The Best $200 Laptop? #Helpful Post

hey guys this is Austin this is the 188

dollar HP stream so when I did a video

on this recently I was impressed with

just how much laptop you're able to get

for that kind of price

however lots of you guys commented some

other options for around 200 dollars on

the laptop side one of the main things

people suggested was to pick up a

Chromebook and you can see if there's a

lot of Appeal here what you're getting

is a very cheap computer that while it's

going to be lightweight it's only

running Chrome OS so it's actually not

really going to be a big problem however

even more people suggested to pick up a

used laptop so that is where I found

this HP EliteBook which even though it's

a couple years old still comes in around

$200

ever since Chromebooks were first

announced they've actually kind of been

pretty much the same thing so what

you're getting here is a very very basic

laptop however when you're just needing

to run a web browser that kind of

actually works out okay and especially

considering just how cheap it is

especially how easy it is to set up

stuff like schools and different like

places that are kind of constantly going

through hardware I actually really do

get a big advantage out of using a

Chromebook so this is a fairly small

laptop with an 11.6 inch display so I

will say it actually does feel

reasonably well-built even though it is

all going to be plastic and if we open

it up we'll see lots and lots more

plastic inside the design is about as

safe as it gets so to be fair

Chromebooks actually do have a lot of

the basics figured out so the keyboards

are pretty much always fine the track

pads are pretty decent the screens are

going to be kind of mediocre but you're

going to be getting decent Wi-Fi as well

as just enough ports for while whatever

you're gonna do on a Chromebook what

you're getting here is a stripped down

operating system that is entirely built

around Chrome now for a lot of people

you actually can do most things inside

the browser however there are also some

other options that happen to run full

windows when you get into the world of

used laptops there are options

absolutely everywhere they try to keep

things at least somewhat even I want

Amazon and tried to find something that

was going to be refurbished at least you

get some kind of warranty and you know

it's not going to be completely beat up

or whatever at least I hope it won't be

super beat-up and terrible in the box oh

well okay that's quite the unboxing

experience

we get the giant old-school power cable

so that's the laptop and this giant

cardboard thing well that's actually

really heavy as you can see things that

definitely evolved in the last few years

and your two hundred dollar laptop is

much much thinner and lighter than it

used to be there are advantages to using

something a little bit older though

including a ton of ports so addition to

a full DVD Drive we also have an SD card

reader a pair of USB 3.0 ports we get

firewire around back you're going to be

getting VGA a modem Ethernet and you

flip it over to the other side we're

getting a full-size display port another

USB port as well as issei that and your

headphone and microphone jacks so you

know don't complain about your single

port macbook anymore this guy for 200

bucks has you covered you'll have the

magical experience of being able to

remove your batteries so when inevitably

your old laptop has a terrible 35 minute

battery life is easy just grab another

one off eBay and throw it in there

definitely advantages in going with a

little bit of an older design but what

I'm curious about is what are the

trade-offs is this really going to be

your best option for $200 when it comes

to the Chromebook 3 use it for about 30

seconds and you will immediately

appreciate just how small and

lightweight it is just over a kilogram

or about 2.5 pounds it's so lightweight

it kind of feels like a toy however with

the exception of the bezels which are

shiny and look a little bit cheap it

actually is reasonably well-built take a

look at the screen and you'll see it's

rocking an 11.6 inch 1366 by 768 panel

well it's not incredibly sharp it's

going to be totally usable for something

especially at this price point I'm kind

of impressed with how bright the screen

gets a lot of the time when it comes to

a budget laptop the screens are a little

bit on the DEM side but it's actually

pretty impressive here although it's not

impressive are the viewing angles but I

mean for less than 190 bucks what do you

expect the biggest consideration when

you're picking up a Chromebook though is

whether or not you're ready for Chrome

OS now for a lot of people it's going to

be more than enough and completely fine

but for a lot of other people they're

gonna want the flexibility of something

like Windows it really just does depend

on what you're using it for the basic

idea is the Chrome OS is a stripped-down

version of Linux that is focused around

the Chrome browser now while that might

sound crazy especially if you live your

life and a lot of web apps such as

Google Docs and office 365 it is usable

some newer Chromebooks though including

the Chromebook 3 do support Android apps

and while it's an option it's not

exactly a great one on this system first

most ads expect a touchscreen which is

fine when you're using an Android phone

but not so great when you're using an 11

inch laptop so when it comes to actually

clicking to say jump in Super Mario run

it's not the greatest experience and on

top of that a lot of other games just

won't run all that well even completely

ignoring the controls and performance

really is an area where you notice the

low price of the Chromebook it's powered

by a seller on in 3050 processor which

is a putt as low-end as it gets and a

laptop in 2018 to be fair for basic web

browsing which is what most people are

going to be doing with the Chromebook

anyway it's totally fine maybe not the

fastest thing in the world however once

you start loading up a few tabs it does

noticeably slow down and keep in mind

that I'm using the upgraded model with 4

gigs of RAM there is another model of

the Chromebook 3 which only has 2

