HP Chromebook x2 — Great Device for Kids (and maybe adults too)
For Christmas, Santa brought my two boys an HP Chromebook x2 and so far the device has been a great fit for their needs — and I’ve been impressed by it as well. At 7 and 9 years old, I wasn’t completely sure that my sons needed their own device. Previously they have used our iPads or laptops as needed for homework, etc. However, it has been great to see how they have taken to the new device.
My oldest son absolutely loves it. He loves having a pen to draw with (and use as a laser pointer in his presentations). Google Docs is another commonly used app, and it’s when having a full Chrome browser and a real keyboard are huge advantages over the iPad. He has also become addicted to making Google Slides presentations for all of our trips using photos I share with him. We also use it for some education apps ( IXL is by far my favorite educational app so far). My youngest son also does IXL on the device along with a few games.
When I got the Chromebook, I was worried if it would be capable enough for them or if they would have preferred an iPad or a Mac laptop of some sort (though I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of giving them an easily breakable $1000 device). However, the Chromebook has been a fabulous device for them — and I’m honestly a bit jealous of it some of the time.
To get the most out of the Chromebook, we have been using all 3 of its app setups. Some apps are just web apps (Google Docs, Google Slides, YouTube, etc). However, for quite a few, we actually use the Android app capabilities. A lot of the better drawing apps fit into this category (Autodesk Sketchbook is my current favorite). We also have loaded up the new Linux Apps capabilities and added a Python runtime and Visual Studio Code.
I’m very excited about this capability as it evolves. This is the newest area of apps for Chromebooks and still has some limitations. I haven’t been able to get the Vector SDK working yet due to some dependencies and USB device supports is coming, which will be critical for connecting to Arduino (though the Arduino IDE runs just fine). Clearly, there is still some work to do here, but the progress is impressive, and it’s headed in the right direction.
The one real weakness I’ve found is that we can’t run Minecraft on it right now. I’ve tried the Android version (including trying to sideload it), but it never seems to load. And the Linux version will run but has issues with the touchpad input (the player always looks straight down…). I’m sure we’ll figure this one out — but having official support for the Android version with local network multiplayer games would be a nice development.
And I almost forgot one of my favorite features for the kids (and me!) — real multi-user support. We have accounts set up for each child and I have my account on the device as well. So whenever anyone uses it, they are properly set up with their own apps, logins, etc. It works great — and is something you just can’t replicate on an iPad!
Honestly, I’ve used the laptop several times and I really enjoy it. It’s well built and I love being able to take off the screen to read for a bit and throw it back into laptop mode to do some writing or coding. The experience has me seriously considering a Pixel Slate for as my next device, once they move the Linux apps support forward and hopefully add an integrated LTE version.
In the meantime, the HP X2 is a wonderful device for my kids (and for me to occasionally borrow…)
Originally published at https://jeffkeltner.com on January 23, 2019.
