OCTOBER 2020 PCWorld 87nearing the end of their lives. We did
spot-checks of older models and found
that it’s pretty hard to buy a very old (five
years or older) Chromebook. What you
will find, however, are a lot of used
Chromebooks we’d consider to be on
the “close to spoiling” list being sold.
Many Chromebooks with expiration dates
of June 2022 can still be found in online
stores.
For example, we found the Acer
Chromebook 14 CB3-431-C99D selling for
$300 or more. The high price is likely due to
parents and even school districts rushing out
to buy any Chromebook to prepare for
remote learning (go.pcworld.com/rlrn). We
know it’s hard times for Chromebook buyers,
but $300 would mean just 18 months of
updates before being pushed overboard
by Google.
HOW TO BUY A FRESH
CHROMEBOOK
To get a Chromebook that you
know will get longer term support,
you should first look at our list on
the second page of this article and
determine just how “fresh” you
want it. If, for example, $300 for a
Chromebook with three years of
updates left is fine with you, you
can pick out one like the Asus
Chromebook Flip C101PA and buy
that specific Chromebook with the
confidence that you have August
2023 before the OS gets visited by
Valkyries (the Norse mythology kind [go.
pcworld.com/vlky], not the Tom Cruise
[go.pcworld.com/vlfm] kind). We wouldn’t
advise buying a Chromebook with less than
three years of updates left on the clock if
you can help it.
You can check any Chromebook on your
shopping list against Google’s official support
page (go.pcworld.com/ofsp) to see how
long it will last. Our list (see below) was
compiled in late August of 2020, and more
will be added over time. It’s a good idea to
visit the official list once you have an idea of
the Chromebook you want.CHROMEBOOK
EXPIRATION LIST
For our in-depth list of Chromebooks, go to
(go.pcworld.com/xpch).We found many used Chromebooks for sale with less than
two years of OS support left.