Toshiba Portege R200 (Pentium M Processor ULV 753 1.2GHz, 256MB RAM)

To mark its 20th anniversary of providing notebooks, Toshiba introduces the Portege R200, a long-awaited upgrade of the R100 which turned quite a few heads back in its prime. This time round, Toshiba gives the new version a silver finish and flashy blue LED on the front edge. Though not as tiny as the Libretto U100, this Portege is the slimmest and second-lightest (after the R150) in its 12.1-inch laptop lineup, though this comes at the expense of an inbuilt optical drive.

	The blue light at the front edge exudes class though it could waste quite a bit of battery life.

Design
The instant appeal of the Portege R200 lies in its very sleek 19.8mm thin build. Not many notebooks can boast such a slim and lightweight chassis, but this Toshiba does it in style with 286 x 229 x 9.9 (front) / 19.8 (back) mm dimensions in a 1.29kg (including the six-cell battery) sturdy silver-coated frame. The latchless 12.1-inch screen curiously isn't centrally aligned on the lid and is shifted slightly to the left, though this is a just a minor qualm.

The keyboard provides decent tactile feedback though the depth of the keys is too shallow for our comfort. Two handy quick launch buttons lie on the left edge--one leads to Toshiba Assist (explained below) while the other toggles the display for presentations. Several tiny LEDs line the portion above the keys to indicate power, SD card, hard drive and Wi-Fi statuses, while the front edge alternates between a blue and orange light to show if the unit is active or on standby. As with most Toshibas, there's a dedicated Wi-Fi switch and a volume control.

	At 9.9 to 19.8mm thickness, this is one very slim notebook.

Features
The Portege R200 uses Intel's top-end ultra low voltage (ULV) chip, the 753 (1.2GHz), but the Centrino badge isn't pasted on because an Atheros wireless network adapter is used. We see a paltry 256MB DDR2 SDRAM, expandable to 1,280MB, and a 60GB 1.8-inch hard drive used. Due to the slim design, there's no inbuilt optical drive so you'll have to use an external one (optional) to install your software. The display is managed by Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 900, which shares up to 128MB with the RAM, so gaming is more or less a no-no.

While there are features such as two USB ports, VGA-out and an SD flash card reader, the range of ports is quite limited. There's no FireWire, S-video out or even a microphone-in, though to be fair, the options that Toshiba squeezed in for this ultraportable are the ones that matter most. To make up for the shortage of features, we see a superb selection of networking options such as the Atheros-managed 802.11b/g WLAN, Bluetooth, Gigabit Ethernet, 56K modem and even infrared transfer.

The R200 incorporates a fingerprint reader to the right of the touchpad meant to protect personal data and facilitate access to Web sites with a swipe of your index. Other security features include Toshiba's EasyGuard suite where you get various elements like the Trusted Platform Module chip for data protection and hard drive protection in the event the laptop undergoes jerking movement.

Performance And Battery Life
Running on MobileMark 2002 benchmarking software, we obtained a performance rating of 149 for the Toshiba. This is hardly impressive when gauged with the new breed of ultraportables available where inferior 1.1GHz (ULV) machines like the Dell Latitude X1 obtained a higher 167 score.

While battery life, is indeed, impressive for a notebook, ultraportables are a different matter. Clocking 224 minutes (3.73 hours) of power from the six-cell Lithium-ion, this actually pales in comparison with other ULV units which hit 300 minutes (5 hours) like the Fujitsu LifeBook P7010 and the Toshiba Portege M300.

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Service And Support
Toshiba provides a three-year carry-in international warranty inclusive of parts and labor. The battery itself is covered for a year. Customers can call in toll-free to the Toshiba Global Support Center which provides 24/7 round-the-globe services and support. The contacts are clearly stated on its Web site. Overall, it's a fairly comprehensive warranty though it must be said that quite a few users have had problems with customer support.

The unit runs on Windows XP Professional Edition with Service Pack 2 and includes a variety of software such as Microsoft Office OneNote 2003, Norton AntiVirus 2005 and Toshiba Assist, an interface which gives access to useful utilities such as security and connection management. Softex OmniPass Control Center manages fingerprint scanning, and if you have an external disc burner, Sonic RecordNow! 7 will be helpful should you want to burn CDs.