The all-knowing database gods of the FCC had already
tipped us off to Panasonic's newest US-bound
Toughbooks, but they've just gotten the official press treatment, complete with beauty shots and -- most importantly -- spec sheets. All models check out with WiFi, Bluetooth, 1GB of RAM, 80Gb of storage, and an optional HSDPA or EV-DO WWAN module, but diverge from there: the ultraportable W7 (pictured) weighs in at just three pounds, but features a 12.1-inch screen, 1GHz U7500 Core 2 Duo processor, dual-layer burner, and a seven-hour battery life, while the slightly heavier 3.3-pound T7 "tablet alternative" drops the burner for a 12.1-inch touchscreen, 1GHz U7500 Core 2 Duo and a nine-hour battery life. Topping out the new line, the 14.1-inch Y7 clocks in at 3.7 pounds with burner and scores a 1.6GHz L7600 Core 2 Duo. Panny says the $2500 Y7 is available now, while the $2100 W7 and T7 should ship in December. We actually got a chance to play with all three just recently, check the gallery for some hands-on action.
posted Nov 12th 2007 8:38PM
What's with the wierd looking round touchpad? Its not practical at all.
The disc drive is cool, though.
Do me a favor and take a look at some laptop touchpads...
I just looked at about 7 before posting this to make sure, and yup... they all wear in the middle.
You may think you use the whole thing, but you really just stick to the middle in a circular pattern.
I have a W2 Panasonic, but when you place your finger to the edge of the circular touchpad and move your finger around the edge, it scrolls for you. Surprisingly handy. Some people hate but I like it.
I've taken apart Panasonic laptops but their engineering quality is top-notch. Especially when compared to the "style prioritized" Sony books and the low cost Dells.
Scrolling using the circular touchpad is extremely useful. I wish other laptops had it also.
Sweet touchcircle DUDE!
i love these notebooks but i must have widescreen
On a 12" screen, no. Notebook computers, when opened, have plenty of vertical space but limited horizontal space. A 12" 16:9 screen means that its display is wider and shorter than a 12" 4:3 counterpart. This makes reading standard size pages more difficult.
I totally agree. I can't watch movies on a 4:3 screen. I would totally buy this with a 16:9 screen. I would rather it be a little wider than longer - I can scroll documents.
Make it 16:10 not 16:9 or 4:3.
The dvd drive that pops out under the keyboard is cool. -Bent Cardan
on a 12" screen, yes
what's the point of having the cd drive open up like that?
that's how they make the optical drive lighter.
That's how they make the unit remain thin. Most competing ultraportables don't have an optical drive because it would make them too thick. Panasonic invented this kind of drive (as far as I know).
Sideway-ejecting drives usually bump into obstacles such as mouse, notepad, coffee cup, etc.
I own a cf-74 & a Y5. I like the pop-up CD cover - less apt to get broken off. I owned 2 Sony T series (great size but neither lived to 14 months) and the slide out tray was soooooo flimsy. The Y5 is very light - I love it. Both of mine have survived mishaps that left dents in the top covers. They ARE tough! And finally a manufacturer that gives you a 3 year warranty standard! These are all I'll ever buy in the future.
It might be just me, but none of the units picured look very "tough"
Isn't it ironic that the toughbook has the flimsiest optical drive mechanism of any modern laptop?
Seems like a "tough" optical drive would be just a slot like what's on a Mac Mini.
@the guy above
its made out of aluminum
Wouldnt be the first thing made from aluminium Ive destroyed in my life. And some looked more sturdy, just to start with.
Looks can be deceiving.
These Toughbooks can withstand 100kg/220lbs of pressure behind the screen when closed.
xga=1024 x 768
wxga= 1366 x 768, 1280 x 800
higher resolution with wide screens, meaning what you can fit in vertically STAYS THE SAME. However the horizontal resolution goes up so you can fit more horizontally.
If you want a 12" widescreen that large, you'll be making the laptop wider, making the laptop less portable. Text will be really small too! Any reason why you must have a widescreen? I presume it's for videos.
BTW... Do you realize that you can reply to your own post? It's a heck of a lot less annoying then to see someones comments strewn all over the page.
For some unknown reason that optical drive makes me want to buy the laptop...
The one pictured is Panasonic's semi-rugged laptop, not their actual rugged laptops. Aren't tested/certified to MILSPEC stanadards (they "designed" but not actually tested/certified). On paper they're pretty good, but in reality, they're really fragile.
These are basically standard laptops with metal-plastic alloy cases. They're about as rugged as a Thinkpad, but with less shock-mounting and protection for the LCD... and they cost 50% more.
We've had a bunch of these as well as their fully rugged laptops... Both have very high failure rates--but these semi-rugged are a joke. Don't waste your money.
You're the first person I ever heard to say anything bad about Toughbook ultraportables in years so I'd say the burden of proof is on you. I had my Toshiba's ultraportable R100 LCD go bad and the hard drive died twice in 3 years but I still wouldn't call them unreliable. That's what the 3 year warranty is for, and some parts simply won't last long with constant use (e.g. 1.8" hard drives).
Just because you have a warranty doesn't make it reliable. When I use a rugged laptop, any downtime for repair is a severe problem. A 1994 Hyundai had a 100K warranty. Doesn't mean it was reliable.
We had a field deployment with 5 Toughbook rugged models. All 5 failed within 2 weeks due to failed motherboards--why? Toughbooks aren't fully sealed when in use.
