Just got the new R835-P50X

Hey all,

Just wanted to stop by and say I'm a new toshiba laptop owner!

So far so good. The screen is pretty nice and even though the buttons on the keyboard seem to be a bit smaller, the keyboard has a nice tactile feel to it.

I've been using a macbook air for 2-3 years now (when it first came out) and it's been crapping out a bit lately and the 60gb (or 80?) HD just doesn't cut it. The battery life is down to like 1.5 hours now.

If ya wanna know anything, let me know.

Got it for $750 at Best Buy.

Ken

 

How's the fan noise on the Toshiba? I was looking at it and it was hard to determine at the store how loud the fan is.

 

I got mine from Best Buy also. Everything is fine, it's decent, but... I am so, so disappointed with the sound quality. And this sucks, because I'm a music freak. Listening anything with headphones especially is killing me. Does anyone know any tips or tricks to get rid of the crackling sound? It is extremely annoying. The onboard speakers suck too, but hey, it's a laptop, I'm not expecting any good kind of sound out of them anyway.

EDIT: Ok, since I haven't really been able to try it out that much so far, it might be that this problem only appears with YouTube. Have to do some more testing in the morning.

 

I would like to hear about fan noise as well. Also there should be a toshiba utility showing at what speed fan is running. Just wondering what it is as well.

 

I found Toshiba PC Health Monitor and it doesn't say the speed of the fan in rpm, but instead in %. For me, this little laptop is silent. It's only my second laptop and after the Acer Aspire I had, this thing is almost noiseless.

Right now, I've had my laptop on for almost an hour on balanced power plan and the fan speed shows 36%. It's pretty silent. Let's see if I have the time later today or the near future to do some more extensive reviewing of this device, but all in all I have to say it's been great. The sound issues I was talking about last night seem to appear only on YouTube, so even if frustrating, it's not that big of a deal afterall.

It feels sturdy except for one of the silver covers of the hinges connecting the screen with the rest of the body in my laptop has become loose. Not a big deal, since it's only a cover to give laptop a nice silver touch on the otherwise stylish black case. A little bit of super glue should fix that.

 

If you turn the machine on and do nothing what speed does the fan show after 5mins, one of the complaints about the previous model is that the fan was always on.

 

I don't see why bluetooth is left out of this model? How is the speaker?

 

From my limited experience with mine and friends' laptops, I'd say one of the worst built in speakers. It sure gets loud, something my old Acer couldn't do, but the quality is pretty bad. Probably someone more experienced can say more about this. As far as I can tell and to my taste, laptop speakers always suck.

Lack of Bluetooth surely sucks and makes you wonder how can they still leave it out. That was probably the only reason why I doubted buying this laptop, but I figured I can still hook my phone into the USB slot, which is probably the only device I would connect to my laptop via Bluetooth. 3 USB slots is ok, but a 4th one wouldn't have had hurt, just to make sure you don't run out of USB slots.

 

I want to buy the portege because I have only own Toshiba before but the specification is killing me. No bluetooth, intel graphic, and bad speakers.

 

I know what you mean, we all would like the notebook we are buying to have everything we could think of. It just isn't realistic, it will either be too expensive, too bulky/heavy, etc. I wish it had a back lit keyboard as well as available mSATA myself.

The main attraction of the R835 for me is the weight. If the R835 wasn't 3.2lbs, would there really be a hard reason to consider it? There are many "lightweight" notebooks in the 4-5lb range, even a few in the 3-4lb range but which in the sub 4lb range has what the R835 have? I haven't come across one yet, if I missed something in this weight range with a dvd drive, someone let me know.

 

That is excellent news. Thanks alot! My R700 never went below 44%. I remember when my fan went from 44% to 55% sound got noticeably louder. I guess it should be noticeably quieter at 36%. Does it stay around 36% when surfing, word processing etc. ?

 

My PC Health Monitor is also showing 36%. I actually took it from dallas through 2 connecting flights to seattle and then a 4.5 hour bus ride up into canada with this lil guy and I have to say there's very minimal fan noise on this laptop.

I have to say the battery on this guy is exceptional and that is one of the reasons I bought this toshiba. I watched a couple shows, did a lot of surfing at the airports and on the wifi-enabled bus. After many hours when I got home, I still had 65% of my battery left.

I really like the screen as well. As for the quality of the sound, i can't say too much as i haven't listened to music and have only used my headphones. I'm also not a audiophile so it works fine for me.

