When it’s the wife or the computer

Press, 4 August 1987, Page 45

When it’s the wife or the computer

GARETH POWELL takes a Toshiba laptop to bed

That I am obessed by computers there is no doubt. They have always filled my working day. Now they have gone further, perhaps too far. They have disturbed the even tenor of my ways, put my marital happiness in jeopardy. Max Fredericks, of Toshiba, sent me a Toshiba T3lOO/20 lap computer to test This desirable machine is driven by mains power, has a glowing orange plasma screen and is somewhat faster than an IBM AT. All in a stylish case that fits, just, into my briefcase.

Since taking it home I have been experimenting with it at night while sitting up in bed. At 3 o’clock the other morning, my wife turned to me and said, “You’ve been playing with that damn thing for hours. You’ll have to make up your mind. It is either that computer or me.” Which is a pity. For she was an excellent magazine editor. Portable computers are, however, much more than totally seductive toys. They are, in the opinion of many observers, the way in which the personal computer market is heading, especially at the high, executive-user end. There are several reasons for thls.

• Footprint The problem with most PCs — there are a few honourable exceptions — is that they take up too much room on a standard desk.

If you have a full-sized PC on your desk, you have room for a coffee cup, and not much else. Personal computers, unlike charity, are all puffed up.

With this Toshiba — on which I am writing this article — on my desk I have an acre of usable real estate left over because the space the computer takes up is only slightly bigger than a manila folder.

• Style. Most personal computers are horridly reminiscent of the checkin terminals at Heathrow , Airport In London. Seated d ’behind one, you appear 1 to? be a data entry clerk who has started on-the-job training. Most people, certainly most executives, find this something less than totally alluring.

Some of the newer portables, particularly and especially the Toshiba 3100, have so much style the user is instantly transported to the arrivedyuppy category. An up-market portable imparts an up-market image. It suggests, correctly, that the computer is serving you. Not that you are serving the computer. • Flexibility. Lugging a full-blown PC around can induce spring’s first careless rupture. They are both heavy and unhandy. Portables, on the other hand, can easily be moved from location to location so that your office, your work station, can commute between your place of business and your home, can be placed anywhere in any building and can even, for the incessant traveller, be used in a car or boat If the portable computer has a hard disk then you are equipped with a moveable feast of information — your filing cabinet in your brief case.

The result of these accumulated virtues is that sales of portable computers are, after a series of false starts, at last on the way up. There is some evidence to suggest, for example, that the Toshiba T3lOO is one of the. best-selling, if not the best-selling, AT machines on the Australian market.

Internationally, the .story is much the same. : Dataquest, an American market research company, has predicted that world sales of the high-end-of-market portables — those that cost $5OOO and up and are compatible with IBM-standard desk-top computers — will reach about $1.6 billion this year. That would be the equivalent of about 500,000 units, up from 300,000 units in 1986. Users, they suggest, are looking for a low-cost, functional computer that is easy on the eyes and is not so heavy that it requires “a lap the size of a gorilla,” as one : user put It is this market that is being addressed by the newest generation of portable computers, which resemble a standard desktop computer in everything except size and screen.

Where the Toshiba scores over most of its competitors is in its speed of operation and in the legibility of the screen.

Because it is driven with an Intel 80286 chip at 8 MHz, it operates as an IBM AT, only rather faster. At the same time, its 20-megabyte hard disk sprints along at about 32 milliseconds access time. This is very quick and the result is a computer operating at superfast speeds.

The screen itself is a miracle of clarity. Characters are shown in bright amber agains a muted reddy brown background. They are sharp enough to cut you. At the moment, I am hammering my way through documentation for a series of seminars I am giving. True, my brain is tired. And my fingers are a little weary. But I have not had a headache from viewing the screen. It is that easy on the eyes. Gas plasma screens would appear to be the way to go. Compaq, which built its ■ considerable fortune on the first so-called “transportable computers” — the desk-top machines with handles — has spent the last two years developing a portable computer with a gas plasma screen like the Toshiba, full-sized keyboard and a 20-mega-byte hard disk. : „ Compaq’s president, Rod Canion, says, “We feel there is a pent-up demand for such a computer.”

Compaq has already released this computer in Australia. It has an Intel 80826 chip running at eight and 12 MHz which makes it the fastest laptop on the market. It is also the most expensive at more than $lO,OOO. It is somewhat larger than the Toshiba and,/-' Indeed, when I saw it recently in Perth, it reminded me of the Sharp PC 7100. This Japanese manufacturer launched a portable computer about two years ago which was, in truth, not good enough , to review. Except pgfchaps-as an awful warnipgjj tf;? -:'i. ;>■

But it has totally made up for that with .its 7100 which looks like a small sewing machine; has a screen which rivals any standard VDU and has a built in 20-megabyte hard disk. Screen lettering is in dark blue on pale blue. The Sharp has the great attraction that it is considerably less expensive than the opposition. - A slight drawback is that it uses an Intel 8086 chip instead of one of the go-faster 80286 versions. This matters not in the slightest if you. ate using it for word processing or normal spreadsheets. Where it does; become noticeable is if you are essaying desk-top publishing _____

No matter what the software publishers say in their advertisements you cannot do successful desktop publishing without the faster chip. The story from Japan is that a second version of this model will be available soon with an 80286 chip and other changes even though the basic machine will remain the same. I have been trying to think of the precise word to describe the Sharp 7100 and I keep coming back to the word endearing. It is a very lovable computer.

Is this style of machine, then, the perfect computer? Are there no faults?

There are, indeed, some.

• Such computers are immensely stealable. In the British Army there was a special classification for stores that were likely to get nicked known as GlO9B. All portable computers are GlO9B stores in the full meaning of the act I am ever apprehensive that some light-fingered naughty person will have it away with my borrowed Toshiba.

However, there is a plus side to this. When you have finished with it at night or at any time during the day you can easily lock it in a desk drawer. This not . only stops it walking, it stops anyone getting, at. your confidential data oh the hard disk.

They do not have colour.?-? There is no doubt colour will come. Not soon, but eventually. If I want to work in colour with the Toshiba, which I am currently doing to produce some slide presentations, I need to hitch on an external monitor. Not difficult. But I would prefer to. have it built in to the screen. • There is no specially ? designed printer. This is passing strange in the case ot theT3loo. because Toshiba does a slashing line in top-end printers. • ” What is required : .is small stylish printer in the ■' game’ incurious, “yet ?restrained,styling' of ; -the 3100 and working very quietly. ... • ? • These are not cheap machines. Such miniaturisation never lent itself to low pricing. Basically, look to pay about twice what you would . for a similarly equipped desk-top Taiwanese clone.. But for you, as for me, such a computer may totally change your working patterns.?;’

As I am self-employed, I cannot afford ...a T3lOO and must therefore, eventually and under severe duress, return it to Toshiba. ■; ' ?■

At least then I will get my wife back. " :