Very Impressed after using this laptop for a while
928757
I feel compelled to upgrade my previous review from 4 star to 5 star.  As time passed and I got more and more comfortable with this little laptop, I cannot believe it, but it has now replaced my MacBook Air as my laptop of choice.  My original review follows below:

There is much to like about this Haier Chromebook 11.  But if, like me, you write a great deal, you will have to develop a very light touch with the keyboard.  I have had this laptop 4 days and I am working on developing a sufficiently light touch.  Just a moment ago, for instance, I had written a long review of this computer right here and I must have touched something quite sensitive because my entire review vanished.
Setup is a snap.  Have your gmail address and your wi-fi network password ready and you will be up and running in no time.  Battery life is quite good.  Much better than the battery life on my Macbook Air which is 3 years old.

Using the internet is actually much better on this Haier Chromebook than on my Macbook Air. I can smoothly scroll through pages on this laptop which are very jumpy on my Macbook.  I like to read the sports pages in the NY Post, but on my Macbook this is a hassle.  It is no problem at all for this little Haier.  Many websites which I frequent I can scroll through much more fluidly on this new laptop.  I guess my Macbook is loaded with cookies, whereas this new laptop is cookie-free so far.

Well, I don't want to write much more for fear my clumsy fingers will 'disappear' my review again.  But I do recommend this laptop.  You cannot beat the price.  And if you have a lighter touch than I do you may find it perfect for your needs

In further explanation I must add that I recently developed arthritis in my right pinky-finger.  I believe that this pinky finger problem may be the cause of the problem I have with typing on this keyboard.  I think my finger may be brushing against one of the arrow keys without my intending to do so.  Otherwise, I really like this baby.  It gets at least 4 1/2 stars.
219509
I pondered long and hard before I decided to purchase this one. I researched Asus and Acer and I don't know what, before I was convinced by friends and colleagues to go with Asus. After a quick little research, I found that this one was probably the best due to battery life. So the decision was made.

It was a long agonising wait before it arrived. Of course when it arrived, I couldn't open the box quickly enough, and my cat was just as curious as I was. It came with a small cover and a cleaning cloth, which I thought was a nice touch. Fingerprints do stick to the cover, but the cleaning cloth is perfect to shine it up. The blue colour is really nice, deep blue.

It doesn't come with a lot of software, no MS office, but it does have Star Office, which is made by Sun. For most cases, it is more than adequate for home users. It can read documents written by MS office, as well as export to those formats for portability. Macros may not work though. The machine also has a few games, but other than that, no more than the standard MS packages. I got the MS version, because I needed it for my phone. However, the HD was divided into two partitions, so I have since installed Fedora 11 (Leonidas) on the second partition. This too worked out of the box, hibernation as well as wireless.

What really impressed me was the battery life. I have not managed to get it to the 9 hours promised, but I constantly get about 7 hours before I charge. That goes for both Windows and Linux.

One thing I found a bit frustrating is the resolution. There is no reason why they couldn't have made this a 1280x1050 or something like this. However, the resolution is 1024x600. It can be increased to 1024x768 with one of the soft buttons (doesn't work on F11, but it is at least 1024x600 with proper configuration. I guess I also could program the button, but haven't gotten around to it). I prefer the extended resolution, even if it means I don't get to see full screen.

Overall, I love my new netbook. It's all I need and more. It's light, small to carry around, and have long battery life. It doesn't have a cd/dvd-player, but it works excellently with an external DVD-drive. Absolutely worth the money!
4219776
I bought this laptop in June 2012 via a Best Buy sale, and am reviewing it 11 months later. I agree with other reviewers on its good points: it's fast, small, light, has great screen image and resolution. It's very thin, yet has a full DVD drive, which many thin laptops have abandoned. I love the fingerprint scan tool, which I use to log in every day to Windows and LastPass.

