Review: Toshiba Satellite E305

Compared to last year’s E205 laptop, Toshiba seemed to have listened to what the consumers wanted for their notebooks. Toshiba Satellite E305 is a third collaboration of Toshiba with Best Buy and what they did last year was thoroughly scraped. The aim of the design was to create a laptop below $900 that still looked elegant and high end. Consumers like metal instead of a shiny plastic. They also prefer seamless touchpad designs compared to the earlier large mouse buttons.

Toshiba Satellite E305 is a 14 inch notebook, 1.2 inches thin and weighs just under 4.95 pounds. So in the realm of notebooks, even for such a small size, Satellite E305 is on the heavier side. Toshiba didn’t trim off much weight but definitely spent some time and resources on E305′s design. In this department, Toshiba can be given high marks for creating a very sophisticated look. The lid’s aluminum cover looks striking and the accents of chrome and the matching chassis will definitely appeal. Another detail is the checkered pattern etched on the surface. It succeeded in preventing the surface from getting fingerprints. The champagne color is also delightful. For the price of $899 Toshiba Satellite E305 is quite a nice notebook. Now, let us see if Satellite E305 is worth your money.

Toshiba Satellite E305 boasts the new 2.3 GHz Core i5-2410M CPU, Sandy Bridge processor, which makes your multi-tasking pretty snappy. Windows 7 Home Premium and Norton Internet Security are installed. RAM is 4GB. Hard drive is 7,200RPM of 500GB with integrated 4GB of Flash memory.  Flash memory helps somewhat with quick loading of docs. There is also an upgrade to USB 3.0 a 4G radio and the BluRay drive. Upgrade to USB 3.0 is recommended as with Toshiba’s  “sleep-and-charge technology” you can charge your USB devices even when E305 is asleep. Standard outputs are HDMI and VGA, a mic jack, memory card reader and an Ethernet port.

Now about the keyboard. Let’s be honest, we are rarely satisfied with keyboard. However, the one on the Satellite E305 felt very easy and comfortable for a change. The chiclet keyboard is well spaced and the shift buttons are just the right size. It is easy to type and you feel comfortable working your documents. This keyboard is also very robust and can withstand typing for extended hours. The trackpad, sadly is not one to impress. It is not as intuitive as you would expect, clicking rights even if you are clicking on left.

The screen of the Toshiba Satellite E305 uses the TruBrite technology and that means we are dealing with a glossy screen. However, the viewing angles are surprisingly good. Especially when watching your HD videos on a BluRay player. With 220-nit display with resolution of 1366×768 pixels all details are seen even from weird angles. The colors are brilliant, the video is crisp and the full screen mode offers good color rendering. 1080p video lags a bit, but not to bother much. 720p streams perfectly. E305 has Intel’s integrated HD graphics which are very common among mid range notebooks such as Toshiba Satellite E305 and for basic photo editing and graphic less intensive games suffices. The speakers are not for those who love really loud sounds, but at low volume sound ok.

Webcam of Satellite E305 doesn’t impress. It may do for a skype chat, but not for taking stills. The sharpness is just not where it ought to be and the colors did not look very natural. The pictures have a bit of a tinge to them. Facial recognition works well and is surprisingly quick. In less than half a minute Toshiba Satellite E305 recognizes your face and stores your facial identity for possible facial recognition log in.

Battery life is outstanding. On a single charge one should get over 7 hours of life. Working your E305 hard will decrease the expectations by couple of hours, but it is still commendable.

Overall, the new Toshiba Satellite E305 is an absolutely good notebook albeit with somewhat crappy touchpad. Nonetheless, this issue is minor compared to the amazing design and other brilliant additions like wireless Display 2.0 technology, Blu-ray playback, USB 3.0, cool operating temperature, and a Sandy Bridge processor.

CNet released this review video of Toshiba Satellite E305:

Enjoy these Toshiba Satellite E305 pictures:

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