Official NEW SVZ Z series Owners Lounge

The sheet battery should work with both of them since the design didn't change and Sony was bundling the sheet battery with some computers.

Does anyone have any experience with that clear coat covering? I saw the thread about it and am considering getting t.

 

Hmm, that is what I was thinking.

Well no surprise that Sony Vaio online sales team have said no

 

those who own extended sheet battery, do you keep it on all the time?

 

I bought the Z2 sheet battery off of amazon for $90 and it works perfectly fine with my SVZ. And funny, I asked the Sony Vaio online sales team if it would work before I bought it and they said yes.

Personally, no. I pop it on and off all the time. I usually have it in my bag, but most of the time not even attached to the laptop. I only attach it if my SVZ's battery is getting low or I know I won't be moving for awhile and won't be near power. It adds an amazing amount of flexibility to the machine, but after you feel how light the laptop is without it, you're going to prefer to have it off if you don't need it. Check my posts a few pages back about how the sheet battery works on the Vaio if you have any more questions.

 

Can Sony send you recovery discs if you need them? I think I read earlier about someone doing that but wanted to make sure since sony is telling me to make a second set of recovery discs. The sony rep I was talking to told me the only way to delete the recovery partition is to reinstall windows 7 using the recovery discs. Wouldn't this mean that I would have to unistall all the bloatware from sony again? Even if I do a system image will it reapply on a different sized hard drive? Just a little confused about this. Is there a simpler way to delete the recovery partition?

 

how often does sony run sales on the z? i remember seeing past promos where free upgrades to ssd's and i7 chips were being offered.

 

If you are in the USA, they just recently updated with two discounts.
10% off now includes the Z and $200 off if you purchase a plan and an accessory.

 

any possible way to improve svz keyboard and trackpad? its totally bad and out of sync for fast typing..

 

question regarding vaio svz led screen. one of my friend bought a new svz from sony direct usa, after he received , he put it on a sleeve and tried to squeeze it on his bag and finally fits it. after he went to office and turned his laptop on and shocked to see his svz led screen seemed to look like cracked with light bleeds on top of the screen, its not a physical damage, its like a big hole like dead pixel and cracked black marks around it. that was the first time he turns his laptop on. what might caused it? is it a defective item he received or rough handling got it damaged? if its rough handling, how come its so sensitive? he didnt even touch the screen.. he tried to put the laptop on his bag with the sleeve.

 

I see the $200 off (which unfortunately doesn't seem to apply to custom systems), but I don't see the 10% discount. Where did you see that?

 

A sleeve will protect from impacts and scratches but if you put weight on the top of the sleeve it's still going to press down on the laptop to some degree. The Z has a very flexible lid by design. With phrases like "squeeze" and "finally fits," that's not a situation I'd put my Z into.

If he is still under the 30 day return period, just send it back to Sony for light bleed issues. I doubt they would be able to tell it's due to being "squeezed."

 

There are a few deals to be found on ebay -- some used, some new.

 

Try this link:

VAIO Student Offers | Sony | Sony Store USA

In the middle column it says,
"Not a gamer?Save up to 10% on select PCs, now including the ultra-portable Z Series."

(Code is "CAMPUS10" for the 10% off)

I just ordered a few hours ago and the $200 off applies to the custom systems but you have to add a service plan as well as an accessories (apparently, the Power Media Dock is excluded as an accessory if you buy it in the bundle).

But also the $200 discount doesn't combine with the CAMPUS10 (10% off) code. The highest discount will override the lower one.

 

I have gotten mine in. So far the webcam works and I am now busy with a clean install. I'm still downloading all the drivers now...

 

Hello. I'm deciding whether to buy this sweet machine or consider something else. I have read more or less this whole thread, and several reviews (the recent Review: Sony Vaio Z-Series Notebook (2012) and the early Sony VAIO Z 2012 Review - YouTube). The reviews don't agree on some points, the one on wired.com being generally more negative than the one from MobileTechReview.com.

