Broadwell chip inside this year's Google Chromebook Pixel ($999, £799, AU$1,277), performance on the Dell Chromebook 11 is extremely smooth.

Given that most computing activity on a Chromebook will be done through the cloud rather than on the device - and that most Chromebook users won't be running heavy video editing programs anyways - "downgrading" to an Atom-based processor on the Dell model brings a lot of value for the performance.

In real-world use, performance of the Chromebook 11 is similar to the Toshiba Chromebook 2. Both models share the same processor, RAM and screen resolution, but the Toshiba model comes with a larger 13-inch display.

I had about 15 tabs running in three different browser windows without any slow downs on the Chromebook 11. The Chromebook 11 is fast, responsive, and exhibited no delays.

The Intel Celeron chipset's performance seems better than the ARM CPU on the competing Acer Chromebook 13, which runs on Nvidia's Tegra K1 processor, and exhibited slightly diminished performance when tested by TechRadar.

Multimedia

Unfortunately, lacking the in-plane switching (IPS) screen technology of the Toshiba Chromebook 2's display, the Chromebook 11 has narrower viewing angles. The 180-degree hinge design mitigates this somewhat as it allows students to still have peer-to-peer collaboration when the screen is laid flat.

In my testing, I found that even though the screen is adequately bright indoors with a 200-nit rating, I struggled with the display outdoors as the screen was too dim, even at full brightness.

Surprisingly, audio produced by the stereo speakers came out loud and clear. In fact, at the loudest volume, audio produced by the Chromebook 11 could fill a small room.

When watching YouTube review videos, instructional TED Talk videos, and streaming music on Pandora, I preferred to keep the volume between 50% and 80%. I found that there is slight distortion at volumes higher than 80%, and at that level the audio lacked fullness.

Battery life

With a stated battery life of 10 hours, the Chromebook delivers an all-day computing experience. For classroom use, this means that teachers won't need to recharge Chromebooks between classes or in the middle of lessons, and students won't need to find power outlets when using the Chromebook 11.

In real-world use, with screen brightness set to around 60%, the Chromebook 11 lasted for just over eight hours on a single charge. In my testing, I surfed the web, managed my emails, watched a few marketing videos on YouTube, edited documents in Google Docs and Google Sheets, checked the news on Feedly and performed Google search in the Chrome browser.

Eight hours is enough to get through a full school day, but students who carry their own Chromebook 11 likely will need to charge the Chromebook at some point during the day if they intend on using the netbook after-school for homework or other extracurricular functions.

Collaboration and communication

Dell has created a useful way to use technology to foster classroom engagement. The Dell activity light is a tool that encourages participation and communication.

For students who may be too timid to raise their hands or speak up in class, the activity light alerts instructors when a student wants to join a discussion or has a question. Students can tap or click the appropriate icon on the accompanying app on the Chromebook, and a corresponding light will appear on the lid to alert the instructor.

A blue light means the student wants to participate. A red light indicates that a student has a question. And finally, a yellow light alerts the instructor that the student may need more time or may not have understood the materials presented.

Chromebook management

To manage the Chromebook 11, Dell offers an easy enterprise mobility management solution through its KACE program. School IT administrators can use the Dell KACE K1000 Systems Management Appliance as a comprehensive systems management solution to inventory Chromebooks.

Dell also sells a $1,899 (£1,280, AU$2,450) mobile computing cart that can store up to 30 devices at a single time. The cart, when used inside a classroom environment, allows teachers to securely lock up the Chromebooks for safe storage. Additionally, the cart is also a charging hub, allowing educators to quickly charge up to 30 Chromebook 11 laptops overnight.

The value of running Chrome OS on the Chromebook 11 is that it requires very little maintenance. Unlike using Windows systems that require constant OS updates, antivirus software, and a powerful CPU and GPU to handle computing tasks, the Chromebook 11 is a physical device that connects to the cloud to do heavy lifting.

