Amino
01-25-2005, 10:28 AM
I have had my Qosmio G10 for about a month now and thought I would let you guys know how much I am enjoying it.
I knew, as soon as I saw it, that I wanted this laptop. It is about £300 over priced but for me (I spend about 14 hours a day on it), having a nice screen was the first priority. Nothing else I saw even comes close. Sometimes I feel a bit weird taking out this 17” beast of a laptop in public….but I’m getting over that!
There are hardly any reviews available, it seems like Toshiba’s pr department really dropped the ball, or that they were afraid of bad reviews.... If anyone knows of any besides the following, please post them.
http://forums.computers.toshiba-europe.com/jive3/category.jspa?categoryID=54
http://laptopmag.com/Review/Toshiba-Qosmio-G15-AV501.htm
http://reviews.cnet.com/Toshiba_Qosmio_G15_AV501/4505-3121_7-31138488.html?tag=pdtl-list
http://reviews.designtechnica.com/firstlook55.html
Qosmio G10-100 Review in PC Plus, January 2005
Toshiba G10 Review - Pocket Lint 10th Jan
http://laptopmag.com/features/qosimo.asp
I have yet to use the TV tuner or the included remote. I also don’t use the Qosmio engine thingy (for instant on dvd/ mp3) Maybe I would if I had no ac and wanted to watch a film and eek out battery life.
The keyboard and trackpad are both very good, as this is my third toshiba laptop I am now used to the unusual windows key placement (I still think it should be exchanged with the the FN key but.... not a big deal). Quite often when typing my thumb or something will hit that trackpad and move the cursor somewhere random. Annoying, but not necessarily Toshibas fault.
I use my old Targus laptop backpack, Qosmio just fits inside this (a bit tight but passable for the time being).
Pros
Of course the screen!!! The screen is incredibly bright, I often find myself running it a few notches down from the full power setting.
Qosmio Engine enhanced video rendering
Volume wheel and wifi switch easily reachable on either side of the keyboard
Speakers, they really do make an almost wall of sound.
Aesthetics. It’s a really good looking laptop. Slightly chunky, but stylish
scroll buttons on the trackpad
not too hot or noisy
Plays every game I install smoothly and beautifully at its native resolution
No serial or parallel port!! Yay, free of legacy inputs
Lots of USB2 ports
It is quite heavy and I do often worry about putting too much stress on it if I pick it up with one hand. Best to always use two hands.
Cons
The power brick is far bigger then it needs to be, this becomes a big deal as u have to bring it with you everywhere. I have lots of those small kettle lead type plugs placed around my house and just plug the actual brick in.
The power plug kind of wobbles in its socket (don’t know if this is intentional)
it seems to stick out a bit from the back of the computer and I worry that it might get a bit stressed at times if I have it on an uneven surface.
Really crappy battery life (to be expected) However, I would gladly pay more for a higher rated battery!! (Toshiba, could u make one available for sale??)
Why don’t any pc laptops have proper 6 pin fire wire ports??? (Qosmio does include one of those 4 pin mini fire wire ports)
Where is Bluetooth?????? those jerks, although they seem to have amended the problem with a new model Qosmio G10-133 P-M 735/ XP MCE/ 512MB/ 80GB/ 17WXGA TruBrite/ DVD SuperMulti/ TV Tuner/ WiFi/ BT (http://uk.computers.toshiba-europe.com/cgi-bin/ToshibaCSG/selected_product_option.jsp?service=UK&PRODUCT_ID=101302&DISC_MODEL=0&toshibaShop=reseller) Does anyone know if I can buy an internal Bluetooth module from Toshiba?
There is an ir sensor on the front of the machine -- but it seems as though u have to use the included USB external ir sensor with remote.
Screen creaks a little when I open it.
No second hard drive bracket included. I went to install a second hard drive and found that they didn't put a bracket in. that really pissed me off!
It makes my girlfriend jealous.
There does not seem to be a firmware flash to make the dvd drive region free… yet.
Things I would have liked
PCI Express modular graphics card + 256 mb ati or nvidia
Serial ATA RAID HD support
Higher resolution screen
An extra pc card slot (for a total of two)
6 pin firewire port
Gigabit Ethernet
power over ethernet support, or a smaller ps
DVI out
Dual layer DVD
Conclusion
Well, of course, I love it. Highly recommended.
