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Entered CNET Catalog: 03/04/2007
SKU: 0032017816022
Manufacturer: Toshiba
Manufacturer description
The Tecra M5 delivers the optimal balance of on-demand performance, reliability and security designed to keep business users mobile and productive-today and tomorrow. The Tecra M5 is meticulously engineered for the daily rigors of mobile computing with a comprehensive set of Toshiba-exclusive EasyGuard Technology enhancements that secure and protect critical components and data, simplify connectivity and customize the mobile experience.Product summary
The good: Lightweight yet sturdy; strong office productivity performance; comfy keyboard; Trusted Platform Module and fingerprint reader; long warranty.
The bad: Short battery life; display is not wide-screen; weak speakers; smallish touch pad; available only in fixed configurations.
The bottom line: But for its abbreviated battery life, the Toshiba Tecra M5 is a well-balanced, powerful business laptop.
CNET editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 03/15/2007
The Toshiba Tecra M5 seems be something of a dying breed. While most business laptops have incorporated wide screens and more entertainment features, the Tecra M5 holds fast to its standard-aspect display and minimal media controls. That's not to say that the Tecra M5 is behind the times; it's just all business, with such corporate-friendly features as a fingerprint reader, Trusted Platform Module, and a lengthy three-year warranty. And when it came to our office productivity tests, the Tecra M5 performed as well as some laptops with higher-end components. In fact, our primary complaint relates to the system's battery life: the Tecra M5 couldn't quite hit the two-hour mark on our drain tests. If you're not planning to stray far from a power outlet, or if you can afford the extended battery ($152), the Toshiba Tecra M5 delivers a nice balance of business-friendly features and strong performance for its $1,899 price.
Weighing 5.3 pounds (6.3 pounds with its AC adapter), the Tecra M5's boxy case is lighter than you'd expect. It measures 12.2 inches wide, 10.1 inches deep, and 1.5 inches thick, making it a bit chunkier than the Lenovo ThinkPad T60P, which has the same size display. Despite its light weight, the Tecra M5 feels well-built and sturdy enough to endure the bumps and spills of business travel. Two thick hinges support the display, and Toshiba trumpets a magnesium-alloy chassis and a shock-absorbing hard drive. Overall, the Toshiba Tecra M5's boxy, gray-and-black design can't be called inspired, but it is functional.
The 14.1-inch standard-aspect display on the Toshiba Tecra M5 has a native resolution of 1,400x1,050. The boxy screen lacks the glossy finish found on more entertainment-focused notebooks, making the Tecra M5 ideal for documents and spreadsheets, but less exciting for watching DVDs. Though it'll do for watching a movie on the plane, the screen color seemed washed out, and the video had to be letterboxed to fit the square screen. As on many business-oriented laptops, the built-in stereo speakers produce muddled, canned sound. A volume wheel on the right side of the case constitutes the extent of the system's media controls.
Typing long documents on the Tecra M5's keyboard was a breeze; the nearly full-sized board felt extremely sturdy and the keys offered just the right amount of resistance. As with all Toshiba laptops, the Windows key has been moved to the upper-right side of the keyboard, and the right-side control key has been completely eliminated--a frustration for heavy keyboard-shortcut users. In a nice touch, Toshiba gives you a choice of navigation devices. A blue eraser pointing stick has its own activation buttons just below the space bar, which are curiously one above the other rather than side by side, and a smallish (3 inches diagonal) touch pad features two side-by-side buttons as well as dedicated scroll zones. During our use we found both methods workable, though we do wish the touch pad were larger. Below the keyboard, you'll also find a fingerprint scanner for quick, secure log-on (which also conveniently frees you from having to remember passwords). Above the keyboard sit two buttons: one calls up Toshiba's help and configuration utility, while the other maximizes the laptop's output for presentations.
The Tecra M5's case is well-stocked for business users; it includes three USB 2.0 ports (two side-by-side, which can lead to cord crowding), a four-pin FireWire port, VGA-out, headphone and microphone jacks, and a serial port that gave us flashbacks to the '90s (though it could be welcome to businesses with older input devices). An expansion slot recognizes Type II PC cards and the latest ExpressCards; there's also an SD card slot . A built-in DVD burner sits along the right side of the case. Communications options include modem, Ethernet, 802.11a/b/g Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR; a handy hardware switch lets you quickly turn the wireless radios on and off. The final feature of note is the laptop's Trusted Platform Module, which secures data at the hardware level.
Toshiba sells a number of fixed configurations of the Tecra M5; our review unit, the Tecra M5-S4333, cost a competitive $1,899. Its components include a 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7200 processor (the third-most-powerful in the Core 2 Duo mobile line), 2GB of swift 667MHz RAM, a large 120GB, 5,400rpm hard drive, and the business-focused 128MB Nvidia Quadro NVS110M graphics card. For the sake of comparison, an identically configured Lenovo ThinkPad T60P costs $2,292 (though at the time of this review, it was on sale for $1,957), while a nearly identical Sony VAIO BX640 with half as much RAM costs $2,100.
The Tecra excelled on the Office productivity portion of CNET Labs' benchmarks, keeping pace with three other laptops with faster processors, better graphics cards, or both. In fact, the Tecra M5 held its own against similarly configured entertainment-oriented systems, such as the Dell Inspiron E1505 ($1,789) and the Dell XPS M1210 ($2,329) on all our benchmarks. However, the Toshiba was bested by the $2,250 Lenovo ThinkPad T60P--not much of a surprise, given that the costlier Lenovo incorporates a 2.33GHz processor and a 256MB graphics card. That said, for the money, we think the Toshiba Tecra M5 offers more than enough oomph for business tasks.