I would like to ask the owners of the Vaio Z3 a few questions:

1) I've read that the keyboard is not that great (actually, horrible). Can someone elaborate a bit on this topic? Is really that bad?
2) I've read around that the trackpad as well is not that good. Actually yes, it seems to be smaller than what we're seeing on today's laptops, but still, I believe it's just a matter of getting used to is. Any user can elaborate on that, please? I'm coming from an old Thinkpad, and I've been loving the trackpoint so far. I'm quite worried by this small trackpad.
3) Do you believe that FULL HD resolution is needed on a relatively small display? Shouldn't a 1600x900 res be more than enough? What's the point in having an high-res panel when you have to increase the fonts in order to see them clearly without getting blind?

Thanks

 

vaio svz series discontinued in Australia.. prolly new model coming?

 

Sony UK currently has a half price HDD upgrade available, I don't know if they're doing this in the US but it saved me £210 (320-ish USD).
Now it's just a case of delivery, 3 weeks lead time

 

1) In my opinion the keyboard really isn't that bad once you get used to how shallow it is. My accuracy and speed has gone way up in my opinion from when I was using a deeper keyboard on my Sony Vaio FW.
2) Trackpad is great when it's working and the size for me is fine for normal use. I still prefer a mouse for extended periods of time but mainly for the speed and accuracy that offers. Others may have better input on that.
3) The screen is amazing in my opinion in terms of color and clarity but your right in that it sometimes is too small to read some things. As long as you adjust the zoom levels in your browser and everything its fine. A few things, like skype, won't adjust though so you will have to deal with slightly smaller icons.

Overall I love the computer, by far the best one I have owned and the convenience of the PMD and great battery life is nice.

 

Hey arenesus.. i just read your signature..
"VAIO Z 2012 (Awaiting arrival) - i7 3612QM 2.1GHz, 2x4GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM , 256GB SSD, 13" 1980x1020 IPS, WWAN."

13" 1980x1020 IPS <-- since when vaio svz comes with ips screen oO?

 

Selfish Mom - unless the headset provided with your laptop doesn't work (i.e. both mic and earpieces don't work), everything is working as it should, and there is nothing wrong with it.

As mentioned by others, the plug/jack in the Vaio Z3 is a very unusual type - I have researched it for quite a long time, even calling up custom cable and connector companies to ask about it.

NO company I have spoken with has EVER heard of a 5-conductor TRS (tip-ring-sleeve) conductor like this one (technically, it's a TRRRS - tip-ring-ring-ring-sleeve) connector.

I also was on the phone for many hours with Sony support, and most of their support people knew nothing about it. The one person I spoke with who tried to find information on it could find nothing other than it was proprietary, and there was no other support for it. The recommendation was "always use Sony headsets of this sort". Nobody else that I can find uses this type, or knows about it.

I also bought a "headset buddy" splitter, and it didn't work in my Vaio Z3. I told the Headset Buddy people about it, and they apologized for it not working and gave me my money back, saying that their plugs do not support this type of jack.

I tried the splitter on my Thinkpad x120e, and it worked fine there (it uses a TRRS (tip-ring-ring-sleeve) and not a TRRRS type; the TRRS type is much more common. The extra conductor is used either for a stereo microphone, a control button on the headset, or for noise cancelling - I'm not sure which one. In any case, it is proprietary to Sony, and Sony won't reveal ANYTHING about the setup of it.

If you're really interested in figuring this out, you could do surgery on the supplied headset and see which parts of the TRRRS connector are connected to which parts of the rest of the headset, and at least know what was connected to what. You could then re-use the connector itself and create your own custom splitter.

The cable companies I spoke with that made custom cables said they didn't even know where they could FIND a TRRRS connector, so that would be a problem if you didn't want to use the supplied connector.

In other words - Sony sucks.

- Tim

 

how power media dock works?
do we need to connect it to power socket all the time?
or it works on usb to access dvd drive on the go?

 

Do you guys think next refresh might have an IPS screen? I'm currently using a Vaio SR but the 3 year extended warranty ends next month so interested in upgrading/replacing. I've been looking at ux31a and researching ux32vd. Also looked at ux31e because its 800 dollars with xbox right now, which seems very cheap. But all in all nothing compares to a Vaio Z. And while its expensive, typically it's a no compromise laptop. Except for the screen which is clearly inferior now to a ux32vd or ux31a or sammy series 9.