We replaced those and each of the replacements failed 2 weeks with the same problem.
We had another 2 being used in a different environment. Both failed during a thunderstorm because the USB ports are unsealed. Their bad design allowed the motherboard to be exposed to water. Other rugged laptops/tablets seal off the USB ports so that you cannot damage the motherboard.
When the USB port is in use, I would expect the USB device to fail and the port to be ruined (and should be field replaceable), but MB should be safe. Panasonic requires you to send unit back.
We had about 4 or 5 (I can't remember the exact number on this one) others fail due a broken LCD screen. Toughbooks are not rated to be dropped when turned on or the lid is open. Most other rugged laptops are designed and TESTED for such a case.
The LCD screen flexes too much for a rugged laptop. Hence it tends to break when dropped. Toughbooks are advertised as being able to withstand an 8 foot drop.
After a few failures, we put 4 of them through our test facility to see if they met MILSPEC (Panasonic claims their laptops meet MILSPEC)... All 4 failed. When we talked to Panasonic, they refused to repair them--laptops are designed to MILSPEC, not guaranteed. What's the point?
We are an ANSI certified facility for testing sensor equipment so we have *some* clue about testing (I admit, we are not certified for MILSPEC).
One unit was run over by a golf cart due to negligence. Though it was closed and locked (as Panasonic specificies for maximum ruggedness), the case was cracked. Panasonic claims their toughbooks can be runover by trucks and forklifts...
Our law enforcement partner on this deployment told us their Toughbooks lasted an average of 6 months before catastrophic failure. They had 100's in the field.
Not a single one of our toughbooks lasted more than a month in the field... And no, we don't "abuse" our equipment. Everything we do with the equipment is covered by Panasonic's advertising and claims.
I call that false advertising.
So, Cellulose - what brand have you switched to?
Xplore Technologies.
For semi-rugged, I use Thinkpad's. Like the Toughbook semi-rugged, they're not waterproof, dustproof, etc... but they are better built with less flexiing in the case, accelerometer for the HD, etc (later TB may have added this). They handle minor drops better and seem to be less prone to airborne contaminents (though I don't really have big enough of a sampling to say this definitively).
For full-rugged, Itronix has generally done a lot better. Their sales staff are a lot less ambitious about their claims and their units generally meet/beat their claims. It also survived all of the MILSPEC tests.
Both Itronics and Xplore Technologies make great Tablet PCs. Seems to hold up much better than laptops to abuse. They're much better compartmentalized than the rugged laptops so catastrophic failures are less frequent--dust, water, and contaminents can only ruin the USB ports, but not the actual motherboard.
I cant wait to get one of these.
Ultraportable toughbook? No SSD? How do they fit in the padding and "roll cage" and keep weight down? What a weird concept. The dvd drive door looks like it could take a bit more than the average drive, but wouldn't a slot load be ideal for toughness?
My problem with Panasonic is that they have a poor distribution/marketing network; where can one try out these notebooks, without buying one sight unseen?
I settled on a Toshiba Tecra A9, because I could not find anywhere in the Midwest where I could personally see a CF-52 Toughbook. I know that CompUSA used to carry the W series Toughbooks, but you are SOL if you are interested in any other models.
I got a prev model Y5 gray market via ebay and absolutely love it. I went the gray market route because I couldn't get the Y5M (higher rev with some desirable features vs. the US Y5K at the time) and I couldn't seem to get the Core Duo 1.86 stateside either. The RAM upgrade was way expensive (I don't remember the exact type, check the specs) and I had to downgrade from Jap Vista Biz to XP which was a pain (trying to find English versions of the drivers is near impossible). But at the end of the day, it's ~3lbs, very tough and resilient, and rocks from a performance perspective. Their internal engineering must be a marvel because I've had it side-by-side with some other lappies that were 2.4ghz+ and smoked them on compile times and other chores. Also, yes - it actually gets about 6 hours worth of real-world use on battery (that's std. brightness, wifi on, etc.) I haven't found another laptop I like better - bar none.
Minor negatives: the backlighting on mine is a little uneven. Not always noticeable, but sometimes. Also, no firewire port. Oh, and the port expansion unit is a -joke-: you have to power-down to unplug it from panasonic connector - that blows. And given how good the rest of their product is, I can't believe they screwed the pooch on that.
My .02 - Cheers!
I've been using Y5K with a port replicator for 18 months. I have never shut down Windows to plug/unplug the replicator, but my Toughbook is in perfect health.
95% of the time, I suspend it to RAM (takes a few seconds), but 5% of the time, I don't even do that.
Hmmm, I'm wondering if there's a difference with the M rev. The port replicator I got actually said in the docs that it required shutdown before unplugging. Anytime I tried to unplug it when it was on it would go haywire and lockup. I never tried the suspend to RAM (good idea!) though before I sent it back.
Gotta love the battery life! I wonder how good it is with video...
been considering buying a toughbook for the long haul but your article made sense and now i'm having doubts. but still, i wanted to thank you for the truth.
I used the Japanese version of the Y7 extensively and overall, it's a pretty good product. Extremely light and great battery power.
Two gripes though: the backlight (even on maximum power and plugged in) was still too dim compared to other laptops, and the CD/DVD drive is incredibly noisy the entire time it's reading the disc (huge distraction when you're listening to music through headphones).
Hope these flaws will be fixed before they hit the US market.