Official Sony VAIO F Series i5/i7 owners thread *Part 5*

it is easy to check. he should just set parameters of turning display off in 1 minute in power plan

 

good morning fellas

these are my readings without and during rendering
View image: 1

View image: 2

so... what seems to be the problem, doc ?

 

Thank you Willscary!

I stressed the CPU using Prime95. I also tried Aida64’s “System Stability Test”, but it gave the same result (I used the first four options checked). I considered that having just the “Stress CPU” is too artificial, and it will never happen in a real world application. Most of the applications will use the cache and memory at least.

You are right about the difference between the two and the slightly less consumption, but the difference is small. If I would obtain similar values to your second test, with values specific to my CPU, I would be satisfied. The difference till your max multiplier is 0.179x ( or in other words you are using 1.821x from you 2x turbo boost ).

 

The 41.49 W is the CPU Power consumption, not the TDP. On Intel CPUs, the power consumption can go much higher than the TDP.
Some interesting articles concerning this:
CPU World: Thermal Design Power (TDP)
Silent PC Review article, page concerning TDP (Ignore the AMD part)
Not a very good translation, but: How many normal CPU temperature?, and heat CPU thermal power analysis
TechRepublic: 10 tips for troubleshooting PC system slowdowns (1. Processor overheating)

Considering that the temperatures are well kept under control, I think the CPU cooling system is able to eliminate the dissipated heat (Temperature is under 72 degree Celsius after 10 minutes of test).
Based on Intel’s documentation (I quoted in one of my previous post), the other two reason why turbo boost is not increasing the CPU multiplier are the power and current (TB “ constrained by power delivery limits”). That’s why I suspect some powering issue.

 

For the “idle” (without rendering) case, your CPU usage and core frequencies (multipliers) looks normal when 108+ processes are running (including winamp, firefox, …). In order to further reduce CPU usage you will have to do a fresh install (OS, …). There are several posts about this on this forum and many people including myself are recommending it. Also there are a few tutorials (search for Joe Bleau's clean install guide).

For the rendering case, of course your CPU is at max, but I don’t see anything wrong or any reason for the bad mouse movement. Are you using an external mouse (a Bluetooth one perhaps)? Do you experience the same with the touchpad?
Maybe James D is right, and this is a software (driver,…) related issue.

PS: On a side note, you are not reaching the max CPU multipliers (only 13.371x from 15.000x), something I’m also experiencing, but in your case could be because “V-Ray” is using the GPU too, which also draws power.
Anyway, you don’t need to worry about this (your mouse should work just fine even on the lowest possible multiplier).

 

I know what you are saying. My point is that I can't get to 2x with the integer, memory or cache being stressed either, but I can with just the CPU. I figure that either my available power is limiting me or that I am approaching TDP.

I also know that TDP is a suggested amount of cooling that should be built into the design of the machine. In other words, the airflow, heat sink and fan design of a cabinet (desktop or laptop) should be designed to dissipate the amount of heat generated by 45 watts worth of energy.

In my prior post, I wrote that while my 820QM has a max operating temperature of 100C, this is a very short term peak maximum. The sustained maximum operating temperature is 79C. In normal operations, we will not get that high, but during stress tests, I have seen many people who's core sensors not only approach, but exceed this number. During this stress test, they may be at 80C for several minutes!

I am familiar with two of the articles that you posted. The first one tells you that some processors will throttle themselves if they approach TDP. While your temps were 10C under the 79C sustained max temps for my processor, even with only 3 cores running you were within 7.8% of your TDP for your processor. I would be interested in seeing the power used by your processor with all 4 cores running. I have a feeling that you will get very close to TDP and then you will notice the throttling, just as the end of the first article suggests. Really, if you read the last few sentences of that article, it makes sense that this throttling happens. After all, our Core i7s run much cooler than many other manufacturer's Core i7 machines. Perhaps this throttling is built into the BIOS in order to keep your temps from getting above 75C. Remember, the F11s actually had a BIOS update to help with cooling issues. Maybe this is the result?

Try running AIDA with just the processor and see what your results are with all 4 cores running and the processor power draw. Then try it again with all 4 cores and the other options checked. Lets see what your power draw is then. Perhaps it approaches 45 watts and then gets throttled as the cores heat up.

 

I moved your post to this thread as i'll think you'll recieve more help, your original post is on the previous page.

 

Yes lovelely having full HD on this laptop and a full HD TV, so via HDMI there is a 1:1 ratio (no scaling etc).

Audio via HDMI is also a bonus (I think it is 5.1 but have not tried a Blueray disk from this laptop yep). My TV plays 1080p MKV's directly from a USB drive, so no need to use the HDMI connection that often (but it is convenient to have).

 

My Vaio VPCF12Z1E will go to Sony service in two weeks. Hopefully they can fix the gray bar problem for me. Anyways, reporting as soon as I know what they say.

 

I can’t run a test now, but I will do it as soon as I can, and post the result.
In the meantime I checked the screenshots I saved during my testing to find the CPU’s power consumption when stressing 4 cores. It varies around 45W with +/-0.5W.




