Official Sony VAIO F Series Owners lounge *PART 2*

I'm not MelodyMaster but:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=6049869&postcount=1590

And see in the Unification Post #2: Microphone “tweating” or "noises" or "morse code".

Maybe you know this already but it can be useful for others.

 

hmmm I used pc wizard 2010 and it's saying I have intel core i7 820QM???

cache l1 4x64, l2 2x256, l3 4x6144? This has only managed to confuse me more!

 

You definetly do not need 2 AV.

Check the CPU usage monitor panel in Norton 2010 before uninstalling it, if you plan on doing so. It is a good idea to download and run the Norton Removal Tool to uninstall your Norton 2010 product for a complete clean-up.

Check the Norton's CPU and memory usage panels & memory usage in Windows Task Manager. Screen grabs from this page:





Clearly they made quite an effort in view of all the bashing they got about being a resource hog, that's why they now include these usage monitoring tools to show-off their better efficiency & respond to critics.

"I used pc wizard 2010 and it's saying I have intel core i7 820QM???" - hey, maybe_Sony made a mistake in your favor for a change?

Try SIW and also: Start > Search & type: system information.

 

Lol system info is saying I have an i7 720 qm @ 1.6 ghz, but pc wizard says 820QM @ 1.73 ghz with p55 chipset... I'll try cpu-z now as I only see exe files for siw... don't want to install.

 

Ah thank you for the typically Over-infomative and ultra-comprehensive Joe Bleau plethora of information.. That was all very useful and mostly new to me.

I sort of noticed the fancy equalizer was missing in Vista also, but Vista-equipped systems were always elevated to the critically important duties of garage back-door door stop or used cat litter compressor, so I never pursued the issue.

 

OK, after creating a restore point & monitoring with Total Uninstall, I just installed Realtek R2.45 HD Audio Driver & now get this:





I did not investigate yet to make sure it's related to R2.45 but running powercfg -energy, I get this new error:

"System Availability Requests:System Required Request
The device or driver has made a request to prevent the system from automatically entering sleep. Driver Name \FileSystem\srvnet"

Edit: : I found the error, when disabling the Wireless Network Adapter (Atheros in my case), the error disappears in powercfg.

What baffles me is that even when selecting "Allow computer to turn off this device to save power", I still got the error:



The solution so far? Just turn off the Wireless switch (under the touchpad, on the front face) before putting to sleep or hibernate or if you have a Bluetooth device, you can keep the switch on & disable the Wireless Network Adapter in Device Manager as I am doing @ the present.

 

I clean installed V2.45 - ran powercfg and got this:

System Availability Requests:Analysis Success
Analysis was successful. No energy efficiency problems were found. No information was returned.

Guess it's not the drivers.

 

Hey everyone,

I am new to the forums and I just had a quick question. I will be purchasing a Sony Vaio F series laptop within the next 2 weeks and I am looking to dual boot it with windows 7 and OSX. I do a lot of CPU intensive audio editing and I was hoping to use Logic 9(which I already own). Has anyone had any luck installing OSX86 on the new Vaios, is it stable, are there any other issues that have come up?

I assume you would partition the hard drive and install each OS on a different partition. Anything else I need to know?

Thanks in advance. I am new to these forums so sorry if this is not the right place for this kind of post.

 

FYI. Believe it or not, it is against Forum Rules to discuss porting OSX on PCs. More than likely, this is a marketing/sales agreement the forum owners have with their advertisers.

See: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=109941

 

"No information was returned" is fishy.

Are you saying you don't have the "ACPI _PSD Object Failed Validation" that two of us reported?

I could depend on your OS install & hardware config.

Did you run powerdcfg -energy?

Could you post your full energy-report.html? Either in your post or like this: Power Efficiency Diagnostics Report

I have OEM Home Premium upgraded via Anytime to Ultimate.

When I installed R2.43, I got these 2 additional errors in the report that disappeared immediately after rolling back the audio driver:

R2.43 errors:

System Availability Requests:System Required Request
The device or driver has made a request to prevent the system from automatically entering sleep.
Requesting Driver Instance HDAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0275&SUBSYS_104D3F00&REV_1000\4&30a90eb7&0&0001
Requesting Driver Device Realtek High Definition Audio

System Availability Requests:System Required Request
The device or driver has made a request to prevent the system from automatically entering sleep. Driver Name \FileSystem\srvnet
-----------------------

 

I would suggest you go edit your profile and turn on Private messaging.

