Toshiba Satellite A305 Review

by Kevin O'Brien

The Toshiba Satellite A305 is a redesign of the older A205, vastly improving the look and feel of the notebook, as well as adding the incredibly durable Fusion finish. While some of the lower body looks similar to the older notebook, everything from the waistline up has changed to a sleeker, softer, and glossier feel. Read on to see how well this notebook stacks up against its older brother, and find out if this notebook is worthy of a spot on your lap.

Our review unit of the Toshiba Satellite A305 features the following specs:

• Windows Vista Home Premium (SP1, 32-bit)
• Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T8100 (2.10GHz, 3MB L2, 800MHz FSB)
• 15.4" diagonal widescreen TruBrite TFT LCD display at 1280x800 (WXGA)
• ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 with 512MB video memory
• Intel Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN (802.11a/g/n)
• 3GB PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM (maximum capacity 4GB)
• 200GB Serial ATA hard disk drive (5400RPM) Primary
• 200GB Serial ATA hard disk drive (4200RPM) Secondary
• DVD SuperMulti (+/-R double layer) drive with Labelflash
• 1.3 megapixel webcam
• Harmon/Kardon stereo speakers
• Fingerprint reader
• Dimensions (WxDxH Front/H Rear): 14.25" x 10.5" x 1.4" /2.25"
• Weight: 6 lbs 13.5oz with nine-cell battery
• 120W (19V x 6.32A) 100-240V AC Adapter (6.0" x 2.55" x 1.45" and weighs 1.56 lb)
• 9-cell (6000mAh) Lithium Ion battery
• 1-Year Standard Limited Warranty
• Price as configured: $1,249.99

(view large image)

Build and Design

The first thing you will notice is every part of this notebook is glossy, from the screen cover to the palm rest, and even the keyboard keys. Toshiba is really showing off their new durable Fusion finish on every part of the notebook that they can, and in some ways it is a very good thing. Durability is a big thing with notebook finishes, as many glossy finishes will dull and scratch over time. The new Toshiba Fusion finish on this notebook is incredibly durable, and has yet to actually scratch throughout my testing. With multiple trips in my backpack, I can't find any visible scuffs on the cover, where other notebooks would show fine scratches almost out of the wrapper.

(view large image)

So what does this Fusion finish mean to you? Your keys will not go from matte to glossy over time as they wear down (they are already glossy). Every part of the notebook will get full of smudges and fingerprints, but you can always wipe it down in a couple of minutes to make it look brand new. On other notebooks you get all the smudges, but it would take some hard work with some plastic polish before you ever got it looking new again.

(view large image)

Build quality is excellent in most areas, giving the notebook a very solid feel. Squeaks and creaks are not present, and panel flex is at a minimum. The only areas that stand out as needing some improvement are the wobbly battery, and rough edges around the screen frame where the two plastic pieces meet.

Body Changes

The new Satellite A305 changes quite a bit of its design, while still retaining some resemblance of its older A205 brother. The biggest change is the use of the new durable Fusion finish, which can be found on practically every surface of the notebook, from the top cover to the individual keyboard keys. Unlike the older glossy surface that would scuff with minimal effort, the Fusion finish holds up very well, and I have yet to find any fine scratches or other wear on it.

The keyboard and surrounding area has changed quite a bit form the older A205, including touch sensitive multimedia keys, which are all the rage these days on most notebooks. Another change is the flush touchpad area, which is surprisingly slick with its textured surface. It is almost too easy to slide your finger around on it, and slip off onto the palm rest. The touchpad buttons have also changed quite a bit, going from rectangular slabs to chromed ovals which are easier to trigger, as well as being more comfortable to use.

Display

The screen quality is above average for glossy screens, with an evenly bright backlight and vibrant colors. Backlight bleed is minimal, meaning better game play in dark scenes without areas getting washed out. Viewing angles are adequate, with a wide horizontal range, but shallow vertical range. When tilting the screen back, you will have to find a sweet spot, and going out of that means washed out or inverted colors.

(view large image)	(view large image)
(view large image)	(view large image)

Keyboard and Touchpad

The keyboard on the Satellite A305 is made up of high gloss painted keys, which is fairly unique as far as mainstream notebooks go. The look is excellent, and goes very well with the silver striped glossy notebook. The feel is even better. There is just something about typing on a soft glossy surface that makes long typing very comfortable. Even things like gaming seem to work better, letting you easily slide from one key to the next with minimal drag.

