Toshiba Satellite P755D: Nearing the End of the Road for Llano
by Dustin Sklavos on April 11, 2012 12:00 AM ESTBattery Life
One of the places where AMD scored big with Llano (especially compared to their previous generation) has been battery life and power efficiency. Llano presently remains your best option for gaming on the battery, but somewhere along the line it seems like Toshiba may have dropped the ball with the Satellite P755D. Take a look.
Our battery running time results seem to corroborate the results from other sites, but that doesn't actually explain why the P755D's battery life is so terrible. Llano is definitely capable of running very efficiently (our time with AMD's reference platform proved that), so I can't help but get the impression that we're running into another situation where AMD's status as an also-ran in the notebook market is resulting in less care being taken in optimizing systems that run their hardware.
Jarred's remarked on this before but it bears repeating: part of the problem with AMD processors in notebooks is that notebook manufacturers almost never took them seriously. This isn't bad hardware, but Toshiba's engineers seem to have taken only the most minimal of care with the Satellite P755D's APU. It's a decision that ultimately sells everyone on the chain short: Toshiba, AMD, and the end user. We don't think it's impossible for a vendor to produce a very compelling AMD-based notebook, but they have to be willing to try, and it's a shame nobody's really stepping up to do so.
Heat and Noise
The P755D does do right by AMD in one way: it demonstrates just what a good citizen AMD's A8-3520M can actually be in a system where heat and noise are concerned. The fans never have to spin up terribly high in the P755D, even under load, and you can see why.
HWMonitor's wattage reading is undoubtedly off the mark, but check out the thermals. While we're used to seeing other systems we test cook the hardware, the A8-3520M is running downright frosty. Seeing mobile hardware, or heck, even desktop hardware, run below 60C under stress is a very rare thing. At these temperatures it's no wonder the fan doesn't have to work particularly hard.
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jrocks84 - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I was hoping you would consider including testing of the wifi speed in future laptop reviews.jjrudey - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I have the Intel version with i7 2670QM. Pretty sure it's that. But anyway. They're really great for someone who doesn't want to spend over $1000.Bull Dog - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I appreciate your rant about DRM on Batman AA. As a paying consumer, It really sucks when the pirated product is better than the legit one.teiglin - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
Always makes me think of one of my favorite comics: http://xkcd.com/488/Of course, Randall doesn't include the path the vendors hope you'll take: instead of attempting to recovery your DRM-locked files, they hope you'll simply buy the stuff again. I mean, why expect to be able to use your legitimately-purchased products indefinitely? Obviously you should be paying for the same thing every few years.
When I was a kid, I read 20- or 25-year-old copies of Dune and even older copies of The Hobbit and the trilogy. If Amazon's DRM weren't so easy to strip, I'd never buy anything electronically from them, because as much as I love my Kindle, I can't really see passing the exact device down to my son the way my parents introduced me to their old books.
duploxxx - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
toshiba satellite garbage, yet another example why you shouldn't be buying these entry level OEM HW platforms. Selling material is all they care about, not optimizing or finetuning anything at all. in the long run this is negative impression towards Toshiba users and as already mentioned in the review, typical on AMD system as if they don't care....cknobman - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
Exactly. Most of what toshiba pushes nowadays (especially the satellite series) is garbage exceeding the level of crapiness that even Dell stoops too on its budget consumer grade products.Scannall - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I've had an entry level Toshiba for several years now, with the AMD P320 + 4250. And it has been a solid and reliable computer. With the switch to Trinity soon, maybe after those are out these will be at fire sale prices on their Toshiba Direct site on eBay. Might be time for an upgrade.lazymangaka - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I would've loved to see what a decent overclock would've done for performance. K10STAT for the win, my friends.frozentundra123456 - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
I really dont see the point of blu ray on such a low end product with a lousy screen. I am sure the only way to use the blu ray capabillity would be to put it out to a big screen TV. I guess you can do that, but if I had a good entertainment system like that, I would have either an HTPC or a dedicated blu ray player.Also, I would have been interested in seeing results with the memory upgraded to faster dual channel mode, and/or overclocking as some else already mentioned.
Overall, to me who is not really interested in blu ray, too expensive for what you get.
frozentundra123456 - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
Also, I agree with the article that Llano is close, but still not quite there overall. Worse CPU performance than intel, and still very borderline for gaming with modern titles.If trinity lives up to the claims made for it, it might offer gaming that is good enough for decent resolutions and quality settings.