- Okay, so we've covered gaming, we've covered movies.
All right, let's move into applications.
So inevitably when we produce a video like this,
we get comments below saying,
"can I install this windows app
"Or can I install that Mac app?"
And because Chrome is literally a different
operating system, it's a Linux-based operating system
it means that you're not able to install any Mac apps
or any Windows apps.
So Adobe Photoshop for Windows or Mac no,
Final Cut Pro for Mac, no
your gaming title that runs on a Windows or a PC or a Mac no
it's just not gonna work.
So let's pull that one out for you
unless it runs in the browser or it's a Chrome extension,
it's just not gonna run on your Chromebook.
However, Google have recently added
the ability to run Linux apps
inside a Linux container on the Chromebook.
And so you can actually spin up a Linux container
and install some Linux apps.
Now personally, based on my experience, that's great
if you're a developer and you're pretty handy with Linux,
or you've got a specific application that you know,
runs well on Linux or runs by the command line,
that's one way of going and getting that sorted.
But if you wanna do day to day application type work,
and you're interested in using
the Linux graphic user interface,
I haven't had an amazing experience with that.
I thought it might be a viable workaround to use
video editors or image editors,
but haven't found any to work reliably
on the Chromebook yet and so for now,
I've just kinda left the Linux Chrome project to the side,
and I'm gonna maybe revisit it at some point in the future.
Now there are other third party solutions,
like one called CrossOver
and another Linux project called Wine,
which will actually allow you to have the option to run
Windows based applications on Linux devices.
And so that's one workaround that some have tried to try and
get some of their windows applications
running on a Chromebook.
But in my experience, it's not a great experience again,
we haven't been able to get it to work
and CrossOver have actually even discontinued
some of their support for Chrome devices.
The final option of getting your applications running is to
actually not run them locally and run them instead remotely.
So let's say for example, you're a business owner
and you have that one legacy application,
maybe it has to be run on a Windows Server
or maybe it's FileMaker, that's running on the Mac.
Well, you can't run that on a Chromebook
for obvious reasons,
but maybe you could run it on a remote server.
And then from the Chromebook,
you could use a tool like TeamViewer
or remote desktop connection,
or maybe even a Citrix deployment and allow that app
to find its way down to the Chromebook
by way of remote connection.
Now that's the easiest way for an enterprise to actually
deploy applications on mass,
to lots of users who may be in the field
and want to use Chromebooks.
If Chromebooks are a good option for your fleet,
but you've got that one Windows or Mac application,
then maybe you want to virtualize that
host it somewhere else
and then have the Chromebooks dialing in.
Now I have used this a lot because from time to time,
I need to work on Windows Servers and those Windows Servers
that run some of our hosting infrastructure
and some of the tools that we run
that just have to be run on a Windows machine,
I actually can do that right from my Chromebook
and from my Chrome as well,
which is the desktop version of a Chromebook.
And so the remote desktop experience is excellent.
It's been finely tuned over many years to run
even over internet connections
that aren't as quick as super fast broadband.
And so that may be a viable option
if you've got that one app that just doesn't work on Chrome,
but you're really interested in rolling out
your Chromebooks to your team.
Of course, it's probably best
that you get some help with that,
so if you're interested in having a chat,
please get in touch about hosting your applications
on something like Google Cloud Platform.
Okay, so a couple of different options
for photos would be Lightroom, which I already mentioned,
Snapseed is also an Android app that you may choose to use
for your photo editing, that is another one there.
Someone has asked, "how quickly can file transfer happen?"
They happen just as quickly as your network can handle.
So whether you're on Wi-Fi or if you're plugged into a USB-C
accessory into an ethernet port,
you're gonna be limited just by the speed
of your internet connection.
The bottleneck is not necessarily gonna be Chrome OS,
I would say the transfers feeds are probably gonna be
fairly negligible between a Mac and a Windows machine
and the Chrome machine.
Typically with any file transfers
your bottleneck is gonna be your network.
So it's either your internet connection
or your local Wi-Fi connection,
depending on where you're working from.
We get this question a lot,
"can I use a Chromebook to code?"
And that's an excellent question.
It's gonna depend what environment you're coding with
and what tools you want to use,
but many developers will choose to use a Chromebook
because of the simplicity and focus
of being able to just get your work done.
Obviously now that Chrome has a Linux container available,
it means that much more development tools
are able to be used within that Linux container,
and it makes development tasks much easier.
I have tried out some tools like FTP transfers and whatnot
for working with websites and working with web servers
I've had limited success with those.
I tend to find that if I wanna do
any kind of web administration work,
that I'll actually remote desktop
into a Windows based machine
and use a fully fledged FTP client there
rather than doing that locally on the Chrome machine.
But if you're handy with the command line prompt,
then you can certainly make that happen
inside the Linux container inside of Chrome OS.
All right, I'm gonna check for any questions
that have come through.
Lauren has said, "I may upgrade to a Chromebook
"stuck between G Suite and Microsoft,
"I need to consolidate."
That's a good one, Lauren.
So if you're currently using using G Suite
and you're maybe feeling like you're stuck
in the Microsoft world,
and you're not quite ready to make the jump over to Google,
I wanna remind you of a couple of ways that Google G Suite
actually makes it easy for you to work
even with your Microsoft tools.
Now you can actually use the builtin editor
for Microsoft documents side of Google Drive.
You may not have heard of it, but it actually runs
inside the Google Drive browser edition.
