-
"Impressive netbook with great battery life" on by ApacheVoyeur
Pros: Battery, weight, screen, keyboard, performance, easy upgrade to 2gb, bluetooth
Cons: Wife wants it, tiny mono speaker
Summary: Just picked up a blue/grey NB205 at Office Depot a few days ago. I charge when I go to bed and use on-and-off all day long. I'm quite impressed with performance; both long battery life and applications so far. Hulu and You-tube seem to stream fine. Did not have success with 720p-MKV file via VLC player, but that might be asking for too much. I do wish it had a little better sound; the tiny speaker under the front right is pretty weak. Just use headphones if you need the fidelity. Just connected my Motorola BT stereo headphones and it worked flawlessly. Yep, I love this little machine so far.
-
"Excellent machine - minor volume fix" on by wallachia
Pros: battery life, wireless reception quality
Cons: Low Speaker volume
Summary: I was considering returning the machine because of the low sound volume but I was able to tweak a little more volume by increasing all the sliders in the equalizer located in the Realtek HD Sound Effect Manager. (I got there through control panel). I researched netbooks quite a while before deciding on this one. what did it for me was the battery life. I can just grab it and throw it in the car as we go out and not have to worry if I've charged it recently. I've found the hibernate feature really works like it should on this machine. You just close the lid and it saves your place and shuts down. The next time you use it the boot up takes only a fraction of the time a full boot would.
-
"Impressive! Does more than I hoped for." on by calfee03
Pros: Battery life is phenomenal!
Keyboard feels great and is easy to work with
3 USB Ports (1 - Sleep and Charge)
LED screen is thin and bright
WebCam
Price
HDD
RAM upgrade to 2GB
Runs Win 7 w/ no issues
Runs iTunes w/ no issues
Toshiba software suiteCons: Horribly weak speaker!!!!
Large screen bezel.Summary: I bought this out of curiosity for the netbooks as well as to fill a need for a travel computer. I am coupling this machine with a 500GB pocket HDD. The first thing that I did was to install Windows 7 RC. I was skeptical at first but decided it wouldn't be too hard to revert back to XP if needed. Well so far, I do not see a reason to revert. Win 7 RC is running with no issues at all on this netbook. The software suite that comes installed from Toshiba is easy to download & reinstall from the Toshiba support site. The only one that did not work was the power monitor but there is no real need for that one anyway since windows gives you decent control of the power profiles as it is. All others are working great so far.
The next move was to install iTunes so I can keep my iPhone up to date and watch my movies on the computer versus the iPhone itself. Again, I was skeptical but all doubt was erased within the hour after copying my iTunes library from the external HDD to the aptly sized 160GB internal HDD. I have had no serious issues with iTunes either. The movies get minimally choppy if I have to switch from app to app like checking something on the web and then switching back to iTunes. Nothing worth being negative about though. So far so good with the NB 205.
I surf the web using Firefox 3.5 and that is running absolutely wonderfully right now. I did not have the means to install MS Office until I get back home so I opted for the OpenOffice.org suite. That is a suitable substitute at any juncture and it is working just fine for me right now. Its free and it the download/install was quick and painless.
After a couple of days of being plugged in, I decided to test the battery and found that it survived an entire day of on and off web browsing and standing by. I charged it over night and the following day I was able to watch Troy (Directors Cut) without any issues at all. It looked as good as expected on the LCD screen. Probably better than I thought it would. That was over 3 hrs and 15 mins long. I did shut down after that because I had a meeting to attend but in iTunes running a movie for that long on a single charge impressed me. I have not ran the battery to full depletion yet but may test that out later. I'll Troy followed by Braveheart to see if the battery can handle over 6 hours of iTunes movies.
I have used the USB ports extensively though. The two on the right work as expected but the sleep and charge port on the left made me proud as it was able to fully charge my iPhone while powered off and unplugged. When I woke the next morning my phone was full and the netbook still some battery life left when I booted it up.
I have not used the webcam for any vidchats yet but, I like the fact that it has one and it seems to work fine when I recorded a self interview for a work project. It's a little grainy but again it's nothing worth being negative about. My final positive thought is that the keyboard has far exceeded my expectations. I have typed this entire review on the netbook while listening to music via iTunes and there is no significant difference in touch typing here versus on a full size keyboard. Some strokes may be a bit tighter than others but overall it does not slow down my typing at all. The touchpad is the same as on any fullsize laptop.
