I'm in Myanmar right now, doing some charity work :) But I also have to teach online for several hours each evening. Having been a teacher in this country for many years I'm aware of some of the problems of unreliable internet and unreliable mains electricity, but things are a lot worse now!

I'm using an Asus TUF A15 laptop to teach online, which is 'overkill'. Although I've applied recommended 'tweaks' to reduce the energy consumption, with the mains power off for about 18 hours/day, I'm having to use car batteries and an inverter to keep my laptop going :) I need a laptop with a much lower energy consumption/longer battery life.

I can't do much about the unreliable internet, but it would be nice to have a low-power laptop that has a built-in LTE/4g SIM card support. Mobile internet is more reliable than hotel wi-fi, and it would be nice (but not an absolute need), if I can avoid USB/ethernet tethering etc.

This laptop will be my Zoom lesson laptop, so it simply needs to be able to handle Zoom video lessons and shared screen (2 students max) for me to play YT videos etc during the lesson.

Any recommendations? Or questions? Thanks for your advice.

Check out Chromebook variants, cheap, long battery life, ++++++

On 3/26/2026 at 9:03 PM, Hummin said:

Check out Chromebook variants, cheap, long battery life, ++++++

Yes, that's what I want, but nothing on Lazada Thailand etc. Looks like I will have to buy it on Amazon UK and then ship it to Thailand (therefore probably being 'kidnapped' by the tax police and a huge ransom demanded...)

On 3/26/2026 at 3:33 PM, Hummin said:

Check out Chromebook variants, cheap, long battery life, ++++++

Do you know any with LTE/5G support? Perhaps not the best idea to utilise a Cloud based OS in a place with unreliable Internet.

I'd rather use Linux or even Windows. In fact Chrome OS was derived from Gentoo Linux.

They announced that Chrome OS will soon merge with Android.

26 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Yes, that's what I want, but nothing on Lazada Thailand etc. Looks like I will have to buy it on Amazon UK and then ship it to Thailand (therefore probably being 'kidnapped' by the tax police and a huge ransom demanded...)

Perhaps, but you might find that without a mobile phone IMEI(or the ability to spoof one) you might have the same issue with your Internet.

8 hours ago, IsmeUno said:

Do you know any with LTE/5G support? Perhaps not the best idea to utilise a Cloud based OS in a place with unreliable Internet.

I'd rather use Linux or even Windows. In fact Chrome OS was derived from Gentoo Linux.

They announced that Chrome OS will soon merge with Android.

I’m not an expert, but I do use a Chromebook, and the battery life is honestly one of its biggest strengths. Chromebooks are pretty well known for lasting a long time on a charge, and even after 3–4 years mine still holds up really well. They also tend to cost a lot less than more powerful computers, so for everyday use, you often get more for your money with a Chromebook. If the main things he needs are teaching online, browsing, email, documents, and Zoom, a Chromebook can be a really good value. For teaching, he’d need internet access anyway, unless I’m mistaken. Zoom works fine for me even on around 5–6 Mbps. It cuts out once in a while, but it usually picks back up without much trouble.

Surfaace Pro 11 ticks the boxes.

4 hours ago, Hummin said:

I’m not an expert, but I do use a Chromebook, and the battery life is honestly one of its biggest strengths. Chromebooks are pretty well known for lasting a long time on a charge, and even after 3–4 years mine still holds up really well. They also tend to cost a lot less than more powerful computers, so for everyday use, you often get more for your money with a Chromebook. If the main things he needs are teaching online, browsing, email, documents, and Zoom, a Chromebook can be a really good value. For teaching, he’d need internet access anyway, unless I’m mistaken. Zoom works fine for me even on around 5–6 Mbps. It cuts out once in a while, but it usually picks back up without much trouble.

The question was "Do you know any with LTE/5G support"?

Of course they cost less than powerful computers. Less powerful computers usually cost less than more powerful computers.

They are also less versatile. If you wish to use another Browser, other than just Chrome, you'll be stuck with Android mobile versions or have to utilise a Linux container.

Either way, if the OP can fix his Internet issue(perhaps by utilising a separate LTE modem), it may fit his need.

