Toshiba Satellite Radius 15 review

Between convertible tablet modes, touchscreens and 4K displays, laptops have been inundated with features that often do little more than hike up the price. And so when Toshiba lays claim to creating the world's first 15-inch, 4K convertible laptop, I expected it to be one of the world's flashiest laptops with little substance.

Thankfully, the Toshiba Satellite Radius 15 proved to be an excellent device that combines all these disparate qualities to creating one stunning experience no matter how you're using it.

Design

For a 15-inch laptop, the Radius 15 is one sleek device. While most of these plus-sized laptops are large and blocky, the Radius comes to a relatively thin 0.79-inch thin profile when closed. Even the underside of the notebook tapers to accentuate its thinness.

Aesthetically, the Radius 15 looks modern with a dark, charcoal paint job and corners that come to hard right angles. It also helps that brushed aluminum sheets cover both the screen lid and keyboard deck.

Speaking of the keyboard, the Radius 15 features a spacious island layout. However, I have to say it offers some of the shortest key travel I've seen on any Windows laptop. The lack of key travel isn't shockingly non-existent as it is on Apple's New MacBook, but it's shallow enough to make you give pause. However, after the first odd keystroke, you eventually get used to it.

All in all, it's pretty standard keyset, save for a special Cortana key that only triggers a search command when it was originally designed to prompt the laptop to listen for voice commands.

While the trackpad isn't lined with glass, the plastic panel is smooth enough with a slight brushed texture to it. You'll never find yourself stroking your finger across the palm rests wondering why the cursor isn't moving.

One thing you'll especially like about this revision is how it drops the banana-laptop look from yesteryear, where the rear end of the machine would appear to dip more and more as it approached the hinge. From the side, the 2015 model has a much more streamlined profile that's straight from front to back.

Thanks to these aesthetic improvements, you would never take this laptop for a convertible hybrid. But, with one quick flip of the screen, you can use the Radius 15 as a massive tablet or stand it up as a portable 15-inch screen – and that's the star of this show.

Now in gorgeous Ultra HD

By far, the biggest feature of the Toshiba Satellite Radius 15 is its 4K screen, offering up 3,840 x 2,160 pixels of sumptuous resolution. Aside from being extremely sharp, with 282 pixels per inch, the display panel also produces deep shadows and vibrant colors. The combination of sharpness and dynamic range enhances just about any experience you play on it.

Whether it's watching an episode of Daredevil or playing some old missions in Halo 4 with Xbox One streaming, the Radius 15's screen just makes everything look better.

To complement this visual feast, Toshiba has also fitted the Radius 15 with a pair of booming Harman Kardon speakers. Not only do the tweeters sound massive for their size, for once you can pump the volume to max with no worry about distortion.

Toshiba claims that a partnership with DTS Sound, plus an exclusive Slipstream port, allows its laptop speakers to be more precise and produce a richer, room-filling sound.