 

I get my usual 10 errors ever since I first reported the powercfg -energy issue back in 2/21/10 here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=5919589#post5919589. The tenth is high CPU usage from Sidebar monitor apps that I have running all the time.

I am running Windows 7 Professional which was an inplace upgrade with full license key after doing a complete system reinstallation from the recovery & restore DVDs - just like you did for your SSD.

Looking at the driver name - are you running any network drives or NAS attachments?

 

So cpu-z gave me accurate results... seems i7 720 qm@1,6 ghz, l2 cache 1 mbytes, l3 cache 6 mbytes, ddr3 max bandwidth 10700, pm55 chipset. I'm actually disappointed now... screw pc wizard for getting my hopes up

 

Thanks, Joe. I made everything identical to what you have shown above...
But same error symptom. With the mic work around the error comes up...without the work around...it is gone.
I will revert back to factory condition for a while to see if the hibernation/sleep/battery drain issues are gone...I will live with occasional high pitch sound for a while I guess...

 

Thanks for the suggestion.

Turns out the "\FileSystem\srvnet" error was related to the Wireless switch. I updated the post here.

Errr... your welcome, I guess.

 

That's weird! Did you unplug the laptop to run powercfg?

Try the Realtek R2.45. It's a very windy day here but so far even when sticking my ear to the Esc key, I can't hear the Morse code anymore & did not apply the mic fix!

 

The morse-code-ish noise I have comes from the middle of the keyboard area. load of noise too XD but you hvae to put your head up close to hear it.

 

heheh Sony is like the Ford of the computer industry:
They have the F series, the big fast hardcore machine
The E series: Cheaper F that's still powerful

The Z series: Like a mustang, it's faster, generally lighter and better looking than the competition (and for a good price, too!)

And most of their machines are great looking and solid.. mmm. XD

 

At first I didnt notice the issue as well, its not really a high pitch whine..you need to put your ear around the keyboard area in a silent room. Tried check if you connect wireless too, cant connect both wireless and hardwired, there will be some IP Conflict.

 

I filled my machine to 100% (full in SIW), and hibernated while on power. When I fired up later on battery, I got 86% lol.

*shrug* Whatever

 

It's broken!

 

Unf, My whine repair is still pending. Thermal module won't be in till 29th, was supposed to be in yesterday. They said the were going to replace the top key shield part too, whatever that is. They offered to extend my warranty for 2 months for the inconvenience.

 

Yeah, I know how to fix it, it was just in relation to Melody's comment that it was because I had an old stock model when it was actually a CTO assembled last week in Japan...

 

Create a new thread with F series Driver and Utils and App updates.

Still looking for a copy of the UK recovery discs. I only need the WinDVD and PMB app. If someone already has them extracted just a copy of the apps will do.

 

Hello everybody,

So... after reading a lot about F11 inclouding this forum, I bought one. And it have a fan issue, and it is very annoying.. Dont mind the rushing air soud, but that whine sound is realy driving me crazy, it is pure sine wave sound, not good at all, it shouldnt be there. As I create/listen music a lot, so at break times I just want to relax in silence(rushing air sound dont bother me at all, used to it). Does enybody know is it fan that produce the sound it self ? does replacment of the fan will solve the problem ? Thanks

 

I was unplugged already when I did this... :-(
It seems like my F went to bed pretty good last night...
I have defaulted to factory defaults for now...
I will watch for few more days... then I will try new things.
Thanks again, Joe!

 

Same issue with the fan whine ruining what is otherwise a great laptop. It can even be heard in the office above all the background noise and now I have a constant ringing in my left ear

Next week when I have some spare time I'm going to remove it and see if there's anywhere to add a spot of oil. Read some posts about similar fan issues on other notebook models and oil was the solution.

I hope there is a way to fix it myself as I don't want to be without the laptop for weeks while it's been scratched up by some tech in a repair centre.