13 hours ago, simon43 said:

Yes, that's what I want, but nothing on Lazada Thailand etc. Looks like I will have to buy it on Amazon UK and then ship it to Thailand (therefore probably being 'kidnapped' by the tax police and a huge ransom demanded...)

There are loads of Chromebooks on Lazada Thailand.

Example: https://www.lazada.co.th/products/pdp-i16060561518-s126420378490.htm

Though bear in mind that support for that device ends in June. You might then install either Chrome OS Flex, a flavour of Linux(MINT perhaps) or just carry on regardless.

2 hours ago, IsmeUno said:

There are loads of Chromebooks on Lazada Thailand.

Example: https://www.lazada.co.th/products/pdp-i16060561518-s126420378490.htm

Though bear in mind that support for that device ends in June. You might then install either Chrome OS Flex, a flavour of Linux(MINT perhaps) or just carry on regardless.

None of those Lazada Chromebooks seem to have lte support...

Thanks for the advice and comments. I'm in Yangon right now, flying to Bangkok tomorrow. Interestingly, there is no block/throttling of laptop internet speeds in this location..

I thought about this and the reasons. Several Myanmar people at Inle Lake said that laptop speeds are throttled because the pdf (civilian fighters) in this Shan State use laptops to control their drone flights to drop bombs! They don't use mobile phones. This could be a true explanation, because the pdf don't drop bombs in Yangon.

Anyway, I still need to find a solution. As others have said, using a Chromebook with LTE might not actually solve the problem becaue of the IMEI.

Yesterday, I managed 2 online lessons using Zoom and sharing my screen with pdf documents on my mobile phone. It was a challenge, but the lessons went fine and the internet speed was good. Perhaps it would be better to improve this scenario by adding an external bluetooth keyboard and mouse, and also linking the mobile phone to my Asus laptop display. Perhaps even buy a large screen Android device (if they exist - I'll check tomorrow MBK).

2 hours ago, simon43 said:

None of those Lazada Chromebooks seem to have lte support...

I know. That's what I stated in the first instance. But you seemed interested anyway.

37 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Thanks for the advice and comments. I'm in Yangon right now, flying to Bangkok tomorrow. Interestingly, there is no block/throttling of laptop internet speeds in this location..

I thought about this and the reasons. Several Myanmar people at Inle Lake said that laptop speeds are throttled because the pdf (civilian fighters) in this Shan State use laptops to control their drone flights to drop bombs! They don't use mobile phones. This could be a true explanation, because the pdf don't drop bombs in Yangon.

Anyway, I still need to find a solution. As others have said, using a Chromebook with LTE might not actually solve the problem becaue of the IMEI.

Yesterday, I managed 2 online lessons using Zoom and sharing my screen with pdf documents on my mobile phone. It was a challenge, but the lessons went fine and the internet speed was good. Perhaps it would be better to improve this scenario by adding an external bluetooth keyboard and mouse, and also linking the mobile phone to my Asus laptop display. Perhaps even buy a large screen Android device (if they exist - I'll check tomorrow MBK).

Google "how to update IMEI using PuTTY"

I'm not so sure about looking too deeply into solving the issue, for rather obvious reasons 😊

41 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Several Myanmar people at Inle Lake said that laptop speeds are throttled

how do they throttle the speed of a laptop ?

1 hour ago, Ralf001 said:

how do they throttle the speed of a laptop ?

What I mean is that the government internet 'gateway' throttles the internet speeds down to a snail's pace if a laptop or computer tries to access a website (any website), whilst the same connection from a mobile phone is not slowed down. So I wondered how ;they' do this. I tried spoofing a mobile device user-agent on my laptop, but that made no difference. So I edited the TTL value on the laptop to 'remove' the extra hop from my tethered phone hotspot/USB tether/Ethernet tether), but that also didn't make a difference..

So indeed, I'm interested from a techie POV how 'they' manage to do all this! This throttling is not the blocks on social media such as Facebook - my mobile VPN solves that problem.

@IsMeUno - there ARE Chromebooks with LTE available, just none on Lazada :) I can order one from the UK, but then I run the risk of the customs departments 'kidnapping' the computer and holding it for ransom - and it might not solve the problem anyway! I think it's better to try to use my existing Android solution and add peripherals to make it more easy to manage in a lesson.