Toshiba Satellite A665-3DV

We’ve seen laptops Toshiba Satellite A665-line (more than once, actually), and we have seen laptops that incorporate Nvidia’s 3D Vision technology. You can probably guess where this is going and the new Toshiba Satellite A665-3DV takes that trusted multimedia system and adds support for 3D Vision.

The A665-3DV is a powerful performer and solves a major problem with 3D gaming by incorporating all the necessary 3D compatible hardware (the main one is 120Hz display), which only your (included) 3D glasses and a rechargeable small USB IR emitter – the whole thing is much less cumbersome than using Nvidia’s 3D Vision on a desktop PC. The Blu-ray drive also works with 3D Blu-ray discs, although the relatively small screen does not make for a large group viewing experience.

Still, unless you’re a true fan of 3D, $ 1,600 is a bit of a stretch for a 15.6-inch laptop (interestingly, some recent Satellite A665 models had slightly larger 16-inch displays), even one with an Intel Core i7 740QM CPU and NVIDIA GeForce GTS 350M GPU. If we truly 3D PC gaming, would we want something with a bigger screen and better than the A665′s 1366 x 768 resolution.

Design

The look and feel of the A665-3DV is almost identical to other Satellite A665 models we’ve reviewed. The gray plastic structure that includes most of the body looks and feels like it belongs on a less expensive machine. There is nothing wrong with that, but it is definitely not make this a showpiece living room or den. Simultaneously with the construction for the most part feels very solid and sturdy, and there is no annoying flex in the keyboard – a common problem in laptops of all price ranges. Even better, the lid and wrist rest having a finely textured pattern that repels fingerprints.

The keyboard is the typical island-style can be seen on almost every new laptop, with flattened, widely spaced keys. The 15.6-inch laptop body gives just enough room for a full number pad on the right side of the keyboard, and there is a row of touch-sensitive media control buttons above the function keys. We often dinged Toshiba’s media control buttons to emit a loud beep even when mute hit (which was always counterintuitive, to say the least). Although the volume up / down buttons still beep standard, at least Toshiba beep from the speaker mute button while. Turning off all the beeps, then go to the Toshiba Utilities folder, click HWSetup, then press the Settings tab and then “Function Button Sound Notification”.

The touchpad is quite large, but offset to the left, because the number pad, and the surface has a very good friction-free coating with the large mouse buttons. Toshiba also has a small button above the touchpad off you need a mouse to connect.

Features

The system includes a pair of proprietary software utilities. ReelTime shows a row of miniatures on the bottom of the screen (it is intended to look like a film reel) that shows your recently viewed documents and web pages. Bulletin Board The slick-looking app lets you arrange photos and notes in one workspace. Both are well made, but you must take time to teach them.

The 15.6-inch display has a 1366 x 768-pixel resolution, which is the same as most 11 – to 15-inch laptops. The screen has a glossy finish that look of photos and video improves, but creates a glare and reflection. Harman Kardon speakers are the same found on other Toshiba models, although no overt branding on the speaker grills. For a pair of integrated laptop speakers, they deliver excellent sound quality with surprising depth.

The laptop has a useful collection of data and video connections. You get four USB 2.0 ports (one of which serves as an eSATA port), HDMI and VGA ports, a memory card reader and an ExpressCard/34 slot. The combo USB / eSATA port, Toshiba’s Sleep-and-feature that lets you take mobile phones, MP3 players and other gadgets USB charging.

Performance and battery life

The Satellite A665-3DV has an impressive set of components, including a 1.73GHz Intel Core i7 740QM CPU and a high-end nVidia GeForce GTS 350M GPU. The powerful hardware helps to cover the overhead required for the 3D processing, so we are able to play games at high settings not killing the frame rate if switching to 3D mode. If you don’t know 3D Vision and how it works, it should be extended to cover the basic look.

In our Unreal Tournament III test, the A665-3DV ran at 102.9 frames per second at 1366 x 768. That means it should run all current games at high detail levels, mainly because the screen resolution tops out at only 1366 x 768, which are hardcore PC gamers would consider on the low side.

The Satellite A665-3DV ran for 1 hour and 43 minutes in our video playback battery drain test using the included 12-cell battery. Coming less than two hours is regrettable, but sometimes understandable to a high-power gaming PC. However, that usually means a 17 – or 18-inch laptop, not a medium 15-inch model. Combined with the fact that the massive 12-cell battery protrudes from the bottom of the system as a huge standard, and this makes the weak battery life just sad.