Official Sony SB/SA/SC/SD Series Owners' Thread

Me and my parts are impatiently waiting for Monday...

 

lol
is there a reason why you went for 160gb over say 120gb? ill prob upgrade just like you, but later on since ill have no money after buying it

 

Well.. I just got a job making 40% more than my old job and nearing graduation from college so expecting a huge pay increase then. So essentially, I can afford it right now. On top of that, 120 on my Laptop is going to be on the small side imo. My desktop I use a 128GB C300 which has about 60-70GB used most of the time, but I keep my music (10ish GB) and WoW installed on my storage drive. Adding those two things make about 100GB used and I like to keep a cushion of free space on my drive for swapping ISO's around and etc. So I figured 160GB should be about right on a laptop with only 1 drive. I may get a caddy at some point but haven't made up my mind yet. Also, I the 160GB is a little bit faster. The Intel 320 drives get faster as size goes up.

 

Been trying to see if I can overclock the 6630M a tad bit to get a little more out of it. I downloaded ati tray tools and it crashed on me, then installed AMD gpu tool and that was unable to validate my graphics card. THen I installed MSI Afterburner and I was unable to change anything aside from stock.

Does any physically know how to overclock this 6630M card?
Thank you

 

Nope the only way is through software. You have tried all that I can remember, the only way is to search guru3d. BTW depending on the version of the program used, it works. For example, I can only use the ati tray tools to overclock my 4670m, and only the 5870 version, any other it fails, any other of the programs that you mentioned wont work at all.

Its finicky I know but they didnt want to make it easy for us.

 

Note that the pics on the Ambitronic site aren't the same as what I got. Some pics..

empty sleeve


SB fitment


closed up


I would recommend getting the sleeve with the smaller flap. Looks better. The large flap on Ambitronic's site is hideous hehe. Also note that I got the one for the 15" size which is $2 more than the 12" one. Quality is good. Around 5-6mm thick neoprene.

 

Looks good with nice fitment, definitely can't beat it for the price!

 

First of all, thank you. Yeah, but I just wanted to see how was compared to this: http://www.absence.it/vaio-acpi/VPCS-ves_vcc/protezione_hd.png

 

My VAIO is at a sort facility just 30 minutes from my home this morning. Wonder if they would let me pick it up after work so I could have it for the long easter drive.

 

Tested loads of games on this, all at native resolution and the i5-2520 & 6630M packs a strong combo for all of these. The M11xr3 has a similar strength GPU and quite weaker ULV CPU, the new Acer Timelines should however have similar power.

SC2 - main played game, will do High gfx on busy maps easily @50-60fps and Ultra gfx on less busy maps @60fps
CoD:BO - plays high easily on single & multiplayer, no lag whatsoever
BFBC2 - seems bit harder here and I've not spent too much time but still get 2-4xAA
BioShock 1 & 2 - maxed easily

I could go on, but in short if you're only playing at Native resolution the difference between this and GT540M won't be noticable, so it's other things, such as design, build quality, price, etc that should be important.

Tried the USB3.0 on my external HDD (GoFlex USB3.0) and saw no benefit, it had only 35mb/s compared to 30mb/s on my older USB2.0 laptop. Will retry this after holiday but was expecting ~80mb/s or more.

 

Could you try, 3DMark 2011? I have not seen any Vaio SB with 6630m with a score in 3DMark 11!


It's interesting with the performance between 540m and 6630m .(Notebookcheck)


540:
Pipelines 96 - unified
Core Speed * 672 MHz
Shader Speed * 1344 MHz
Memory Speed * 900 MHz
Memory Bus Width 128 Bit
Memory Type GDDR5, DDR3


6630:
Pipelines 480 - unified
Core Speed * 485 MHz
Shader Speed * 485 MHz
Memory Speed * 800 MHz
Memory Bus Width 128 Bit
Memory Type DDR3



In their tests, 540 wins in 3Dmark Vantage and 3Dmark 2011, but this of course is not taking m11x's ulv CPU into play.
The main question for me, is still if 6630 is underclocked. Sony has done it in the past, with even their flagship product(Vaio Z)!

