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High tech piling on
So I get this message when I boot up my Excel 2010 that sometime soon Microsoft is going to stop support for Office 2010 and wouldn’t I just like to switch to the cloud now and keep out the rodents and predators forever. I don’t remember the fee; it is not terrible, but it is a fee.
Then I check my email and the 100 gb of storage that Google gave me for free when I bought my Pixel 2 was really an introductory thing and it’s about to expire and wouldn’t I just like to extend it for a year for $20. I get 15 gb for free anyway and I’ve barely scratched the surface of that but it’s embarrassing to admit that I use so little cloud storage. On the other hand, $20 is $20, so what should I do?
Now the lady who helps us with housework on Fridays bought an HP Chromebook for her daughter for $100 at WalMart when Black Friday came on Thursday afternoon. Some lady in the checkout line told her that the computer will only last for two years and then the operating system will be no good. I’m typing this on a Chromebook that I got a year ago, so I was skeptical, but a little research turned up the fact that all Chromebooks have a pre-determined end of life (EOL) when Google stops automatic updates to their operating systems. My EOL is June, 2023, others are sooner or later, many have already come, but this is the first I’ve heard of it.
Currently there are two decent fixes to the EOL. The Chrome OS apparently has a Linux kernel, so installing Linux is an option for many. For others, there’s CloudReady by Neverware. There is some screwdriver work involved, but not too complicated, I think. Of course, a third fix is to just keep using it; it’s only the updates that stop,
My first thought upon hearing Microsoft’s news was to just ditch them and use Sheets and Docs for everything. You might be surprised at how many schools and businesses do exactly that. Then Google hit me with paying for storage and EOL for my Chromebook, so now I’m truly befuddled.
Home IT can be difficult.
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