Panasonic today updated its most hardened Toughbooks to make them both faster and more usable. The Toughbook 19 tablet and Toughbook 30 notebook are both based on Intel's Centrino 2 platform and use both faster and more efficient low-power Core 2 Duo processors that Panasonic estimates can get up to 10 hours on a single battery. They also get new, much brighter 1,000 nit LCDs with anti-glare, anti-reflection and circular polarizer filters that improve their viewability even in direct sunlight.

The systems additionally have options for relatively shockproof solid-state drives and have a new "concealed" mode that turns the display and all system lights off without shutting down the system itself. The mode is meant to avoid giving away the position of military and police users and also minimizes distractions from light for most any owner.

The 13.3-inch Toughbook 30 is the fastest of the collection and uses the same 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo as the MacBook Air to provide relatively quick performance but with energy use closer to ultra-low voltage chips. It also carries a minimum 2GB of DDR2 memory, a shock-mounted 160GB hard drive and 802.11n Wi-Fi in its base $3,649 configuration. The Toughbook 19 in turn uses a ULV 1.2GHz Core 2 Duo but is functionally identical despite the smaller 10.4-inch display and convertible touchscreen. It costs slightly more at $3,749.

Both revamps should be available today.

Toughbook 19



Toughbook 30