We were less pleased with the performance of the Tecra M5's standard six-cell battery, which lasted just one hour and 41 minutes in our DVD drain test. The Lenovo ThinkPad T60P, even with its higher-end, power-draining components, lasted three hours and 19 minutes on a battery that was only slighter larger than the Tecra M5's. Users who need the extra juice can drop $152 on either a 12-cell extended battery or an additional six-cell battery that can take the place of the optical drive.
In times past, all business systems shipped with three-year warranties, but these days most manufacturers include just a single year of coverage in a laptop's base price. Not so, Toshiba: the Tecra M5's $1,899 price tag includes an attractive three-year warranty. Support is accessible through a 24-7 toll-free phone line, an online knowledge base, and both a carry- and mail-in repair service.
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Find out more about how we test Windows laptops.
System configurations:
Dell Inspiron E1505
Windows Vista Home Premium; 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7200; 2,048MB DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz; 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon x1400; 100GB Hitachi 7,200rpm SATA/150
Dell XPS M1210
Windows Vista Ultimate Edition: 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7200; 2,048MB DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz; 256MB nVidia GeForce Go 7400; 120GB Hitachi 5,400rpm SATA/150
Lenovo ThinkPad T60P
Windows Vista Business Edition; 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7600; 2,048MB DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz; 256MB ATI Mobility FireGL V5250; 100GB Hitachi 7,200rpm SATA/150
Toshiba Tecra M5-S4333
Windows Vista Business Edition; 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7200; 2,048MB DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz; 128MB nVidia Quadro NVS110M; 120GB Toshiba 5400rpm SATA/150
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2 3 4 User Rating: 
10/10
Wonderful and very Reliable
Pros: Great speed,
very reliable,
powerful workstation Quadro dedicated video card,
Very universal and works with old equipment
Cons: main cons are about the actual hardware itself, the screen is extremely thin, something that I personally am generally paranoid about, could be very easy to damage.
the laptop itself contains a DVD burner, so its very easy to go somewhere and burn the things you need for a quick data backup
Up to date with the security methods it has a fingerprint reader to log you into the computer (using this as an alternate method vs. password input) and the Toshiba software contains a program that protects your data using fingerprint credentials.
Its a business grade machine, having the ability to do presentations, graphical work, or even working in photoshop! You will not be let down be the power of the M5, its Nvidia Quadro NVS110 has the power of a slightly beefed up 7300, basically a 7400, but its optimized to work with graphical applications such as 3ds Max, Maya, After Effects, ECT... this is one of the main features that are important to me, having the ability to work on a laptop and not be hampered by an on-board video processing unit hogging up system resources.
The Core 2 Duo T2500 is perfect for modern day applications, able to process most everything in a very timely manner.
The ability to work with the 'old days' hardware is very nice, working with the printers that run on the serial bus.
bottom line, this is a very wonderful laptop if you don't mind the thin screen.
User Rating: 
1/10
absolutely hopeless on Vista
Pros: sleek look
Cons: Heat Engine;Noisy;
CPU Usage is constantly 100% or close.
The Wifi Never works properly it is an Intel 3945ABG the worst ever.
It generates enough heat to make an omellette and makes enough noise to qualify for a band.DOnt even try putting in a disk in the DVD Drive. As for the battery back up the less said the better.
ALL IN ALL A THOROUGHLY USELESS PRODUCT.
User Rating: 
2/10
Do not believe specs as Toshiba claims them!
Pros: Great laptop
Cons: Horrible Customer Service
I would never ever buy a laptop from Toshiba again. They are great little powerhouses that get the job done, that is for sure. But Toshiba as a company just wants to be "seen" as a great company and not actually hold up the service end of the purchasing agreement.
Take a very close look at all of the specs that are listed before you buy. I bought one of their u305 13.3″ laptops 4 1/2 months ago. The specifications on their website very clearly and proudly state that the laptop is capable of utilizing 4Gb?s of RAM. It is not! And it is not because of the chipset or board being used (others use the same and are capable of 4Gb's). It is because they could not program the bios properly to handle it.
Toshiba has since my purchase changed the manual and the online specifications for this laptop line to an upper limit of 2Gb?s RAM. After many hours on the phone with their ?customer service? handlers, I am at a loss for what to do. It is at the point now that I am considering suing them. They have made absolutely no effort to rectify the situation.
It is apparently my burden to bear that the laptops specifications changed. They are not willing to allow me to return it and pay the difference for another model. They will not compensate me in any way for their mistake. I now have 2 2Gb sticks of top end OCZ sitting at home gathering dust. I cannot return them because it is past the 14 day limit. Although to OCZ?s customer service I send thanks! They are willing to send me out new (in exchange) ones if the future laptop I do buy needs differently spec?d RAM.
Stay away from Toshiba as a laptop manufacturer, they do not hold up their end of the purchase agreement and feel perfectly okay doing so.
Jake Z
User Rating: 
7/10
A business portable machine and a desktop replacement at the same time
Pros: Powerful with SXGA (1400x1050) resolution provides excellent brightness
Cons: The disply is non-glossy
The Tecra M5-S4333 quality is great; it?s very solid in a silver metallic chassis and it is very silent without any excessive heat.
The non-glossy matt display of 14.1" Diagonal SXGA with (1400x1050) resolution provides excellent brightness and makes text easily readable and pictures looks good. But in terms of imaging performance the glossy screen is better so for superior imaging you have to conceder a machine with Toshiba's TruBrite technology.
The Fingerprint Reader provides a higher level of security as well as convenience it will allow you to log on to your secured accessing website such as your email by placing your finger in the device. I own this machine and its battry life is excellent, it easely stay for more than two and half hours.