gigabytes of RAM if you know you're

really all about that single tab light

as a Chromebook you don't exactly need a

lot of storage which is good because the

Chromebook 3 only has 16 gigs of storage

onboard now well that might not be

enough to get you a full copy of Windows

10 onboard it's actually fine for Chrome

OS it gives you about 9 gigs or so free

to install other Android apps or

whatever kind of stuff you want to

actually download one thing that is

decent is the battery life so Samsung

claims up to 11 hours on a charge and

while that might be a little bit

ambitious this is a laptop that I would

feel totally comfortable going for a

full day without taking the charger I

know they sound pretty negative but

don't get me wrong there is definitely a

market for Chromebooks

however if it's my money I'm gonna spend

my $200 elsewhere like for example with

this giant used HP EliteBook look this

thing is absolutely enormous I'm sure

you're getting a lot of extra ports and

features that you're not getting on the

other laptops but you're also getting

something that weighs over five pounds

it's like basically both of those

combined there are also some really

weird quirks with the elite block so

beside the webcam there's a little light

button press it that tiny LED pops out

to illuminate the keyboard so you know

if you're heavily working in the dark or

your need to sign some incredibly

important legal documents on your

keyboard this tiny light has got you

covered a quirk that I'm not as big a

fan of is the trackpad now sure you're

going to have left and right click

buttons on top and bottom but even for

2012 this one's a little bit raw now it

does support two finger gestures my big

problem is just the tracking

sure once you crank up the sensitivity

it's not that bad but especially

compared to even low-end stuff like on

the stream in the Chromebook is just not

in the same league on the plus side

though in the middle of the keyboard is

a little trackpad nipple

you know who's ever gonna complain about

having an extra nipple and those

performance-wise you're getting a core

i5 3360 em now is a third gen Ivy Bridge

part it is definitely little bit on the

older side but it actually holds up

surprisingly well today we run it

through Geekbench and there's no context

it absolutely destroys both the

Chromebook and the stream it's not just

for benchmarks either you really do

notice the difference when you use all

three of these laptops back-to-back the

EliteBook just feels much much faster

and to be fair I'm not going to want to

do a lot of gaming on this for example

but for normal use it stays very snappy

pretty much throughout which is

definitely not something I can say about

the stream especially when it starts

doing something like an update in the

background and everything grinds to a

halt that Core i5 is backed up by a good

bytes of RAM and a 320 gigabyte hard

drive well 4 gigs of RAM is fine on the

Chromebook and feasting on the stream is

really nice to have that extra memory

when you load more than say 2 things up

at a time and something that really

surprised to say is the 320 gigabyte

hard drive actually isn't terrible

screen wise we're looking at a 40 inch

panel with a resolution of 1366 by 768

and that's actually pretty mediocre

these days to be totally honest but when

you compare to these other two laptops

at the very least you're getting a nice

we're looking panel it's low res but

it's not gonna you know make your eyes

bleed or something something else is

slightly behind the times is the 802 dot

11 and Wi-Fi now keep in mind this is

actually a pretty solid implementation

with 2x2 Wi-Fi antennas and I was

actually able to get around 200

megabytes per second on the download but

it isn't quite match up to the latest AC

solutions still though for under 200

bucks I'm not complaining and speaking

of price this laptop was originally over

$1000 five years ago considering that

it's now about 20% of that value

it's actually not too bad and you do see

a lot of the advantages of having

something that was much more expensive

when it first came out however

everything comes crashing down when it

comes to the battery life so as you

would expect from a five-year-old

business laptop it's exactly the strong

suit I'm meeting somewhere between two

to three hours of fairly basic use on

this guy a big part of that is because

it has a pretty small 55 watt hour

battery so even though it is swappable

andthere you could carry a couple around

I feel like especially when you put this

side-by-side with the newer laptops like

the Chromebook in the stream which are

getting well over double the battery

life it

kind of hard to justify carrying this

huge big of a laptop around and of

course the other big wildcard is the

fact that you're buying a used laptop so

like I said earlier I picked up a

refurbished model from Amazon which does

come with a warranty and at least

someone in theory went over it to make

sure everything works and thankfully I

lucked out everything actually does work

pretty much flawlessly now there are a

couple of very very minor blemishes on

the outside of the laptop but honestly

I'm surprised with just how clean this

thing is of course your mileage will

definitely vary depending on where you

find a laptop whether it's been

refurbished or not whether someone took

care of it or not for me it really comes

down to two things you can either go

with this safe option and get a brand

new laptop with good battery life it's

gonna be small and portable but you're

going to be losing performance or do you

want to take a chance on an older laptop

that might have a couple of problems

that is going to deliver a lot more

performance and a lot more features if

it's my money if you find the right used

laptop I think it's totally worth

considering even something that's five

years old it's still going to be good

enough for 99% of people and the good

thing is a lot of the upgrades that you

might want to do and like more memory or

an SSD or fairly cheap these days I'm

curious what do you guys think is the

best option for a two hundred dollar

laptop today let me know in the comments

below and I will catch you on the next

one