Netbooks, or mini laptops, are coming down on the mobile consumer like rain. They are beginning to be manufactured on the scale of cell phones. For the sake of this dear Earth, I hope there’s a recycling program available for these mini’s as well. The Toshiba Mini NB205 is a purse computer that is selling at the $400 mark. However, the performance doesn’t compete well with other netbooks product lines that have already been well established in the market. This mini, because of its price, will surely not do for Toshiba what the Palm Pre did for Palm. For $400, more is expected but that depends on the value of your dollar in relation to the performance and your love for Toshiba.
Compliments: The design stands out from the rest; Touch pad is spacious; Can be charged by USB when off; Long battery life – 8.5 hours; Keyboard; Easy to Upgrade
Complaints: Speakers make you think you’re losing your hearing; Boots as fast as a slug; Battery pack is a bit bulky; Price
Design
I have a lot of admiration for Toshiba products and so I have a bitter/sweet relationship with this mini. What I first thought to be a nice aspect of this design that would have stood out for me is the power button being exposed even when the netbook is closed because it is placed in the screen hinge, right in the middle. I thought the Toshiba Mini can be turned on by feeling around in the bag for the power button while waiting for my Mocha at Biggby Coffee. This might have made up for the longer than average boot time because the Toshiba should have been ready to go by the time my Mocha is ready. However, the button isn’t able to be activated if the netbook is closed. Why they put this at that location is something that troubles my dreams. Of course, having it activated while closed could be a killer for the battery and a disappointment when being ready to access the Toshiba Mini but finding it had been on for hours and is ready to hibernate because of low battery. Like I said, it’s a bitter sweet dance.
To start off on a good note, the bottom of the Toshiba Mini NB205 has plenty of air vents to keep this little computing cutie cool. It almost seems a little unnecessary because of the size but it’s a delight to see. It would be nice if more of the larger laptops were ventilated to this extent.
The quality of the construction doesn’t seem sufficient despite its size. Usually small things are tougher because of their lower center of gravity and higher concentration of matter. However, this mini has too much of a plastic feel to it that makes you feel like it will break if you shake your bag or purse just a little bit. The screen seems to be securely snug but that’s the only thing. The keys of the keyboard seem as if they’ll break from extensive typing.
Back to the bottom of the Toshiba Mini and back to some good points, there are panels that make it easy to access the hard drive and RAM for simple upgrading. There’s no worry about breaking this secondary computer when all you want to do is add more RAM or change the hard drive.
Another delightful aspect that tries, though in vain, to take my mind off the $400 dent it attempts to make on my wallet is the nice sized mouse pad and large mouse knob. I always found a tiny mouse pad to be the hardest thing to adjust to when paired with a tiny screen so the increase in the size of mouse pad and knobs in the Toshiba Mini NB is a warm welcome.
Sharing the bottom of the Toshiba netbook are the speakers which are weak and not worth talking about. This computer is mean to be used with headphones. I will say that, for a mini, can Bose quality be expected? Do you expect a subwoofer to be magically placed on a 10” computer?
Color, Dimensions, Weight
Color options for the lid are Sable Brown, Posh Pink, Frost White, and Royal Blue. The compact dimensions of this netbook are 10.4” x 7.6” x 1.3”. It’s small but not the smallest – which is a reassuring thing for some people. The weight is 2.8lbs with the adapter – less than a gallon of milk.
Keyboard
The keyboard is also something I found to be gratifying because they keys are raised and on a metal island. It does take some getting used to but with minis, one thing I found a challenge when typing is being able to know what keys I am pressing. The raised keys make me surer of what I am typing. I like it.
Display
At 10.1” the resolution is 1024 x 600 pixels. It has a display with LED-backlight. Colors are clear and it has just enough gloss to improve the picture quality without being as reflective as a mirror.
There is too much bezel around the display that takes up too much real estate. To make up for the small, 10.1” display there are short cut keys that allow the user to zoom text in certain programs like the browser and PDF readers.
The webcam, which is 0.3 megapixels, sits above the display and works rather nicely. The speed depends on your connection but on standard DSL there was no blurry motion and the image was clear.
Performance and memory
Processor
A 1.66-GHz Atom N280 powers the Toshiba Mini NB205 and it does so with impressive results. Running a few other applications while streaming video didn’t slow things down much or cause anything to freeze.
Memory (RAM Hard drive) and Graphics
The SATA hard drive runs and 5,400 rpm and stores 160GB. I still look back at the days when full sized laptops came with 80GB and were considered impressive so 160GB for a mini will always fascinate me until the days come when they start storing Terabytes.
The Toshiba Mini NB205 comes with 1GB of RAM that can be upgraded to 2GB.
The graphics card is a GMA 950 and the video memory is 251MB.
Wi-Fi
The Wi-Fi card performed great, giving an impressive a bit over 20 Mbps from 15 feet away. 40 feet and it was still around the 20 Mbps mark. The connection stays strong and didn’t hinder streaming of music or videos. YouTube worked well and the Toshiba leaves the wireless performance up to the router being used.
Software
Windows XP is the OS that functions this mini and other software like Zoom Utility and HDD Protection, PC Health Monitor. Norton is the provided security software trial offer.
While Toshiba will not offer configuration options, you can upgrade the netbook’s RAM to 2GB on your own. As mentioned, Toshiba will also sell the $349 NB205-N210 model without the adorned lid and island keyboard.
Warranty
Toshiba gives a warranty of 1 year, limited, with 24/7 toll-free tech support – standard.
The Gist of It
The price of this laptop could be scaled down about $30, and then I would say it’s a decent buy, especially when you can buy some decent laptops for the same price during a sale. Of course, I’m a bit biased because I don’t think going mini should mean the price is miniaturized along with the size. Toshiba does offer another version of this model for $349 (Toshiba NB205-N210) but it excludes the island keyboard and pretty lid. Over all I give it an 8 because it is a pretty solid performing machine with great endurance. Toshiba products are built to last. However, $400 is a bit much but it’s sadly in the price range with others in its class. I’d wait until it goes on sale or buy it refurbished in this time of needful thrifty spending.
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http://www.pcworld.com/article/154358/top_10_netbooks.html
Congrats. I think you’re the first reviewer that didn’t find this netbook completely awesome. PCWorld rates it their #1 netbook right now.
Thanks for the Reply! Gives me hope that this Blog has some life to it.
The Toshiba NB205 is a netbook and not the only netbook in the market. The battery is too bulky and they put a $50 value on the fancy keyboard – it’s $349 without it. I say lower the price a bit and show me that it will survive a few drops and then I’d be impressed. These are the times where $50 will be the determining factor.