HACKER Q&A
📣 indigodaddy

Is my child’s Chromebook inhibiting her computer learning/literacy?


All, two or three years ago, I found an incredible deal for a used very high spec HP Chromebook and I jumped on it for my now 9 year old.

So it’s still working great, and she uses it all the time for online school and Roblox (via android app capability). However, I feel like it might be holding her back from learning how actual computers and traditional OS’es work. I feel like she can’t really “explore” and do other things on it that she might otherwise do with a Windows or Linux laptop.

Do I need to get her a Windows(/Linux) laptop asap to widen her technical horizons? Not interested in a Mac for cost and other reasons..

  👤 salawat Accepted Answer ✓
Yes.

So much yes. If you are not giving her the opportunity to learn the difference between locally installed and runnable programs vs. those that require the Network, they are losing out. If they can't get a feel for how a system is really just a carefully lined up set of bits and bobs wired together whose specs just happen to match;they are missing out.

So much tech literacy is lost with these abominations of budget devices.

Don't cripple them. Get them a General Purpose PC. Let them noodle. Help them break and fix it. You will not regret it, you'll all learn something, and it'll give you an appreciation for what we're slowly losing as industry runs away toward remotely arrestable computing.

The PC is Archimedes' lever of the digital world. Don't deprive them of the chance to come to grips with it.

👤 akerl_
At risk of stating the obvious: does she find that it’s holding her back? There are all kinds of learning that are possible via a Chromebook (as you’ve noted, she seems to be doing just fine using it for Roblox and school). If she wants to dig deeper into customizing her local workstation, you’re likely going to need to supplement the chromebook with something else. Not sure it needs to be a laptop, especially if she wants to understand the interior components.

If she wants to do things like web development / Devops / sysadmin / etc style learning, the local env isn’t hugely important, there’s any number of VPS options or local NUC/RPi/etc options for giving her access to a hobbyist environment that can run Linux/Windows as she chooses.

👤 quasarsunnix
Some of my fondest memories are of building computers with my dad at a young age or receiving hand me down parts from him and throwing them into my machine as quickly as I could.

I know you said about a laptop, but would a cheaply built desktop be feasible to compliment the Chromebook? Could be a nice way for the two of you to bond, if you think she may be interested.

👤 bsg75
Some chromebooks can run Linux: https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/9145439?hl=en

There are also several services that let you run windows and Linux desktop sessions on remote hosts, which would be accessible from the Chromebook: https://www.shells.com

I don’t have experience with the latter, but options like that allow someone to explore different operating systems without having to invest in specific equipment.

👤 _trampeltier
It depends .. I drive a car and how almost no idea how the motor is working etc. Does this make me a bad driver? I think not ..

Soon all our computers and phones are closed anyway.

It's more a nice to know but does she need it .. maybe, she will choose a job without computer.