(view large image)

One disappointing aspect of the keyboard is that it is not backlit, as that could be the only possible way to make it even more awesome. Hopefully this keyboard stays the same in the Qosmio, and gets some special backlit treatment. Below are some images showing how the backlights look in a dark room (the Satellite logo, media button and touchpad backlights can be disabled).

(view large image)	(view large image)
(view large image)	(view large image)

The touchpad is mounted flush with the palm rest, with the only indication of it being a touchpad at all is a semi-smooth textured overlay. I don't know what the surface is made out of, but it is oddly slippery. No matter if your fingertip is mildly sweaty or perfectly dry, it doesn't stick to the surface. For anyone who has used a notebook for hours on end, you know that eventually your fingers start to stick on some touchpad surfaces, this surface somehow prevents that. In use the sensitivity is excellent, with a wide range of adjustment offered through the Synaptics driver control panel.

The touchpad buttons are very nice, reminding me of the chrome bumpers on older cars. They feel soft to the touch without any hard defined edges, and even though they have very shallow feedback, they are probably some of the best touchpad buttons I have used.

Performance

For a notebook that costs $1,250 retail, you get a nicely equipped gaming rig that is hard to beat in performance or build quality. Mating the Penryn based Intel T8100 with the ATI Radeon 3650 gives outstanding overall performance, and easily copes with most modern games. The dual hard drive setup lets users gain additional space, as well as opens up the door for future expansion for even greater storage space without replacing the main system drive.

wPrime is a program that forces the processor to do recursive mathematical calculations, the advantage of this program is that it is multi-threaded and can use both processor cores at once, thereby giving more accurate benchmarking measurements than Super Pi. (Lower numbers mean better performance.)

Notebook / CPU	wPrime 32M time
Toshiba Satellite A305 (Core 2 Duo T8100 @ 2.1GHz)	36.442s
Asus M51S (Core 2 Duo T5550 @ 1.83GHz)	46.293s
Lenovo IdeaPad Y510 (Core 2 Duo T5450 @ 1.66GHz)	50.184s
HP Pavilion dv6700t (Core 2 Duo T5450 @ 1.66GHz)	50.480s
Dell Inspiron 1525 (Core 2 Duo T7250 @ 2.0GHz)	43.569s
Dell XPS M1530 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.485s
Portable One SXS37 (Core 2 Duo T7250 @ 2.0GHz)	41.908s
Sony VAIO NR (Core 2 Duo T5250 @ 1.5GHz)	58.233s
Toshiba Tecra A9 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	38.343s
Toshiba Tecra M9 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.299s
HP Compaq 6910p (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2GHz)	40.965s
Sony VAIO TZ (Core 2 Duo U7600 @ 1.20GHz)	76.240s
Zepto 6024W (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2GHz)	42.385s
Lenovo T61 (Core 2 Duo T7500 @ 2.2GHz)	37.705s
Alienware M5750 (Core 2 Duo T7600 @ 2.33GHz)	38.327s
Hewlett Packard DV6000z (Turion X2 TL-60 @ 2.0GHz)	38.720s
Samsung Q70 (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2.0GHz)	42.218s
Acer Travelmate 8204WLMi (Core Duo T2500 @ 2.0GHz)	42.947s
Samsung X60plus (Core 2 Duo T7200 @ 2.0GHz)	44.922s
Zepto Znote 6224W (Core 2 Duo T7300 @ 2.0GHz)	45.788s
Samsung Q35 (Core 2 Duo T5600 @ 1.83GHz)	46.274s

3DMark06 comparison results for graphics performance (higher scores mean better performance):

