New Toshiba Satellite C55-B5298 16-inch Laptop (2.1 GHz Intel Celeron N2830 Processor, 4GB DIMM, 500GB HDD, Windows 8.1) Jet Black
This is My Opinion About This Product
After I buy this New Toshiba Satellite C55-B5298 16-inch Laptop (2.1 GHz Intel Celeron N2830 Processor, 4GB DIMM, 500GB HDD, Windows 8.1) Jet Black (Personal Computers)
I just received this laptop and here are my initial impressions:
The laptop is super thin. It is pretty close to MacBook Pro territory in terms of thinness. One inch is the sweet spot for laptop thinness in my point of view.
I was comparing this laptop to similarly priced Chromebooks and a similarly priced Dell Inspiron. The advantage over Chromebooks is obvious when you look at the specs. With this laptop you get two USB2 ports and 1 USB3 port. You get a larger screen at 15.6 inches. You get a full size hard drive at 500GB and a full size keyboard. The bottom line is that you get a full computer. I own a Samsung Chromebook and this laptop is better in every regard, except perhaps size and weight.
The advantage of this over the Dell Inspiron is the location of the speaker grills, USB 3.0, and the inclusion of a VGA port and an ethernet jack. As a part-time instructor, the inclusion of a VGA port is very important since I need to plug into a projector that uses VGA.
I purchased a Toshiba Satellite about 8 years ago for my wife. Over time, the power adapter port broke inside the laptop. The power adapter port inside that laptop was a barrel. The power cable and the barrel inside the laptop plug into each other. Somehow the barrel inside her old Toshiba broke off its mount points inside the laptop. Perhaps it was stress on the cable, since it sticks out quite far from the laptop when plugged in. It still works, but it is dangling inside, making the process of plugging it in more difficult. Additionally, the left mouse button broke on her old Toshiba.
Why do I mention this? I mention this because this laptop has the same barrel-style plug. The mouse buttons also feel very similar to her old Toshiba. They even have the same hollow clicking sound as her old laptop. I am afraid this laptop may exhibit the same issues over time. I recommend taking good care of this laptop to hopefully avoid these issues.
The keyboard of this laptop is super low profile. It looks great, but there is practically no movement of the keys. While this is an exaggeration, there is some truth to it too, because these keys are amazingly flat and short. I get the impression that these keys can't take a beating. I am used to Lenovo Thinkpad keyboards at the office and a Thinkpad SL510 at home, just so you know what I am comparing this laptop's keyboard to.
It feels well-built and solid, despite my past history with my wife's Toshiba as described above. Only time will tell if the power plug, keyboard, and mouse buttons hold up to use.
The design style of this laptop is nice. I like the textured look and the black color. The sculpted lines of the sides of this laptop are attractive as well.
I have been using Windows 8 since the beta test, and I still find it awkward. This laptop did not come with a restore CD, so I suspect there is a restore partition, like most PCs.
The Celeron inside is not fast at all, but is good enough. I suspect the additional software bloat, like the included 30 day antivirus package is weighing its performance down. I will probably uninstall the software and just use the Microsoft antivirus that is built into Windows 8.
On Geekbench, this laptop scored 991 single core and 1701 multicore on the 64-bit benchmarks. On the 32-bit benchmarks, it scored 870 single core and 1367 multicore. These scores are lower than my Thinkpad SL510 with a Core2Duo chip inside from a couple of years ago (64-bit: 1184/1939 and 32-bit: 1094/1846). Then again, I paid three times as much for that laptop.
This laptop is good for its price. I'd say that price is its leading feature. For its price, you get a full size, fully capable PC laptop that can handle day to day tasks. I'd recommend this over a Chromebook for sure.
If I had to sum this up in one sentence, it is amazing how much computing power is included for the price.
As I use this more I will provide further updates.
The laptop is super thin. It is pretty close to MacBook Pro territory in terms of thinness. One inch is the sweet spot for laptop thinness in my point of view.
I was comparing this laptop to similarly priced Chromebooks and a similarly priced Dell Inspiron. The advantage over Chromebooks is obvious when you look at the specs. With this laptop you get two USB2 ports and 1 USB3 port. You get a larger screen at 15.6 inches. You get a full size hard drive at 500GB and a full size keyboard. The bottom line is that you get a full computer. I own a Samsung Chromebook and this laptop is better in every regard, except perhaps size and weight.
The advantage of this over the Dell Inspiron is the location of the speaker grills, USB 3.0, and the inclusion of a VGA port and an ethernet jack. As a part-time instructor, the inclusion of a VGA port is very important since I need to plug into a projector that uses VGA.
I purchased a Toshiba Satellite about 8 years ago for my wife. Over time, the power adapter port broke inside the laptop. The power adapter port inside that laptop was a barrel. The power cable and the barrel inside the laptop plug into each other. Somehow the barrel inside her old Toshiba broke off its mount points inside the laptop. Perhaps it was stress on the cable, since it sticks out quite far from the laptop when plugged in. It still works, but it is dangling inside, making the process of plugging it in more difficult. Additionally, the left mouse button broke on her old Toshiba.
Why do I mention this? I mention this because this laptop has the same barrel-style plug. The mouse buttons also feel very similar to her old Toshiba. They even have the same hollow clicking sound as her old laptop. I am afraid this laptop may exhibit the same issues over time. I recommend taking good care of this laptop to hopefully avoid these issues.
The keyboard of this laptop is super low profile. It looks great, but there is practically no movement of the keys. While this is an exaggeration, there is some truth to it too, because these keys are amazingly flat and short. I get the impression that these keys can't take a beating. I am used to Lenovo Thinkpad keyboards at the office and a Thinkpad SL510 at home, just so you know what I am comparing this laptop's keyboard to.
It feels well-built and solid, despite my past history with my wife's Toshiba as described above. Only time will tell if the power plug, keyboard, and mouse buttons hold up to use.
The design style of this laptop is nice. I like the textured look and the black color. The sculpted lines of the sides of this laptop are attractive as well.
I have been using Windows 8 since the beta test, and I still find it awkward. This laptop did not come with a restore CD, so I suspect there is a restore partition, like most PCs.
The Celeron inside is not fast at all, but is good enough. I suspect the additional software bloat, like the included 30 day antivirus package is weighing its performance down. I will probably uninstall the software and just use the Microsoft antivirus that is built into Windows 8.
On Geekbench, this laptop scored 991 single core and 1701 multicore on the 64-bit benchmarks. On the 32-bit benchmarks, it scored 870 single core and 1367 multicore. These scores are lower than my Thinkpad SL510 with a Core2Duo chip inside from a couple of years ago (64-bit: 1184/1939 and 32-bit: 1094/1846). Then again, I paid three times as much for that laptop.
This laptop is good for its price. I'd say that price is its leading feature. For its price, you get a full size, fully capable PC laptop that can handle day to day tasks. I'd recommend this over a Chromebook for sure.
If I had to sum this up in one sentence, it is amazing how much computing power is included for the price.
As I use this more I will provide further updates.
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