Re: D8: Speed issue - very slow even on P4 1.4

From: Arthur Hoornweg (arthur.hoornweg_at_wanadoo.nl.net)
Date: 02/20/04 

Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2004 15:32:36 +0100

damian marquez wrote:

> Is it a T40? I think I will be assigned one of those soon. Interested in
> any opinions :)

Sorry for the delay, I had forgotten all about this thread.

It is an R40. Very similar to the T-40 but different in
details. I think it is better value for money (got mine
for 1100 Euros, but that's the wholesale price without
VAT).

The casing is not magnesium but plastic, but of extremely
good quality. This notebook will certainly not crack at
the hinges like my previous Toshibas did. It is very
robust and perfectly suitable for travelling.

Mine has a 15" XGA screen (my eyes are too bad for sxga),
11 mbps WLAN, 30 gb HDD, 1,3 GHz Pentium-M. It's very
lightweight, runs 5-6 hours on one battery. It is by
far the best notebook I've ever had (my previous ones
were Toshibas and boy, is this an improvement!).
And that Pentium-M is fast, much much faster than the
GHz number suggests. Comparable to a 2 GHz P4. And
perfectly silent!

Screen is OK but not great, a bit blueish, but the
display driver corrects that nicely because one
can correct gamma for all 3 primary colors. I reduced
the blue and green a bit and now it looks just right.
It is a true 3x8-bit true color LCD, not a cheapo
high-color one, and perfectly usable for playing DVD's.

The keyboard is absolutely terriffic, never seen anything
like it. Nice big keys, good tactile feedback, very
robust. You can hit them real hard without anything bending
or breaking. I especially like the small white LED that
illuminates the keyboard (great for nightly train trips).

The motherboard is equipped with a TCPA-like security
chip that is disabled by default. If you want, you can
download a free application on the IBM website and
enable it.

A few Gb of the HDD is "hidden" and contains a backup of
the system files. I deleted it because I need all the
HDD space I can get.

The only negative point is that the optical drive won't
read DVD+R or +RW, only -R and -RW. I'll replace the
dvd/cdrw combo soon for a "real" dvd writer.

A word of advice: Get the docking station as well! I use it
with an external keyboard, mouse and an LCD monitor.
The graphics adapter (Ati mobility radeon 7500) supports
multi-monitor desktops

The IBM may not look spectacular, but looks are deceiving.
I have yet to see a nicer notebook. It is less suitable for
the fans of action games, though. 

-- 
Arthur Hoornweg
(please remove the ".net" from my e-mail address)

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