Students just need to sign into the Chromebook 11 with their Google ID and Google will keep Chrome OS constantly updated in the background. As users are mainly running web apps, not much computing power is needed as long as the school has a robust wireless connection.

Sony s6000 Review:

Sony's NEX-6 was a departure from the company's usual lineup of mirrorless cameras when it was introduced in the Fall of 2012. It slotted in between the various NEX-5 models and the NEX-7, and staked out a middle ground between the two, aiming to offer an accessible camera that offered a strong feature set for photographers. So you got a small camera with an electronic viewfinder and a degree of direct control. To this the NEX-6 offered two things that were yet to appear on any Sony mirrorless camera: an exposure mode dial and an ISO-standard hot shoe.

The new a6000 sits in the same place in Sony's mirrorless lineup and offers a broadly similar feature set, but adds a number of significant new features (while also losing the NEX moniker of its predecessor). The resolution and processor have been bumped up, the most notable feature on the a6000 is its updated Hybrid AF system.

Where the NEX-6 had 99 phase-detect points covering approximately 50% of the sensor, the a6000 has 179, with 92% coverage - by far the most comprehensive of any contemporary camera. This, combined with the new Bionz X processor, allows the camera to shoot continuously at 11 fps with subject tracking, according to Sony. The company also claims that the a6000 has the fastest AF performance on the market, though those statements should always be taken with a grain of salt.

The only major losses are that the a6000 utilizes Sony's lower resolution, SVGA viewfinder, rather than its top-end XGA panel. It also loses the NEX-6's level gauge - which seems like an odd thing to remove, just to help it hit a lower price point. However, those cost-cutting measures seem to have worked: the a6000's list price is $100 lower, at $649, than the NEX-6's was at launch.

Sony a6000 key features

• 24.3 megapixel APS-C CMOS sensor
• Bionz X image processor
• Hybrid AF system with 25 contrast-detect and 179 phase-detect points
• Built-in flash + Multi-Interface Shoe
• 11 fps continuous shooting with subject-tracking
• 3-inch tilting LCD with 921,600 dots
• OLED electronic viewfinder with 1.44M dots
• Diffraction correction, area-specific noise reduction, and detail reproduction technology
• Full HD video recording at 1080/60p and 24p; clean HDMI output
• Wi-Fi with NFC capability and downloadable apps

The major changes here are related to the sensor. The new 24 megapixel 'Exmor APS HD' CMOS sensor has on-chip phase detection like its predecessor, but it covers a much larger area of the frame. Sony promises better AF tracking, especially when shooting continuously. The a6000 uses Sony's latest image processor - Bionz X - which touts improved detail and smarter noise reduction as improvements.

While the specs of the a6000's movie mode aren't a whole lot different from the NEX-6, users now have access to a zebra pattern (a live exposure warning that can be set to indicate a chosen brightness level), and can output 'clean' video over HDMI. The menus have switched to the new 'Alpha' style found on the a7 and a7R (for better or for worse), and the camera can now be controlled via a Mac or PC over a USB connection. The Wi-Fi feature is about the same as on the NEX-6, offering remote control from a smart device, the ability to transfer images from the camera and options for uploading to the cloud, across Wi-Fi networks. The camera can also download and run Sony's feature-enhancing 'Playmemories Apps' of which there are an increasing number.

Hybrid AF System

If there's one area that makes the a6000 stand out from the crowd, it's the camera's improved AF system. While the 25-point contrast detect part of the system remains the same, the number of phase-detect points has increased from 99 to 179 since the NEX-6. All of those extra phase detect points give you a much wider coverage area: roughly 92% of the frame, compared to around 50%. The benefit? A wider area that lets phase detection autofocus do what it does best: track moving subjects.

Bionz X Processor

The company's latest 'Bionz X' processor is considerably more powerful than the previous generation, allowing what the company says will be more sophisticated processing.