And what that allows you to do is work with Microsoft Word,
Excel files, and even PowerPoint files
and edit and save them in their native formats.
And so if you're a Google business and you have people
sending you files in Microsoft format
where you can just save them into Google Drive
and from there still work on the file
and even send it up back in Microsoft format if you want.
Of course, there's always the button
to convert that over to a Google Docs,
which is our recommendation
and use that document in the Google format.
If you're someone who has deployed G Suite in the past,
and you're still having an aurin about making
that final jump to doing everything the Google way,
then switching over to a Chromebook is a nice way
of giving yourself a gentle kick up the bum
to move over into the Chrome world.
Remember some of the benefits of a Chromebook are that
there's no malware, there's no viruses,
everything is encrypted and locked down
to your Google account.
All of the policies to manage the hardware are actually
pushed down from the G Suite admin panel.
So what that means is you're not messing around
with having to manage and configure a local machine,
it just completely changes the game
from an IT management perspective.
And if you're a small business owner,
you've got one or two or three people in your team,
it may not be too much of a trouble to manage the computers
that are in your business, but as your organization grows,
and as you scale your business,
when you've got five or 10 or 15 or 20 people
and beyond in your business,
then you start to run into challenges of IT management
with checking everyone's any viruses up to date,
making sure there aren't a security exploits,
making sure that your staff aren't installing apps
that you don't want them to install,
making sure someone doesn't disappear with the computer
and they leave you without the admin password to it,
meaning that you have to break into accounts.
Chromebooks just solve all of those problems
because everything is tied to the cloud
and tied to your secure G Suite Google accounts.
Okay, so we count off Lauren questions,
but drop your questions below guys
and I'm gonna cover off as many as I can in the remaining
couple of minutes that I have left.
Someone has said,
"what about podcasting and editing on a Chromebook?"
Okay, that's a good one.
So if you're a digital producer,
maybe you're interested in producing something
like a podcast.
Unfortunately you're gonna have challenges
in the Chrome environment because again,
like the other professional design and editing software,
you're not gonna have a great experience
trying to edit audio on a Chromebook.
There are Android apps that will allow you to do it,
but they're not gonna be as great and experience
as if you were using a Mac or a Windows machine
with more media dedicated apps
that are dedicated to be used on a desktop.
Again, as I said earlier, it would be probably easy
you just delegate those tasks over to someone else,
but if your job is to be a content producer,
then maybe this is not quite the machine for you.
Ok, we've got another question,
"can you install Source Filmmaker?"
I would say no, but I covered that.
"Can a Chromebook do home design apps like SketchUp?"
No, I don't think so.
"Is the Chromebook worth it if you have an iPad Pro?"
Oh God, that's such a good question, ok.
We had one question posted to a YouTube channel
asking whether or not you should get a Chromebook
if you already have an iPad Pro?
And this is such a great question.
I've been traveling and using both my iPad and my Chromebook
as my two primary devices for the last,
let's say about a year's time.
Previously I was using just the Chromebook for everything,
but from time to time
I find myself moving over to the iPad Pro
and using that as well.
Now, why might I use those
and it's probably only when I'm traveling?
But why might I use those in conjunction with each other?
Well, the iPad Pro gives me a slightly better pen input
than the Chromebook does.
Chromebook is excellent for pen input,
though Pixelbook has got a really nice pen,
but the Chromebook is just that little bit better
sorry the iPad Pro is just that little bit better,
and that allows me to really have a bit more finesse
in my pen strokes.
Now does that mean that they need to be perfect
when I'm just using the Jamboard app?
No they don't but I tend to like it.
The other thing I will use my iPad Pro for is if I'm working
on my notes and my primary work device being my Chromebook,
and I wanna see my team on a Google Meet
as I'm working away,
well then I might spin up a Google Meet in the iPad,
and then on the Chromebook I'm able to get my work done.
Now does that mean that I should pick
one device or the other?
Well, if I had to pick between the two,
I'd probably still pick the Chromebook.
The Chromebook allows me to do things
like work in applications that are designed to be used
on a computer browser rather than a mobile browser
or the Chromebook also has just that little bit more
power with multitasking.
I can quickly switch between apps or using different tabs
and it allows me to get just a little bit more done
than the iPad does.
When I find myself using the iPad,
that's what I wanna do really focused work.
I don't wanna distract myself with multiple tasks
or maybe I wanna get into that deep work mode
of not being distracted at all.
I really love the iPad,
but when I'm on one device and for example,
I wanna be on a meeting and taking notes at the same time,
if I don't have both those devices next to each other,
I would choose to do that on the computer.
Because on my Chromebook
I can have one window open with my Meet
and another window open with my notes,
or maybe Asana for taking down my tasks,
and on the iPad
it's a little more clunky to do the multitasking.
The iPads have come a long way in power and in flexibility
and if I was just doing literally one task at a time
like writing emails or just responding to tasks in Asana,
or just viewing videos inside of Google Drive,
then I can definitely get my work done on the iPad,
But for the most part,
I tend to find myself picking up the Chromebook
for most of my work.
So it's nice to have both
if I had to pick between the two,
I'd always pick to have the Chromebook
as my primary work machine,
but if I was doing most of my work
from a desktop computer in an office,
and I just needed the iPad or a mobile device
just for meetings or just for moving around
or getting work done in a cafe or a park well,
I may find myself tempted to use the iPad
because it's such a nice experience in the Apple ecosystem.