Chromebook Support Information
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If your Chromebook, hotspot, or charger is damaged (e.g. broken screen, keyboard, water damage) or lost/stolen, please contact your school to schedule an exchange.
For all other issues, please review the getting started guide and troubleshooting steps below BEFORE having your student exchange their device at their school's library. If none of the basic troubleshooting items address your issue, move onto the advanced option of a full reset.
Getting Started Guide
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Power On
Power on Chromebook by opening the Chromebook or by quick tapping the power button:
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Logging into the Device
When you open your Chromebook and it powers on, you may see a prompt to login to Clever Badge. If so, you’ll want to dismiss that and login manually:
- Click on “Sign in with a different account”
Sign in with your entire NTPS Student log in and enter your student ID for the password. Student ID’s are typically the first five letters of the last name and the first three of their first name.
For example: Katniss Everdeen, student number 0013579, will log on to the Chromebook as follows:
- everdkat (for the username)
- 0013579 (for the password)
If your student isn’t sure what their username or password is, please contact their teacher.
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Settings Menu
For the next few steps you will be accessing a settings menu by clicking the clock at lower right:
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Power Off
To turn the Chromebook off, either
- Hold down the power button until the screen goes dark
- Click on the clock menu (see Settings Menu above)
- Clock on the power/shutdown button
Note: Closing the lid places the computer into a sleep mode that will drain battery power over time. Turning off your Chromebook when not in use will preserve power. Charge often!
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Connect to Home Wi-Fi
- After the Chromebook is powered on you should see a “NO NETWORK AVAILABLE” window
- Click on the time button in the lower right corner of the screen (pictured below)
- A small pop up menu will appear
- Click the “Not connected, No Networks” drop down menu
- Select your home network from the list
- Enter your home WiFi password
- Check by making sure the “pie shape” wireless icon is a solid white color
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Keyboard and Quick Keys
- Go to previous page (F1 or left arrow)
- Go to next page (F2 or right arrow)
- Refresh your current page (F3 or circle arrow)
- Make your page take up the full screen (F4 or expanding square)
- Show all your open windows (F5 or stacked squares)
- Decrease screen brightness (F6 or small sun)
- Make the screen brighter (F7 or large sun)
- Turn off the sound (F8 or speaker with a slash)
- Lower the volume (F9 or speaker with one bar)
- Raise the volume (F10 or speaker with multiple bars)
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Capturing Chromebook Screenshots
Capture an image of your entire display by pressing Ctrl +
The Print Screen key is typically the sixth key from the left and has a symbol of a square next to two lines. A window will later appear with options to view the screenshot and copy to Google Drive.
Capture a partial screenshot by pressing Ctrl+Shift+
You'll then be able to drag your cursor to form a box around the area of your display that you want to capture. A window will later appear with options to view the screenshot and copy to Google Drive.
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Update your Chromebook
ChromeOS updates should apply automatically during normal use. If you want to ensure your student device is fully updated, please see the instructions below for how to manually trigger an update.
- Turn on your Chromebook.
- Connect your Chromebook to Wi-Fi if you haven’t already.
- At the bottom right, select the time.
- Select Settings
- At the bottom of the left panel, select About Chrome OS.
- Under “Google Chrome OS,” you'll find which version of the Chrome operating system your Chromebook uses.
- Select Check for updates.
- If your Chromebook finds a software update, it will start to download automatically.
Note: If your Chromebook uses your phone's internet connection or its own mobile data, you'll get an alert about how much mobile data it needs to update. You can then stop or continue with the update.
Basic Troubleshooting
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Device not powering up, or wifi or sound issue? Try a Power Reset
- Make sure the Chromebook is off
- Press and hold Refresh
+ tap Power
- When your Chromebook starts up, release Refresh
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Verify the TIME of the Chromebook is correct
- Sign in to your Chromebook
- At the bottom right, select the time
- Select Settings
- Scroll down and select Advanced
- In the "Date and time" section. If it does not list Pacific Standard Time, select side arrow and choose correct time zone.
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Device Slowness & Issues Viewing or Submitting Assignments
Students experiencing issues with submitting assignments, viewing images and videos and other issues may have filled the local memory on their Chromebook. Please try these strategies listed below to clear synced tabs, delete files stored on your Chromebook, and clear your browsing data. If these steps don't resolve your issue, please be sure to let your teacher know.