Hence do you guys think competition will force Sony into IPS or how close in quality is the screen quality? Since I'm aware Vaio Z had best TN screen. Not sure if that's still the case.

 

For those of you that still want to see some more pictures about the main difference between 'Carbon black' and 'Premium Carbon black':
Comparing the carbon of the most popular colors! VAIO Z Series reviews - Satouchi.

He has some excellent pictures of the details.

 

The power media dock only works when it is connected to both your computer and the wall socket. It requires more power and so you have to use the power cord provided with the PMD. It cannot draw power from the laptop and run off of that when on the road. If you need a portable dvd drive you will need to buy a plain usb one that is powered off of the usb.

 

Well, I've "solved" my Premiere Pro problem, and now it is on to Photoshop. I find that Photoshop CS6 crashes immediately on the VAIO when the PMD is connected. It seems to work without the PMD.

This Adobe support note gives some suggestions for Photoshop problems with the AMD chip, but as this thread points out, replacing Sony's combined AMD/Intel driver with something from the AMD site is not possible (or at least not practical). I concur, having tried to do this to solve my Premiere Pro problem.

Are any of you using Photoshop CS6 with the PMD?

Thanks,

Derry

 

IPS is a double edged sword. Sure the viewing angles are considerably better, but the color reproduction of the Z3's screen destroys the Samsung Series 9. This is in part to the fact that the contrast ratio of IPS displays cannot compete with similar non-IPS displays; its just one of the disadvantages of the technology. I'm personally very pleased by the the Z3's screen and would call it a similar level to the zenbook prime series and better than the series 9 because of the S9's sub-par resolution. There is a slight red tint the farther you go in any direction of viewing, but the color of the 1080P Z3 will still blow you away.

 

Thank you for your response.

I saw a Asus ux31a at best buy today, and that screen looks insanely good.

Guess time to take a trip to a Sony store to compare.

This is gonna be a very difficult decision. Wish Sony had a nice promotion, or Microsoft store had a nice promo on a vaio z.

 

My opinion on the following points:

1) The keyboard isn't that bad. I am having little problems acclimating to it from my Lenovo, HP, Dell laptops as well as my regular keyboard on my desktop. Actually, out of the 5 computer keyboards mentioned the Lenovo is the worst in terms of layout due to propitiatory Lenovo key placement.

2) The trackpad is fine. No real issues here. What does one expect from a 13 inch platform. I, too, use a mouse when I work due to being able to manipulate the mouse and keys better.

3) The display is outstanding. I even went down to 100% text size and can see the font/screen pages just fine. Not bad for late 40s eyes. The resolution is terrific compared to my Dell 13" machine. This is also the best display in terms of color and clarity I have ever had on a laptop.

In all, after several days of configuring/using my Vaio Z 13" I am very pleased. Now with software being loaded that I require for my profession we will see how this phase goes. So far so good!

 

Take this Softly, I mean no offense at all...

Asus, Toshiba, Dell, HP, Apple, and even All Sony Vaio series are just typical laptops.

Z Series is a whole different thing and in a league of its own, in every possible sense, its the ONLY Consumer laptop on Planet Earth, that's MADE IN JAPAN, and in my opinion when Japanese dedicate time and R&D to manufacture a laptop at this era, then its surely holding Tech that is years ahead of competition.

Please Look at/Consider the Z series differently.

Well, I hope I could explain more, but its just a word of advise, You do the research yourself.

 

The Vaio Z is also much, much faster than the UX31A since it has a full mobile quad core i7 instead of dual core ULV CPUs. Of course, not everyone needs lots of processing power or the option of an external GPU.