Sony is being a little vague on specifics, but is touting the new processor as offering 'Detail Reproduction Technology' which appears to be a more subtle and sophisticated sharpening system. The company promises less apparent emphasis on edges, giving a more convincing representation of fine detail.

Another function promised by the Bionz X processor is 'Diffraction Reduction', in which the camera's processing attempts to correct for the softness caused by diffraction as you stop a lens' aperture down. This processing is presumably aperture-dependent and sounds similar to an element of Fujifilm's Lens Modulation Optimization system (introduced on the X100S), and, as we predicted when we first saw it here, it's subsequently appeared across several brands, including Olympus.

Finally, Sony says the Bionz X chip offers a more advanced version of its context-sensitive, 'area-specific noise reduction', which attempts to identify whether each area of an image represents smooth tone, textured detail or subject edges, and then apply different amounts of noise reduction accordingly.

Compared to a5000 and NEX-6

While most of the changes on the a6000 are for the better, there are a few things that have gone the other way compared to the NEX-6. For the sake of comparison we've also thrown in the a6000's step-down model, the a5000.

	a5000	NEX-6	a6000
Resolution	20.1MP	16.1MP	24.3MP
Processor	Bionz X	Bionz	Bionz X
AF system (contrast/phase)	25 / 0 point	25 / 99 point	25 / 179 point
ISO range	100-16000	100-25600	100-25600
LCD design (tilt up/down)	Tilting (180° up)	Tilting (90°/45°)	Tilting (90°/45°)
EVF type / resolution	None	OLED / 2.36M dot	OLED / 1.44M dot
EVF magnification (equiv.)	N/A	0.73x	0.70x
On-screen level gauge	No	Yes	No
Max burst rate	4 fps	10 fps	11 fps
Video resolution	1080/60i/24p	1080/60p/24p	1080/60p/24p
Zebra pattern	Yes	No	Yes
Clean HDMI output	No	No	Yes
PC remote	No	No	Yes
Battery life (CIPA)	420 shots	360 shots	360 shots

In most respects, the Alpha 6000 is a big step up from the NEX-6 - the slightly smaller, lower resolution viewfinder is the only major step down in the specification.

As you'd expect, the a6000 is considerably more capable than the lower-cost a5000, unless you want a 180 degree flip-up screen. The trade-off for that feature is the lack of an EVF.

Kit options and pricing

The a6000 is available in silver or black, at a price of $649/£589/€649 for the body and $799/£719/€799 for a kit including the 16-50mm F3.5-5.6 power zoom lens.

The a6000 is available in silver or black

Accessories of note include an 'active sling bag', screen protector, and body case. Some users may also be interested in the BC-VW1 external charger, as Sony only includes a USB charger in the box.

Sony Xperia Z2 Tablet review:

A supercharged, super-skinny slate

The Apple iPad Air might be a slick piece of design, but dunk it in the bath and it'll quickly turn into a lifeless slab. Enter the Sony Xperia Z2 Tablet -- a 10.1-inch slate that is completely waterproof. It replaces Sony's existing Xperia Tablet Z , but packs in a new quad-core Snapdragon 801 processor clocked at 2.3GHz, adds the latest Android KitKat software and slims the design down to only 6.4mm thick.

The Xperia Z2 Tablet is available to buy now online in the UK starting at £399 or throughout wider Europe for €499. Sony is yet to announce wider availability. The iPad Air also starts at £399 (both with 16GB of storage) but Sony's comes with 4G LTE connectivity, something which will cost you an extra £100 on the iPad. The Z2 Tablet's waterproof skills may mean you're less likely to have to shell out on a new one if you're clumsy enough to drop it in the sink.

THE SKINNY, WATERPROOF SONY XPERIA Z2 TABLET...

Design and build quality

When you first pick the Z2 Tablet up, the first thing you'll almost certainly notice is just how incredibly slim it is. It measures only 6.4mm thick, knocking 0.5mm off its already razor-thin predecessor. It feels like you're holding a skinny pamphlet, which is compounded by its light 426g weight. By comparison, Apple's iPad is both slightly thicker and heavier, at 7.5mm and 469g.

