*Disclaimer: The Macbooks referenced in this post are at least 3 years old but the issues existed from the beginning.
I collaborate in a 1:1 Macbook classroom. The teacher just moved from a different building and the laptops are finally ready for use in the new school. Thats 6 weeks sitting around collecting dust waiting fora tech or having the tech work on them. On the flip side, I just moved from a new school too and the Chromebooks took 2 hours for me and 1 helper to reset all 30 of them and be ready for the first day of school.
In my classroom, the Chromebooks start up in under 10 seconds. Within 30 seconds, students are logged into their accounts and into a browser. When the get to Google Drive, it automatically is in their account. getting the classroom up and running and ready for the lesson is less than a minute. WIth a warm-up activity on the board, they have 6ish minutes to be write and publish on their blog and be ready for learning. I don't need to run around helping students log in.
In the Macbook classroom, half the computers didn't even power on. I think it was a battery issue but I'm not positive. This might also be a function of them just being old. The ones that did power one, took at least 3 minutes to get to a point where someone could log in. After typing in their information, it took another couple minutes to get to a point where they could start working on something. Safari and Google Drive were faster than Word opening.
This log in issue has existed from day 1. It is not the wireless because the Chromebooks don't have the same issue. I've been told that it isn't the server either. That leaves the actual laptop as the issue.
So, lets boil it down to two points: speed of logging in and price. The Chromebooks log in and are ready in less than a minute. The price of Samsung 550 is half the price of a Macbook. Other Chromebooks can be had for 1/4 the price of the Macbook.
Thanks for reading!
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