The only real negatives that I have about this machine is the speaker. It is practically non existent. A set of earphones or small external speakers is a must for watching movies or listening to music. I am not sure what happened with in the sound department but they might as well have not even put a speaker in saved themselves a couple of buck in manufacturing.
I listed the large screen bezel as a con but it is only minimally so. It is unsightly but cosmetics don't affect functionality. It seems that screen could be almost a full inch larger but that may have affected the webcam and certainly would have affected the price. So, the 10.1 inch screen suits me fine and the large bezel is not that big of a deal.
Overall this is a strong machine and I am glad that I held out on netbooks until now. This was a well spent $349. I love the fact that runs Win 7 and the install was painless. The half star deduction was for the weak sound but I would have given 4.75 if that was an option. The speakers aren't work a 1/2 point but the system isn't perfect because of the speakers so I had to compromise there. I would recommend this system to friends and family and will probably buy one for my wife and son also. Hope this was helpful and happy shopping! -
"I would NOT recomend this to anyone. Waste of money." on by ShredrickMcGnar
Pros: Works just long enough for the warranty to expire.
Cons: Hard Drive went on it. So its worse than useless. Instead of helping me work Toshiba has made me go backwards. I would happily pay 350 dollars to be back where I was before I bought this junk.
When it was working though I experienced the issue withSummary: Called Toshiba and tried to kill them with kindness to get them to pay for the hard drive replacement and they weren't having any of it. Bottomline is computer lasted for 1 year and 4 months. Guess i should have heeded all those offers Toshiba made to "backup" my info. Should have seen the writing on the wall that this must happen alot. Stick with Apple. If you still just want a cheap thing to surf the net with I recommend getting the warranty and backing up frequently.
-
"Great battery, frustrating touchpad..." on by hessyhess
Pros: - Great battery life for a compact, sub-$400 machine (7 hrs.)
- Good keyboard
- 3 usb ports, decent webcam and SD reader
- Runs decent with Windows 7, despite Atom processor
- Easy access to hard drive, WiFi card and RAM (/w torx screwdriver)Cons: - A bit slower than competing notebooks (hp Mini 5101, Asus 1005HA)
- Intel Atom performance
- Poor touchpad responsiveness (tried 2 models)
- Poor speaker volume
- Build quality vs. competing models (again, hp Mini 5101, Asus 1005HA)Summary: This is certainly a good candidate for anyone interested in a netbook, especially considering its super-long battery life. It's attractive, the glossy LCD is quite bright, and it's quite thin, compact and light.
However, the Toshiba forums are filled with concerns over the touchpad, and I can confirm the validity of these concerns with the two models I've tried (with XP and WIndows 7, with and without touchpad drivers).
While the Alps touchpad is much larger than those in other netbooks, the sensitivity leaves much to be desired. The edges of the touchpad do not register swipes well. Even in the center, it just doesn't recognize my taps and swipes as well as other touchpads do. It make day-to-day usage frustrating. Uninstalling the Alps drivers seems to help this quite a bit, but then you lose the scrolling functions and tap zones. I suppose I could use a wireless or bluetooth mini-mouse, but that would add to the overall bulk of this package.
The Atom N280 leaves a bit to be desired, but it's still usable, especially with Windows 7. Don't expect Flash to run well, and definitely keep Aero disabled.
Other than that, this is a good netbook. The keyboard is a bit slippery, but otherwise great (even for larger hands); it also reflects the LCD light, eliminating the need for a keyboard backlight. The webcam, despite the low 0.3 MP resolution, is also decent.
Before buying this netbook, have a look at the Toshiba forums to see if/when Toshiba addresses the Touchpad issue. Google something like *Toshiba NB205 touchpad issues* and you'll see what I mean. If the touchpad issue is resolved, this thing deserves four stars for the price. In the meantime, definitely check out the Asus 1005HA -- I think it's a better netbook overall (at least for now).
Write a Review
Compare to other laptops
Compare Selected
%20-%20Laptops%20-%20CNET%20Reviews&srcUrl=http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/toshiba-mini-nb205-n311/4852-3121_7-33698116.html&x_breadcrumb=3000:3121&x_arw_bkts=MAD:high_wireless_switcher){kind=small}