That extreme skinniness has come at a slight cost however. While the iPad Air's metal body is incredibly sturdy, with little flex anywhere, the Z2 Tablet feels much less secure. It's not difficult to give the entire tablet a slight bend in your hands -- I don't imagine it would come off too well if it was accidentally sat or leant on.

Design-wise, not much has changed since the previous model. The front is a button-free, all-glass design, while the back panel is a wide expanse of matte white or black plastic, with the minimal Sony branding in the middle. It maintains the 16:9 aspect ratio, which, while helping show movies without black bars, does mean it's quite wide in landscape mode, making it cumbersome to use with one hand.

That's not helped by the enormous black bezels which surround the screen -- 22mm on either side, to be exact. That's a hell of a lot of wasted space. Apart from making the tablet look like a less premium device (cheap slates often use wide bezels) it means the body is needlessly wide for the screen. Sure, it allows you to easily grip it without activating the touch screen, but I'm sure there's a happy medium.

At only 6.4mm, it's incredibly skinny.Tayeb Fethallah

Like its predecessor, the Z2 Tablet is completely waterproof, allowing it to shrug off an errant spilled drink or even let you happily take it into the bath to watch "Breaking Bad". Personally, I like being able to prop it up in my kitchen to watch shows while cooking, safe in the knowledge that when it gets splattered with sauces, I can simply chuck it in the sink with the other pots and give it a rinse.

It keeps the water out by covering the main ports -- including the microSD card slot -- with rubberised flaps. Mercifully, the 3.5mm headphone jack doesn't require a flap, meaning you don't have to unhook a cover every time you pop your headphones in.

You'll also find an infrared blaster on the top, allowing you to use it as a remote control for your TV. Setting up the remote app is a simple process -- select your TV manufacturer and the app will do the rest. It took less than a minute for me to set it up with my Toshiba telly and gives access to all the essential controls you'd normally find on your remote.

Display

The 10.1-inch display boasts a Full HD (1,920x1,200-pixel) resolution, giving it a pixel density of 224 pixels per inch, making it well equipped to tackle glossy, high-definition video. It doesn't quite match the iPad Air's whopping 2,048x1,536-pixel resolution (264ppi), although side by side, I doubt you'd notice a massive difference.

The display is extremely crisp, with sharp edges on text and icons throughout the Android interface and on Web pages. High-definition photos look sharp and well defined too, which is helped by the high brightness of the screen and the excellent handling of colour.

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The Full HD display is bright and has great colours.Tayeb Fethallah

Sony states that the tablet uses some of the same 'Triluminous' display technology from its line of TVs, which promise brighter, bolder colours. Whatever Sony has done, it works well. Colours are rich and deep, without looking bold to the point of being unnatural. If you're not keen on the colour balance, you can pop into the settings and tweak the hues to get something more to your taste.

Software and processor

The Z2 Tablet comes running the latest version of Android, known as 4.4.2 KitKat. Sony isn't brilliant when it comes to updating its products with Android updates -- we're still waiting for KitKat on last year's Z1 -- so it's good to see the latest version on board at launch.

Sony has made many of the same tweaks to Android as you'll see on the rest of its recent mobile range. The five homescreens are littered with icons for Sony's music and movies services and there's a tool to the left of the app tray that lets you easily change the order of the app icons. Although the Sony photo and video galleries are a little clunky, the interface is generally easy to use and won't take long to get used to.

Stuffed into that skinny frame is a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor, clocked at an impressive 2.3GHz, backed up by 3GB of RAM. That's a burly lineup of specs so it wasn't much of a surprise that it has a some serious power behind it. It achieved an impressive score of 3,787 on the Geekbench 2 benchmark test, putting it alongside its superbly powerful Xperia Z1 smartphone sibling. Navigating around the Android interface was extremely swift, with zero lag when flicking between homescreens, opening menus or pulling down the notification bars.