I really wanted a tablet PC for college so I convinced my parents to get this one. It cost $1500 and I believe I had to chip in about $500 of that.
I purchased a second battery for it. Then they issued a battery recall so I got each of my two batteries replaced, except I did not send the "dangerous" ones back, so I had four batteries that I used.
The story of why I put an SSD in it.
I took my Proview PL713s with me to use as a second screen.
Incredibly, I was able to find my review (later version) on the Wayback Machine:
SATELLITE R15:REVIEW:AARON AXVIG
Pros
- Large writing area (equal to one 8.5"x11" piece of paper)
- Adequately performing processor that will likely be speedy enough through 2007 or 2008 (including running Vista).
- Built-In CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive.
- Durable construction
- Hardware volume control knob (to make sure your computer doesn't make any noise when you turn it on during class)
- Battery life of up to 5+ hours with wireless off and screen dimmed (~3.5 hours with wireless and average battery-saving settings
Cons
- Default 512MB RAM is a bit light
- Commonly reported dust specks under screen (on this and many other Toshiba models)
- Large size may not be for everyone
- Graphics processor not capable of running Vista's Aero Glass effects.
- I bought my Toshiba Satellite R15 in June of 2005 at Office Depot. Price payed after tax was something like $1750 USD after tax, but there was also a mail-in-rebate for $200 I believe. A week later I ordered a 1GB stick of Kingston RAM at Newegg, along with an extra battery and spare pen.
Since then it has been a great machine for me. During my first year of college that fall I used it for almost all of my classes, and had no issues which kept me from using it everyday. It seems to be a very durable model. I carried it in my backpack already converted to tablet mode 70% of the time, and have no screen damage other than a few very small scratches that are probably from my watch or something else.
Modifications & Repair
This spring I finally got together the courage to remove the "grainy" screen-protector film that many people complain about with several of the Toshiba tablets. When I removed mine, the glue did not seem to come with it, so I spent several hours rubbing it off centimeter-by-centimeter. I got several blisters from that. :) Remarkably, putting all that pressure on the screen (and in turn on the LCD) didn't do any damage.
I have also removed the screen-protector itself to fix dust specks that snuck into the area between the screen-protector and mask. I've never had to take the unit in for repair, nor send it in for repair. However, this is probably in my future now, as a piece recently fell into the fan, causing a small "poof" of dust to blow out. I was finally able to shake the piece out through the fan vent. Upon disassembly of the unit, I determined it was a piece from a screw mount on the hinge assembly. Thankfully, it will probably be covered on the lifetime warranty that Toshiba puts on their hinges.
Gaming
Obviously the integrated Intel Graphics Media Accelerator is not going to do you a lot of good with newer first-person-shooters. To that end, I have tried Half-Life 2, but it was not quite playable (the flashlight wouldn't render properly in dark areas, making it impossible to proceed). Half-Life works fine, however. Other games I have played successfully include SimCity 3000, Age of Kings, and Empire Earth.
Vista
Final RTM Version (Build 6000)
Alright, I've got Vista Business running on my tablet now (well actually for the last couple of weeks. It's been working pretty well. Here are a few highlights:
- The VGA output works. It can drive many different resolutions, all the way up to 2048x1536.
- I haven't installed any drivers other than the ones that Vista had automatically. I don't believe it went online to get any.
- Rotation doesn't work automatically (display mode doesn't change when I swivel the screen). However, the Mobility Center provides a pretty quick way to do it the manual way.
- I also have OneNote 2007. The full screen mode really looks awesome on this screen (the biggest tablet screen available). Lots of note-taking room. I use my computer for 5 college classes MWF.
- The pen's calibration is almost perfect. So close that I haven't bothered to track down the calibration screen (and I probably won't).
- A couple of annoying interruptions have happened:
- One was a prompt to turn on automatic learning for handwriting recognition. It was really not cool to be interrupted by this in the middle of my first use of the TIP.
- The other was a similar pop-up, this time about pen flicks. I happened to make a quick gesture with the pen in between note-taking bursts and it popped up. I didn't really want to hear about that right then.
- The Ctrl+Alt+Del button works fine. The other buttons on the screen panel don't though. This is a disappointment, as most of them did work in RC1. Maybe that was because I played around with installing some of the Vista drivers from the Toshiba website. I haven't done this yet for the RTM version.
RC1 (Build 5600)
My latest experiment has been to install Vista RC1, which runs just as fast as XP (except there's no AeroGlass, due to the older Intel graphics). It is a good enough experience to use as my main OS, as I have been doing for the past month since RC1's release. Drivers are half-way there:
- The virtual numpad keys work, as does the Fn+F11 key to lock them.
- Fn+F5 works to switch the VGA-Out port on and off, but only after installing the M400 Vista Beta drivers.
- The hardware "Ctrl+Alt+Del" button works out-of-the-box.
- To get the other buttons on the screen panel working, I had to install more drivers, either from the M400 beta drivers or from the Toshiba Recovery CD.
- I was able to install Quicken from the Recovery CD onto Vista. I suspect you can do this with any of the other programs also.