Notebook	3DMark06 Score
Toshiba Satellite A305 (2.10GHz Intel T8100, ATI Radeon 3650 512MB)	3,810 3DMarks
Asus M51S (1.83GHz Intel T5550, Nvidia 9500M GS 512MB)	3,749 3DMarks
Lenovo IdeaPad Y510 (1.66GHz Intel T5450, Intel X3100)	543 3DMarks
HP Pavilion dv6700t (1.66GHz Intel T5450, Nvidia 8400M GS 256MB)	1,556 3DMarks
Dell Inspiron 1525 (2.0GHz Intel T7250, Intel X3100)	545 3DMarks
Sony VAIO NR (1.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5250, Intel X3100)	504 3DMarks
Dell XPS M1530 (2.20GHz Intel T7500, Nvidia 8600M GT 256MB)	4,332 3DMarks
Dell Inspiron 1520 (2.0GHz Intel T7300, NVIDIA 8600M GT)	2,905 3DMarks
Dell XPS M1330 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS 128MB)	1,408 3DMarks
Samsung Q70 (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo T7300 and nVidia 8400M G GPU)	1,069 3DMarks
Asus F3sv-A1 (Core 2 Duo T7300 2.0GHz, Nvidia 8600M GS 256MB)	2,344 3DMarks
Alienware Area 51 m5550 (2.33GHz Core 2 Duo, nVidia GeForce Go 7600 256MB	2,183 3DMarks
Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Xi 1526 (1.66GHz Core Duo, nVidia 7600Go 256 MB)	2,144 3DMarks
Samsung X60plus (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo T7200, ATI X1700 256MB)	1,831 3DMarks
Asus A6J (1.83GHz Core Duo, ATI X1600 128MB)	1,819 3DMarks
HP dv6000t (2.16 GHz Intel T7400, NVIDA GeForce Go 7400)	827 3DMarks

PCMark05 measures overall notebook performance (higher scores mean better performance):

Notebook	PCMark05 Score
Toshiba Satellite A305 (2.10GHz Intel T8100, ATI Radeon 3650 512MB)	5,622 PCMarks
Asus M51S (1.83GHz Intel T5550, Nvidia 9500M GS 512MB)	4,649 PCMarks
Lenovo IdeaPad Y510 (1.66GHz Intel T5450, Intel X3100)	3,749 PCMarks
HP Pavilion dv6700t (1.66GHz Intel T5450, Nvidia 8400M GS 256MB)	3,386 PCMarks
Dell Inspiron 1525 (2.0GHz Intel T7250, Intel X3100)	4,149 PCMarks
Dell XPS M1530 (2.20GHz Intel T7500, Nvidia 8600M GT 256MB)	5,412 PCMarks
Dell Inspiron 1520 (2.0GHz Intel T7300, NVIDIA 8600M GT)	4,616 PCMarks
Dell XPS M1330 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, NVIDIA GeForce Go 8400M GS)	4,591 PCMarks
Sony VAIO NR (1.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5250, Intel X3100)	3,283 PCMarks
Lenovo ThinkPad X61 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	4,153 PCMarks
Lenovo 3000 V200 (2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7300, Intel X3100)	3,987 PCMarks
Lenovo T60 Widescreen (2.0GHz Intel T7200, ATI X1400 128MB)	4,189 PCMarks
HP dv6000t (2.16GHz Intel T7400, NVIDA GeForce Go 7400)	4,234 PCMarks
Fujitsu N6410 (1.66GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400)	3,487 PCMarks
Alienware M7700 (AMD Athlon FX-60, Nvidia Go 7800GTX)	5,597 PCMarks
Sony VAIO SZ-110B in Speed Mode (Using Nvidia GeForce Go 7400)	3,637 PCMarks
Asus V6J (1.86GHz Core Duo T2400, Nvidia Go 7400)	3,646 PCMarks

HDTune results:

(view large image)

(view large image)

Audio

The Harmon/Kardon speakers included on the A305 were excellent for gaming and watching movies. Unlike many normal notebook speakers, you can actually hear a hint of bass, which is welcome for speakers of this size. Volume levels that would easily annoy those around you could be reached without distortion.

Headphone performance was also very nice, providing clear, static-free audio.

Ports and Features

When it comes to ports Toshiba didn't hold anything back from the A305; packing every square inch of this notebook with a wide array of ports all around the sides.

• ExpressCard slot (ExpressCard/34 and Express Card/54)
• 10/100 Ethernet
• Modem jack
• 5-in-1 media card reader
• VGA out, S-Video, HDMI
• Microphone input port
• Headphone output port
• IEEE-1394 (FireWire)
• Four USB 2.0 ports (with "Sleep and Charge&quot
• 5 in 1 SD-Card Reader

Left: VGA, S-Video, HDMI, LAN, 2 USB, Firewire, Expresscard/54.

(view large image)

Front: Wireless On/Off, SD-Card Reader, Mic/Headphone, Volume.

