Product Reviews

It's fun to have choices. Will it be chips, boiled or mashed potatoes, sir? Red wine or white? And when it comes to buying a PC, we're presented with an increasing number of options. You can have a full-on desktop PC, a mini-PC like this month's Watford Aries, a desktop replacement notebook, a portable notebook or something small and ultra-portable.

The new Toshiba Satellite 2450 is certainly a very good-looking option, mixing metallic blue and black to excellent effect. It's a bit on the chunky side, though - 336x290x38mm (wdh) - and weighing 3.59kg, it's not a lightweight travelling companion.

With its lid lifted, the Toshiba Satellite looks the part, though. Its translucent blue keys, sculptured corners and silver speaker grills wouldn't look out of place in the most image-conscious Soho bar. The Toshiba purrs: "I'm cool - and so is the person carrying me."

Fortunately, the Toshiba isn't too cool to be useful. Its keyboard is just as pleasing to type on as it is to look at. The keys are well-sized and generously spaced, and the typing action, though a little light for my taste, was just firm enough. I didn't much care for the short space bar, but Toshiba has placed it in just right place for you to find easily with your thumbs when typing at speed.

Next the hinge, which connects the body of the notebook to the screen. Here Toshiba slips up a little in the pursuit of coolness. A notebook's hinge is critically important, as it gets loads of stress and aggro throughout its life, yet must remain solid to support the screen. It must also protect the wires that run from the body of the notebook to the LCD screen. For my money, the Toshiba's hinge is too flimsy.

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Move the screen to a comfortable viewing angle, let go and the screen bounces back and forth on its hinge. Not ideal.

Consolation for this minor gripe is in the screen itself: it's an excellent 15in TFT display. It's lit evenly across its whole area and very crisp and sharp under close scrutiny. It would certainly make working in Windows very easy on the eye. The richness of the display's colour also lends itself to watching DVDs.

To aid you further in the film watching department, the Toshiba has a useful combination CD-R/W and DVD player. This is an excellent addition and goes some way to compensate for the absence of a floppy drive. Floppies may be old hat these days, but they can still be very useful when it comes to getting your work off a notebook. If you find yourself stuck, remember you can use a CD-R/W disc as if it were a giant floppy disk.

The Toshiba's speakers are also something special. Stamped at the top-right of the machine is 'Harman/Kardon' - makers of very fancy Hi-Fi amplifiers, speakers and the like. Despite having little in the way of bass, the stereo speakers are surprisingly clear and crisp, and there are some chic silver buttons on the front of the machine for controlling the CD player functions.

The notebook also bristles with useful connectors. Along with the now-standard USB 2 ports and a FireWire connector, you'll also find a Secure Digital slot. SD cards are little bigger than a first class stamp. They are becoming common in MP3 players, digital cameras and handheld computers, so passing files between your Satellite and your funky new SD-equipped music player or camera will be a cinch.

Sadly, performance isn't blistering, The Toshiba scores only 923 in our 2D benchmarks. When compared with the performance of the Multivision from this month's group test, this is very average. In 3DMark 2001, the Toshiba scores 4180 - respectable, but not record breaking.

The Toshiba Satellite 2450 is a beautiful notebook. It looks attractive, has a fantastic screen and its keyboard, despite some minor compromises, is lovely to use. However, the Satellite's little luxuries can not compensate for the fact that it's slightly over-priced. If you're looking for a better buy, check out this month's Notebook Labs winner.