Now that you've owned the M40 for a while....

For those who have owned the M40 for a while, with the issues that you've experienced, would you still recommend the M40 over other laptops? I was thinking about the M40 and I think it is better in many respects vs. the Sony Fs550 that I was originally considering. But the problems particularily with the high pitched noise and the AC adapter issue have me a bit worried.

 

my major beef with the M40 was the poor battery life, I got (no joke) 1 hour and 20 minutes of life from one charge. Granted that was with screen brightness all the way up and wi-fi on, but i literally did nothing and let the notebook idle for that time. Unacceptable. The missing ExpressCard slot when they said it would be in there was another issue I had with this. But if you'll be next to a power outlet all the time this could be a fine option, I'd take it over the Dell 6000 because of the superior screen. I think the Sony FS, Fujitsu N3510 and this are all a close call though...I'd be equally happy with each but would likely go with Fujitsu in the end for better support and warranty. Sony has the worst support, I'd put them last on this list for that reason.

DigitalCameraReview.com | BargainPDA.com | TabletPCReviewSpot.com

 

Err the Sony FS550 screen is ok, if thats what your comparing. But the video card, GF6200 TurboCache is actually turboCRAP. It only has 32mb onboard memoryl, the rest it shares with your system RAM but nVidia makes up some hocus pocus about how its faster than intergrated sharing etc etc. In overall its not that bad but its about the same or WORSE than a GF5700.

My opinion is, if you dont need a hi poerformance video card, then consider sony or fujitsu as i heard their battery life is ok.

 

The only major grunts I have against my M40, that I've had for about a month already, are these:

- Poor battery life: I can't watch a 2 hours DVD, it shutdowns before the end (I'm telling the truth, me and my girlfriend were watching a movie in fullscreen and I was unsuspecting about the battery life remainging and suddenly, somewhere around 1h45m, *POOF*, the computer shutted down, battery was dead, hehehe). However, I noticed the following: the big battery life suckers for this laptop are the LCD screen (if you use the lowest setting you'll get considerably more time) and the DVD drive (because when I watch TV shows from my hard drive, I get a noticeably longer battery life).

- So-so construction: Flimsy plastic. You can bend the notebook easily and the LCD cover is not very hard. The screen can wobble quite much when you're moving it, it's not really stiff.

That's about it for anything major. The buzzing noise is not loud enough for me to be an annoyance. Only a slight background noise will wash it out and you don't notice it. I didn't have any problem with the AC adaptor, it works fine. I can unplug and plug back the laptop without a hitch.

There's also one last thing, but this is not related to the M40 by itself. It's about the Pentium-M. I thought it was more powerful than it actually is. I can notice it being slower than my previous P4-2.66ghz in some annoying occasions But that's the Pentium-M's fault, not the laptop!

All in all, these are the only gripes I have against this notebook and I recommend it to anyone who doesn't move around too much, because except for its poor battery life (that can however be taken care of by buying the extended battery from Toshiba) and poor construction (bending and LCD protection), it's a great notebook with a price that's right.

About the price, I can tell you this: try to have a price made for a compact desktop system with comparable specs and a good 17 or 15" LCD and the price won't be too far away from this laptop's price.

Toshiba Satellite M40 - Pentium-M Sonoma 1.6ghz - 512mb DDR333 - 60gb 4200rpm - GeForce 6600 128mb - 15.4" BrightView WXGA TFT LCD

 

Thanks to everyone who has responded so far. Does anyone else who has this laptop have anyother opinions that might help me make my decision? All opinions are helpful.

 

I can only praise mine, although I have the YP3 model. (Got it from Future Shop for $2199,00 +tax, after price match from Bestbuy[ ])
I found the JM3 a bit too slow.. The only other laptop I considered was the Sony FS550, but the Thosiba had better Specs for the price.

I have no problem with switching between AC/Bat., the High pitch noise I can hear very rarely ,since I live in an apartment where there is allways some noise...,and I keep my window open 24/7.
In fact if I would not read about it here, I would not have known about it at all..
Battery life is about 2hours, but I knew it before buying.
(I rarely venture to places where there is no AC outlet, an Airplane would be one place...)
Works flawlessly with Photoshop and PSP 8, editing 8Mpix photos, and designing Architecture and Landscaping with latest Punch Software.
DVD-CD burning is easy.
I uninstalled/disabled most of Toshibas' preinstalled Crap, disabled many Windows services,Start-up items, cleaned the registry, and tweaked some registry entries regarding startup & shutdown times.
This machine makes my 3 years old Dell Inspiron2650 a dinosaur.
And at that time the Dell was $500 more.
Wifi works well in my Apartment, yet to try it in a house, and never tried Bluetooth.
So far, so good. I might get a second battery and upgrade to 1Gig RAM later, if needed.
I got myself a Logitech Mediaplay wireless mouse, a good Linksys router, and an Allsop Metal Art Micepad.
I have never owned such a Stylish and Sheek Computer setup.

That's all from me, hope this helps.



Les

Toshiba Satellite M40 YP300-E, PM 750 1.86GHz, HDD 80MB - 5400Rpm, 533MHz FSB, L2 Cache 2MB, DVD Super-Multi Double Layer Drive,512MB DDR, 15.4” WXGA TruBrite,NVIDIA® GeForce™ FX Go 6600, 128MB DDR dedicated

 

As mentioned, the battery life of the M40 isn't wonderful, but that's the only con I can find with this otherwise excellent laptop. I bought mine to replace an old Dell laptop as well as my Athlon-powered desktop, and it's perfect for the job. It's not too big or heavy as to be almost non-portable (unlike a lot of the 17" mammoths that can be found in many stores today), it's fast, and the graphics and DVD playback are excellent. The screen is gorgeous, too.

All in all, I don't think there's a better laptop for the money available today.

Toshiba Satellite M40

Pentium-M 1.6 GHz | 512MB RAM | 128 MB nVidia Geforce GO 6600

 

Hey guys, thanks for your comments. After researching the available notebooks that would meet my needs and with your helpful comments, I decided to bite the bullet and get the M40-YP3 last night. I've just started playing with it and so far I like it. My only two negative comments thus far are the issue with the blue screen of death if I unplug the AC adaptor while the computer is on and the relative flimsiness of the LCD cover. Other than that the M40 is one impressive computer. I couldn't believe how quick it was to load up all of Microsoft Office XP. It was done by the time I returned from my kitchen with a cup of coffee. I remember how long it took my last desktop computer and I wasn't expecting this M40 to blast through the installation like it did.

 

For your BSOD experience, it may have to do with one of Toshiba's crap-ware that comes pre-installed, like Config-Free. You could perhaps try to uninstall it. Just a suggestion, as I did experience BSOD when using stock software, but none so far with a custom Windows re-install.

Toshiba Satellite M40 - Pentium-M Sonoma 1.6ghz - 512mb DDR333 - 60gb 4200rpm - GeForce 6600 128mb - 15.4" BrightView WXGA TFT LCD