My only beef is with the keyboard, which is unlike any other laptop keyboard I've used. The keys have very little vertical travel, and no depression for fingertips, which may be part of my biggest complaint: both the keys and the spacebar frequently fail to register my strokes, though this has improved somewhat over time. As a result of this maddening problem, I use a wireless keyboard for most of my work on this laptop.

UPDATE: After writing the above I researched the keyboard issue on an HP board, and discovered a solution to the problem, which worked - my keyboard now types as it should! Simple procedure: Go to Device Manager, find the PS/2 Keyboard, click its Driver tab, then click un-install. Close Device Manager and reboot the laptop. On reboot, it will re-install the keyboard driver (which is a firmware driver, so no worries about finding the file).
981095
I've had this laptop for longer than a year. Things I love about it are the keyboard, the screen is very nice, the sd card slot, and it doesn't look cheap -- it looks very stylish. It's very fun to use.

The only drawbacks to this computer would be the crappy webcam, the fact that it is a pretty slow computer. But I also am running photoshop, and a bunch of applications on it at the same time, and I can notice only some lag.

I used this as a desktop replacement for a year and I think that for the price it's a great buy. It is kinda heavy, so depends on what you mean when you ask for portability. I like this laptop because I can bang it up and drag it with me everywhere I go and not feel sad about it because it would be easy to replacement. I just really love the screen though and the way it displays pictures beautifully, almost uniquely. I would buy another one DEFINITELy if this one died or crashed. But I hope they come up with a faster, thinner version by then!
952261
I bought this laptop mainly for music creation via FL Studio and For some gaming. I'm actually very impressed with it and it exceeded my expectations. There are a few problems but i'll get into those later. Anyways the build quality on this thing is excellent with metal on the lid and inside where you will lay your hands while typing. the bottom of the laptop is plastic, but it doesn't really feel that bad, would be better if it was all metal though. The i7 in this thing is a beast and is perfect for music creation, video editing, and anything else that is very CPU intensive. The GPU is also quite good, but don't expect to max out everything with it. It games very well in 1080p but if you want to get 60 fps you may need to lower the settings in some games. I've been playing fallout 4 on this thing at 1080p 60fps on a mix of low and medium settings, which is fine for me. The screen on this laptop is also very impressive. It has very wide viewing angles, and the colors look great. Now I did encounter a few problems with it, but they were all relatively easy to fix. first problem was that multi touch was not enabled on the track pad by default. To fix this, go to your mouse settings>additional mouse settings>device settings and then click the settings button. after that you should see scrolling on the list of things to configure. click on one finger or two finger scrolling and then click enable vertical scrolling and horizontal scrolling. Problem solved. Some other issues I've experienced were the keyboard lights would stay on red rather than what ever you programmed it to be. I think this was a windows 10 issue though because after an update this stopped happening. So make sure you update all your drivers and stuff. Once you do all that though this laptop works  great and is definitely the best in this price range. My biggest complaint is that the space bar on the keyboard sometimes won't register towards the far right or far left, but this is only if you hit it at the very very edge. Other than that the keyboard is amazing. So yeah overall this is a great laptop and you won't be disappointed.
178988
As an engineering student I scraped up my savings to purchase a decent computer this summer, and after several days of surfing and researching I decided on this one.  So far I have no complaints, I've installed all of my programming software for school with ease, and they run flawlessly.  I've noticed others have had problems with crashing, however I find that hard to believe as this laptop has been performing beyond expectations since the moment I opened it.  One tremendous feature of this laptop that I absolutely love is the different battery settings for those nights that I'm grinding out code; on the energy saver settings it outlasted 6 hours!!!!(I fell asleep before the laptop did)

I am a little disappointed with the hard drive space of the laptop, however for the money you can't find a better deal on the market.
3821827
Best laptop i've used for the price hands down, blows every game I've thrown at it so far out of the water and is overkill for the games i play usually (League of Legends mainly..i get 120 Steady FPS at maxed out settings) battery life is also great, i get 3-4 hours when gaming on batter easy (a little more depending on how bright i have my screen) and i get 8-10 when just doing school work with a diminish screen

