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Of all the Chromebooks that have come across my desk over the years, the Acer Chromebook Vero 514 is by far one of the most unique. With a clear and present message around sustainability, the Vero lineup of laptops deliver a unique look and feel that isn’t matched by anything else in the industry.
And you know what? I love it! While I’m generally all for any initiative that is Earth-friendly, I wouldn’t call myself an environmentalist at all. When I say I like the Chromebook Vero 514, it’s mainly due to the wildly-interesting aesthetic it brings to the table. If you can do that while making a more sustainable laptop, it’s just a win-win, right?
We talked about this a lot in our unboxing of this device, but I absolutely love the look and feel of this Chromebook. Though made from lots and lots of recycled materials, the Vero 514 still feel amazing. It’s all plastic, but super rigid with a boxy design and fun, bright yellow highlights. It simply doesn’t look like anything else out there: that’s for sure!
And right now, Walmart has the model with a 12th-gen Core i3, 8GB of RAM and 128GB of NVMe storage on sale for just $299. With the 1080p webcam up top, this one is certified Chromebook Plus and has all the new AI features available that you would like to use. From generated wallpapers to all the fun, new camera tricks, you can do it all with this $299 device.
The trade-offs for this price are minimal, but you need to know about them. This particular model ditches the touchscreen, but the anti-glare and 300 nits of brightness are still nice to look at for sure. The fingerprint scanner we had in our review unit is also gone at this sort of price point, but those things are to be expected.
What you are still getting is a fantastic backlit keyboard, an OceanGlass trackpad, plenty of I/O with a USB Type-A and Type-C on each side, and internals that are fast enough for nearly anything you want to do on a Chromebook. For $299, this is simply a deal you can’t ignore. And if you are on the lookout for a Chromebook that doesn’t just blend into the crowd, this could be the one for you.
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