The interesting thing is, that when I disabled the Turbo Boost in i7-Turbo, the power consumption went up to 48W (+/-0.5W), but the multipliers remained the same.




As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, Turbo Boost cannot be limited from BIOS. At least not directly. By this I mean that there is no multiplier which could be locked by the BIOS. Turbo Boost just happens if the conditions described by Intel are met (CPU load, power constrains, current constraints, temperature constraints). Do you think, that when they modified the BIOS they force the CPU to throttle if their CPU power sensor reports certain values ? (throttling like it is implemented for the ACPI T-states? See last paragraph of the Wikipedia page: Dynamic frequency scaling or Google “ACPI T-states”).

 

thelulz, I am honestly not sure if it is the fan that makes the noise when display is off. I assumed it was.

 

Unfortunately my TV is HD-Ready, and the worst one: 768p. The Vaio Control Center disables the 768 selection for some reason on my F13. With the same TV on the F12 this was enabled and working. So now I have to select the 720 with additional “Adjust Resolution” in order to make it work. But the result is not so good compared when I used the VGA connection from another notebook.

I tried to use the VGA connection of the F13, but it is very noisy. I have dancing horizontal lines. I think this was already addressed on this forum, but the forum search is not working, I end up on the main page. Does anyone knows the link to the solution for this problem? Thanks!
( My VGA cable is shielded and it works well with another notebook connected to the same TV ).

 

Thanks terhox! Keep us updated!

I also contacted Sony about this problem. When I will have any news I will post it.

 

What do you see in Device Manager?

 

You might want to do what James D outlined, just temporally set your power options to shut the display off after a minute. If the noise stops, it could be a failing inverter board. Common symptoms of bad inverter boards typically include a buzzing type of noise. The inverter board is also behind the SONY logo on the lower screen bezel, which is right above the speakers, so you could be mistaken in saying the sound is coming from the speaker grill/fan.

I hope this helps.

 

so ... i keep my laptop plugged in all the time, i use it as a desktop replacement like i said before earlier through the posts.

i keep it with the balanced power plan on and charged at 50% max. this it's said to keep the battery life even longer. (or so it does in the menu)

so i ask you guys, what's the best way to keep the battery for a longer lifetime, either than not turning it on in the first place ?

p.s:a friend of mine said that it's better to let it charge and then let it discharge and repeat this cycle all the time...

what's the proper way ? thanks!

 

Jasweb, did you encounter problems with the webcam connected to the USB 3.0 port ? Or you don’t have the F13 ?
This is the second USB 2.0 device which is not working on the USB 3.0 port .

 

dan smith, did you try to switch off then on the display using the “Display off” button and see if the noise disappears and then reappears.

 

Basically when I press the "display off" button the whistling noise is not there, but when I move my mouse for the screen to come back on, the sound begins to appear. Also how would I go about doing what James D suggested.

 

I have the F12, so no USB3, but I don't own any USB 3.0 devices (nor any of my friends, nor anyone at work etc...).

I have the Logitec 9000 Pro and really happy with it. Works like a charm (for me).

Good luck!

 

Sony is offering some pretty neat discounts on RAM and HDD right now so I am very tempted to buy it but I have only two concerns:

1. New Intel Sandy Bridge
2. LED backlit screen

Those two things for sure will be part of new F model or its replacement.
I know F just got a refresh but does anybody know when actual replacement will happen? I dont want to buy it now only to find out that its being replaced few months down the road.

My use on F would be Photoshop, Illustrator, inDesign and Flash so good CPU and good screen is always a must.

 

I lost my chance to have Dx11 graphic card and usb 3.0 ports as up to 2 month before f13 I bought f12. don't hurry

Was it a question?
I did not suggest display off button because it actually doesn't turn it off. It turns off only a backlight. You can still see smth on monitor

 

Moving the mouse or pressing the “Display Off” button or any other button on the keyboard has the same affect of turning the display back on. I think that James D wanted to find out the same information just using different approach. Based on what you mention, your problem is display related, and thelulz is probable right about the LCD inverter. Mention this problem too when you are sending your notebook for servicing.

 

The webcam is working well on the USB 2.0/SATA connector of the F13, or on any other notebooks with USB 2.0 I tested. And I’m very satisfied with its quality as I already mentioned.
I have problems only when I connect the camera to any of the F13’s USB 3.0 ports. In that case it is recognized by the software, but there is no video and after a while all software which tries to use it just hangs.

 

Zperf, I am running of out patience will all these problems occuring consistently.

 

Can it clip onto the screen? Or does it need to be mounted somewhere?

I thought both usb ports on f13 were 3.0, and i dont get why a faster usb port would be causing issues with any webcam?

 

Wow! Good catch! I had not noticed that, and you are definitely correct. I can barely see the windows on the screen, I can scroll, and I can use the mouse with the "display off".

Honestly, I had never noticed that before!