Had ONE issue but not enough for me to take a start off - The issue was due to the BIOs (Or intel graphics driver) being out of date, i kept getting freezes / stutters..Which was frustrating but apparently it wasn't an issue for anyone else with the computer, updating drivers fixxed it up though and have had ZERO problems since...Though i'd include this for anyone else that might run into this issue just in case!
2019502
First of all, I purchased this laptop from the Microsoft store instead of Amazon which comes with no bloat ware and is optimized for Windows (whatever that means).  I was really excited to unbox the laptop and begin using it immediately as this is the lightest and thinnest laptop that I've ever owned and it supposedly gets 10+ hours of battery life.  And as many other reviews have stated, you get a lot of bang for the buck.  At the moment no other laptop gives you a 256gb ssd and 8gb of ram for $699.  The only other feature I wished it has is a backlit keyboard.  I primarily use the laptop for surfing the web, light word processing, and some spreadsheet work and when working on the bed with the lights off, a backlit keyboard is a must.

I didn't run any benchmarks, but all of the work I've done on it so far has gone smoothly.  One thing I did check is the battery life.  I got about 7.5 hours of use off my first charge which I'm happy with since I travel quite a bit and can usually recharge before the battery runs out.  I couldn't say the same for my previous laptop which needed charging after 3 hours so this is a major improvement.

Almost everything about the laptop was perfect....the touchpad however drove me crazy.  For some reason I felt the right click made more noise than it should and just pressing it didn't feel like it clicked properly.  It felt like the touchpad was loose and made a clattering noise every time I pressed it.  I went back to the store and checked out the demo unit and the touchpad on the demo unit was firm and tight fitting.  Then I googled the problem and it seems like others were having the issue too.  I exchanged the laptop for another one and it had the same problem.  I then exchanged it one more time and the 3rd laptop still had the problem!  I was really bummed and was about to return it for a full refund.  I really wanted to keep the computer, but every time I clicked the touchpad it just bothered me.

I searched for a fix and came across a website that showed how to disassemble the laptop.  I was fairly hopeful that if I opened it up, I could easily fix the issue with some electrical tape which would tighten the gap that was making the touchpad behave the way it did.  Well I gently opened the back cover and examined the touchpad area.  I lightly tapped around and noticed that if I pressed against the bottom plate of the touchpad, the touchpad felt much better.  So I added a couple strips of electrical tape and sealed everything back up.  It was enough tape for the bottom cover to firmly press against the touchpad and now it is 99% better.

I would have easily given this laptop 5 stars, but because of this touchpad issue I'm only giving it 4.  If I could not have remedied that problem, I probably would have just returned the laptop and give it a 2 star rating.  I wouldn't recommend this fix for everyone since I probably voided my warranty.  But now that the touchpad doesn't clatter, I feel like its worth it.
4429214
I bought this laptop then the price dropped, first of all really have to give Amazon a big thumbs up for matching the current price.

Now down to the laptop basics itself, where do I begin, this machine is LOADED for the price! I spent almost 4 months researching laptops and comparing every machine possible, there were a few good deals but nothing even came close to the specs this thing comes with.

After nearly 2 weeks of use, I have come to the conclusion that this laptop is hands down the best laptop I have owned( I've owned a few HP's, alienwares and dells) Don't let the bulk of the machine fool you, it is very light! This machine has performed every task I have thrown at it without a hitch.

