You can’t help but think upon first glance that the Toshiba WT310 tablet is similar to other OEM tablets running Windows 8.
But it’s not. The first thing I noticed was the feel of the device in my hands. It felt sturdy. The back of the 11-inch tablet is made from plastic resin, while the front is Concore glass, an anti-reflective coating that prevents fingerprints. Toshiba even included a soft-cloth to wipe the screen with. For me these little touches add up especially since Toshiba is positioning this product in the business market against heavyweights such as Samsung, Lenovo, HP, Dell, Apple and Microsoft with is Surface product. And, lets not forget the other OEM brands such as Acer, Asus and Sony. You can even put in Google now too.
My point here is that the tablet market is a crowded marketplace and Toshiba needs to standout. And, I think they have pretty much achieved that with the WT310. Here are two things that I noticed. The first is the digitizer stylus pen easily slides in and out from the top of the device but is contoured to the back resin surface. The same goes for the SD card slot. Microsoft makes a big deal about the click sounds on the Surface, well the WT310 has audible enough click sounds for its pen and SD card slot. A nice touch.
The digitizer pen really improves the handwriting experience. There are still a lot of business people who prefer to take notes for meetings. Now they can take those notes on a tablet and have them stored for easy retrieval. The same can be said for drawings and even capturing one’s own signature.
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The Portege is thin enough, while sporting a strong complement of ports such as HDMI. It does not, however, have a full USB slot settling instead for the smaller memory media slot. Battery life is really good. Powered up the Portege got just under six hours of battery life.
The machine is powered by the latest Intel Core i5 processor with vPro and you notice the difference.
Pricing is something to consider. The Toshiba WT310 is on the high end at just under $1,400. But as business tool it might be worth the investment as it supports 32- and 64-bit versions of Windows 7. The device is Intel Wireless Display Ready and features HD front-facing and 3MP rear-facing cameras, ideal for virtual business meetings.