Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 hands on: Cut-down class

Last year at CES 2020, Samsung announced one of the highest quality Chromebooks we’ve seen so far, the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook. It had a premium metallic design, a 10th generation Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, and even a built-in pen. In combination with the spicy color Fiesta Red, this laptop was definitely an eye-catcher.

But there was a minor problem with the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook – it was really expensive. At $ 999, it’s hard to justify buying a laptop with Chrome OS when many full-featured Windows laptops can cost the same or less. Much of the value of Chromebooks is based on the cloud, not necessarily the specifications.

This year, Samsung is updating the Galaxy Chromebook with a model that slashes specs to cut costs. This is the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2.

One of the biggest changes between the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook and the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 is the display. While the original Galaxy Chromebook had a 4K OLED display, the Galaxy Chromebook 2 uses an FHD QLED panel. The previous 4K OLED panel was certainly quite nice, but it was a big reason why the laptop‘s battery life was nowhere near as good as we’d hoped. Samsung rated the original laptop’s battery life at eight hours, with many reviewers looking closer to four and a half.

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Another change to the laptop concerns the core specs. Instead of a 10th generation Intel Core i5 processor, Samsung has reduced processing with two different SKUs many times over. There is a model with an Intel Celeron 5205U processor with 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB of storage and a model with an Intel Core i3-10110U processor with 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB of storage.

Both devices have two USB-C ports for charging the 45.5 Wh battery and for data transfer, a microSD card slot and a headphone jack. While last year’s Galaxy Chromebook had a camera on top of the display and above the keyboard, the Galaxy Chromebook 2 removed the keyboard camera. There is also no built-in pen for marking documents. The Galaxy Chromebook 2 still supports a pen, but you won’t find one built into the case. Too bad.

Overall, Samsung clearly wanted to keep the core DNA of the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook, but had to cut a few things down to make it more affordable for the average consumer. Since most of the processing on Chromebooks takes place in the cloud anyway, it makes sense to keep the premium design while reducing the technical data.

The Samsung Galaxy Chromebook will be available for $ 549.99 in the first quarter of 2021. You can get it in Fiesta Red and Mercury Gray.

What do you think of the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook? Let us know!