Toshiba Unveils Three Notebooks

Toshiba has announced three new laptop PCs, one a multimedia notebook and the other two positioned as desktop replacement models that use desktop processors.

The Satellite 1905-S303 and the Satellite 1955-S803 are designed as somewhat-portable PCs for home or small-office use, according to Toshiba, which unveiled the new systems on Tuesday. The other new notebook, the Satellite 5205-S503, is designed for high-end consumers who want to use their notebooks for multimedia applications.

Overheating Avoided

The Satellite 1905-S303 uses a desktop 2.4-GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor and weighs 8.3 pounds, while the 1955-S803 is powered by a 2.5-GHz Pentium 4 and weighs 9.6 pounds, according to the company.

"These notebooks are designed for people who want to be mobile, but don't do it on a regular basis," said Oscar Koenders, vice president of product marketing and worldwide product planning for Toshiba.

Toshiba's notebooks with desktop processors have come under fire by analysts and users for the excess heat generated by their desktop processors. In a desktop chassis, this heat is dissipated, but the smaller notebooks retain more heat, which can cause the processor to throttle back its clock speed or shut down altogether. Owners of Toshiba's Satellite 5005-series notebooks filed a class-action lawsuit against the company in August, charging that Toshiba was aware the desktop processors would cause problems in those notebooks.

But these two new laptops will not suffer from this problem, he said.

"We are talking about a completely different machine" with the 1900 series, Koenders said. The notebooks are larger than the 5005 series, and include additional heat shields, he said.

Prices, Portability

A sample configuration of the S303 with the 2.4-GHz Pentium 4, 512MB of RAM, a 40GB hard drive, a 15-inch TFT LCD, ATI Technologies Mobility Radeon graphics, two USB 2.0 ports, and a DVD-ROM/CD-RW combination drive costs an estimated $1999.

The S803, with a 2.5-GHz Pentium 4, 512MB of RAM, a 60GB hard drive, a 16-inch SXGA display, NVidia GeForce4 440 Go graphics, three USB 2.0 ports, and a DVD-ROM/CD-RW combination drive, will cost an estimated $2799. The S803 also comes with integrated Wi-Fi (802.11b) wireless capability, which allows Toshiba to package a wireless keyboard and a wireless mouse with the notebook.

The other Toshiba notebook, the Satellite 5205-S503, is designed for high-end consumers who want to use their notebooks for multimedia applications, such as viewing DVD movies. It features a customizable bay that can accommodate an additional hard drive, battery, or optical media drive, Koenders said.

The S503 uses Intel's Mobile Pentium 4-M processor, which alleviates the need for heavier heat shields and more-expensive heat sinks. The notebook will come with NVidia's GeForce4 460 Go graphics card, which uses 32MB of graphics memory. This card was announced on Monday by NVidia.

A sample configuration with a 2-GHz Mobile Pentium 4-M, 512MB of RAM, a 40GB hard drive, three USB 2.0 ports, and a remote control will cost $2199. The standard lithium ion battery offers up to 3 hours of battery life, and the notebook weighs 7.7 pounds.