The one thing I find annoying is the page scrolling on the right side of the trackpad. I find when i scroll down, when i let go of my finger, it will scroll up a little bit or a lot.

Other than that and wishing I got a LED backlit version (used to that feature on my macbook air) - i can't complain for the 750$ from BB.

Love the battery, love the screen, love the weight, love the feel of the keybaord.

Dislike the trackpad scrolling.

Never used bluetooth on my computers before so don't really care about that one.

I didn't know I would enjoy this laptop as much as I have and so I have a bit of buyers remorse - I want the i5 with the LED backlight.

 

thanks for the review. Can you run some test on it on? I want to know how far the temp and the fan go when it is in full power. You can download Prime 95 and just let it run for least 30 minutes with maximum consumption option

 

PCMag reviewed the R835 and on their sample notebook, they said this...

"My only complaint about this laptop is that the two tiny speakers above the keyboard are prone to distortion when the screen or entire laptop is moved. "

Those that have the R835, can you test and see if your speakers distort when you move the screen or notebook around? I hope it was an isolated issue only with that notebook.

Original link to review..

Toshiba Portege R835-P50X Review & Rating | PCMag.com

 

I'm glad you are enjoying your laptop. I'm set to buy a Sony SA when it comes out in couple of months but now that I'm hearing this positive reviews regarding fan noise, I may just buy a r830. The only reason why I sold my r700 was the high pitched fan noise even when doing light tasks. I'm wondering when you put lots of load on r830, is fan noise still high pitched ?


Also how are the viewing angles of the screen(vertical viewing angles)?

 

If you're not against returning your current laptop (and can get away with it), you can pickup the Core i5 version from amazon for $875 Toshiba Portege R835-P56X. I'd buy this notebook in a heartbeat if it had some sort of discrete graphics.

 

get a tecra r840

 

Yep, a Tecra 840 for those looking for discrete graphics. It will bump the price up to about $1,100-1,300 and weight to 4.2lbs, though you will gain bluetooth and 3 year warranty.

 

so the tecra 840 vs acer 4830. the question is which fan run louder

 

Ehh...for that price I feel like the Sony Vaio SB is a better price vs cost choice, although the screen on the R835 was very nice (IMO), if the R840 has one that's comparable....

 

According to the Toshiba web site, the 50x and the 56x have the same LED backlit screen. If so, the only difference is i5 vs i3. Is this worth $150??

 

The i5 has TurboBoost, see the notebookcheck benchmark list to compare the performance (and also relate to whatever CPU you have now).

John

 

I almost pulled the trigger on the R835-P50X yesterday until I saw the webcam quality at BB. It was EXTREMELY grainy. I played around with the resolution settings as well, but the only thing it seemed to do was make the picture size vary (no change in quality). It was like using a 15 year old webcam.

Can any of you comment on the webcam quality? Has anyone used it with skype?
Thanks.

 

Has anyone tried dropping an SSD into this? I'd like to know how straightforward it is, would loath to tear apart the whole thing

 

Replacing the HDD is really really easy. It took me a total of 5 mins to install a new HDD. You just unscrew the 3 panels in the back and the 3rd one will get you the HDD. Just pull the white strap to pull up the HDD and remove the connector. Connect it back, slip the hard drive back in and you're done. No screws to deal with.

 

fan noise and backlit keyboard's, something notebook manufacturers do not seem to understand

 

Cheers Nomis, sounds good.

How is the temperature when you have it on your lap for example?
What about the keyboard, does the whole thing give in when you apply pressure or?
Batterylife while surfing/playing music into headphones?

 

I just picked one up.
I had to get a NB with external SATA and HDMI outputs for work...

Toshiba states in there videos that it has a copper heatsink
infact it does not..

i have uploaded a very detailed video opening of the laptop.
its 25 minutes hope you have a minute.

YouTube - Toshiba Protege R830 R835 In depth Review of heat management design Not what Toshiba Says R835-P50X

Video Description

Toshiba Protege R830 R835 In depth Review of heat management design also Showing Differences from what Toshiba says. R835-P50X ships with Aluminum Heat sink not copper like advertised

After seeing many Toshiba Videos that show there is supposed to be a Copper Heat sink I purchased it ( I needed a machine with external SATA and HDMI for work)
however unlike in the units in the video showing copper I saw Aluminum when I opened the memory door. so i had to dig deeper and here is the vidieo outcome.

