Along with an upgrade to its Satellite and Quosmio range, Toshiba last week launched its new ultrabook, the Portégé Z930 ultrabook, at a glittering event in Fourways.

 

Weighing in at a mere 1.2 kg, the company is touting the 13.3” device as being the ‘world’s lightest’ ultrabook. Specifications wise, the Z930 boasts an Intel Ivy Bridge processor, up to 8 GB of DDR3 memory and a 256 GB solid state drive.

 

“The Portégé Z930, in addition to being the world’s lightest ultrabook, is also engineered for big things,” asserted Jorge da Silva, head of sales for South Africa. “The combination of superb styling, ultra-portability, performance and power management means that the Z930 is superbly geared for professional and leisure needs,” he continued.

 

 

Despite its 15.9 mm high profile, the company has packed a number of features into their new offering. These include several full size ports, namely USB 2.0 and one USB 3.0, as well as a VGA and HDMI port and an SD card reader.

 

We were happy to note that the ultrabook does indeed offer a backlit keyboard and a multi-touch touch pad (in our minds backlighting should be as mandatory as decent keyboards). Additionally, stereo speakers enhanced with SRS Premium Sound 3D a high-definition webcam have also been crammed into the magnesium alloy frame. 

 

Also onboard is USB Sleep & Charge technology, enabling users to power up their smartphones while the system is powered off using the ultrabook. Most importantly for an ultrabook though, Toshiba asserted that the Z930 would offer up to eight hours of battery life.

 

 

 

The company noted that the Portégé Z930 is also well suited for business users, and “up to handling demanding business applications.” To this end, it has included its EasyGuard suite of technologies, which are aimed at protects the ultrabook from ”accidental bumps and spills” on the keyboard.

 

Advanced security features, such as Trusted Platform Module and a fingerprint reader for convenient yet secure log-in, are also supported. Additionally, the company explained that the ultrabook further integrates IT management capabilities based on the 3rd generation Intel Core vPro processor family, and delivers intelligent performance with embedded security like disk encryption and password protection.

 

 

Admittedly, we had limited time with Toshiba’s latest at the launch. However, what we did see we liked.

 

Most notable in our cursory observation was the brightness of the screen and keyboard backlighting, and the seemingly solidness of the Z930’s build quality. Alas, attempts to chase down an end user price have not born fruit as yet; however, hopefully this is an ultrabook that we will be seeing more of and have the opportunity to dig deeper into in due course.