Just curious. Some of the Chrome OS notebook deals being offered seem like pretty good deals for the hardware package. Any issues with switching them over the Windows 7? Are the Chromebook onboard hardware and chipsets too recent to be supported by Win 7?
It’s like what the first link in Duckster’s post says: it will depend on which Chromebook you get. If you get one with higher specs, (like Pixel), it’s technically possible, although I’d question why anyone would want to put Windows (or OSX for that matter) on a machine that is optimized to be used online. But that’s a different matter…
Chromebooks focus on web based services. Your internet connection is orders of magnitude slower than things like typical CPU’s and memory handling. They are cheap because they have usually compromised heavily on that hardware to make the price points. They do that because the main bottleneck is the internet connection.
Some can hypothetically be done, but you will not be happy with the end result. Netbooks designed for windows use will give you a far better experience.
The ones that are x86/x64 based (Intel Core, Atom, etc. CPU) - maybe.
Ones that use ARM or MIPS CPUs (Samsung Exynos for one), absolutely not - there are no Win7 builds for those architectures.
Most of them only have 16GB internal storage (SSD). I don’t think that’s enough for a useful Windows-7 installation.
For a cheap Windows 8.1 experience there are the newer HP stream devices. They seem to get pretty good write-ups and run on Chromebook equivalent hardware specs.
Asus also has a “return” to the netbook, with the eee x205. Definitely not comparable to higher end computers, but it runs a full Windows 8.1, includes office (for a year at least) and is extremely light and thin. Runs cheaper than most chromebooks as well.
Remember that Win7 will cost you about $100 above the price of the Chromebook.
I bought a brand-new Acer laptop for $280 or so, it comes with quad core CPU, 4GB RAM, and a 500GB hard drive. Also Win8. Yes Win8 sorta sucks but 8.1 can be beat into a decent OS.