Toshiba Satellite L450

A Warning from History?

Bought someone an L350D Toshiba. The 'D' meant it uses an AMD chip, not Intel. More bang for the buck, better overall specification of laptop for similar price.

Toshiba UK have support forums, so before you buy this model, if I were you I would go check there first to see what typical issues you may encounter.

Sturdy laptop, very sold, good keyboard, typical Toshiba traits. However:

1) Certain laptops, AMD or Intel, seem to have very poor ventilation design, so can overheat when playing a game or using other CPU intensive tasks. Not sure if dust is a problem, but it's suggested dust blocks the vents on the forum, although I still think it's an overall bad design after research.

2) These laptops seem to still come generally with Vista. Put XP on, and although there are all the relevant XP drivers on Toshiba's website, some things are strange. The rubbish realtek WLAN adapter is USB unbelievable, not mini-PCI, and has an on/off switch on the front. With WPA1 or 2 PSK it just doesn't connect properly. A basic quick-fix for this (XP remember) is to use WEP (yes, we all know the security issues there.) The network icon does not always show the wireless network is connected, but you can still do everyday internet-tasks fine. It is indeed a very strange one, and I can only put it down to a combination of XP, bad driver design, and the fact the WLAN adapter is USB.

The limited WLAN connectivity with strange icons is a quick-fix that worked after a BIOS update of the laptop.

Those were just my experience with this laptop I had bought for somebody. From Toshiba forums there are a whole host of other problems, some ridiculous and user-caused; but some not. I think XP should be expected to work fine on t hese laptops, but really you want an intel, not realtek, WLAN adapter, and make sure you give it a thorough going over before your return-to-shop period is up.

If anybody has any questions about any of these cheaply priced Toshibas, check out Toshiba forums, where it will already have been answered. If you own a Toshiba laptop in these ranges, update the BIOS first, to see if that makes a difference.

Widescreen

So have Toshiba finally abandoned common sense and decided to go full widescreen too? Looks like my wife bought hers at just the right time (1280x800 dual-core Athlon for about the same price, FWIW). Beware, 15.6" widescreens are pretty much completely unusable for anything other than watching video (wrong aspect, and insufficient vertical resolution), and the laptops with them tend to be positively monstrous compared with preconceptions of what 15" laptops always used to be like. Budget for a new desk (or lap), carrying cases etc, and forget about doing any actual work.