Chromebooks Vs laptops

Hi everyone,

I'm buying a laptop at the end of the month and have some questions about chromebooks.

I've noticed they are a lot cheaper than standard laptops but I also heard that they're only for browsing the internet on and you can't install programs. Is this true? I'd also need a large hard drive to house my music and tv shows.

I mainly use my laptop for internet browsing and downloading tv programs and music, I don't really use MS Office or other software. The programs I use regularly are Chrome, Vuze, VLC media player, itunes, and Skype once in a blue moon.

I don't want to buy something that doesn't suit my needs, so I guess what I'm asking is: should I buy a chromebook or should I spend a bit more and get a typical laptop? Can anybody recommend me a decent laptop for under £400? It needs to have a huge hard drive, minimum 4gb RAM, and 15.6" screen or bigger. I don't want a tiny netbook.

Thanks in advance.

Literally the Chromebooks operating system has been built on bare bones (just about) its only capable of using one programme which is the web browser. The operating system is a bare bones linux system incapable of doing anything else apart from running the browser. So if everything you want to use it for is online then that will be fine, if not.....get a proper laptop. I would.