Review: Toshiba A100/R00

[Rondog]

Toshiba A100/R00 – Windows Vista Edition

Recently I have purchased yet another laptop for work use. I needed the biggest and the best, and when layed down the dosh, the only choice was the Toshiba A100/R00. Carrying a hefty tag of $2899 my hip pocket felt it.

The Toshiba A100 comes in two flavours, Windows XP and Windows Vista giving users the option to install whichever they want and not having the issue of worrying about driver support.

The R00 is the top spec of the Vista version. Featuring 2 GB of RAM, 160GB HDD, an Intel Core2Duo 2.16 GHz CPU with a 256mb nVidia 7600GT thrown into the mix. It makes for an excellent all rounder and decent gaming machine. For what I use this machine for its quite possible over kill.

- Storing my 45gb music collection on the go for when I’m at work
- Storing numerous image files including things like all versions of Vista, XP, Office 2000, 2003 and 2007. You never know when your going to need them going ‘onsite into the unknown’
- Quicken accounting software so I can track stock and write invoices for customers on the stop and print them on site and not have to mail them out.



All I actually need in a laptop is a basic number cruncher. At this point I’m deciding about selling my desktop so paid an extra $1000 on a laptop to get something capable of gaming should I ever have time to load CSS and kick some arse.

Additional features of this unit include 4x USB ports, VGA out, both standard PCMCIA and Express card slots, and a biometric scanner (fingerprint reader).

Gigabit Ethernet is also another fun feature.

This laptop handles CSS quite well managing to pull a stunning 87.19 FPS on the CSS test with all settings maxed out running at a resolution of 1280x800.

Running on maximum power it manages 27.444 sec on Super PI. When running off the battery this time climbs to almost a minute stopping short at 57.998 sec.

The built in 16x DVD burner allows you to burn 4.7gb of data in around 15 min. Or rip a DVD movie onto the HDD in about 11 min.

Bluetooth comes standard in the A100 series from about $1499 and up. The device is above average being able to transmit a 1mb photo from my phone in about 30 sec standing at 4-5m with a plasterboard wall in the way.

The built in software is nothing to write home about. Includes the usual 60 day trial of Norton, no office package and only basic burning software which comes included as a part of Windows Vista Home Premium.

Build quality is outstanding being a tough-shell and not having any problems with abuse and general use it receives from me in the few months i've had it.

All in all this is a good solid performer at quite a reasonable price. Offering almost everything currently available in a notebook and still being a stellar price.

[Samuknow]

Front Page

[Áedán]

What's the battery life like?

Your comment about Bluetooth: "The device is above average" makes it sound like the Bluetooth module is a 2.0 or 2.1 EDR device, which transmits about three times faster than the older 1.x Bluetooth devices.

[Rondog]

I'm not sure whether what it is, but I believe it is 2.0.

The battery is reasonable for the spec of the unit, running in maximum power saving mode while just browsing the net over wifi and downloading drivers and things etc approximately an hour and 45 min to 2 hours depending on if the screen is actually on or not.

EDIT: Thanks for the FrontPage.

[dsio]

I must say, I've always had a profound respect for Toshiba laptops. The Japanese just tend to know exactly what they're doing, and take engineering seriously.

Only thing letting it down is Vista.

[aghastpumpkin]

Only in your opinion...

[Daniel ~]

Well yes, that's what we often post here opinions.
If only you weren't afraid of Fedora! ":O}

Fear of Fedora has motivated many a timid soul to go Vista... sad, but what can one do!? The up side is that having Vista beat the crap out of them, disappoint in every benchmark, over charge and then just fizzle out and fade from the scene tends to toughen 'em for Fedora... life is a wheel! ":O}

[Daniel ~]

Lighten up AP, your among friends.":O}