I also had contacted many toshiba phone numbers to find out why there was aluminum even though its well advertised as copper.
i was given the run around and had to play word games with there esclated tech department then
I finally got in contact with E.P. Notebook PR Manager for Toshiba Information Services.
we started talking May 4th, he agreed it should have been copper, then calls back later that day to say it could be few things to make the copper look silver,
in the vid you can clearly see it looks like pop can aluminum material

i sent him a bunch of emails with info and a few jokes. and several calls since then.
As of friday 5:30pm i have gotten a reply from him saying he is awaiting japan for an answer, i told him about the video here.
i forgot about GW in Japan,


I see a few fixs to fix this for all i will psot those soon. here...

The fan gets loud when its trying to bring the higher temps down this would be less of an issue if nullified if it had a copper heat sink.

This is video 1 of 2 the 2nd one will be of the resolution's of this issue.

 

I've got the R700 which appears to use the same form of construction. HWiNFO32 reports that under full CPU load the CPU core power consumption peaks at about 20W and stabilizes at 17W with the CPU running at 1.75GHz with the CPU core temperature of about 88C. The air coming out is plenty warm enough which, IMO, suggests a need to pass more air through rather than the limit being the ability to transfer heat through the metal.

Hence, my own perception is that the cooling system is physically not big enough to handle the heat output of the CPU under full power. Also, the fan arrangement, while allowing a larger fan than if it were located next to the heat sink, results in a rough path for the airflow where the air also has to turn a corner before exiting. However, it is a much better arrangement than on the older Toshiba R500 where the fan is very small and extremely noisy under load.

I look on these R series as being candidates for the lower power CPUs. However, Intel's pricing means that it is less expensive to use a normal CPU with throttling. Users also get the benefit of better CPU performance during short bursts of CPU activity. However, if you want good CPU performance under sustained load then you need a notebook with a bigger chassis and cooling system. Overall, Toshiba have done an impressive job of packing decent performance into a light chassis and having some aluminium in the cooling system is one of the compromises.

John

 

toshiba advertised and said the copper was a major part of the design then ships with AL>

i will say if it had a copper heatsink (HQ like shown in there vids)
it would run cooler..

The problem if you watch my video the heatsink will fall apart soon aswell as the poor thermal properties of the AL one.
another problem i have with it is so thin No Mass means it its not really doing what it should..

we should not accept compromises like this that will affect life.
LOL i just popped 2 of my blue ray players and found the reason the one failed was poor thermal management. and the other one not as bad but close. has a heatsink but rough so no real contact with chip..

 

That sucks. Though it looks like it starts off copper, it ends with aluminum. Maybe it's a "Best Buy" exclusive; lol. I think it's a Best Buy problem.

The Best Buy portege is cheaper than the actual portege from Toshiba. Maybe Best Buy configured their unit that way to bring down the price. I've seen similar "deceptive" units from ASUS that best Buy carried [ASUS G73SW; only has GTX 460m 1.0 GB GPU; actual is 1.5 GB].

As for the honeycomb, I just rewatched part of the Toshiba vid, it says the honeycomb is found on the 14 and 15 inch models.

That sucks on the heatsink.

Good luck

 

Excellent video on the inside of the R835. May I suggest you post your findings on Toshiba's forum.

Portégé Laptops - Toshiba Forums

Maybe, someone from Toshiba will publicly come out and explain or comment on your findings. It will also help spread the word to others researching this notebook.

Even posting over on Amazon in the reviews will allow everyone understand more of the importance of proper cooling in such an enclosed space. As you know, too often the consumers are brainwashed by marketing only.

 

Tempurature is not bad, it doesn't get unbearable or anything but the fan gets pretty loud though.

Keyboard pressure wise, I didn't really test it, but from regular usage, no bending or anything. It's pretty sturdy.

I haven't ran any battery test but from casual observation, I can run video streaming and browse the web on battery without any low battery warning coming on.

 

as far as battery life.
Pretty good so far.
havent tried any long runs.

but i did render a 1080 25mbps (heavy load) with only 25% battery life when started and finished with a lil left (about an hour or so of full Load_
i dont know if the battery thing was right. i just glanced at it

 

Here's the "real" porteges from Toshiba: Toshiba Direct | portege Laptops & Notebook Computers


The model names are different from the Best Buy model and they have differing specs. I would like to see if the models directly from Toshiba also have a partial aluminum heat sink.

