Mind you, battery life isn’t great even when using the 9400M G graphics. We got about 110 minutes of video playback with the 9400M G, and switching to the SLI graphics for playing games reduces that time to about 90-100 minutes. However, a laptop of this size and weight isn’t necessarily going to be carried around to coffee shops. Home use is more likely, moving room to room and plugging it into the mains when you need to top it up. With this in mind, we wouldn’t consider the limited battery life to be a major weakness.

Impressive audio and graphics hit the spot for gamers

For some reason, PCMark 05 took a dislike to the partitioning on the primary hard drive, preventing it from running its hard disk tests and producing an overall score for system performance. However, tests for components such as CPU and memory performance all produced impressive scores – as did gaming sessions with Call Of Duty 4.

Set to 1024 x 768 resolution with its SLI rig turned on, the X300-13W had moments where it actually hit 200 frames per second, although the average score was around 150-160f/s. As you’d expect, cranking the resolution up to 1680 x 1050 caused the frame rate to drop, but it still managed a very respectable 110-120f/s.

Verdict

The X300-13W may be a bit of a departure for Toshiba, but it certainly has the looks and the power to make a fine gaming laptop. It’s not badly priced either, as similar 17in laptops from gaming specialists such Alienware, also come in at well over £2000. Its size, weight and limited battery life mean that it’s not the most portable of laptops, but it’s an excellent option for gamers who are looking for an alternative to a conventional bulky tower PC. ®

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