Pro's:
Decent battery life ~4.5 hours of constant video streaming
I was surprised at the boot speed, it takes about 15 seconds, not bad for a machine without an SSD
I put in an m. 2 ssd, watched a video, took about 20 minutes
The machine itself is very sleek and futuristic looking, someone told me it looks like Darth Vaders laptop(too bad HP released one!)
6th gen skylake is really the next step in intel's drive to achieve a processor that will outperform the rest of the hardware
The GFX card can pretty much handle all the games I have thrown at it

Cons:
I have OCD, and any part of the laptop will leave fingerprints, but it wipes of very easily!
It can be a bit confusing to use the FN keys at first, but with practice it'll be of no concern.
I let my cousin use the laptop it took him 5 minutes to find the power button, once again not really a bad thing!(its hidden at the top right corner)

Overall I'd give this machine:
10/10 for value
8.5/10 for specs(only because SSD's are now becoming a mainstay instead of regular Hard drives)

I'll update more as I use the machine!
1596064
I bought this laptop about three years ago, so I've had it for quite a while. Little to no problems. I customized mine with an extra 465GB of storage space, an extra 8GB of memory, and some extra RAM. Figured if I was going to go big, I might as well go all out. I'm not a gamer, but I love to play around with large photo and video files.

I only have a few minor complaints:

Yes, sometimes the laptop runs hot. Mostly when I set it on a bed for a couple minutes without closing it. I bought a $30 lap fan to always have under it, which helps a lot.

The fan: When I read reviews about the fan being loud, I decided that I didn't really care, and for the most part, that's still true. It's only annoying for things you don't really think about, like "overhearing" a nearby conversation. It interferes with eavesdropping. Seriously. Sometimes I play a game of close-the-laptop just so the fan will shut up enough for me to hear something.

I had a bit of trouble with my keyboard back light ONCE. It wouldn't light up again after I turned it off and I read reviews with the same problem and started freaking out, but then once it "rested" enough I guess, I tried again and it worked. No problems since. Yes, it's FN+Z to turn off and on. Press the Z twice to keep the back light on between pauses in typing. The keys seemed a little wide-spaced at first, but I'd had a netbook beforehand. Anyway, I got used to it.

Where the charger plugs into the laptop is secure, but I feel like that port could have a little more depth so the connection could be *more* secure. On the other hand, if someone yanks on the cord, there's little to no chance of damaging it, because it'll just pop right out of the laptop.

I would purchase this laptop again in a heartbeat. It's not light and it's doesn't have a long battery life (giant, heavy charger, too), but for at-home or fairly stationary work, it's fantastic. It handles video editing for videos under an hour long with ease. I can have YouTube, Netflix, Photoshop, AND video editing software open and it doesn't even slow down. This laptop is POWER. No, it's not Apple or a fancy brand name, but you pay for a brand name and since this laptop works great, I'd never pay more just for an Apple.

LOVE the track pad. It's really large and there's no button for your thumb to click, you just click the track pad (requires very little pressure) or double tap it. Occasionally I have trouble right-clicking, but if I'm aware of where my thumb is (bottom right corner), it's fine.

Overall, 4 1/2 stars. Maybe even 4.75. It's the bomb. Buy it and love it.
1342814
I did not purchase this from Amazon but wanted to leave a positive note after having used this laptop for more than 6 months now. I fortunately do not have the spacebar problem that others have encountered. Overall, this has been one of the best laptops I have owned. I love the fact that after a two hour charge, the laptop last a whole day for me, even more if I am not playing videos. The laptop is very light weight and at the time I bought it there weren't too many light laptops you could buy for this price point. The laptop has consistently booted up in about 30-40 seconds (from pressing the power button to getting the login prompt) even after several windows updates. :)  Windows 10 works wonderfully and applications load fast and responsive.
3289625
I rarely buy top-of-the-line products. Not because I can't afford them, but I usually go for value rather than "best" product in the market. This computer might change my perspective.

I quickly glanced over the other reviews on this product, there is nothing much I can add as far as features user experiences go. So, let me mention few of the performance observations I made.

Average time for:
Turning the computer on to Win 8 login screen: 7 seconds
Login submission to Metro tiles: 5 seconds
Photoshop Elements 11: 20 seconds
Microsoft Word: 2 seconds
Microsoft Excel: 2 seconds

Granted, I don't have sophisticated equipment to measure these times, I just used the stopwatch app on my Android phone. Give or take a second, but these times are impressive.

