Toshiba AT100
Category : Notebooks / Tablets
Published by Marc Büchel on 13.10.11
With the AT100 Toshiba presents a tablet PC which is quite thick and heavy compared to products from other manufacturers. Therefore you get full size USB and HDMI ports. This seems like Toshiba is trying to convince customers that their product offers very good ergonomics and is practical. 
In Switzerland you can get the Toshiba AT100 in exactly one flavour. The device which sets you back CHF 479.- (est. EUR 399.-) has been equipped with a 10.1 inch display, 16 Gigabyte memory, WiFi/Bluetooth an a 1 GHz NVIDIA Tegrea 2 Dual-Core CPU.
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Preview
One of the first things you'll notice when unboxing the Toshiba AT 100 is, that this thing is remarkably thick and with thick we mean twice as thick like for example a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 or an iPad 2. One reason herefore is, that the tablet has an exchangable cover made of rubber. When we wrote this review the covers which should be available also in different colors couldn't be found in any Swiss online shop. Thanks to the tablets height of 15.8 millimeter - from which we say that this is thick for a tablet - Toshiba could equip is with a full size HDMI port as well as a full size USB port which makes it very easy to connect either a USB hard drive, a USB stick or even connect the tablet to ones TV. We had to smile quite a bit as soon as we saw that there is a really big handbook in the delivery. The first question which arose in this contex was: why do you need such a huge manual for a thing which es expected to be self explaining? Furthermore it would also have been an option to deliver the manual as PDF and make it visible on the entry page already when you start the tablet for the first time. This way the company could have save quite a lot of paper.
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Specifications
| Model | Toshiba AT100 |
| CPU hardware | Ventana |
| CPU Model | Dual-Core ARMv7 (VFPv3) |
| Clock Speed | 216 - 1'000 MHz |
| Display resolution | 1280 x 800 |
| Memory size | 16 Gigabyte |
| Memory | 1'024 Megabyte |
| SD-Card size | 32 GByte |
| Camera | 5 Mega Pixel Back 2 Mega Pixel Front |
| Connectors | 1 x HDMI Connector 1 x USB 1 x mini USB 1 x Audio Jack 1 x MMC, micro SD, SD, SDHC card reader |
| Audio | Speaker |
| Connectivity | WiFi 802.11 b/g/n Bluetooth 3.0 |
| OS | Android Honeycomb 3.1 |
| Battery | 1 x 24.4 Wh Battery, Tab 1 x 24.4 Wh Battery, Dock |
| Dimensions | 273 x 177 x 15.8 mm (W x D x H) |
| Wight | 765 g |
| Software | Toshiba File Manager Toshiba Online Manual Toshiba Places Client McAfee Wave Secure Evernote Adobe Reader Toshiba Media Player |
The specifications which are listed here represent the model we've had for review. The dual core Tegra 2 solution is quick engough for an Android Honeycomb based tablet.
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Case, Display, Haptics, Dock
The display comes with 10.1 inch size and 1280 x 800 pixel resolution. This means that you get 16 : 9 aspect ratio which makes it suitable to watch a video on the go. Unfortunately the display is the major weakness of this product. Absolutely critical for a good tablet is, that you get a very good display if this isn't the case this seriously compromises the user experience. In this case the display lacks brightness as well as contrast. If you for example increase the brightness colors quickly seem washed out. Therfore it won't make it easier to read long texts. Furthermore the display is very glossy which bears the consequence that when you have sunlight directly shining onto the panel you won't be able to read text. On the other hand if you're in a closed room without light shining directly onto the display the user experience is quite pleasing.
We also noticed that sometime we hade to tap the display two or three time that the tablet performs a corresponding action. This makes the interaction with this thing not that comfortable.
What we liked very much was, that Toshiba equipped the AT100 with a full size USB and HDMI port. This makes it very easy to connect, let's say an external hard drive to the tablet or your TV. Furthermore there also are different lock buttons. One of which can be used to deactivate the tablets tilt functionality, which might be handy under certain circumstances.