(view large image)

Right: 2 USB, Optical Drive, AC Power, Kensington Lock Slot.

(view large image)

Rear view: No ports on this side.

(view large image)

Heat and Noise

Thermal performance of the Toshiba A305 was above average, with mild fan noise at low and high speeds, and the notebook staying relativity cool during game play. One area that did get kind of warm that is worth mentioning is the touchpad, which would reach almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit after the notebook had been on for a while.

(view large image)

(view large image)

Battery Life

Our review unit came with the larger 9-cell extended battery, which ended up not performing as well as we would have hoped because of constant background processes. With the notebook on the balanced power profile, and brightness to 50 percent, the notebook managed 2 hours and 50 minutes before it had to be shut down.

Conclusion

The Toshiba Satellite A305 is an excellent upgrade and overhaul to the older lackluster A205 notebook. The design looks great, the finish is awesome, the performance is outstanding, and the price is much lower than expected. I would have no problem recommending this notebook to friends and family, and right now it is almost too tempting to go out and buy one for myself.

Pros

• Above average LCD
• Slick keyboard (literally)
• Touch sensitive media keys
• Flush mount touchpad with great surface texture
• Excellent performance
• Outstanding price
• Great Harmon/Kardon Speakers

Cons

• Warm touchpad
• Reflective surface can blind others with its awesomeness
• Wobbly 9-cell battery

 

nice review, well done

 

great review!

 

Agreed, great review! Wow this machine 3d benchmarks faster then the dell 1520 with 8600 GT. And it pretty much blows the HP 6700 out of the water. Looks like the biggest issue is a warm touchpad which is probably because they crammed two hard drives and a strong dedicated gpu. I'd buy this over a Dell 1530 any day. I know many like Dells higher resolution screens but I'd rather have a nicer looking wxga without the risks of getting a grainy dell screen. And the step up in built in speakers puts this machine in the lead in my book. Looks like Toshiba has another winner here.

 

was that GDDR2?

the ATI looks promising, I may consider this one since I could not buy a XPS M1530.

thanks for the review.

 

From Toshiba's site:

ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 3650 with 512MB DDR2 discrete memory
+ up to 255MB allocated shared graphics memory

So no, its DDR2

 

I can't comment on benchmarks, performance and all the stuff like that.
I have not had the opportunity to check these parameters.

I had a very basic encounter with A305 in Best Buy and I do not like the look and design as well as built quality.
Palm rest feels cheap and my guess it has acrylic lamination finish. The whole area of palm rest is sagging pretty much when I squeeze it between fingers.
Because of black polish and rounded corners of a case the whole piece looks like a 'fat boy'
May be inside this notebook shines with top notch components, but exterior looks very cheesy...

 

Thanks for the review.

Were those hard drives set up as a RAID configuration? Did you record the HDD performance in PC Mark05? Something has contrived to give a very good PCMark05 score but the individual HDD performance is nothing stunning. If not the pair of HDDs then what else gave PCMark05 the big boost?

John

 

Strong scores for that ATI card. I do like the looks of the A305/A300, it's far superior to the A205. The A305 does seem a little bulky to me though and I'm not sure I'm as in love with the keyboard as Jerry and Kevin. Though to be honest I haven't spent more than 20 seconds trying it out, so that's not a fair assesment, it does take a bit of getting used to though.

Anyway, Toshiba is definitely back in the game with their latest Satellite offerings.

 

Is it possible to get some more in-depth performance benchmarks of the HD3650?

 

Most probably not. HDTune results for RAID show up in a single result, not in two hard drive results. I suspect having a Penryn processor + 3 GB RAM + a good dedicated graphics might be giving it the "big boost"? Which really isn't a big one because it scores quite near to an XPS M1530; the Tosh is just slightly higher probably because of Penryn.

Anyway nice review! Interesting notebook! Reminiscent of my Vostro -- big black chunky laptop with a good price/performance ratio. One big plus though is having two hard drives.

I lol'd at "Reflective surface can blind others with its awesomeness" :laugh:

 

but it is just T8100 , which is the slowest Penryn. So as for the CPU , the pc mark 05 score is very high and remember the Dell M1530 reviewed here had T7500, which is as fast as the T8100 in the A305.