These links can also be found in the HELP AND TROUBLESHOOTING section of your Clever Dashboard.
- Clear Synced Tabs: Go to this page, scroll to the bottom and click the CLEAR DATA button.
- Empty Downloads Folder
- Clear Browsing Data
- Powerwash Chromebook
- Update Chromebook
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Turn On/Off Accessibility Features
- After the Chromebook is powered on-
- Click on the click (screen, lower-right)
- In the small pop-up menu
- Click the 'Accessibility' drown-down menu
- Click the turn the following options on/off:
- Spoken feedback
- Select-to-Speak
- Dictation
- Magnifier(s)
- On-Screen Keyboard
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Magnification Settings
- To make the page bigger: Press Ctrl and Plus .
- To make the page smaller: Press Ctrl and Minus .
- Reset zoom: Press Ctrl + 0.
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Turn Off High Contrast Mode (mostly black and white screen)
- Open the Accessibility Settings
- Click or tap the status area in the bottom right corner > Settings > Advanced (at the bottom) > Manage Accessibility Features
- Under the ‘Display’ section click the toggle switch next to ‘Use high contrast mode’ or press the ‘Tab’ key repeatedly until the toggle switch is highlighted and then press Space bar to toggle this setting off.
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Rotate Screen
Ctrl + Shift + Refresh
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Charging issues
When plugged into power, what is the indicator light next to the charging port?
- Orange = Charging
- White = Fully Charged
- No Light = Charging Issue
If the Chromebook has no light, try a different power outlet to see if that resolves the issue. Also check to make sure the two pieces of the charging cord are fully connected. If it stays Orange/Red after charging for over 24 hours, open a repair request.
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No Sound in Headphones or from Device
If you’re not hearing sound through your headphones, confirm that the headphones are fully inserted into the audio port.
If you’re still not hearing sound, from the headphones, click anywhere on the menu in the bottom right of your Chromebook to open the setting windows.
There are two different options; the speaker icon could be muted (indicated with a slash). If you see icons in these examples, sound is not muted.
Without headphones
With headphones menu
Headphones sub menu
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Keyboard Typing Odd Characters
Look at the clock icon in the bottom right corner of the Chromebook screen. If you see anything other than “US” this could be an issue with the keyboard setting.
Step 1: Click anywhere on the clock menu to show the menu below.
Step 2: The arrow above indicates where the keyboard setting is, click on that icon and select “US” as the standard keyboard.
Still not working?
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If you’ve followed all the basic troubleshooting guides and your Chromebook is still acting strange or non-responsive, try a power wash (full reset) of your Chromebook below.
Advanced Troubleshooting
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Power Wash of Chromebook (full reset)
Step 1: Sign out of your Chromebook (do not power down)
Step 2: Press and hold Ctrl + Alt + Shift + r
Step 3: At the Reset this Chromebook screen, click the Powerwash button
Step 4: At the Confirm Powerwash pop-up, click the Continue button. A Powerwash in progress message will appear.
Step 5: At the Welcome to your Chromebook screen, click the Get Started button. If prompted, select NO.Continue without ChromeVox
The first time your Chromebook is power washed, it can take a while (around 15 minutes depending on your internet connection). Future power washes only take about 2 minutes to complete.
Step 6: At the Connect to network window, select to your home network. See our Chromebook Basics page for wireless instructions.
Step 6: Uncheck the OPTIONAL choice, then select Accept and Continue buttons.
First Powerwash Only:
A window will appear with “Downloading the latest update” and a time estimate. The estimate may be wildly inaccurate at first but will adjust as the update progresses.
Your device will reboot
Your device should be fully reloaded now and ready for use. If your Chromebook is still not working properly, please submit a support request at the bottom of this guide.
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Hotspot Troubleshooting
If you have a district-issued hotspot, please review the troubleshooting website below. Our district uses both SmartSpot 800’s and 900’s. Please refer to their device guide to identify what your hotspot looks like.
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Chromebook Exchange
If you’ve reviewed our troubleshooting steps and are still experiencing issues with your device, please exchange your Chromebook at your school's library.