The Toshiba Portege R700-S1320 delivers strong Core i5 performance (no ULV chip here) in a remarkably portable 3.2-pound body.
The R700 wears a businesslike suit — matte black being this season’s must-have — and aside from a couple of LEDs by the trackpad and some chrome highlights on the screen’s bezel, there’s not a whole lot of flashy stuff going on around the R700′s magnesium chassis.The chrome hinges are plastic, as are the darker gray touchpad buttons. The overall look is somewhat subdued but handsome.
Toshiba has decked out its new 13-inch ultraportable with a magnesium finish that feels stronger than its 12-inch predecessor and the palmrest features a honeycomb structure that gives added protection to the internal components.
Checking out the R700 from the left side, our beady eyes spy a multiformat card reader, VGA out and USB and HDMI ports. There’s an eSATA/USB combo port too, should you feel the need to attach an extra hard drive to the laptop.
Just as impressive, the R700 lasts 6 hours on a charge.
Weighing 3.2 pounds, the Portege R700 is one of the lightest laptops you’ll find with both a roomy 13-inch display and a built-in optical drive. R700 features a DVD drive, as normally the optical drive is the first thing to go when manufacturers are on a mission to save space and make machines lighter. We also spy another USB port, Ethernet port and twin 3.5mm sockets for headphones and a microphone.
The R700 has a spacious chiclet-style layout with satisfying tactile feedback. However, the keys themselves are a bit smaller than we’d expect from a 13-inch notebook, which made typing feel somewhat cramped until we got used to the machine.
Measuring 3.4 x 1.9 inches, the touchpad is huge. Navigating the desktop was mostly smooth, despite a bit of friction. However, because of its size and the fact that the touchpad is set higher than the keyboard, we sometimes brushed up against the pad accidentally. In some cases the cursor jumped when we didn’t want it to or we inadvertently activated the pinch-to-zoom gesture. Increasing the PalmCheck sensitivity setting helped with the former issue, and we recommend deactivating multitouch gestures.
