Dell Chromebook 11 to arrive on 17 January

Chromebook 11 specsDisplay: 11.6ins (1366 x 768)Processor: 4th Generation Intel Celeron 2955URAM: 2GB or 4GBStorage: 16GB SSDBattery life: Up to 10 hoursPorts: 2 x USB 3.0, HDMIWireless: Bluetooth 4, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n

Dell has announced the Chromebook 11, which will come out on 17 January in the US and UK.

This marks the first Chrome OS device from the vendor and it is specifically designed for the primary and secondary education markets.

Pricing starts at 159 ex VAT (190 inc VAT), making it the cheapest Chrome OS laptop to-date. The closest rival is the Acer C7 Chromebook, which starts at 200 inc VAT.

A key feature of the Chromebook is the integration of Dell Wyse PocketCloud. This allows students and teachers to edit, save and share documents across smartphones, tablets, PCs, laptops and Chromebooks in a p2p-like fashion.

Margaret Franco, executive director at Dell talked up the benefits the vendor will bring to schools if they deploy this Chromebook.

"Dell brings two advantages to the education market. Our Pro support allows for instaneous repairs on-site. We also have a cloud-based management console that can download the applications, images and track/configure the devices," Franco told IT Pro.

Businesses and consumers versions of the device are expected to follow in the coming months.

Franco also hinted that an Android version of Dell's Venue 8 Pro is likely to drop in the UK during 2014. The tablet has initially been released in Dubai and South Africa.

"We're starting the deployment [of the Android tablet] in emerging markets but we are of course evaluating countries and roll-out schedule," Franco added.