Toshiba Portege A200

...STRENGTHS

The Toshiba Portege A200 is one of the lightest, slimmest laptops you'll come across, but apart from a slightly poor graphics card it lacks nothing in features and is highly upgradeable. The run time is over 2.5 Hours on a fully charged battery and the 12.1" screen is 1024x768 resolution so although it takes some getting used to its small size there is room for just as much information on it as a typical 15" screen ...
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It comes supplied with Toshibas own suite of utilities which are superb and consume very little memory. Highlights include profiles to slow down your processor and dim the screen to extend battery life as it runs down, Quiet CD to slow your DVD drive down when watching DVD's and prevent unnecessary whirring and useful wireless network analyzers and trouble-shooters.

In terms of ports you get built in fire wire - well implemented ... more

I have had several laptops, usually older ones and was given this one by my brother six months back. He'd used it continuously for about a year and it was showing its flaws but after a bit of tweaking it's been a dream, and believe me I'm no light user either!

Mostly I use it to develop software (Visual Studio 2005, C#, .NET) and have it weighted down with SDK's. But, I also edit video in premiere on it, and write music in Cubase with some hefty plug-ins running not to mention a Line 6 TonePort GX and amp modelling software

STRENGTHS

The Toshiba Portege A200 is one of the lightest, slimmest laptops you'll come across, but apart from a slightly poor graphics card it lacks nothing in features and is highly upgradeable. The run time is over 2.5 Hours on a fully charged battery and the 12.1" screen is 1024x768 resolution so although it takes some getting used to its small size there is room for just as much information on it as a typical 15" screen and its crystal clear glossy finish helps things along nicely.

It comes supplied with Toshibas own suite of utilities which are superb and consume very little memory. Highlights include profiles to slow down your processor and dim the screen to extend battery life as it runs down, Quiet CD to slow your DVD drive down when watching DVD's and prevent unnecessary whirring and useful wireless network analyzers and trouble-shooters.

In terms of ports you get built in fire wire - well implemented too I might add unlike some of the competition so it's fast and reliable, 3x USB2.0 ports, one conveniently on the side for a mouse, outputs for a second monitor and S-VHS for a TV, a card bus port and all the usual suspects. It also has a built in microphone which you can use with a messaging program, to dictate notes to or even with Skype (assuming you buy Skype software anyway).

WEAKNESSES

The meagre 256MB RAM runs windows XP and Word adequately but that's about it. It has a spare DDR1 slot under the keyboard however (gently prize up the speaker cover, then remove the 3 black screws near the keyboard) so an additional 1GB can be inserted here. (2GB is the total limit but XP won\'t use more than 2.5GB anyway.

The hard drive is also rather small at 40GB but it's not too hard to drop a new one in. Make sure you get a drive that has nothing overhanging the connector pins though, since the Portege has internal strengtheners that will get in the way. I didn't realise this and chose instead to use a pair of long-nosed pliers to break the three plastic strengtheners off - NOT recommended. (To get to the drive you must remove the keyboard as above, then undo the screws under the keyboard plus the two hidden under the battery before gently levering off the fascia containing the touchpad. You'll see one more screw holding the drive cover in place. Undo and slide out the drive. Voila)

The battery can also be a problem but that is in common with most 10.8v batteries. The reduced voltage (compared to a 14.4v battery) means less weight but at the expense of stressing batteries out for a premature death. If you use it heavily you may find yourself shelling out £45-£90 each year for a new battery. But like I say, this isn't specific to the Portege A200, Apple I Books in particular are notorious for this problem, if you want reduced weight you just have to accept it until battery technology takes a leap forward.

But the most problematic of all is overheating. When this happens the Portege shuts down without waning to protect the CPU. It uses a heat pipe to displace the heat away and the heat sink vanes that the fan blows air through are rather fine and prone to collecting dust and blocking up entirely! You can try blowing air in to dislodge it but it this doesn't for you'll have to take the laptop apart entirely to clean it out. Starting with the two steps above, but it's not for the faint hearted!

IN SUMMARY

A great little laptop, very powerful and with lots of potential not to mention much kudos as people stare enviously. However, there is the one serious flaw of dust blocking the heat sink. A bit of care with this though, say using a can of air duster once a month should prevent it getting so bad you have to take it apart.

Don't let the negative points put you off too much. Any technology has limitations and this laptop has far less than most.

BUYING SECONDHAND?

Watch out for worn out batteries and overheating due to a blocked heat sink. Otherwise, you'll have no problems at all. 

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