Scharon Harding
Google is within the US Public Curiosity Analysis Group (PIRG) sizzling seat. This week, the nonprofit revealed its “Chromebook Churn” [PDF] report, pointing a finger at Google for enabling Chromebooks that “aren’t designed to final.” It highlighted Chromebook quirks, like seemingly pointless {hardware} tweaks throughout fashions that problem parts-sourcing and automated replace expiration (AUE) dates, as examples of the repair-averse Chromebook tradition Google has enabled. For goal Chromebook markets, like colleges, that go for Chromebooks to economize, long-term prices might outweigh the quick financial savings, PIRG’s evaluation concluded.
The report focuses on Chromebooks in colleges and relies on an unspecified quantity (we have reached out to PIRG for a agency head rely) of interviews with “college IT administrators, technicians, journalists, restore store house owners, elements suppliers, and academics,” in addition to a “five-question survey with 13 college IT directors and technicians.” The pattern dimension might be a lot bigger, however the particulars within the report are additionally based mostly on undisputed traits of ChromeOS units. And whereas PIRG’s paper emphasizes the influence this all has for colleges, particularly contemplating the inflow of Chromebooks bought for colleges throughout the COVID-19 pandemic’s top and past, it is meals for thought for any present or potential Chromebook house owners or individuals who wish to vote with their greenback.
Sneaky design modifications hinder repairs
The report, written by PIRG’s Designed to Final Marketing campaign director, Lucas Rockett Gutterman, argues that as a result of Chromebooks are largely web-based and do not range in energy as a lot as different laptops, it must be “straightforward” to supply modular designs that permit for elements to be shared throughout Chromebook fashions. Certainly, Framework’s modular Chromebook proves that is attainable. However in its “Failing the Repair” [PDF] report from February, PIRG reported that Chromebooks have a mean French repairability index rating of 5.8 out of 10, in comparison with 6.9 for all non-Chromebook laptops.
PIRG’s “Chromebook Churn” paper particulars hurdles IT managers and others in training encounter when dealing with Chromebook repairs. For instance, PIRG checked out bezel availability for six Chromebook distributors by way of “standard elements reseller” eduPARTS. Discovering substitute bezels is extra sophisticated than it must be:
All six of the producers we surveyed made non-functional modifications to the bezels of their Chromebook 11 sequentially launched fashions that made these elements incompatible from one mannequin to the subsequent. For instance, from the Samsung Chromebook 11 XE500C12 to XE500C13 the cutout within the bezel for the digicam modified from a sq. to a circle. This beauty change rendered substitute elements incompatible throughout fashions. From the Dell 11 3100 to the Dell 11 3110 the bezel will not be suitable throughout fashions, the one seen modifications to the consumer between them being the addition of small notches on the underside of the newer mannequin. On the again of the bezels the 3110 model has lacking or much less pronounced clips, which renders them incompatible.
Even when these modifications have any advantages, like lowering total laptop computer dimension or weight or enabling an improved match in some way, it is clear there are repairability drawbacks, which have monetary and environmental implications.
Chromebook makers can take liberties with their particular SKU designs, however each Chromebook relies on a Google reference design. Last laptop computer designs are a collaboration, that means there’s probably blame to go round.
PIRG did reward Google’s standardization of Chromebook chargers, however relating to the “typical restore, you have to exchange 50 p.c of the machine and chuck it,” Jeannie Crowley, director of know-how and innovation for the Scarsdale, New York Public College District, mentioned within the report. Examples, cited by further folks PIRG interviewed, embrace having to switch a whole Chromebook keyboard as a result of a single key does not work.
“We now have piles, tons of of Chromebooks, and it is so irritating as a result of I can not simply take a key off one,” Crowley says within the report.
Some newer Chromebook fashions, like Acer’s Chromebook Vero 712, market keyboards which can be imagined to be spill-resistant whereas utilizing drainage methods and mechanically anchored keys to withstand breaking, however there are numerous causes a single key may break.
