Gadgetory

with the release of its first chrome box lenovo is looking to offer the Chrome OS experience in a small package designed for educational institutions and businesses the chrome box tiny may be an attractive option thanks to its versatility and affordable price tag this is Bailey Stein with Android authority and this is my for review of the lenovo thinkcentre chrome box tiny the chrome box tiny gets its name from its 1-liter form factor measuring 7 by 7 point 2 by 1.4 inches and weighing 2.2 pounds the size makes it somewhat portable and ideal for use in environments like home entertainment systems well it does have several rubber feet on the bottom for horizontal use there's also a stand to support a vertical position included in the box you should be able to easily use the chrome box tiny with your own monitor or TV since it supports both DisplayPort and HDMI out although one of the key features of the lenovo chrome box is the ability to make a space-saving transformation at least according to Lenovo's website what all of that means is if you purchase a compatible lenovo think vision monitor you'll be able to slide the chrome box right into the open space on the back by doing this you're essentially creating a Chrome OS all-in-one or tiny in one as Lenovo calls it although home users may not benefit from this feature as much it does make it quicker and easier to deploy or upgrade equipment on a large scale there are two models of a chrome box available the 10 h5 and 10 H 3 the 10 H 5 is the less powerful of the two but also cheaper thanks to its use of a dual-core intel celeron 3205 you clocked at 1.5 gigahertz the 10 h3 on the other hand is slightly more expensive with a dual-core intel core i3 5005 you clocked at two big yards you can purchase either model with 2 or 4 gigabytes of RAM but I'm testing the 10 h3 with 4 gigabytes of RAM performance on my unit has been excellent and while I haven't tested the other models myself I'm confident that they'll offer similar performance after all Chrome OS is a relatively conservative operating system and it isn't nearly as demanding as Windows or OS 10 for that matter I would recommend getting a model with 4 gigabytes of RAM however especially if you'd like to have a lot of tabs open at once the chrome box provides 4 USB 3.0 ports an audio jack HDMI and DisplayPort outputs a Kensington lock an Ethernet port and built-in 802 11 AC Wi-Fi I did find that attaching the included antenna boosted the Wi-Fi signal significantly and yes lenovo did design their monitors to accommodate this there isn't an integrated speakers so you'll either have to have a monitor with speakers or use the audio jack well it does support Bluetooth 4.0 I did have some issues when using a Logitech ultrathin Mouse and an Apple wireless keyboard the mouse cursor would occasionally flicker but what was more alarming was when the computer would start entering a keystroke repeatedly well it did seem a bit funny at first when the computer started typing the number 8 it became very frustrating when it started backspacing all my work and one note I decided to switch to the included wired keyboard and keep my Logitech mouse to see if this would resolve the issue but it seems that the issue is present regardless of whether I had the keyboard connected only to be resolved by completely switching off bluetooth a computer restart does temporarily resolve the issue but I still had issues where my devices but just randomly disconnect and refuse to pair again in the end I turn bluetooth off and just switch to the wired accessories since it was just too much trouble to keep it on hopefully Lenovo can resolve these issues in the future so that users can use bluetooth reliably the included mouse and keyboard although wired are actually pretty good the keyboard provides a good amount of tactile feedback while offering Chrome OS exclusive shortcuts the mouse is also nice to use although again I would have preferred wireless accessories since this chrome box is targeted towards educational institutions and businesses however the included wired accessories do make sense running Chrome OS the lenovo thinkcentre chrome box tiny provides a very basic software experience for those who use cloud services exclusively Chrome OS is very easy to use and offers only the things that you absolutely must have when turning on the chrome box you can immediate notice the sense of simplicity there's a chrome West logo and within just a few seconds here at your login screen log in and you'll be greeted with the main Chrome OS interface a search button in the left corner next to the pinned apps and status information in the right corner there's no desktop where you can place shortcuts or files just a wallpaper of your choice the search button will pull up Google where you can search the web launched specific apps or use Google now the main app you're likely going to be using though is Chrome which works exactly like it does on Windows and OS 10 you can install apps and extensions from the Chrome Web Store and also quickly switch between those apps by using the task view shortcut on the keyboard if you click the time in the bottom right corner you can access a system menu with options to sign out or power off connect to Wi-Fi or Bluetooth adjust the volume or access the consistently simple full Settings app there's also a help link in that menu which provides a bunch of excellent helpful resources if you have any questions or need help and that's really all there is to it if you plan to use the chrome box like a regular PC you'll probably have to make some changes but those changes may not be as major as you may have expected unless you need serious local file management powerful photo or video editing tools or developer tools you'll likely be able to use Chrome OS quite efficiently if you're someone who just wants to type up documents send emails and browse the web you won't have any trouble using Chrome OS although you can't install Microsoft Office you can still use Google Docs or word online for basic documents as mentioned earlier there are multiple variants of the lenovo thinkcentre chrome box tiny starting at about 200 $5 and going up to $340 there is a 16 gigabyte SSD but it should be noted that you likely won't need to store much locally since the cloud-based Google Drive is baked into Chrome OS you also get 100 gigabytes of free storage for two years with the purchase of a Chrome OS device so you should have plenty of space while Chrome OS may not be for everyone the lenovo thinkcentre chrome box tiny offers a good value for not only educational institutions and businesses but also home users who just want to if I'd experienced and don't need Windows or OS 10 applications Lenovo's chromebox is small and portable performs well and offers a simple software experience on the other hand I do wish that Lenovo would fix the Bluetooth bug and I understand that this won't be enough to replace a full PC for many people including myself although there are similar offerings that run Windows ad subsequently offer better application support the chrome box is a very solid option for those wanting something very easy to use thank you for watching this video and please make sure to give it a thumbs up below if you enjoyed it also please make sure to subscribe to the channel if you'd like to see more content and feel free to leave a comment below finally be sure to visit the Android Authority website for additional coverage it's we are your source for all things Android