Toshiba Tecra M11 review

The screen above is decent, too. The 14in width and 1,366 x 768 native resolution are fine, and the panel offers reasonable detail and colour accuracy, which makes it ideal for working and surfing the web. We did detect a slight grainy finish, common to touch screens and netbooks alike, which became noticeable on lighter areas. It's another fault which, along with the lack of a discrete GPU, puts paid to the Tecra M11's prospects when it comes to precise graphical work.

As usual, Toshiba offers a range of accessories for use with the Tecra M11, but they don't come cheap. Port replicators run from £80 exc VAT to £145 exc VAT, and a replacement battery will set you back £93 exc VAT. The warranty, which stretches to three years by default, can also be augmented with a variety of collect and repair options.

This model's base price of £784 exc VAT, though, could prove its undoing. There's plenty of competition at this level, and other machines make more convincing cases: the £746 exc VAT HP Probook 6540b boasts a larger screen and a wider selection of ports, and the £765 exc VAT Acer TimelineX 5820T is lighter but still packs in an ATI Radeon HD 5650 graphics chip. Both machines include Intel Core i5 processors, too, which aren't far behind the Core i7 used in the Tecra M11 in performance terms.

There's plenty of competition, then, but there's also plenty of reasons to like the Tecra M11. Its fantastic build quality and superb application performance coupled with decent design elsewhere mean that, if you take the plunge, you won't be disappointed.