 

Seems the GDDR3 8600M GT is a very nice card still. Beats 9500M GS and HD3650... hehe

 

Great Notebook and Toshiba is moving forward in satellite notebook design

 

Nearly 7 lbs.

 

Nice review Kevin.

I saw the Toshiba A300s at Best Buy before they were for sale (must have been a mistake on their part) and I was less than impressed with the build. It felt solid but considering that every single square inch of viewable area is covered in glossy coating, I can't see the long-term durability being that great. Also, this must attract fingerprints like mad.

Secondly, I didn't like the keyboard - it was okay, but not great. It feels a bit cheap to me and the tactile feedback is lacking when keys are depressed. The keyboard does not seem that durable. The keyboard makes cool sounds though.

Definitely an improvement over the A200, but it was more a step sideways than a step up in my opinion.

 

It's sad that computers specced better than mine are so much cheaper now.

:[

Oh technology...

 

cheapest 15 inch with 2 hds?

well you can get the t61p for less if you spec it down.

 

Cool review, but sad to see the HD3650 performance that low but I like blinding people with awesomeness part!

 

i would have expected a better battery time of Toshiba :S

 

It looks pretty nice...

 

Wow, it looks really nice. Too bad the ATI HD3650 sucks, though.

 

too shiny and glossy but it looks sexy

 

i own this for almost 4 weeks, bought if from BestBuy. Although now CircuitCity has better combo deals and a little cheaper price.

All i can say is that it feels very cheap and the screen quality is not any way better than HP, i owned an HP 2700 as well.

It looks cool, but i would again say the screen quality is very poor, now i think about it again. No HDMI either, at least on mine.

Keyboard is slippery feel, at least i don't feel comfortable.

Web Cam is very nice. Also very less bloat ware pre-installed.

Overall ok for the price, but again if you want to go for screen quality, i would suggest an LED pannel like 1330 or Sony notebooks.

 

We have Editor's Choice now? Yes!

Kevin, I love you.

 

Really an editor's choice? Pricing isn't anything special. It's large and heavy (especially with the 9 cell), performance is average, and battery life is awful.

From the sounds of comments here, build quality is also lacking. Then again it is called Editor's Choice for a reason right? To each his own.

 

i also headed down to the local bestbuy after hearing this glowing review and was not impressed
they did not have the version with the 3650 there, but the one with the 3570
overview of issues
the lower chassis is rock solid, no complaints there, however.....

wxga only, just like the m51 was railed on for
screen hinges seemed very flimsy (this is compaired to an s96j, not exactly the epitome of build quality)
lcd protection seemed very flimsy, the back of the lcd seemed as bouncy and soft as certain cheap notebooks like say a dell inspiron or the old aspires (havent felt the new ones) once again dissapointing compaired to my s96j.
keys.... are pretty but i have never noticed such a clicky keyboard, every press results in a loud "click"
finally i looked up the specs on toshiba's website..... WTF is with the hard drives? one is 5400 , the other an archaic 4200rpm drive. what is the point of having two drives = 400gb when a single 320 or 500 drive could be used, esp considering the low performance of the second drive. It seems the hard drive configuration is just a waste of battery life.

one final note..... parts of it are beautiful, but hte overall design is a bit hiddeous, the upper and lower chassis just dont belong together.... the lcd bevels to the center, leaving a big gap that just doesnt look right.

im sorry i respect this website a ton, i do view it as the one reputable place to find out about notebooks, but certain reviews have made me scratch my head

edit: just to clarify i headed down, not to see for myself and raise trouble, but because im planning on getting a new notebook this summer, and until this had been considering between the compal 92, m50, and f8. ill still keep an eye on this, but with the lack of upgrade options (only wxga), poor warranty, and half assed fit, i doubt ill be picking this

 

if it's screen quality is as bad as the HP pavillion's , I would never touch it for sure.

but I dont think the LED in the Dell XPs is so great either.

I think resolution is more important than brightness, personally for a 15.4 , it's got be at least WSXGA+. For a 14.1, it's got be at least WXGA+...........WXGA is only good for 13.3 or less.

 

Thats is very true, I had a go on a A3xx (Asia Pac model, with X3100) about a month ago. The keyboard gloss is quite unnecessary, and the keys felt a little ''mushy''.

 

What was the resolution for the 3dmark06?