 

Ended up going to the SonyStyle store in Victoria yesterday and they were very helpfull. Had to re-order the laptop at an additional $700 what I paid for the original order. They have assured me they are going to alter the price on the back end to the same price I had on my original order....will see.
New ship date is April 28th (changed from my original order of the 14th that was moved to the 25th). They also say they are going to try to expedite the build and ship....Wondering if the problem was because my PayPal account is in my business name and I ordered the laptop in my name?? I ordered the 2nd one in the name of the business so I am hoping that works?

 

I ordered mine on the 6th and mine has yet to be cancelled - I really hope it isn't. They assured me it would be shipped on Monday but with all the delays that have been happening I'm not too sure their words have any merit

 

right before i was going to call, i saw this

Apr 22, 2011 7:33 AM
On FedEx vehicle for delivery

i'm hoping its true

 

When did you place your order? Are you in the US?

 

1. April 12th at night
2. yes

 

I guess they're much more on the ball for US order than Canadian ones! I ordered mine on the 6th and still no word.

 

Has anyone got the docking station for the 2011 model?

Im interested because that has its own HDMI port, so would it be/is it possible to have 1 screen plugged into the docks HDMI port and 1 screen plugged into the laptops built in HDMI port to triple screen?

 

I ordered mine on April 14, and mine is shipping out of China today. Expected date is 27th... I'm in Canada too.

 

Are you kidding me...a CTO? I can't believe Sony is so disorganized, what horrible customer service...I'm definitely going to be talking to them when their customer service call center is open again.

It says on the sony site that it has shipped?

 

CTO, i5 2410, 6630, no upgrades other than fresh start and win7 pro. Yea it's pretty ridiculous. I think it might've had something to do with how the ENTIRE website was messed up for weeks. I tried to order before the 14th, but the site wouldn't let me... maybe for good reason looking back.

Sony sent me an email early this week saying it was in production then Apr 21 it said it was being shipped and sent me a tracking number. On the fedex site it says it's in transit.

 

It's most likely true.

Apr 22, 2011 8:56 AM
Delivery exception - Customer not available

FFFFF MMMM LLLLL

If they were 15 mins earlier I would have got it before I left for work. I'm hoping the door tag lets me pick it up around 6PM even though its good Friday.

I checked at 830AM and it said it was at a sort facility 30mins away, but in 26 mins time supposedly it made it to another local facility then had a delivery attempt. Way to update fedex...

 

just got it =)

 

Thanks for the replies guys, undecided on whether to pick this one up or not. I am still torn on whether to get a Apple Macbook, as not had one before but the cost is just crazy!

 

I placed mine on April 14th late afternoon (3pm ish). I win lol. Eastern US here.
My step mom just texted me saying the door tag says pick up available after 5PM so I am in luck it appears.

 

i believe fedex, if you call them will tell the driver to try again. i did it for my dads thinkpad

 

Mine was delivered today. Sony and FedEx delivered before their own estimations. Too bad I won't be able to see my SB till next month, when I come to US.

 

also for those wanting another AC adapter on amazon sony oem is only 35

Amazon.com: Sony VGP-AC19V32 Power Adapter for Select Notebook Computers: Electronics

 

Don't quote me 100% on this but I'm pretty sure that the port is blocked so you only use the docking one. Take a look at the pictures though. There are two tabs that stick up and cover some ports, I'm not sure which ones they cover though.

 

Hmm, I have the i7 and sheet battery - I can't imagine it being delayed to this extent because of that though.

 

Having Googled around a bit, this is a picture of the dock, which has a plastic bit that pokes up, and then going by these photos it appears to block what i think is a charger plug, if anyone with a new S series could confirm that the laptop is still laid out as the pocket lint photos suggest that would be great, thanks!

Just to be safe i'll give sony a call tomorrow and see if they can confirm or deny it, although judging from other peoples experience, im not expecting much Help...

 

Yeah I'm in the exact same boat as you, ordered pretty much the same thing on the 6th but the guy said not to expect anything until next week at the earliest, which I think is pretty ridiculous. Plus the site hasn't updated for weeks...it still says my Vaio is being built with an estimate ship date of 6th April...

 

Yep, mine says the same thing. It kind of sucks that they're closed today, no one to take my frustration out on

 

Been lurking in this thread for a while, I got my CTO SB last week, here are a few unboxing pics.





Only annoyance I'm having so far is the fingerprint reader doesn't work with Firefox for some reason. Other than that I think it's a great machine, even my wife with her Macbook is jealous.

