The ASUS Chromebook Vibe CX34 Flip isn’t Chromebook Plus, and that hurts

This morning, a massive deal arrived that saw the powerful, well-equipped ASUS Chromebook Vibe CX34 Flip drop in price all the way down to just $599.99. That $270 savings is significant because price has been one of the primary reasons many potential Chromebook buyers have likely passed on this device. At $870, you have to give buyers a substantial reason for spending that sort of cash, and it is clearly a tough sell on the high end of the Chromebook market that ASUS hasn’t really overcome with the Vibe CX34 up to this point.

Enter Chromebook Plus

And then along came Chromebook Plus in October of last year to further make consumers wary of a nearly-$900 Chromebook that doesn’t get the new, shiny upgrade. With Chromebook Plus – as we’ve shown time and again here at Chrome Unboxed – you get a solid device with a somewhat-rigid set list of hardware requirements that doesn’t break the bank. The first wave of these Chromebooks largely pulled this off really well, and those existing devices that met the spec requirement also got upgraded to Chromebook Plus as well.

With this change and fragmenting of the Chromebook ecosystem just a bit, it makes life a lot harder for devices like the ASUS Chromebook Vibe CX34 Flip since one of Google’s rigid requirements for Chromebook Plus is a 1080p webcam. In our review of this otherwise-excellent Chromebook, I noted the fact that the 720p webcam is pretty terrible and one of the few sources of frustration for me in this powerful device.

No Chromebook Plus upgrade

And that small hiccup is now a very big difference maker. ASUS’ decision to oddly cheap out on the web cam for the Vibe CX34 means this device isn’t considered Chromebook Plus and it doesn’t get the upgrade. For now, that’s not a huge deal, but as more Chromebook Plus-only features start to arrive, this Chromebook will feel the pain far more than others that get left out.

While there are devices that barely meet the spec requirements needed for this upgrade and still get included, the Vibe CX34 blows all but one of those requirements out of the water. It has twice the RAM, four times the needed storage and the Core i5-1235U is far superior to any available Core i3’s in a Chromebook Plus. The screen is also superlative, coming in at 1920×1200, 16:10, 400 nits, and 144Hz. Add in the RGB keyboard and stowed, included USI pen and you quickly see that this Chromebook exceeds the Chromebook Plus spec requirements by leaps and bounds.

But the webcam isn’t 1080p, and that single fact removes it from consideration. While I totally understand and support Google’s hard line on this stuff, a silly decision on ASUS’ part is the only thing keeping this one from getting the upgrade it honestly deserves, and it just hurts. For those that bought it and those that take advantage of the current $599.99 deal on this one, I understand your frustration.

But the aggravation needs to be leveled at ASUS, not Google. I said in our review that it was dumb for them to put such a terrible camera in the Vibe CX34 before I knew anything about the Chromebook Plus spec requirements, so it was a poor decision either way. It just turns out that this particular bad choice is far more detrimental now that Google has rolled out the Chromebook Plus upgrade. It’s a tough lesson to learn, but hopefully one we don’t see much more of moving forward from ASUS or any other manufacturer in the future.