The new 11.6-inch Toshiba Portege Z10t Ultrabook + Tablet Hybrid. Image: Toshiba
A new Windows 8 hybrid laptop tablet with a detachable screen was released for sale today in North America by Toshiba America on their online store. This new Toshiba hybrid is the first hybrid released by the Japanese computer maker with a detachable touchscreen.
Named Toshiba Portege Z10t this new hybrid is a business-minded computer like the rest of the Portege family of notebooks. For business users Toshiba has made sure their Portege Z10t comes with Windows 8 Pro on all available configurations. At this time there are two models to pick from on Toshibadirect.com (Toshiba’s online store); the Portege Z10t-A1110 which is priced at $1,449, the Portege Z10t-A1111 which is priced at $1,749.
The Toshiba Portege Z10t isn’t the most elegant looking hybrid on the market, but it’s design isn’t bad. The Z10t can be used as either a touchscreen Ultrabook (thin and light laptop) or a standalone tablet PC, all while being lightweight in either form. The total system weight for the base Z10t hybrid is 3.19 pounds and when you leave the keyboard dock behind the Z10t is 1.98 pound tablet.
Although not as good-looking as other hybrid Windows 8 mobile computers the Z10t has a very attractive feature package at the base level. The main features for the base $1,449 Portege Z10t include a 1080p resolution 11.6-inch capacitive multi-touch IPS screen, a built-in Wacom digitizer, a 1.5 GHz (2.3 GHz Turbo Boost) Intel Core i5-3439Y dual-core processor, 4GB of DDR3 memory clocked at 1600MHz, a 128GB SSD (mSATA-type), integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000, and all major I/O ports (USB 2.0, USB 3.0, VGA, micro-HDMI, SD, and Ethernet) are supported on either the tablet or the keyboard dock.
With the digitizer alone the Toshiba Portege Z10t sits above many other touchscreen Windows 8 hybrids available on the market today. Because with an active digitizer from Wacom included users get to enjoy the best pen input experience with palm rejection that a touchscreen laptop has to offer at this time. With an increase in accuracy of pen input you get to write notes down faster and if you’re an artist you’ll be able to draw digitally like a pro within drawing-specific programs.
The more expensive $1,749 Toshiba Portege Z10t-A1111 model comes with a better processor and 256GB of SSD storage as differentiating features compared to the cheaper Portege Z10t-A1110. The processor included with the Z10t-A1111 is the 1.5 GHz Intel Core i7-3689Y dual-core processor which can get up to 2.6 GHz with Turbo Boost.
Toshiba doesn’t rate the battery life too highly for either configuration with the longest battery life estimate being only 5.16 hours with Windows 8 Pro. Other hybrid Windows 8 laptops that offer detachable screens are promising around 8-9 hours of estimated battery life with Windows 8. One reason for the lower battery life is the Toshiba doesn’t use two batteries like other makers do with their hybrids. Other hybrids have a battery in the tablet and the keyboard dock and when you are in laptop mode both batteries can work together to extend your mobile computing experience by a few hours usually.
Since the Toshiba Portege Z10t really is the first generation Toshiba hybrid with a detachable touchscreen you might be able to see a dual battery solution arrive with future versions. Also once Intel launches Haswell processors a refreshed Z10t is also possible and the Haswell processors are capable of offering battery improvement equal to a 50 percent increase over the Ivy Bridge family of chips (what the Z10t currently runs on).
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