4. Keyboards, Fingerprint Sensors, A Stylus And More

The full-size keyboards on both laptops are a pleasure to type on. The keys feel good to the touch, downward and upward key travel are as expected and mechanically produced sounds are assuring, not distracting. The keyboard on the Toshiba flexes downward during typing. It is not distracting when you are typing, unless you look at the keyboard, which is a benefit for touch typists. Toshiba is aware of the issue, says it doesn't affect the functioning of the computer and has assured us it will take this flexing into consideration in designing future generations of this model.

Both laptops feature fingerprint sensors that read your fingerprint and use it in place of your Windows password. Because each person's fingerprints are unique, a sensor offers greater security than a password, which could slip into the wrong hands. The sensor on the Toshiba R200 worked fine. The optional security chip was not installed on the Fujitsu so its sensor was not functional. Home users probably do not need the security offered by the fingerprint sensors, but highly mobile business users will appreciate this extra lock on the computer's operating system and data. A fingerprint sensor acts as a first line of defense against less-aggressive, less-technically inclined snoopers. To fully protect data stored on a disk drive data should be encrypted and the disk drive should have a BIOS chip level password.

The Fujitsu Lifebook B6110D's fingerprint sensor is circled in red.

The Toshiba Portege R200's fingerprint sensor is circled in red.

The mouse touch pads and left and right mouse buttons on both computers work well. As you can see in the picture, the Fujitsu's fingerprint sensor sits between the two mouse buttons. We hit the fingerprint sensor a number of times by accident instead of the mouse button we were aiming at. This did not activate the sensor because the laptop did not have the necessary security chip installed, but it did leave us wondering why the mouse button had failed to work until we realized we were hitting the sensor. The Lifebook's fingerprint sensor can also function like the scroll wheel on a mouse.

The Fujitsu B6110D comes with a stylus-based mouse. You can use the stylus to move the cursor around the screen, do mouse button presses and even draw in mouse sensitive applications. Though Fujitsu makes Tablet PCs, the B6110D is not one and the stylus does not have all the functionality of a Tablet PC stylus. With a Tablet PC, only the stylus can initiate mouse-related actions on the display. A pencil, your hand, a finger nail or even the B6100D's stylus would not be mistaken for a mouse on a Tablet PC. On the B6110D, however, anything can act as a stylus. This can be annoying in drawing programs where you would not be able to rest your hand on the screen while drawing for fear it would attract the cursor away from the stylus or even leave a mark of its own.

Also, unlike with a Tablet PC where you can write on the display as though it were a piece of paper without a keyboard getting in the way, you have to reach over the Fujitsu's keyboard to use the stylus on the screen. Those with more flexible joints and steadier hands than us might find the stylus useful for browsing the Internet. However, we found it awkward to do so. We finally disabled stylus functionality when our luminance meter's sensor enclosure acted as a stylus in Microsoft Paint, where we did some luminance measurements, and drew its own marks all over the pure white Paint window thus changing the luminance of the window.

The 12.1" 1024 x 768 displays on both laptops are of very good quality. Text and images are crisp and easy to see. The screens provide enough contrast for viewing up to about 45 degrees off of the perpendicular in either direction. Neither is designed for use outdoors, except in deep shade. See the tests section for more on the quality of the displays on these two computers.

Both the Lifebook and the Portege handle sound well, especially considering their small size. Using the internal speakers, volume is more than adequate and sound quality is not bad. As might be expected, both laptops produce the best sound when used with a set of decent external speakers or headphones.

Fujitsu provides a 1 year limited international parts and labor warranty on the Lifebook B6110D. Except for the battery and AC adapter, which carry a 1 year limited warranty, Toshiba covers the Portege R200 under a three year limited parts and labor warranty.