Toshiba has unveiled a light "new" Portégé R500-S5007V ultraportable PC, though it's pretty much the same as existing models that start at 1.72 lbs (0.98kg). Toshiba is describing it as "the world's thinnest widescreen 12.1-inch notebook PC," but its main claim to fame is that it includes a new-technology 128GB solid state drive. The current top-of-the-range model is only 64GB.
Anyway, the fully-featured Portégé R500-S5007V weighs "from 2.4 pounds" (1.08kg), whereas the feature-crippled MacBook Air weighs 3 pounds (1.36 kg). The Toshiba has a DVD drive, PC Card slot, SD card slot, three USB ports, Firewire port, Ethernet port, monitor port, fingerprint reader, TrackPoint pointing device, user-replaceable battery, dock connection etc.
Of course, the S5007V has its own compromises. It has a smaller 12.1 inch 1280 x 800 WXGA LED screen (the ThinkPad X300, Dell XPS M1300 and MacBook Air have 13.3 inch screens) and a relatively slow but low-voltage processor: a 1.33GHz Core 2 Duo U7700. It's also not particularly cheap at $2,999, but swapping the SSD for a 160GB hard drive takes it down to a reasonable $2,100.*
Still, the spec helps with battery life, which Toshiba claims is "up to 7.5 hours". Packing a spare battery should enable you to keep working through a long flight, and it's lighter than packing two MacBook Airs.
For more info, Google News currently has around a hundred stories about the new machine.
* Toshiba's UK page for the R500 range doesn't show the new SSD model, but is showing price drops on all the old ones.
