Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030 review: Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030

Editors' note: This review is part of our 2010 retail laptop and desktop back-to-school roundup, covering specific fixed configurations of popular systems that can be found in retail stores.

6.2

Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030

The Good

Better-than-expected performance from its AMD Turion II processor; solid construction.

The Bad

Weak battery life; thick-bodied design isn't backpack-friendly.

The Bottom Line

The Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030 is a decent all-around budget laptop. However, with its short battery life and cheaper options available from the competition, it's not an overly impressive deal.

If you were to look for the definition of "perfectly average laptop," you'd probably find a picture of the Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030. It has a solid dual-core AMD Turion II processor, 4GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive, and a decent 14-inch screen that complements its fair-looking, but forgettable, chassis.

There is good and bad news here: the good is that this Toshiba laptop is zippier than we expected. The bad is that it has an underwhelming, nearly useless battery life. Its $599 price knocks on the door of slightly higher-priced laptops that offer better performance, and other budget systems--such as the Asus K50IJ-BBZ5--are cheaper and faster. If this laptop were to cost less than $499, we'd say it was a steal; however, at $599 you can find a better system.

Since it lacks an HDMI port, has tinny-sounding speakers, and has an overly thick chassis, we'd skip the L645D if we were shopping for a computer in this price range; however, if you end up with this model, at least take heart that it won't disappoint you performancewise--provided you keep it plugged in to a nearby electrical outlet.

Toshiba tends to make its budget products sturdier feeling than that of other manufacturers, and the L645D is definitely a solid-feeling chunk of plastic. It's 1.5 inches thick, which is a bit more than we'd prefer on a 14-inch laptop. Toshiba covers this Satellite with a dark silvery-gray patterned finish. It's a more attractive looking than an overly glossy monochrome finish, but it still looks a bit generic. The screen and surrounding bezel are glossy black, as is the wide and flat keyboard. Even though this Satellite is bulky, it's fairly light; at 4.7 pounds, it doesn't weigh you down.

The flat-style keyboard, which Toshiba has largely moved away from in favor of raised keys on many other models, is quite familiar to us--we saw it in nearly all Satellites last year. We used to complain that this type of keyboard felt squishy and uncomfortable, but for some reason--possibly the extra elevation due to a thicker base--typing on the L645D is actually comfortable.

The matte multitouch touch pad lies flush with the rest of the keyboard deck and can get a little lost under your fingers, but it works well. Its large curved buttons beneath the pad are firm and click solidly, but there is no practical reason for them to have a convex shape.

The L645D-S4030 has a 14-inch screen with a 1,366x768-pixel native resolution, like 11- to 15 inch laptops have, and it has a fairly bright LED backlight. For a budget laptop, the Toshiba's screen is crisp and colorful enough to provide decent video playback, and it looked fine when browsing and reading documents. Its exposed stereo speakers, which are above the keyboard, disappointed us. Unlike with higher-end audio components on other Satellites, the audio TV shows and music on the L645D sounded tinny and underpowered, even when maxing the volume out.

The Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030's connection options are a little bare bones. A USB/eSATA combo port is about the only special feature the laptop has. As it doesn't have Bluetooth, HDMI, or ExpressCard, Toshiba limits your expansion options even though the laptop certainly room on its sides and front to fit these features in.

The Satellite L645D-S4030 is powered an AMD Turion II dual-core CPU that offers surprisingly good performance for everyday use. It works particularly well in single-task and video playback functions and has nearly comparable performance to an Intel Core i3 processor, handling single-core tasks in our benchmark tests just a little slower some higher-end retail machines do. The Satellite takes a performance score hit as it isn't as efficient when multitasking. However, it is zippy when navigating around Windows 7 and opening programs.

While this Satellite has ATI graphics chip, its performance is not much better than integrated Intel graphics. In our Unreal Tournament III benchmark test, the laptop chugged at a paltry 17.4 frames per second at 1,200x720-pixel resolution. This laptop isn't a gaming system, but its ATI graphics should provide a little help with video and system performance.

Juice box
Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030	Average watts per hour
Off	0.31
Sleep	0.86
Idle	13.55
Load	44.41
Raw kWh number	51.51
Annual power consumption cost	$5.85

The real deal breaker with this Satellite lies in its subpar battery life: The Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030 lasted only 1 hour and 50 minutes with its included six-cell battery in our video playback battery drain test. It's battery life is rock-bottom among our budget retail laptops. You could select a laptop with better battery life nearly by accident. Admittedly, many of our budget laptops do not have stellar battery life, but at least others like the Asus K50IJ-BBZ5 approach 3 hours.

Toshiba includes an industry-standard one-year warranty with the Satellite L645D-S4030. Support is accessible through a toll free phone number, live support chat, and e-mail. Toshiba has an online knowledge base and driver downloads that are relatively easy to find on its Web site. Retail outlets also offer extended warranties to laptop buyers at the point of purchase, but we generally don't recommend them.

Find out more about how we test laptops.

Asus K50IJ-BBZ5
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.3GHz Intel Pentium Dual-Core T4500; 4,096MB DDR3 SDRAM 1,066MHz; 64MB (Dedicated)/1,696MB (Total) Mobile Intel GMA 4500MHD; 320GB Western Digital 5,400rpm

Compaq CQ62-215DX
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.19GHz AMD Sempron V120; 2,048MB DDR3 SDRAM 1,066MHz; 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4250; 250GB Western Digital 5,400rpm

HP G62-225DX
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.3GHz Intel Pentium Dual-Core T4500; 3,072MB DDR2 SDRAM 800MHz; 64MB (Dedicated)/1696MB (Total) Mobile Intel GMA 4500MHD; 320GB Samsung 5,400rpm

HP Pavilion dv5-2035dx
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.3GHz AMD Turion II P520 Dual-Core; 4096MB DDR3 SDRAM 1066MHz; 320MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4250; 320GB Seagate 5400rpm

Dell iM501R-1212PBL
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.1GHz AMD Athlon II P320 Dual-Core; 3072MB DDR2 SDRAM 1333MHz; 384MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4250; 320GB Toshiba 5400rpm

Toshiba Satellite C655-S5049
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.2GHz Intel Celeron 900; 2048MB DDR3 SDRAM 1066MHz; 128MB (Dedicated)/829MB (Total) Mobile Intel GMA 4500MHD; 250GB Toshiba 5400rpm

Toshiba Satellite L645D-S4030
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit); 2.3GHz AMD Turion II P520 Dual-Core; 4096MB DDR3 SDRAM 1066MHz; 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4200; 320GB Toshiba 5400rpm