Tag Archives: chromebook

getting started with the chromebook – part 3

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We’ve finished part 2 and I’m still happy with the Chromebook itself.  Today I’ll be walking through the process of activating 3g service from Verizon and my impressions of it.  I’ll post back some time from now how bandwidth usage is over time.  In particular, I’m concerned with how often/large the software updates are.  So far it has been 10 days and no updates so I know it isn’t a weekly thing.

Setup

“My Google Chromebook” has instructions on how to get started with 3g. Unfortunately, it is already out of date.  It says to click the network icon on the top.  It is no longer on the top.  Instead click on the bottom and choose “settings and help”.  Or go to chrome://chrome/settings/ in a browser.

  1. Pull down mobile access 

  2. Fill in a straightforward form.  It doesn’t require a credit card if choosing free plan  No dash allowed in mailing address though .  This is always fun.  My address has a dash.
  3. Terms and conditions warn you will be charged for video buffering even if you don’t watch it.  Sample bandwidth is shown.  10K for an email.  1MB for a webpage. 3mB for a PowerPoint.  200-500 MB for a Windows update.  (Wonder how much a Chrome OS one is).  More at verizonwireless.com/datacalculator.
  4. A month is considered 30 days
  5. See verizon.com/privacy and s at www.verizon.com/privacy/#limits. 
  6. You get a wireless #.  apparently the computer is treated as a phone nobody can call
  7. They also provide a # for Chromebook connectivity tech support: 800-922-0204.  Once you enter your #, it knows you have a Chromebook.

Checking your bandwidth usage

Verizon offers the following options to check your bandwidth usage:

  1. There are a few ways on the Chromebook.  I find the easiest to be:
    1. Click on network connection icon.
    2. Click on connected to Verizon Wireless
    3. Click on Verizon Wireless
    4. A pop-up comes up with the bandwidth remaining for the month and the number of days left in the month.  I’ve noticed sometimes the data doesn’t load on that screen.  Try again.
    5. Alternatively click “my account” on that page which opens a browser. That always works.  However, this data has quite a lag.  The pop-up tells me I have 50MB left and the browser says I have 75MB left
  2. My Verizon – This only works from the device not via a URL.  And if you are on the device it isn’t the easiest way.  I tried to register with verizonwireless but it says, “We’re sorry but you cannot register you tablet on MyVerizon.com.  Please setup your account information on your device.”

I also got a warning in the lower right corner of the screen when I only had 50MB data left available.  And when I ran out, I got a warning in that spot saying I was out of mobile data and a link to buy a plan.  Not sure if I had a plan whether I would get charged for overages or it would just stop. I  imagine the former.

I can’t find a way to check bandwidth from a different computer.  I asked in a forum.  I can get it by phone by calling 800-922-0204 or 888-294-6804 and entering my phone #/4 digit security code.  It’s a lot of info to enter and you have to talk to a human though which means it is easier to just ask my mother to check.  Note that I haven’t paid for the 1GB plan yet so it could get easier when I do.
Is it hard to connect?
I had trouble once so far.  It was during a thunderstorm; don’t know if that matters.  I wound up clicking the button to disable 3g and re-enable 3g and all was fine.  That or I waited a few minutes.
How is the speed?
For regular browsing it is fine.  It isn’t quite as fast as my home wifi but not noticeably different.  (Note that I have pretty slow DSL to compare to.)  I was able to watch a few videos on youtube without hitting any buffering.
Do I think 3G is enough?
So far so good.  It wouldn’t be enough for just me.  But I think the 1GB plan will be enough for someone who just browsers the internet and doesn’t listen to music/watch video.  To use up the free 100MB in 10 days, I uploaded a bunch of screenshots and watched some videos.  But I did most of my real internet surfing on my Mac.  Next month I’ll try to use it for internet more actively to see what happens.  But I will be buying the 1GB plan before giving the Chromebook to my mother giving her 10 times the bandwidth.  Unless OS patches are huge!

logging onto a chromebook with two factor

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I have 2 factor authentication set up on my gmail.  Needless to say signing on with my id was not the first thing I did with the Chromebook!  But now that I’m content that easy things are easy, it is time to try something hard.  [turned out not to be hard at all]

I’ll be back with the getting started with the chromebook series.  2factor isn’t something most people have set up so I’m posting this one standalone.

Step 1  – Add a user

Click the “Add user” button in the lower left.  It requires network access for this.  I was worried, I’d have to re-enable wifi, but it lets you click Verizon for the network and activate over 3g.  It is only the initial user that requires wifi.

Step 2 – Sign on with password

This is where I was expecting trouble.  I typed in my password.  When I enter my password in gmail, I get prompted for another code (my 2 factor code.)  I was thrilled when the chromebook prompted me for the 2 factor code.  This is great!  I can logon to the chromebook using two factor just as easily as I can logon to gmail using 2factor.  Good job!

Alternate approach

I was expecting my fallback to be logging onto the Chromebook as a guest and then using two factor normally from the browser.

getting started with the chromebook – part 2

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Part 1 covered buying a Chromebook.  I tried setting up Chrome OS (Chromium) on a virtual machine last year.  In addition to covering set up here, I’ll also remark on how it is different for a “real computer” so techies can support a Chromebook without actually having one.

Part 1 ended with me turning on the computer.  Let’s see where we go from there.

The first time you use the computer

  1. Tell the machine how to connect to the internet.   (The dark lines don’t appear on the screen and seem to be an artifact of taking a photo of the screen.  Can’t take a screenshot before logging in.)  *** Important *** you must connect via wifi the first time; you can’t go straight to 3g.  This means you need to take the laptop to a library/starbucks/etc if you do not have home wifi.  This seems like it could be a problem as some public wifi requires a browser to get started.  Luckily, I am at home where I do have wifi.This step was different than the virtual machine since I was already online for the virtual machine.
  2. I selected my wifi network and entered my WEP key.  There is NO feedback at all that something is happening for about a minute.  If your key worked, the continue button becomes enabled.  If not, you see a yellow message saying it couldn’t connect.  However, either of these takes a little while – in which you are left wondering if the Chromebook is doing anything.
  3. Accept terms and conditions.  I unchecked about sending crash data to Google.  If I’m paying based on bandwidth used, I don’t want to waste any.
  4. Oh, did you want to use your Chromebook?  Sorry.  The first thing that happens is a system update.  It’s a large download.  I don’t have the fastest wifi, but the progress bar appears to be going slowly.  And I can tell it is busy downloading, because the internet speed on my “real computer” is crawling implying the Chromebook is using it all.  I really hope it doesn’t do this for each update!  It took 35 minutes.
  5. After ChromeBook reboots automatically, logon with your google username/password.  From here on, it is similar to the virtual machine setup
  6. Interestingly, you get prompted for an image even if you already have with that google account from another ChromeBook. 
  7. The “home page” screen is a list of things you might want help with for the ChromeBook.  (This screenshot is my first taken on the Chromebook!) 
  8. To get started you click on the gmail or chome icons at bottom.  Once you are in a browser, you can add more tabs and surf the internet as normal.  The icons to use as starting points are:
    1. Chrome (browser)
    2. Gmail
    3. Google search
    4. Google docs
    5. Youtube
    6. Tips and tricks
    7. Downloads folder
    8. Current browser tab
    9. Apps – like a desktop with more icons as shown here:

Issues

  1. You have to be on wifi the first time.  Since the laptop supports 3g, it would be nice to go right to 3g
  2. The icons at the bottom of the screen have text under them.  However this text is cut off using the default resolution.  Odd since everything else seems to work out of the box.

Part 3 is about getting on 3g