 

1280 x 800

 

Kevin,

Future proof how easy is it to get to the CPU? The review had pictures of the underside but the numbers did not tie into descriptions. I had a zd8000 from HP and it was a disaster to get to the CPU. The version of the 305 I'm looking at comes with HD 3470 graphics so I'm also looking for a guide on how easy to change that card out for an upgraded GPU.

I'm liking the price point for this machine with the T8100 and HD 3470 but I'll want to upgrade down the road.

Haven't found any Toshiba's with Bluetooth? Not their deal?

 

I just read this review...wow great review

everything Kevin said about this laptop is true, its my third laptop and by far the best in all aspects.

I have the A305-S6845, I've had it for almost one month now.

I just added a 2gb stick of ram to max out at 4 now...i'll wait a few more months and get the t9300 2.5 ghz...

I really do enjoy this one it is faster in everyway than my old desktop was (since rebuilt).

I would recommend this laptop to anyone that asked...

edit: The CAPS LOCK key even has a little green light so you know its in caps lock mode

 

just wanted to add to Kevins review on some key selling points for myself;

the touchpad is my favorite, its flush mounted and very slippery making it the best touchpad i've ever tried on any laptop period.

as far as construction goes, every laptop that ive seen and touched in retail stores is flimsey to a certain point. this model is up there in my book on construction strength.

the screen is just fine to me also, its brite and watching movies on it is a pleasure.

the keypad is noisey but that doesnt concern me. i do like the feel of the keys also.

having a built in webcam is a plus for me, since its my first laptop to have this feature. what can i say, its great with skype.

and for the overall design, i am very pleased with it. its different, its retro yet modern and thats why i like it so much.

it is a finger print magnet...though Kevin is right, its easy to wipe smudges and finger prints off to make it look new again. I use a micro fiber cloth that works great.

i think the only complaint i have for this laptop is that it can generate some heat indeed.

what else can be said...i know the design is new and unusual, that is what people cant get use too, they are use to seeing things a certain way and no other laptop looks like this one and thats why i like it...

"change is good"

 

i love mine. although, mine came w/ 4gb ram and no fingerprint reader.

 

That's a pretty typical Toshiba issue.

Well, I want, I want bad.

 

Are those temperatures under load or idling? If it is just idling, what temperatures are reached at the top and bottom of the notebook under load?

 

External temperatures did not vary much between heat soaked being on for the entire day, or under load for an hour or more. Most of the time the fans kick in and certain parts become cooler with the increased airflow. We take temperature readings by warming the notebook up under load, then let it sit for a couple of minutes to even out.

 

so 3800ish at 1280x800. Sounds like a 8600M GT to me,still not bad.

It's a laptop typical issue Most of the laptops I`ve used get warmish around and on the touchpad.

 

Thanks for the information!

If you have time, could you state roughly what external temperatures were experienced during some simple operation like word processing?

 

Ive evaluated this series of laptop in stores, as usual the reviews here focus on form instead of function as the repeated emphasis on the fusion finish dictates.

This laptop is not well ventilated and the "fusion" finish is not likely to look soo wonderful two years from now when its good and used.

The review mentions NOTHING about how badly the laptop flexes from palmrests to the weak lcd cover that permits you to dimple the lcd screen when you press against it. Better graphics cards would have been nice too....oh yeah we only put one fan in the laptop so better graphics options are not likely.

This series focus on two things, cheap and bling. Alas for those who want a good price and a quality built product.

 

Hello,

I joined today after purchasing this P305D lappie that has RM-70 cpu. You mention the flex in this laptop but I have to disagree. I was at circuit city today and tested most laptops that were on display and almost all of them had the same flex including the one that this replaced--hp dv6700.

This laptop is freaking awesome. I currently own a hp 6700, hp 2700, mac book pro 15.4 and now this lappie. I wanted a larger laptop and this fits the bill and for $799!!! The speakers on this laptop are the best I have ever heard on a laptop..simply amazing for laptop speakers.

The build quality is as every good as the build quality on my hp's and I have had them for 1.7 yrs.

cheers
Hawkeen

 

good review, toshiba seems to be getting serious

 

We came across this item at Circuit City and Best Buy when we were looking for a laptop for daughter to use for school and games, myspace, email, - mainly SIMS - that's about as heavy of gaming that would take place. The price was great especially with 3gb of ram, etc...so am hoping this laptop would fit our needs. Any input will be appreciated. Thank you.