Side by side:

 

Does anyone know if you can buy third party docks for a more reasonable price...200$ is pushing it

 

I ordered a Blue, i7, 6630, 500Gb@5400, fingerprint reader,sheet battery and laser marked SB on the 4th April, wonder when i will get it... to my understanding of things it won't be before May =/

will be adding a caddy for the HDD and buying an SSD whenever they decide to send my product..

has any European Owner tested the headphones+mic jack? i have an Sony-Ericsson set which should work and a Y adapter for my Sennheiser headphones and Zalman mic that came with my Astro's Mixamp that should also work.. wanted to be sure though

 

Thats not the right dock that you linked to. The correct one has two tabs on the right side.

Here ya go:
Sony VAIO SB Dock

 

Cheers for clearing that up...

That sucks, looks like ill have to settle for 2 screens.....

Maybe the VGA and HDMI can be used at the same time?
I would hope so.....

 

There aren't any, at least not yet.

Here's one for right about $20 off though:

Sony VAIO SB/SC Dock

I would probably wait a bit until Amazon starts stocking them as they usually offer pretty reasonable prices. I wouldn't expect more than $50 off though.

EDIT: It is now $180 on the SonyStyle USA website now as well.

 

Is that a MBP13?

 

Nice, congrats!

No problem. That might be a possibility, not sure if that would work or not though.

 

As they are just about the same size, and the way it looks, yes it is a 13 inch MBP.

 

I tried my HTC mic/headphone combo, but it didn't work. I'll try my Steelseries splitter later. But the manual doesn't say a word about connecting an external mic. Oh and you won't be dissappointed by that colour, it's awesome and original . (I still don't understand why it's called blue, it's definitely a deep purple).

For the FPSgamers:
I tried MW2 both on the Intel IGP 3000 and the AMD HD 6470M and I must say there's world of difference in this game.

I had all special settings off (including AA), but models and textures on HIGH and specular map resolution on low. On the HD 6470M I tried some maps both online and offline. Lowest FPS drops I got was on Afghan near the middle when watching to some players and having a large part of the map in sight, there it dropped for a short moment to I think ~60 fps. Perhaps it will be lower when having more enemies in sight on sub base or when overlooking the whole map.
Skidrow almost constantly was 90fps.

When I tried the Intel 3000 I immediately noticed how slow mousing in the menu already was. When I fired up Skidrow (offline) I started out with 30~35 fps when I spawned. With much reluctance I walked a bit, and I only got some FPS peaks to just 60 :s So that's really unplayable for me.

So with the HD6470M on these settings it's I think just playable for me (at least on the maps which I tested). Although I haven't tested walking in smokes yet.. I guess it will be too low there. But on public people don't use smokes that often, and I won't use this device to play important matches anyway

 

I'm thinking of instlaling a fresh copy of WIN7 pro, does anyone know if its easy to find drivers? Or can I use my CD-key with someone else's "fresh start" copy of win 7 pro?

 

Sony's website.. (and read a few pages back for problems that might occur)

Why would you want somebody else's fresh start.. when installing a fresh W7 is almost the same. (Ok you have to get your own drivers, but then you know for sure you got the right ones and the most recent)

 

good luck mate. i'm in vancouver and i ordered on apr 6. my order status still says "processing". no emails from sony with any updates. after repeated calls they told me a parts shortage led to the delay and they should be ready to ship monday. i have my doubts. it's a bit reassuring that they're going to honor your original price though. i ordered mine over the phone during the week that their website was going through all sorts of bugs (i7, 8gg ram, bluray for $1400 after taxes). the fact that there might be a chance of them honoring this discounted price is the only thing that is preventing me from full on flipping out at them for this ridiculous shipping delay.

 

she's a beaut! nice work

im a 5 year owner of a Macbook pro 15" and i'm going to be sooooo relieved to be back to a windows operating system on hardware that weighs half as heavy as that beast

 

i opted for a fresh start so i woudln't have to deal with all the pre-loaded junk while i wait for someone to write an official clean install guide for the SB

 

That's what I thought, but the thing is, the SB looks bigger than the S which is bigger than the Z. I didn't try to actually compare the size at the stores though but the SB does feel bigger.

 

Oh thát fresh start, I thought just a random start from someone . Wish we had that option here in The Netherlands (perhaps only when you order by phone).