 

a) Thanks to the person who helped me out getting Premiere Pro working on my machine sans PMD - it works great now.

b) In response to the above posts, I was also considering a UX31A over my Sony SVZ. In short, the reasons why I chose the Sony are as follows: full mobile processor (I do a lot of video editing), full gigabit ethernet NIC (whereas UX31A only has Wi-Fi or "Fast" ethernet (100 mbps, a miserable 12.5 MB/s)), HDMI port (enough said), the screen (the colors are mindblowing), possibility of sheet battery / PMD (though I haven't bought either), and finally the fingerprint reader for security. Having used both a UX31A and my own laptop, the SVZ definitely feels more "business-like" than the UX31A which seems more consumer-oriented.

 

1. Like all the very thin laptops, a shallow keyboard is the price to be paid. Some like this keyboard -- it's has move of a hard click to it. Others don't anyone who really pounds the keys would tend to not like it. For my use, it is one of the best ultra portable keyboards I've tried. I think the Macbook Air and Dell Ultrabook do a bit better. It's definitely something you would want to try before you buy if you can.

2. The trackpad is small but otherwise it's a nice trackpad. The texture is unique and the gestures and such tend to work well for a Windows machine. I've found that the momentum/Glide feature of the track pad helps out with the small size.

3. On my Z2, I opted for 1600x900. I can use everything at 100% that way. Of course if Sony's only offering the full HD version, you don't have a choice unless you hit eBay for a 2011 model.

4. One question not asked: Are the speakers any good? They are the worst speakers I've ever owned on a computing device. If you use your speakers today, keep this in mind.

 

Can anyone from the U.S please help buy me the laptop and sell it to me on ebay or something? it's sold out in Australia, Taiwan and Hong Kong!! I live in Australia.

The ones on ebay don't sell the glossy Premium Carbon Fibre...I can pay a higher price, I really want this!

 

I've gotten mine in and so far I'm loving it! The webcam works, before the clean install and after. I'm also not having any issues from noises or stuff like that. I'm still waiting for my sleeve though...

The screen is beautiful and I'm pretty glad I didn't go for the FHD screen version. 1600 x 900 is just fine. Any smaller wouldn't be great...

I also like the batterysheet. Although I don't like it that you have to screw it stuck to the vaio. Of course, you could just only click it, but still, it is not as easy as say, a transformer prime.

 

i heard that strange "hsss" noise along with the fan sound on my vaio svz today. it happened after windows update completion, i kept the laptop on the bed.. probably the heat caused the sound issue?

 

Can people that own the European Version the (SVZ1311C5E) please tell me if you don't choose to have the WWAN/3g modem

Option when you bought the Laptop, does it still have the sim card slot and Antennas for the WWAN inside (Just missing the 3g PCI-E Card?)

The reason i'm asking is that i'm bidding one on ebay that doesn't have the WWAN Card, so I wanna add one later

Thanks!

 

I have the svz1311c5e and I don't know how to look in to that. I see on the back a place where I suppose was to place the sim card, but you can't really open it somehow. Unless you were to open the whole case.
Which I'm scared to do with my new baby...

 

Could be. Since the Vaio has so little space in it's chassis, I would really avoid keeping it on the bed, collecting dust for the inside...

 

Does anyone know what the status is on Windows 8? I've got the manufacturing release available via MSDN, but I don't know if there is full driver support available for it yet. Anyone tried an upgrade?

 

Read back a few pages on this thread. Many people have talked about hearing a hissing noise coming from the computer that is not the fan. My Z does not have this problem, but it seems others do. They have called Sony and talked to support but have not found any fix.

 

For those who have a sheet battery with their Vaio Z, how do you like the battery in terms of additional charge and weight? I just ordered mine because the offline robot programming software I use is a graphics piglet (but my Z3 handles it quite well). Thanks in advance.

 

The battery sheet doubles my battery life on the road while remaining under 4 pounds. When traveling I found that the sheet itself was useful to keep hotel pillows and such from blocking the fan vents.

Since the lid normally lifts the back of the laptop,adding the battery sheet doesn't result in the lid being higher. This is useful on an airplane when half an inch is the difference between seeing your movie or having your screen crunched by the seat in front of you.

 

oh. my vaio svz has no support for wireless wwan / sim card slot
model number SVZ1311BGXXI
any solution?

 

My camera also stopped working, not sure when, but I checked Skype now and it's not responding. Not sure if it's a driver issue, but it was working fine earlier. Might want to try a clean install.

