A Few Days with Dell Chromebook 13

Everyone knows my main machine used to be an X1 Carbon 2017. Unfortunately, I lost it earlier this year.

After that, my wife was actually on board with me buying a new one, but the X1 Carbon 2021 was about to launch and the rumors said it was a big upgrade — new 16:10 screen, better GPU and CPU performance. So I decided to wait. But while waiting, I still needed a laptop to get work done.

So I started looking:

• Performance has to be passable
• Keyboard has to at least be usable
• Screen at least 1080p, color gamut can’t be terrible
• Strong battery life
• Build quality as good as possible

I ended up going with a Dell Chromebook 13, around 500 yuan on Taobao. It’s a Chromebook, but you can flash the firmware and install Windows 10 or Linux with full driver support. It was also a “premium-tier Chromebook” back in the day — carbon fiber pattern shell, keyboard feel close to the XPS line, so using it isn’t a problem. Screen is 1080p and the color gamut meets my needs, at least it’s not one of those washed-out white or blue panels.

The downside: most of the good-condition Dell Chromebook 13s on Taobao are the worst CPU config with 4GB RAM. The Dell Chromebook 13 does have a high-end version — touchscreen, i5 5300u, 8GB RAM.

Eventually I found an i3 5200 + 4GB version on the Hi PDA forum for a so-so price, just under 800, and it even had the glass touchscreen. The catch: the condition was genuinely bad. As everyone knows, these units are just foreign e-waste…

But I had no computer at the time, so I figured I’d deal with it once it arrived. And when it did, I managed to screw up while adding an SSD myself. Not sure if the motherboard is just fragile or I bumped something, but the power delivery died — a filter capacitor kicked the bucket, apparently. I couldn’t afford to send it to a proper repair guy, and a local shop had no idea, so I had to think of something else.

Searching Taobao, I unexpectedly found someone selling original motherboards for this machine — and the top-spec i5 5300 + 8GB version, no less. So I hatched a plan: DIY a “perfect edition Dell Chromebook 13.”

I asked several sellers about these motherboards. One wanted 720+, another 650+. I bought from both and both boards had problems: the 720 one wouldn’t even boot, another faulty board. The 650 one booted, but the HDMI port didn’t work. I returned both and felt pretty lost.

“Maybe there’s just too much e-waste for this model, and every motherboard on Taobao is a repaired secondhand part. Finding a good one is genuinely hard.”

But there’s always a way. I eventually found a seller with very few transactions who claimed to have “brand new stock motherboards.” Decided to take a gamble. The listed price was 650, but strangely the final price changed to 500, and the seller never said anything about it even after the transaction closed. I’ll just take it as an accidental discount.

The board really was new old stock. Installed it and everything worked perfectly — the machine was basically functional again.

Of course, that wasn’t the end. I went to Xianyu and picked up a “great condition Dell Chromebook 13” for 500, the lowest config. When it arrived I swapped in the high-spec motherboard and the high-spec touchscreen, and finally assembled a “top-spec Dell Chromebook 13” out of two machines and one motherboard.

The laptop also supports adding your own SSD, so I went to the local electronics market and bought a 250-yuan Kingston 2242 256GB SSD (SATA only). After swapping that in, a decent “backup machine” was done.

Then I used the leftover parts to build a “mediocre-condition low-spec Dell Chromebook 13” and sold it on Xianyu for 500. The faulty i3 motherboard from the start got sold for 150 as a parts board.

I also bought an Intel AX201 network card on Xianyu for 50 yuan, upgrading the networking. The old card could be sold too, but it’s still listed for sale.

Final cost: 800+250+500-500-150+50 = 950 yuan. Add in the misc shipping from those returns, and it’s about 1000 yuan all told.

1000 yuan, backup laptop sorted.

• 1080p resolution
• Carbon fiber shell (no idea if it’s real, but the pattern is carbon fiber)
• Glass touchpad
• i5 + 8GB + 256GB SSD
• Touchscreen
• Acceptable keyboard feel (similar to XPS)
• Battery life is genuinely absurd — 7 hours easy, the battery on this thing is huge

Overall I’m very satisfied. I’ve been using it from January until now with basically no problems. Peak performance is a bit lacking, but for handling files and browsing the web it’s completely fine.

I also grabbed a USB-C Dell dummy plug on Taobao for just over 10 yuan, which makes charging more convenient. Then I installed Fedora 33 and recently upgraded to Fedora 34 — but that’s a story for another post.