As for the form factor, I will post a few photos of this ultrabook against a typical Lenovo laptop so you can judge yourself.

So far, all my expectations of an ultrabook are exceeded by this product. The device stays lukewarm after long usage. I am certainly enjoying the product.

Update 06/24/2013:
Speakers on this laptop are incredible! I connected this to a TV to play a streaming live video from a Web site for my family and guests to watch. I had to play video on TV, but sound on the laptop due to some technical challenges. Nobody could tell that the sound was coming from this little laptop. I had to tell them to go near the setup. They all were as surprised as I was when I first experienced the speakers' capability.

Still liking and enjoying the computer and very happy with it.
3602385
Great laptop! I had an initial problem when I started it up, BUT IT WAS A PERSONAL PROBLEM. The hard drive comes preinstalled with a partition, a big one! I mean they gave me ~ 130 GB for OS & program files and then ~ 370 GB of free space. I did not like this partition because after installing all my programs and games I had about 30 GB of free space left on my OS drive (C:). Plus all the document files were linked to the C and I had to put them on the D because I have ~ 290 GB of personal files. Anyway I called them up and it was AMAZING! All I had to do was boot up hold F9 (I think) and it has the restore installed already into it. I restored with no partitions and now it runs and feels amazing. I think this may be a Windows 7 thing, but I am not sure.
Another thing that amazed me is the 1 year of accidental spill and drop protection. When you get the computer ASUS even gives you another year (I think) if you fill out the registration within 30 days of purchase. Oh and when I called to get my problem solved customer service was amazing! Quick, to the point and with the right solution!
AMAZING SOUND!
1020223
The results turned out much better than I thought they would.  It's not a toy.
+ Full blown Windows XP rather than Linux.  I can run just about any of my programs.  Sure the processer is slower than my dual core, but that's an expected payoff.
+ 160G hard drive - plenty of storage space for when I'm on the road.
+ Great battery life.  My first three full-to-empty charges lasted around the advertised 5.5 hours.  I would imagine that the smaller SDD have better battery life; however I needed the larger hard drive.  Plus, it looks like the 160G is the only version with the 6 cell battery.
+ Screen is nice and bright.  Even on lowest brightness it is very readable.
+ After about 30 minutes, I was used to the small keyboard.  Not an issue.
+ VGA output for on-site presentations.
+ Lightweight - Actually, it's a featherweight when compared to my standard laptop (15.4"). Two could fit in the same space.
+ Build quality appears to be high.
- No bluetooth - solved with a USB adaptor.  Not a significant issue.
- High gloss case results in fingerprints.  Not a big deal.
3427889
I ordered this chromebook after doing some research on them and learning their place in the tech world. Overall, I was impressed by the design and build quality initially, and after a month or so with the chromebook I still really enjoy it and am glad I made the purchase. For the price this is a great machine.

First thing you should know if that this is a Chromebook. It is not what you might expect from a regular laptop. Basically everything operates off an internet connection and your google account. Don't get me wrong there are definitely things that you can do offline and some of the Google apps work offline now, but the expect to get the most use out of this computer when connected to the internet. For me, having a portable wi-fi connection device is necessary. You could also use your phone as  a hotspot if you have that option.

This computer is ultra-light and ultra-portable. The screen is so vivid, I was truly impressed by picture quality. All in all I am loving this HP Chromebook 11. So long as you understand the intent of a Chromebook I think this one is a GREAT option.
1814544
I have wanted a laptop a long time and now i can afford one and this one is really nice.
1297104
I once had an Asus Laptop about 7 years ago. It was small and quickly became a piece of junk. It was slow and the software felt clunky.

Fast forward to a year ago, I bought this Laptop and it has exceeded my expectation. I've had it for a year and it still runs fast and smoothly. And the price point puts this to the top for a good laptop choice.

If you're looking for a laptop to browse the Internet and stream your favorite content, I highly recommend this