 

Thanks for the answers, I finally bought it. I was wondering, which case do you use for your vaio Z3? This one VGP-CKZ3 (VGPCKZ3, VGPCKZ3.AE) : VAIO & computing : Sony looks pretty, anyone have it? Can you reccomend any other slim case?

Thanks

 

The weight part is less fun. But when you are travelling it really gives you alot of extra juice. Like rrm98 said, it doubles the batterylife. Preventing dust to get while using it on the bed is really big plus for me as well.

Can anyone help me with running battlefield 3 on the Z? I assumed it would be possible to get it working decent. I have everything on low and I even tried the throttlestop program from an earlier post. Can someone help me which settings I have to use in Throttlestop? In the post earlier it said to set the multiplier to turbo. But I can't find this option.

I am only using the HD4000. I'm also working with Throttlestop 5.00. I hope to get it running on around 30 fps. That would be good enough for me.

 

Due to modest presumed savings with a JP campaign expiring today bought a JP model. Comes with JP warranty 3yrs vs the 1 yr USA. Of course, need to service in JP.

Price just under 185K-JPY: i7Q;HD;256GB; 8GB; MS-Office Home/Bus; WebCam; FingerScan; TPM. The last 3 were ala carte at 5K for Cam & 2.5K/each for FingerScan and TPM. Did not buy the 2.5K headphones included in US package. I also selected an English keyboard, provides a larger space & backspace keys. Japanese input on my Thai keyboard(same as English) is generally very good with once in a while minor mapping offsets for shift access characters. Price includes 5% JP sales tax. It appears I saved about 10K buying today but a new campaign probably will replace the old one maybe even better. But waiting delays delivery too.

Believe the US price is $1,950USD for similar spec(+HPs) without MS-Office home/Bus ala carte at 21K. Pretty close considering the 5% JP tax. A better warranty in JP. Of course need to service in JP. I will be in JP for first month or two with PC when most likely to fail and then intermittently for duration of warranty so not decision factor for me. The US also has some other campaign specials that offer additional savings but did not delve into those details since was set on my config and desire a new Z as my 5+yr old one is a bit "long in the tooth and acting up".

They start out with the 1,600 display and cost 2K-3K to upgrade to 1,920. The base model with i3, 1,600Display = JPY 110K. No web-cam, 128GB, 4GB.

The Sony Style staff at their Ginza store was very helpful and overall nice experience since I could touch, compare most everything much better than at the Yodobashi&Bic Sony corners. The extended sheet battery was 15K so will pickup in US in due tome as not urgent need but liked the design. Easy to add/takeoff, provides a small air passage to suck in air and not obstruct the bottom fans(naturally).

I opted out of the free engraving since felt it might hurt a potential future resale but in hindsight could have selected something neutral for a little style.

Appreciate all the constructive comments on this forum. Thanks!

 

You've gotten good feedback already, but here's my take:

1) because of the even weight distribution over the entire sheet, it does not seem to add nearly as much weight as, say, the extended battery for my Z1, which weighs about the same as the sheet, but concentrates it all in the back of the machine, making it feel unevenly weighted and back-heavy. Also, the new Z is so darn light that the extra 0.8 lbs leaves it as still among the lighter units out there.

2) Not only does the sheet allow you to work on s soft surface - eg, bed, sofa - and prevents dust from getting into the fan openings on the bottom of the case, but it also protects the bottom from scratches, which are very easy to cause while the bottom of the sheet battery is very resilient to scratches.

3) To own a Z2/SVZ13 and not have the sheet battery to me seems like paying a lot of money for a computer and depriving yourself of one of the most valuable features it has: providing a full day's use off the plug. The only other comparable ultraportable that does this is the Thinkpad X220/230 and the added battetries make it heavy and bulky. Plus, while the TP is a fine machine, comparing it to the Z is kind of like comparing a Toyota to a BMW!

 

Why I am not surprised! Thanks for the feedback. If I keep the laptop, most likely will pick a sheet battery up.

 

Can you provide a link or any other navigation help getting to this deal? I can't find it on Amazon US. Thanks.