 

Due to the fan whine issue, I am going to return mine back to Best Buy and get another one in the hopes that I might get one without the problem. It's a long shot, but gonna try it anyway.

 

I have had my fan replaced by Sony and it it did not correct the whine. Oil will not help as there are no bearings in the Panasonic fan - the blade is held in place by magnetism.

You cannot access the fan unless you remove the entire thermal module which will break the thermal bond between the heat sinks and the CPU/GPU chips. Doing so will void your warranty

 

so bad news then if its not the fan that cousing the sound..
has anybody at all solved this problem somehow ???

 

Are the newer CTO builds still getting the whine issue?

 

So there is a fix for the droning fan that constantly changes speed? I'm having my laptop sent out for repair on the LCD (again) and might try to get that fixed as well. What a pain all of this has been - it's like the F11 was engineered specifically to irritate the user.

 

Welcome to the F Owners Lounge

First, we highly recommend to bring yourself up to speed with the Unification Post #2 ( http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5992644&postcount=554).

I have the old thermal module as the tech that performed the in-home service was not required to return the old part. See these posts for pictures

1. Fan Pictures http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=6036930&postcount=1366

2. Bottom cover removed. http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=6036774&postcount=1358

I have removed the fan from the thermal module and connected a variable voltage DC power supply and have observed the following:

• The variable pitch "whine noise" is not present as I change the speed of the fan.
• The constant pitch intermittent tone (I will try to analyze the frequency later) that others have recorded is coming from the fan motor. It's generation is NOT speed dependent. See this post http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=6000563&postcount=702 and listen to the audio clip in the zip file.

I reattached the fan to the thermal module and experimented again with different speeds. There was very little variable pitch noise but an increase in air rushing white noise which I would expect as the air is forced through the copper colling fins.

Then something interesting happend. I inadvertantly placed a CD jewel case near the fan intake port when the fan was in slow speed operation and immediately heard the variable pitch whine!

There are two are intakes on the fan on either side of the squirrel cage. The Sony (or Foxconn) design extracts heated air from either side of the mobo and then out through the cooling fins that exhausts the heat from the GPU and CPU chips. The size of the air plenum above each side of the mobo is very tight. I think the whine we are hearing is a direct result of the close tolerances of the bottom case to fan intake and the bottom of the keyboard shield to the upper air intake. Now we are getting into acoustics.

I plan to do some more tests with the F itself with and without covers and keyboard in place. I will post the results later.

 

Hey I've just connected this laptop to my panasonic g10 full hd tv with my hdmi cable. The TV sets 1080p when I switch to the hdmi1 channel, however the laptop asks me to choose the resolution for the external display and it is set at 720p and 1080p is grayed out/non clickable.... now I'm forced to set it at 720p, while my tv can do more...

EDIT: ok, at the time of connecting the tv to the laptop, it's still working at 1080p... however a prompt will show to ask me at what hdmi res I want to set the external display... I can't switch to 1080p but ignoring the prompt and leaving it minimized will let me continue at display settings 1920x1080. However, it is still strange that it does not let you choose anything higher than 720p in the hdmi res settings when connected to a 1080p capable tv.

 

It's a magnetic bearing, the fan rotor is suspended in a magnetic field with no hard contact, thus no oil is used or needed, in fact like a watch crystal flywheel bearing it would just stop the thing functioning properly.

 

Can you tell us you experiences with dealing with Sony for the LCD so far? Thanks

 

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I sent Sony an e-mail with pictures two weeks ago. I phoned them a week later to follow up and they said the complaint is still being reviewed. I called yesterday and the support tech said that Sony goes by the repair technician's report and if they say it's ok, there's nothing wrong with the laptop. I explained that I've been waiting for two months to get this resolved and I won't accept this screen. The tech finally put me on hold to talk to a supervisor and they're sending me a box to ship the computer to Toronto. This time I'm setting a movie screen shot as the wallpaper which really makes the poor quality of the screen stand out. I have a feeling that they're just going to ship it back.

P.S. VISA can't help me on this one, I called them yesterday as well and the "all sales final" pretty much means that I can't get my $ back.

 

Thanks for keeping us posted. Your result will determine whether or not I cancel my scheduled repair on the 7th April... and I suspect it's the same with other people as well.

