Toshiba is a safe pair of hands when it comes to business-first laptops. But the hardware maker's newest Portege range differs from the norm and goes down a path less travelled into the world of the hybrid laptop.
How does the 2-in-1 convertible fare?
Design
Toshiba's newest Portege looks the part when closed thanks to that magnesium alloy lid in graphite black. Opening the hybrid, however, reveals a multitude of sins. We're not talking about the attractive backlit and spill-resistant keyboard, but those harsh angular edges and sharp corners that mark the Z20t-c's unforgiving design.
There's a strong focus on business customers here and we realise that Toshiba isn't overly concerned with consumer-friendly design, but are a few soft curves too much to ask?
Things get better when talking about dimensions. The Portege is just 8.8mm thick when used as a tablet, increasing to a none-too-fat 21mm in laptop mode. It weighs 0.73kg in tablet mode (the same as the Surface Book) and 1.51kg when docked. That's not too heavy on paper but after a little while we did need a break from using it as a tablet.
Let's talk about the docking mechanism. On the whole it's a pretty robust system. A long sliding catch towards the top of the keyboard pops the two pieces apart, while a further lock switch lives on the side and helps to prevent unwanted detachments.
However, the great big catches that make this all possible are all a bit much and it's not an elegant solution.
Worryingly, in laptop mode the Portege Z20t-c exhibits a somewhat rickety build. You can't put much pressure on the screen when the laptop's in docked mode, or you risk toppling the whole thing over.
Saying that, the Z20t-C is made of sturdy stuff, having undergone drop-testing up to 76cm and pressure-testing under a 100kg weight for 10 seconds.
It's heartening to come across a device with so many connectivity options. What's more, these aren't all restricted to the keyboard dock. Toshiba has spread them across both parts, which means you don't lose out when working in tablet mode.
There's a mixture of old and new on the keyboard base, for instance a VGA and a full-size HDMI port, which is always useful for presentations.
In addition there's a RJ-45 (Gigabit Ethernet) along with two USB 3.0 ports. The Portege supports Bluetooth 4.1 connections too.
The tablet section houses volume controls, USB Type-C port, micro-HDMI port, microSD and 3.5mm headset jack.
The power button is also located on the tablet, which to us was unexpected. Some hunting was required on first use.
The Portege comes with two styli, one loose and one hidden away in the base of the tablet. As nice as it is of Toshiba to supply two, we wanted to use only the larger pen-like stylus as the other felt bendy and cheap. What's more, the bendy model is inaccessible whenever the tablet is docked, which is surely a bit of an oversight
Performance and hardware
In an attempt to be all things to everyone, the Z20t-c can't be thin, light and boast blazing performance all at once.
This is confirmed by the presence of the Intel Core m7-6Y75, 1.2GHz (3.1GHz Turbo). The Intel Core M chip lacks speed and power compared with the meatier Core i series especially in terms of multitasking, which is something of a nonsensical move for a laptop aimed at enterprise users.
The Portege coped ably while web browsing and working with documents or spreadsheets, but anything more (like video editing or other processor-heavy applications) is likely to bring it to its knees.
The Portege scored 2,264 in the PCMark 8 Home test. Microsoft's 'ultimate laptop' managed 2,833 and, while the difference may only number in the hundreds, the jump is considerable. The Dell XPS 14 Series scored an even bigger 3,300+.
When it came to putting those Intel HD Graphics 515 through their paces, the 3DMark Sky Diver benchmark returned a score of 1,966. Put that against the Surface Book's 6,144 and it becomes clear that the Portege is purely a business-only machine.
Our demo model came with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of SSD storage.
We found the touchpad needlessly sticky, and sometimes struggled to rouse the cursor and make it travel even a short distance. But it glided around the screen with an impressive level of precision when it behaved normally.
The keyboard fared much better. There was a pleasing bounce to the keys and the ergonomics meant typing for long periods remained comfortable. This may not be a laptop for those with larger hands, however, owing to the smallish keys.
In laptop mode (and on the front) you'll find a Full HD camera with Ambient Light Sensor and a stereo microphone. The tablet has a rear 5MP Full HD camera with auto focus.
Display
The Portege comes with a toughened 12.5in IPS touch panel running at a 1,920 by 1,080 pixels resolution (176ppi).
At a shade under £2,000 you'd at least expect QHD. In picture terms it's certainly nearer the muted end of the scale, and on first impressions it made us wonder whether
Windows 10's Battery Saver setting was turned on. Disabling Adaptive Brightness settings boosted things a little, but to the detriment of battery life.
It's hard to look past the somewhat tricky 12.5in screen size as the wide-screen aspect ratio makes for a slightly unusual experience when browsing webpages and working on documents. It feels much more at home when watching the latest film trailers or settling down to a Netflix marathon, but we get the impression that's not what Toshiba had in mind.
It's somewhat unusual to see a laptop in 2016 with a matte finish, but this at least means that the Z20t-c is able to shrug off unwanted glare.
The touchscreen offers 10-point multi-finger support and is supplied with two styli so you can really make the most of the touch functions.
The display can also be reversed (always handy when confronted with a room full of people), and it can be doubled over on itself.
Battery and power
The keyboard and tablet contain individual three-cell batteries providing a combined maximum of six.
If it didn't quite cut it in the performance stakes, the Intel Core m7-6Y75 is known for its impressive power efficiency. Toshiba quotes nine hours and 30 minutes for the tablet only, and 19 hours as a whole. We got around an hour and a bit less than those estimates.
The entire right side of the tablet heated up considerably during normal use, but other than that the fanless device remained impressively cool.
The power brick connects to the keyboard part so you'll need to ensure that the tablet is suitably charged before using it in isolation.
SoftwareThe Portege Z20t-c has
Windows 10 Pro installed as standard.
Delve into the Start Menu and you'll find a selection of
Toshiba's own apps and software, including TruRecorder, TruCapture and TruNote, Power Media Player and an app explorer. Plus there's bloatware from the likes of McAfee, WinZip (evaluation) and TripAdvisor, as well as links to IOLO, Booking.com, Symbaloo Online, Dropbox etc.
With the exception of McAfee these are all fairly unobtrusive, but thumbs down to apps that try to hijack our browser on start or prompt us to use their own search tools.
Buyers are well catered for when it comes to security and enterprise features. The laptop includes a Trusted Platform Module 2.0 and supports Intel Active Management Technology that should make it easier for IT departments to monitor, maintain, repair, update and upgrade machines remotely.
As usual, Windows 10 Pro ships with BitLocker that provides full-disk encryption.
Price
This portability doesn't come cheap. Toshiba offers the Portege Z20t-c in a variety of configurations, starting at £1,399 (ex VAT) for an Intel Core m5-6Y54 1.1GHz with 128GB of storage.
This increases to £1,899 (ex VAT) for the top-of-the-range model with the Intel Core m7-6Y75 1.2GHz CPU and a 512GB SSD.
Summary
If you're after a business-grade hybrid laptop that provides a true tablet experience the Toshiba Portege Z20t-c hits all the right notes.
