Toshiba Portege R500

One look at the Toshiba Portege R500 and you know you're in the presence of a breakthrough. Weighing a mere 2.4 pounds, this notebook has all of the makings of a true no-compromise ultraportable. The silver magnesium-alloy chassis is sophisticated chic, and we love the full-sized keyboard that doesn't waste even a centimeter of surrounding space. This superthin, superlight machine is easy to grab and go in a hurry. The lack of mobile broadband is a bummer, and the razor-thin display lacks the punch of some other ultraportables, but overall this is a very good laptop for users who care more about portability than sheer power.
 
At its thinnest point, the R500 measures 0.8 inches thick, widening to one inch on the backside. The subtle wedge design makes the notebook easy to slide into a tote bag. And with its relatively long battery life, you can skip the AC adapter for general commuting or day trips, which saves 0.4 pounds in overall travel weight. The advanced magnesium-alloy case contributes to the R500's light weight, but what's most interesting is its flexibility. While some manufacturers tout their cases' rigidity, the R500's lid flexes and bends--seemingly with the glass in the display--to make for a uniquely durable case (view photo gallery).
 
The 12.1-inch backlit, transflective LED screen is fairly bright and easy to see in a regular office environment. What's most significant is the size of display you get for the weight. The Sony VAIO VGN-TZ150N, for example, weighs 2.7 pounds and features a smaller 11-inch display. However, the viewing angles on our unit are fairly narrow, and the colors aren't anywhere near as rich as the VAIO TZ150's. On the plus side, Toshiba includes a button above the keyboard that dims the display for outdoor use. A small speaker on the upper-left side of the deck is all you get for sound. It's good enough for Skype calls or watching a movie in your hotel room, but not for serious multimedia apps.
 
The keyboard has full-sized letter and auxiliary keys, save for the function, arrow, and Page Up/Down keys. These were still plenty accessible, and we had no trouble touch typing. The depth and feedback of the keys felt very good as well. The touchpad is nice and big for an ultraportable, and it includes vertical and horizontal scrolling, but there aren't any visual indicators. The mouse buttons are a litle small--because of the fingerprint reader located between them--but they got the job done without slowing us down.
 
You'll find three USB ports--one on the right and two on the left side of the system, along with FireWire, Ethernet, VGA, headphone and mic ports, and a volume dial. The DVD SuperMulti drive sits on the right, tucked in between the keyboard deck and a PC Card slot and an SD Card slot. Remarkably, this system includes a DVD burner that uses a new 7mm form factor, which is amazingly thin. A Wi-Fi on/off switch sits next to the optical drive.
 
Our system came with 1GB of RAM, but you can configure it with up to 2GB. It also has Intel's 945 chipset--no Santa Rosa here. But the 1.2-GHz Core 2 Duo U7600 processor offered decent performance, scoring 1,778 on PCMark05. That's a bit higher than both the VAIO TZ150 and Panasonic Toughbook CF-W5. The R500's 3DMark03 score of 810 means this system is just good enough to handle Vista's 3D Flip effects and basic multimedia.
 
We saw 3 hours and 15 minutes on our DVD rundown test, which is only 6 minutes less than the VAIO TZ150 but 15 minutes less than the Fujitsu P7230 and 44 minutes less than the Panasonic CF-W5. You should expect at most 5 hours of runtime when performing productivity chores.
 
The R500's 802.11a/g/n radio turned in very good wireless scores, managing 19.4 and 17.6 Mbps of throughput at 15 and 50 feet from our access point, respectively. Toshiba claims that since adding a PC Card is so easy, there's not much demand for built-in mobile broadband. Still, we'd still prefer to have the option. We like that this system has Bluetooth 2.0 on board, however.
 
For such a portable system, durability and security are key. The R500 comes with a spill-resistant keyboard--good for water, coffee, soda, and even beer. It has active hard-drive protection to stop the heads in case of a fall. TPM circuitry and the fingerprint reader are there to protect your data. And just in case something goes wrong, Toshiba backs this system with a generous three-year warranty.
 
All in all, the Toshiba Portege R500 packs a lot functionality into a very thin and light notebook. We wish the display offered better viewing angles, but if paper-thin computing is your thing, this is definitely the notebook to buy.