Toshiba Tecra R940-S9440 Pro Reviews

Toshiba’s Tecra R940 mostly amounts to a chipset-level update of their previous generation of Tecra laptops. In many ways, it is identical to the R840—just with an Intel Ivy Bridge CPU, a different discrete graphics option, and two USB 3.0 ports (as opposed to the single 3.0 port of the R840). To that end, the very same praises we lavished upon the Tecra R840 still largely apply here, with reasonable temperatures, comfortable noise levels, an excellent keyboard, and solid build quality all topping the list. And, likewise, the same drawbacks also apply, such as the tiny (yet largely unimportant to business users) speakers. But where the R840 succeeded in battery life, the R940-S9440 configuration we reviewed lacks in exchange for a questionably beneficial AMD Radeon 7570M dedicated graphics adapter. The total runtime across nearly all scenarios is but a fraction of that of its predecessor (which instead leveraged the integrated Intel HD Graphics 3000), leaving few scenarios where this upgrade would prove worthwhile. Likewise, the Intel Core i7-3520M CPU that our review unit came equipped with is only marginally more powerful than its closest competitor, the Intel Core i5-3360M, which can be had for $100 less. As such, if nothing else, it might be wiser to opt for the same configuration as our review unit, but with a lower-grade i5 CPU and without dedicated graphics.