Acer made an announcement for the CXI Chromebox, a different way to bring the Chrome OS to your desktop without a Chromebook! Acer keeps its commitment to Chrome tight in its own line of PCs, and the CXI continues the powerful track record of the brand. Although its spec list might not sound super different from other Chromeboxes running similar processors, such as ARM and Intel Atom, this is the cheapest Chromebox out there with 8GB of memory.

These Chromebox devices, dubbed the CXI-i34GKM and CXI-i38GKM, which resemble an external hard drive enclosure, sport a dual-core i3-4030U Haswell processor. According to ZD Net, that is more than enough performance to run Chrome OS. It also supports 2K and 4K display capability, that's 2,048 x 1,536, and 3,840 x 2,160, respectively. Additional support includes 4GB to 8GB of RAM (depending on which model you choose), and an external 16GB SSD, just enough for regular day-today web and document activity, Intel HD GPU, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, USB, microSD, and HDMI (Ubergizmo).

The CXI-i34GKM runs for $349, and the CXI-i38GKM for $399, and Acer is continuing to offer a $179 Intel Celeron 2957U model. Both models come with a Google-approved keyboard and mouse, as well as VESA mount kit for hiding the device behind your monitor (Ubergizmo). With a hefty amount of memory, as well as the fourth-gen Haswell processors, this series of Chromeboxes are pretty much on par with any mainstream Windows desktop you can find.