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Schools who bought a whole slew of Chromebooks during the Covid-19 pandemic are now complaining about their short lifespan and reparability issues, The Verge reports.
The Covid-19 pandemic that occurred in 2020 resulted in massive lockdowns and school shutdowns. Many schools in the county went for online teaching, and as a result, the sales of cheap laptops and Chromebooks soared. Three years on, the schools have ended up with so many broken devices that are not repairable.
According to the US Public Interest Research Group Education Fund, reparability is the biggest issue of Chromebooks. This is because finding spare parts like screens, hinges, and keyboards is hard. School use also makes these devices more likely to break or get damaged.
The PIRG argues that increasing the lifespan of 31.8 million Chromebooks sold in 2020 could reduce the e-waste and “ result in $1.8 billion in savings for taxpayers.” Additionally, it can cut 4.6 million tons of CO2e.
Chromebooks that Schools bought during the Covid-19 pandemic are starting to break and are not repairable
Besides the unavailability, the high spare parts costs for Chromebooks are also a problem. For example, over a third of keyboards listed for Acer Chromebooks cost $89.99 or more, which is a high price for a $200 device. PIRG reports that some IT departments are buying new Chromebooks to use their components to fix broken ones.
“These high costs may make schools reconsider Chromebooks as a cost-saving strategy,” PIRG added.
In response to the news, Acer told The Verge that schools who bought their Chromebooks from the company had received spare parts directly from the Premier Support Team. The company also said a keyboard obtained in that way would cost under $25.
“Acer supports our in-warranty customers with spare parts for a minimum of 4 years for our education accounts. Our spare parts availability was 95% within 24 hours of the order being placed,” Acer spokesperson said.
Moreover, schools are also complaining about the Chromebook’s auto-update expiration. While Google promised eight years of automatic updates, PIRG argues that Chromebooks’ expiration could be “four to five years away” by the time schools get their hands on them.