My Apple laptop was dying a slow death and I didn't want to fork out $1K plus for a new one. I use my work laptop during the day. At night, I need something just for surfing the web and doing email. Really basic. So I opted for a Chromebook.
I hate touch screens, I much prefer typing. This is the Chromebook I bought, it has no touch screen:
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-.....&psc=
Overall, I've been very happy with it, most especially the price. I do not like the keyboard, but I hear that Toshiba has improved the keyboard with a newer backlit version. The screen display is very nice and it's fast enough for my needs.
You mentioned GAP and Athleta above. Occasionally I have weird issues with GAP's website when making purchases. Not sure if that's just me or what. But just a heads up. I move to my work laptop and complete my purchases there. That's happened maybe 3 times in a year.
The thing to remember about Chromebooks is that you can't download much onto it. So you're forced to use Google docs and Google drive. That's good enough for my personal usage requirements. Google photos is good enough for now, too.
I don't really use a lot of other apps. That said, more is coming to the Chromebook world:
https://chrome.googleblog.com/.....ng-to.html
So to sum up, this was the perfect laptop for *right now*, for my very specific (i.e., basic) requirements. This is my "bang around", "leave it on the couch", "no worries" laptop.
However, I do still need a laptop that I can use to process photos and videos, and for that, I much prefer a Mac. So I do see another Mac laptop purchase in my future.
Hope this helps!
