Panasonic ToughBook line consists of mobile computing workhorses. His ultra model, the ToughBook W7 is, however, a quarterhorse dragging too heavy basket.

The W7 has a nice couple of design choices: The DVD + RW charges at the top of the laptop, under a palm rest, swap hard to achieve rapid easy even in tight spaces - so that no part of the ejection trays of your balance of payments will be plan-seat neighbour. Although the lack of W7 the webcam and a fingerprint scanner, you find many books mind these days, it does pile on just about everything else.

Three USB ports, an SDHC card slot, a PC Card slot and a VGA-out port of seeds of its edges. This model has also built a wireless WAN. Unlike Sony VAIO VGN-TZ295N, you’re not locked into a single plan for wireless data transmission. You can specify whether you want to use EV-DO over Sprint or Verizon, or HSDPA on AT & T network. The only thing we missed: FireWire.

The notebook keyboard is supposed to be resistant to spills of up to 6 ounces, then going on - that guzzle large cappuccino with one hand and type with others.

Unfortunately, the W7 sustainability is a sacrifice in performance. The ToughBook slogs with a 1.06-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo U7500 CPU and 2 GB of RAM, a gain WorldBench 6 score of 52. However, it remained alive for 6.5 hours before the race to the battery, is about two hours longer than the average Ultraportables we’ve tested. The message of these results tell me is that this machine was built for the simple-minded single tasks - data entry, for example - but in the most hostile climates that through your office.

The keyboard spacing is certainly quite comfortable, but the keys are a bit more slippery to the touch. The W7 has a circular keyboard, which appears to be a clear idea, but it does not work well. It might be if the buttons were spaced further apart around the wheel - or simply expanded. I have often found that my fingers were jammed by the hinges of top-loading DVD shelf.

A major flaw compared to other notebooks, even Ultraportables: The screen resolution is a measly maximum 1024 by 768 pixels, which has often squint. It does not help that the display seems to be relatively low until you crank back to a dignified recliner-135-degree angle.

There are many good ideas at work here - not to mention many characteristics that make it difficult to beat ToughBook outdoors. But when you Hunker and, indeed, to get to work, you May take a little more time to do things that you want.