6. The Real Advantage Of The E740

Intensive users of iPAQ and Palm will all agree: a PDA is also and especially worthwhile for its extensions. The e740 is the first Toshiba handheld to have any. There are already at least two: a video output to PC or video projector and a GPS module. Other products are being developed, including a joystick... but the value of this remains to be seen, given the reaction we heard from the publishers. Still, with its extensions and wireless communication capacities, the e740 is a top-range PDA designed for a more business public than the e310.

Battery Life

Regarding battery life on the other hand, the raft of statements on low consumption of the graphics chip and the processor have more to do with marketing than reality. The e740 has the same battery life as the e310. Allow about 5 hours if you are working, 3 if you play MP3s at the same time or 5 if you listen to music with the screen off. So the e740 does no better than the e310, but at least it does no worse.

In this respect, it is not as good as the latest iPAQs with their 1520 mAh batteries - the e740 has only 1000 mAh.

Competition Line-up

The e740 has a screen with a diagonal of 3.5 inches, against 3.8 for an iPAQ. Advantage to Compaq then, though the Toshiba is still quite readable. But for sound, Toshiba could have made an effort. The loudspeaker can hardly be heard and is of much lower quality than rival products. This is all the more deplorable because ATI and Toshiba have strongly promoted the video capacities of the X100 chip which hardware-decompresses the MPEG-4 format. The software used for playing these files is PocketDivX. Though the speaker is bad, fortunately the sound via the headphones is good, so on with your phones. You will then be able to enjoy the quality of the images and benefit from smooth full-screen output. At least if you close all your other background applications. It may sound like a detail, but if you really want to relax and watch a movie when on a long flight, then remember to take some extra memory cards. One minute of MPEG-4 video weighs not far from 2 MB.