I knew, as soon as I saw it, that I wanted this laptop. It is about £300 over priced but for me (I spend about 14 hours a day on it), having a nice screen was the first priority. Nothing else I saw even comes close. Sometimes I feel a bit weird taking out this 17” beast of a laptop in public….but I’m getting over that!
There are hardly any reviews available, it seems like Toshiba’s pr department really dropped the ball, or that they were afraid of bad reviews.... If anyone knows of any besides the following, please post them.
http://forums.computers.toshiba-europe.com/jive3/category.jspa?categoryID=54
http://laptopmag.com/Review/Toshiba-Qosmio-G15-AV501.htm
http://reviews.cnet.com/Toshiba_Qosmio_G15_AV501/4505-3121_7-31138488.html?tag=pdtl-list
http://reviews.designtechnica.com/firstlook55.html
Qosmio G10-100 Review in PC Plus, January 2005
Toshiba G10 Review - Pocket Lint 10th Jan
http://laptopmag.com/features/qosimo.asp
I have yet to use the TV tuner or the included remote. I also don’t use the Qosmio engine thingy (for instant on dvd/ mp3) Maybe I would if I had no ac and wanted to watch a film and eek out battery life.
The keyboard and trackpad are both very good, as this is my third toshiba laptop I am now used to the unusual windows key placement (I still think it should be exchanged with the the FN key but.... not a big deal). Quite often when typing my thumb or something will hit that trackpad and move the cursor somewhere random. Annoying, but not necessarily Toshibas fault.
I use my old Targus laptop backpack, Qosmio just fits inside this (a bit tight but passable for the time being).
Pros
Of course the screen!!! The screen is incredibly bright, I often find myself running it a few notches down from the full power setting.
Qosmio Engine enhanced video rendering
Volume wheel and wifi switch easily reachable on either side of the keyboard
Speakers, they really do make an almost wall of sound.
Aesthetics. It’s a really good looking laptop. Slightly chunky, but stylish
scroll buttons on the trackpad
not too hot or noisy
Plays every game I install smoothly and beautifully at its native resolution
No serial or parallel port!! Yay, free of legacy inputs
Lots of USB2 ports
It is quite heavy and I do often worry about putting too much stress on it if I pick it up with one hand. Best to always use two hands.
Cons
The power brick is far bigger then it needs to be, this becomes a big deal as u have to bring it with you everywhere. I have lots of those small kettle lead type plugs placed around my house and just plug the actual brick in.
The power plug kind of wobbles in its socket (don’t know if this is intentional)
it seems to stick out a bit from the back of the computer and I worry that it might get a bit stressed at times if I have it on an uneven surface.
Really crappy battery life (to be expected) However, I would gladly pay more for a higher rated battery!! (Toshiba, could u make one available for sale??)
Why don’t any pc laptops have proper 6 pin fire wire ports??? (Qosmio does include one of those 4 pin mini fire wire ports)
Where is Bluetooth?????? those jerks, although they seem to have amended the problem with a new model Qosmio G10-133 P-M 735/ XP MCE/ 512MB/ 80GB/ 17WXGA TruBrite/ DVD SuperMulti/ TV Tuner/ WiFi/ BT (http://uk.computers.toshiba-europe.com/cgi-bin/ToshibaCSG/selected_product_option.jsp?service=UK&PRODUCT_ID=101302&DISC_MODEL=0&toshibaShop=reseller) Does anyone know if I can buy an internal Bluetooth module from Toshiba?
There is an ir sensor on the front of the machine -- but it seems as though u have to use the included USB external ir sensor with remote.
Screen creaks a little when I open it.
No second hard drive bracket included. I went to install a second hard drive and found that they didn't put a bracket in. that really pissed me off!
It makes my girlfriend jealous.
There does not seem to be a firmware flash to make the dvd drive region free… yet.
Things I would have liked
PCI Express modular graphics card + 256 mb ati or nvidia
Serial ATA RAID HD support
Higher resolution screen
An extra pc card slot (for a total of two)
6 pin firewire port
Gigabit Ethernet
power over ethernet support, or a smaller ps
DVI out
Dual layer DVD
Conclusion
Well, of course, I love it. Highly recommended.