Thanks @jacksjw too, it's interesting stuff. +1

 

sheepb, is yours an onsite repair or do you have to send it in. Asking as I'm not too far from London and would prefer not to have to send it away.

Also, are you able to help me out with a copy of the recovery discs or just the apps I'm missing please?

 

Sleep isn't as bad on the battery as I thought it would be, I left my machine sleeping all night (about 8 hours), and this morning it only has 10% less. Sweet!

Edit: About 14%, actually. STILL! Not bad for a machine with 6gb ram lol

 

Maybe some other owners could confirm this but the first few days, my F was whistling softly on and off @ idle and 2 weeks later it's totally gone by itself. A break-in period?

Mujja, maybe you missed jacksjw's F mobo, cooling unit & fan photos?

Edit: I see that jacksjw replied here but will keep the rest of this post anyway.

Dunno where you will add that dab of oil as his comment seems to imply that it's a fan with MagLev technology: "...The blade in the Panasonic fan unit integrated into the cooling assembly is held in place by magnetism. It is actually suspended from the underside of the board...".

Check these posts with large F parts photos (fan: Panasonic UDQFRRH01DF0 DC5V 0.36A 9Z11V):

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=6036930#post6036930

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=6036774#post6036774

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=6036822#post6036822

In this Anatomy of the Silent Fan article, there is a table showing to which type of fans you can add oil and which one needs replacement.

 

Thanks for that. I asked for a replacment and they eventually sent it, so thats good. Now I have 3 including the broken one! I did measure mine tonight on the mains side and I couldn't get it much over .4A (@240V= 96W).

 

Good! Sony_did not ask you the return the 90W A/C adapter replacement they sent by mistake?

 

Hi Guys,

I've ordered my vaio, should arrive in the next week or so, I'm counting the minutes..

Anyway I'm a bit worried about the (seemingly endless) problems people seem to be having, what with faulty screens/fan whine etc. , is this still a problem with the new models?

I'm having mine custom built so I'm hoping they'll use the latest components?

Please someone reassure me as I'm a bit worried..

Cheers.

 

These are my findings on a EU CTO built last week.

I can hear the fan whine on mine but only as it switches between speeds (which it tends to do a lot at low speed for some reason) but it's very faint. Basically the whine is just a sound caused when the fan hits an exact RPM, almost like resonance and vibrations (but in this case RPM and air flow).

The morse code issue still exists but can be solved by muting the Mic (which is something you should normally do anyway when the Mic and speakers are in such close proximity).

Other than that it seems great. The screen is indeed amazing on the i7 EU version.

 

I am about to do the clean install, I have got a question:

Why should I create a Recovery Disk if, at my understanding, I can restore the system through the Sony recovery partition? Is it "just in case"?

 

They might have fixed some of the problems, but if I bought another computer from Sony, It would be through the actual store. Ordering CTO from the website was one of the biggest purchasing mistakes I've ever made. If you read the fine print about CTO, it says all customized computer sales are final, something I didn't realize until I tried to get a refund. I had assumed that the much advertised 30 day satisfaction guarantee would apply to me. Anyways, It's been over two months since I ordered my computer and my defective screen still hasn't been fixed. I would definitely recommend anyone interested in this computer to avoid CTO as you lose the option to return it in case you get one with the bad screen or noisy fan. If I were to buy another computer I would have to see (and hear) it first before I bought it.

 

Yep, how could you use the recovery partition if the HDD is dead or if you format it for your install? You can also use them to install the factory state on an other HDD & recover some software & drivers with them & using Vaio_Care on your clean install.

You can also use them to reset the HDD before selling the unit or sending it for servicing. Anyway, 2 DVD's is pretty cheap.

BTW, make sure to check the Unification Post #2 for clean install guides & tips.

 

No, they never asked. And DHL delivered to the wrong (my home) address anyway: they tend to sign your receipt themselves if you are not around to allow them to meet their targets. Sony told me it had been delivered and that I had signed for it even though I was 20 miles away.

 

I see the point now.

It's when I use the Sony recovery partition given the hd is not dead.

I did read the Great Unification Post.

Thank you.