Toshiba Tecra A9-127

Toshiba makes great fanfare about the EasyGuard technologies within its business notebooks. Crucial components are cushioned against impacts, and areas such as the delicate TFT display are reinforced. While these features are genuinely useful, as is the spill-resistant keyboard and the hard disk shock protection that parks the drive heads and helps keep data safe in the event of a fall, we weren't entirely convinced of the Tecra A9-127's robustness.

It isn't a bad-looking notebook, but the build doesn't feel all that solid. We merely had to grab the display and adjust its angle to notice ripples across the TFT panel. More energetic grappling and twisting of the display resulted in even more image distortion. The base feels equally flexible, and the wristrest was also more pliant than we'd like.

Toshiba has squeezed the power button and a couple of shortcut buttons along the keyboard's left-hand side. This leaves the keyboard feeling cramped, and it took a while before we stopped hitting the shortcut buttons instead of the Shift key. The keys don't give much feedback and feel too close together for comfortable typing.

Despite its budget price, the spec hasn't suffered. A 120GB hard disk is among the smallest in the group, but the accompanying DVD writer makes light work of backup tasks. And with an Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 processor accompanied by 2GB of memory, the Toshiba earned a respectable 1.11 in our benchmarks.

The 1,280 x 800 resolution display isn't the best in the group, but it's free from any serious defects. It's bright enough, and the matte finish keeps distracting reflections to a minimum.

Battery life is good, and under light use the battery managed just over four-and-a-half hours. Heavy usage saw this drop to an hour, but for office tasks it will outlast many of the 15.4in laptops here.

The Toshiba offers impressive value for money, but unimpressive build quality leaves a blot on its copybook.

Author: Sasha Muller