Toshiba Tecra A3 Laptops Review Part I

At 6.2-pounds, the Tecra A3 is a relatively lightweight system, especially considering that it's a full 13.3 inches wide, necessitated by a spacious 15.-inch wide-aspect-ratio display. Toshiba's Tecra A3 wraps up a reasonably fast Pentium M processor, DVD/CD-RW combo drive, and value-added perks like a FireWire port in a portable six-pound package. Unfortunately, the A3's mediocre multitasking performance, lack of memory, and very limited wireless range drag it down a few notches.

Toshiba Tecra A3 Laptops Keyboard Touchpad
We also like the look and feel of the A3, starting with the full-size and comfortable keyboard, and solid touchpad buttons. Each button has a slightly raised bump that makes it easier to click without looking. Above the keyboard is a system control panel featuring a power button, Toshiba assist button, and presentation button. The touchpad is easy to use and the corners of the touchpad have hidden features such as scrolling, this can be handy but in my case it can sometimes be annoying if you press in the corner when moving over the touchpad. The mouse buttons that are under the touchpad are simple and function just like the left and right mouse buttons on a regular mouse.

The keyboard is easy to type on, sometimes too easy. At least I have found you will have to press the key a little harder to get a letter on the screen. The layout of the keyboard and the Fn keys is fine, there are not too many extra hidden functions or other things needed to do using the keys -- just the few you need for starting some extra Toshiba features.

Toshiba Tecra A3 Laptops Port

While it wasn't designed for gaming, the Tecra A3 was built for connectivity. You have your choice of three USB 2.0 ports, FireWire, S-Video, VGA, a fast infrared port, and even parallel and serial ports for older peripherals. When you want to network your system or get online, you have a modem, Ethernet adapter, and 802.11b/g adapter.

Toshiba Tecra A3 Laptops Screen

The screen is perfectly connected to the laptop, the hinges are good. After testing and trying to bend the screen and pushing on the lid area you can see some ripples on the LCD, but you have to push hard to see that. Under the silver-colored lid, you'll find a nice 15-inch XGA display that works well for any kind of application. We watched a couple of hours of DVD movies on the system and they looked great, with crisp detail and smooth playback. Additionally, while the A3's embedded stereo speakers offer average output, we were glad to find a real volume control wheel on the front panel of the system. it's a glossy finish screen, or what Toshiba calls TruBrite, and has an XGA resolution. This display glossy is very nice for when you are watching a movie on the laptop, and also for when you are doing some work with photo's -- the brightness and high detail real come out at you.

Toshiba Tecra A3 Laptops VGA

Although the system uses the Intel 900 core logic chipset's integrated video adapter, it's far more capable than most embedded graphics chips. We were able to play Far Cry in low detail at passable frame rates.