Quirky design mars the well-equipped Toshiba 4900CT
Rex Baldazo
Toshiba has long produced impressive laptop computers, and the T4900CT continues the family tradition. This 6.9-pound portable features a low-voltage Pentium processor, a 10.4-inch SVGA active-matrix color screen, separate Type II and Type III PCMCIA slots, and an unusually roomy 772-MB hard disk. But while we found it a powerful traveling companion, problems with the AccuPoint mouse substitute gave us second thoughts.
Solid Pentium Performance
With its speedy 75-MHz Pentium CPU, the T4900CT was about 80 percent as fast as our 90-MHz Pentium baseline in the
BYTE Benchmarks test
. The 3.3-V Pentium also helped stretch battery life on the Thumper 2 word processing test to 4 hours and 15 minute
s.
A small, nonbacklit LCD strip located above the keyboard displays the charge remaining in the main battery, as well as other status information. Known as the QuickRead icon bar, this LCD can show remaining battery life as either a percentage of the maximum charge or in hours and minutes.
When the laptop is idling in resume mode, the QuickRead bar displays an icon of a book with a bookmark. In this mode, a backup battery supplies power to main memory even when you shut off the computer. The main battery continuously charges the backup battery, so simply turning the T4900CT back on returns you to where you left off. But don't depend on this feature if you plan to leave the computer unplugged for an extended period--the backup battery will eventually drain the main battery, and you'll lose everything that you had stored in RAM.
Resume mode also allows you to swap out the main battery without losing the memory contents. However, this feature requires Toshiba's tailored version of DOS, whic
h is included with the T4900CT. When we installed MS-DOS 6.22 and swapped out the main battery, the computer rebooted instead of resuming, and we lost everthing in RAM.
The other icons on the QuickRead bar are fairly intuitive, though sometimes text would be better than a picture. For example, we'd prefer a simple Num Lock label to the tiny keypad icon.
Many laptops have a single Type III PCMCIA slot that also accepts a pair of Type II cards, but the T4900CT has separate Type II and Type III slots. You can install one of each type of card simultaneously, or two Type II cards. Both slots are on the right side of the computer, and they have separate access doors. Oddly, the Type II slot has a hinged door, while the Type III slot has a pop-off door.
For multimedia presentations, the T4900CT has a built-in sound system. But there's only one speaker, so if you want stereo sound, you'll still have to carry a pair of external speakers.
AccuPoint Agony
We like the
T4900CT's mix of features for power users, but we think the Achilles' heel of this machine is its AccuPoint pointing device. It handles pointing quite well, but is awkward for the clicking half of point-and-click operations.
The AccuPoint is a small green knob sticking out of the keyboard between the G and H keys. It works at least as well as similar devices, allowing confident control over the pointer. But for some reason, Toshiba decided to place the mouse buttons vertically along the front edge of the computer (
see photo
).
This peculiar placement makes it nearly impossible to use a wrist rest and the buttons at the same time. While writing this review on a T4900CT, the buttons became a real sore point, both literally and figuratively.
We also found that manipulating the AccuPoint with our right hand required a very nonergonomic twist of the wrist to reach the right button. In fact, we found the AccuPoint easier to use left-handed. Perhaps that was the intent,
but it seems unusual in the face of competing designs that work equally well for right-handers or southpaws.
Flip of the Coin
Our problems with the AccuPoint might seem like a minor complaint, but modern Windows applications increasingly rely on point-and-click operations, and it's those very applications that would make you consider a Pentium-powered portable in the first place. For that reason, we recommend that you try using a T4900CT for a while before buying; if the AccuPoint buttons don't bother you, the T4900CT is definitely a worthy machine. Its combination of a huge hard disk, built-in sound, and Pentium power is very appealing. Just leave room in your luggage for an external pointing device.
PRODUCT INFORMATION
Toshiba T4900CT (8 MB of RAM)
772 MB HD $6499
Toshiba America
Irvine, CA
(800) 334-3445
(714) 583-3000
illustration_link (6 Kbytes)
The floating-point and integer indexes compare performance to that of a 90-MHz Dell Pentium.
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The vertical placement of the AccuPoint buttons proved awkward, especially when used right handed.
Rex Baldazo
is a BYTE technical editor. You can reach him on BIX or on the Internet at
rbaldazo@bix.com
.
Color and a Pentium To Go