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Test setup
To test and afterwards compare the performance of Android based tablets we use AnTuTu Benchmark and Vellamo. AnTuTu is more of theoretical nature whereas Vellamo is more relevant for every day usage. Overall we think that this is a good mixture. In order to measure battery life we use Battery Spy and Flashlight. Battery Spy constantly monitors capacity and records the time the device was on. With Flashlight we make the screen light at full brightness with white color.Benchmarkprogramme
- AnTuTu Benchmark
- Total
- CPU Integer
- CPU Floating-Point
- 2D
- 3D
- Database I/O
- SD card write
- SD card read
- Vellamo
- Total
- Sun Spider
- V8 Benchmark
- Networking Loader
- Battery Spy / Flashlight
- Screenlight
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AnTuTu Benchmark - CPU and Graphics
| Total | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 5'778 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 4'526 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 4'325 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 2'890 |
| CPU Integer | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 1'387 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 945 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 776 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 607 |
| CPU Floating-Point | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 1'269 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 1'036 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 974 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 152 |
| 2D | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 297 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 296 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 293 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 352 |
| 3D | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 1'235 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 1'114 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 837 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 797 |
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AnTuTu Benchmark Database and Memory Subsystem
| Database I/O: | Punkte |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 470 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 275 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 170 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 190 |
| SD card write | MByte/s |
| Toshiba AT100 | 15.4 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 15.2 |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 7.4 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 4.1 |
| SD card read | MByte/s |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 22.2 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 19.2 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 16.2 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 10.6 |
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Vellamo Web browsing
| Total | Punkte |
| Toshiba AT100 | 980 |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 920 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 916 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 611 |
| Sun Spider 0.9.1 | Punkte |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 127.55 |
| Toshiba AT100 | 124.85 |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 94.09 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 24.37 |
| V8 Benchmark | Punkte |
| Toshiba AT100 | 104.25 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 104.79 |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 81.45 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 38.15 |
| Networking Loader | Punkte |
| Toshiba AT100 | 115.67 |
| Samsung Galaxy SII | 113.05 |
| Samsung Galaxy S | 78.72 |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 65.19 |
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Battery Life
| Battery Life | |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer with Dock | 11 h 52 min |
| ASUS Eee Pad Transformer | 6 h 47 min |
| Toshiba AT100 | 4 h 45 min |
Letting the display shine white at full brightness allows almost five hours of battery life. Having the display shine at full brightness draws about the same amount of power from the the battery like it does when one is whatching a movie. The only important difference for testing is that this scenario is easier to reproduce.
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Conclusion
| General | + | - | |
| Toshibas AT100 leaves us with mixed feelings. On one hand we very much like the full size USB and HDMI connectors. Using which it is childrens play to attach an external hard drive or a TV to the tablet. On the other hand there is the display which lacks contrast and brightness, the heavy weight, the build quality and the material which could have been chosen more wisely. Sometimes it is a good idea to not do too many things in a different way then the others do it. | - Full-Size-Ports | -
Display - Weight - Build quality |
|
| Gehäuse, Display, Haptik | + | - | |
| Top
quality and comfortable that's the two attributes we think are most
suitable for this device. Furthermore we also liked the unique look of
the design which is another reason why this very tablet stands out of
the crowd. Also part of the category "comfortable" is the display which
is based on an IPS panel with LED backlight and therefore offers very
good contrast ratio and brightness. Only the shape of the case could be a bit more ergonomic. The circumstance that it is curved on the edges makes it a little bit tricky to hold the device in hands. |
- | -
Case-stiffness - Weight - Brightness and Contrast of Display |
|
| Performance, Battery Life | + | - | |
| NVIDIAs Tegra 2 SoC offers
plenty of performance for an Android Honeycomb based Tablet. The dual
core CPU allows a smooth user experience an there even is plenty of
grunt for mobile gaming. The battery lasts for almost five hours when the tablet is being heavily used. Toshiba claims that the battery can power the AT100 for up to eleven hours. |
- Smooth browsing and working experience - Mobile gaming |
||
| Rating | |||
| The AT100 from Toshiba gets sufficient three out of five stars. | |||
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