Another year flying by, gave up smoking in Jan to become a fitness freak have to work on this 5.30 a...
Another year flying by, gave up smoking in Jan to become a fitness freak have to work on this 5.30 am gym lark though.
Member since:07.09.2004
Reviews:103
Members who trust:34
INFO I have been involved with Toshiba laptops for a few years now. First in having one as a work laptop and secondly supporting them for other users.
Toshiba have the ability to create a laptop that is rugged enough to withstand daily use whilst being designed well enough to fit the daily use it was intended for.
The Portege R200 is no exception and is an exceptional laptop for the business traveller. Once given the go ahead to buy a couple of these I couldn't wait to ditch the Dell equivalents.
COST I managed to secure 2 R200 laptops for a mere £1234 each excluding VAT from Inmac. I have however seen one on EBAY last week for £994. Now that's cheap.
FIRST THOUGHTS When the first R200 arrived I couldn't believe the size of the box. It's so small you would think it had a couple of paperback novels in it and not a PC.
The R200 arrived in its original Toshiba packing. Opening the box up you find that Toshiba send you what you need and not 100 CD's of trial software and AOL internet. Inside the packaging you get the laptop, Recovery CD, Power Supply and a manual. The actual laptop is shrink wrapped to a sturdy piece of cardboard and is secured well enough to keep it safe.
QUALITY Now my next surprise was touching the laptop for the first time. I honestly couldn't believe how light the unit was. If you turned the cardboard back over so that you couldn't see the laptop you would all most think that the laptop wasn't there. The R200 weighs in at a light 1.29Kg.
Nothing.
DETAIL The power supply is tiny on this. At last a small laptop with an even smaller power supply. The battery is a Lithium Ion with around 5 hours operating time depending on what your up to.
The laptop is an all silver design on the outside. Opening up the screen, the screen surround is black and the keyboard and surrounding areas are silver. The keyboard is a standard laptop keyboard with all the usual functions. There are some additional Toshiba quick keys for Information and a monitor switch. The one thing you do have to remember about the R200 is there is no CDROM. If you need one then Toshiba make a USB DVD/CD writer which is available for £139 and has a similar design to the laptop. Next to the keyboard there is also the standard touch pad and mouse buttons which I found to be of reasonable use, not to sensitive to use.
SPEED The R200 has a Pentium M 753 (1.2GHz) processor with 512MB of RAM to back it up. That's not the fastest processor and not a huge amount of RAM but its more than adequate to get a quick boot from the laptop and is quick enough for standard office tasks etc.
DISK SPACE The model I bought had a 60GB hard drive in it. There are also 40GB and 80GB options available at different costs. With XP Pro, Full office 2003 pro and a few other apps on there I still have around the 50GB of space left, plenty.
SIZE Overall the laptop dimensions are (WxDxH): 28.6 cm x 22.9 cm x 2 cm
SCREEN The R200 has a 12.1" TFT XGA screen. Whilst that sounds small you have to remember that this laptop is intended for a sales / business traveller so size and weight are critical. Resolution goes up to 1024*768, not fantastic, but enough to get on with your working day without getting eye strain.
USING Setting up the laptop for the first time is easy. Plug in the power supply turn the machine on and off you go. Windows XP Professional comes as standard on the R200 and it is preinstalled. You need to wait a few minutes and answer some basic install questions and then your ready to go.
The R200 comes with built in Bluetooth for connecting to phones and built in wireless for network connections. Also as standard there are 2 USB ports, Ethernet port and a modem port. All these connections are easy to manage via a Toshiba application that controls the lot.
Using the Ethernet is as normal with XP Pro, plug it in and use it. Setting up the wireless on the R200 can be a little harder. I generally prefer to use the manufacturers software to control my wireless rather than windows. Now the problem on the R200 is that there are 3 different programs you can use to change the settings ????? why I don't know. So once you have disabled Windows you need to hunt about for the other to kill before you can get going. Toshiba use this cool little app which looks rather like a ships radar. Turn it on then turn on your Wireless via a switch on the side of the laptop. You get this radar software picking up the wireless networks at which point you can click and connect them to your PC. This is so easy to use and perfect for using in wireless hotspots.
Software wise you get the usual manufacturer rubbish, some good and some not so good. I have had a look through most of these and 90% are probably just best taken off. You do get Norten Internet on there which is an added bonus.
COOL TOYS Another little feature of the R200 is a finger print security scanner, yes finger print. This is a security aid for logging in and is located next to the touch pad. This runs along with an OmniPass program. You can scan your fingers in and use that to login. I found that it seemed to work most of the time depending on which finger you used. I think I'll stick to the good old password method, quicker.
SUPPORT If like me you tend to play about and break software then you needn't worry. Toshiba have the legendary Restore CD that has a Ghost backend. You could break the software all day long and the Restore CD will always get it back for you. There is a limitation here where by your stuck using the preconfigured single C Drive unless you have access to another Windows CD.
Well about a week has passed and I've been using the laptop for a few hours each day. I have to say I find it really easy to use. I had my doubts about usability because of the small size but they have been unfounded. The same applied to the small screen but I have no had any woes there either. Leaving it running for hours on end seems to have no effect, no noisy fans and no excessive heat.
If you dig one of these out in the aiport lounge then your a god.
The one that really got me was the warranty. You get a full 3 year manufacturers warranty with the latop, something you would normally have to pay extra for from other manufacturers. Toshiba suppor is always 2nd to none for laptops. You also get a full set of manuals already installed on the PC along with a variety of backup applications that run on your behalf.
OTHER SPECS
Toshiba Portege R200 - Pentium M 753 Pentium M 753 1.2 GHz 60GB disk (can get 40 or 80) 12.1"tftXGA (1024 x 768) 512MB RAM 2 x 256 MB chips Built in Bluetooth Built in Wireless 802.11b, 802.11g finger print scanner No cdrom Networking: Network adapter - Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet Manufacturer Warranty: 3 years warranty Battery: Lithium Ion Output: Sound card Input Device: Keyboard, touchpad AudioCard Reader: Yes Telecom: Fax / modem - 56 Kbps Graphics Controller: Intel GMA 900 Processor 24-bit (16.7 million colours)
Pictures of Toshiba Portege R200
Portege R200
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