 

from what i gather. from talking to the Manager of PR for toshiba TAIS notebook div.

he said they busting one open and then they where like we are trying to find out why the change. so i assume they checked the ones toshiba sells as the Reeal ones. LOL real ones. whats this world coming to..just sell on series with it all.. just screen and high or low cpu.. this 100feture option is a joke

 

I wonder if my R835-P56X has the the aluminum heatsink, i'll check tonight.

 

do that let us know.
if its silver its AL if its Copper color its copper..
if you can get a picture of it. Use a light not the flash if needed..

If its a BB thing Im really upset if its a Toshiba wide im just as upset either way its not cool..

also if you notice in the vid of there heat plate its thick and looks machined IE no flex like our thin plates thats besides the heatsink issue.

PS>
i just had a samsung BD player crap out.
and noticed it had horrid thermal mngmt.
on the new one it has a bit better but the heatsink is not smooth at all Like they wanted it to last a little longer than the last seriies but not to much longer.LOL

 

I would expect that they are all the same. The Aluminium will reduce the weight. Here's a photo of the R700's internals and I think it has the same cooling system.

John

 

Unfortunately, looks like Toshiba made 2 different tiers of laptops. The Best Buy exclusive laptops seems to be of a lower tier. My R835-P56X looks to have the copper heat sinks instead of the aluminum

 

Maybe I'm not seeing it but I think your pic only shows the plate, not the fins, correct?

 

It only shows the plate but compared to John's picture of the R700, even the plate is aluminum. I'll post pix of the entire thing when I get my 6230 card tomorrow.

 

A bit OT but I think the give away that the BB models are lower tier(at least this is how it was on the R700 series) are the glossy display vs the mate from Toshiba and other retailers, no esata port, and no port for the docking station(not really a big deal).

Is the version you get at Best Buy vs what you get from Toshiba direct still come with a glossy display? I really like this machine but the fan issue you guys are mentioning and the display are the reason why I am holding back on getting this.

 

Ok, I went back and checked Ratsey's photo of the R700, I understand now. I thought you were comparing your finding to tlordon's finding on his P50X.

 

I can't answer for the rest but the BestBuy model does indeed have a eSATA port, it's a shared with a USB port.

 

How is the matte display on the R835 doing? There's no difference to the R830, is that right?

 

thats the heat plate. not the heatsink.
how thick is that plate.
if you look at my video it has a copper plate also but super thin.
if you look from the side of the notebook at the heatsink is it silver or copper color..

 

im thinking the USA got the alum heat sinks. unless you have a I7
or it could just be the BB p50x that got skimpped.

Toshibas last responce to me after i said
"eric please reply.
what is going. on
at this point i think i want to return the laptop i havent heard anything about any fixs. or resolve.
please autherise either toshiba or BB to return this NB>
as it was only opened up so fast because of the heatsink to confirm "
they where waiting on Japan to comment.

his reply

"I am not sure you are going to be able to return the computer because you voided the warranty when you opened it up. If you purchased it from best buy you might want to check with them.
Regards,
EP"

my reply

"i opened it up beause it was false advertising. and wanted to confirm it. as i saw it was AL from the outside.
as i said it would not have been opened this early in its life
IE this was only opened to confirm it was not what it was advertised as

This is how toshiba is handeling this. "

and

"Eric,
I hoped we would resolve this and it would be good for all.
IE the propper heatsink and all would be happy.

but this had made me feel toshiba doesnt care and wont care again..
we as consumers have a right to know whats advertised and what we actully get.
the opening of the laptop was to confirm this and as much as that voids warranty
so you have me on a technicality in that i did open it up but if you had shipped with proper parts i wouldnt have opened it up..

so is my only resolve to tag this as false advertising,?
not being a but i dont know what else to think.

you yourself agread with me that it should have had copper so why the change.

i dont want to keep emailing you i want this to go away.."

 

Good job!

Keep bugging them. The descriptions should be very specific and should state if a specific model deviates from the mainstream models (IE: Best Buy models are gipped versions. I hear this is also common for some Walmart models).

What's funny is that 20 yrs ago this wouldn't fly; but now that were branded "consumers" and not "customers", they just want to "shoo" us away.

Keep up the fight.

 

Was this reported to Amazon? It appears Amazon has halted sales of the R835 over there while they "investigate"? I saw tlordon's post over at the Toshiba forums and I'm really surprised there has been no posts other than his in the thread. I would have thought being the Toshiba forum, a rep would have followed up on the finding, a moderator would have censored and deleted his post, or some customers there would jump in and question Toshiba's supposedly switch. The lack of response there is either due to lack of traffic or lack of care.