 

dan smith, I understand you! I’m oscillating between different feelings myself too. I know that electronics products can have faults or can break eventually, and that lately the quality suffers due to the short time to market and low price products with which Sony has to compete, but on the other end to have multiple problems in the same product, when this product is the highest end of Sony’s consumer line and it is priced accordingly, is something which is hard to … - let me put it gently - digest. For now I live with the hope that my display will be fixed, and for the rest I find a solution eventually (BIOS update, driver update, …).

 

I have the Logitech HD C510 webcam. It has no clip. It can be folded, rotated, tilt and positioned easily on the notebook display. Stays well even on a flat surface! You can still rotate and tilt. I prefer to place it higher than the top of the notebook display, for a better view. This way the grandparents can see all the time their constantly moving grandchild .

The two USB ports on the right of the F13 are USB 3.0. The USB/SATA port on the left is USB 2.0.

The problem is not coming because of the faster USB port (not a speed issue). It can be a backward compatibility problem or just a driver bug. I don’t know what is causing this issue yet, but Logitech it is known for releasing from time to time buggy drivers.
After new driver has been installed... C910 does not work anymore... on USB 3.0
C910 Slew of problems on Windows 7 64bit
[XP Pro 64 Bits] HD Pro Webcam C910 does not work
…

But if it is not Logitech driver related then can be the Renesas Electronics (formerly NEC) USB 3.0 drivers. Or even hardware incompatibility.

I’m kind of tired to dig more into this now, so I’m using it on the USB 2.0, but eventually I will have to.

 

I get what you mean Zperf, but the amount of money I paid, I expected a machine without so many problems. I feel like smashing this machine due to the pent up anger inside of me. Plus I cant return it.

 

The F series are damn good notebooks.
But then again, I base that off of my experience with both of my F laptops. Everything is relative.

Life is not perfect, someone is bound to get screwed over with some issue. Whatever the source of your laptop's problem may be, be it a bad inverter board or the fan, you are better off sending it off to Sony.
Or you can just deal with it. My apologies if this came off as rude.

 

2nded!

Mine is a great machine. Any problems I've had with it are ones I've created.

dan smith - if you're experiencing this many problems, any of which could be an in warranty defect, I think it's time you contact Sony and get some service done on it rather than get frustrated. You paid for a good laptop and you should expect Sony to deliver.

Call tech support.

 

I also agree. I don't just have one, I also purchased several for our church and I manage them. We have had no problems. they are fast, relatively quiet and have been perfectly reliable. None of these 5 F11's have had fan whistle issues, cooling issues, buzzing issues, failure issues with any parts or problems with anything else.

Of course, this is 5 machines built back in March and April of last year...I guess I can't truly speak about the many millions of machines built since then.

Just my opinion.

 

Thanks for your feedback guys, I know there isnt a perfect laptop but I expect a laptop to not have major flaws. Anyway I spoke to Sony today, and they will email me a date to collect the laptop.

 

When Sony will begin producing new F series with a second generation of i7 ?

 

Good luck with Sony I send mine also in this or next week. Things are progressing well.

 

How can I see the GPU's and CPU's temperatures?

 

Another satisfied F owner here

I have the version with the i5 CPU, so maybe that generates less heat and consequently less noise than an i7 one.

Some pointers howto keep the noise down:
1) Keep Win7 on the balanced power plan.
2) In VAIO Control Center ==> Power Options check the Balanced Mode.
3) Get the latest GPU drivers from GeForce.com - Get the Most Out of Your GPU
4) Use quiet HDD https://sites.google.com/site/quiethdd/ to silence your HDD
5) Do a clean install (with win7 disc or Recovery Discs) to get the best performance out of your F.
6) If you have the funds get a SSD http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...ssd-thread-benchmarks-brands-news-advice.html

 

Setting thermal control in vaio control panel to "quiet" keeps the F pretty quiet even with the i7. I tried it today and it was pretty sweet. Power saver also helps for that more than balanced mode...

 

For gpu: gadgets as like GPU observer. or program GPU-z (which is good for overclocking (portable and can check maximum temp while playing).
Also system monitor for CPU

I have just bought Notebook cooler master Notepal U2. Will check it now

 

Well at least I don't hear that sound like a rocket with a gearbox (no hoghing and lowering sound of fan every 5 seconds I guess larger battery would do the same as it gave space between laptop and a table.
2 Fans gave me the same temp of CPU under stress test (64 degrees max) however it reached it in 5 minutes, not in 3 without turned fans. Both test made ON Coolermaster (with turned on and off fans).

Now I will do overall wet cleaning to keep dust away Write smth later.

 

Hello, I'm trying to implement all (or at least some of) the extra stuff available on the lastest S, Z and F series under linux, such as the keyboard backlit, FreeFall sensor, screen autodimming. Currently I'm working on my Vaio S and a few things will be supported soon, but I'm a bit stuck with the Ambient Light Sensor. You can help providing your DSDT table (and if you can, some dumps of the Embedded Controller registers). So, please, attach such file here or send it to me via PM specifying your exact model. Retrieving the table is easy with every linux distribution (live included), just type:
cat /proc/acpi/dsdt > dsdt.aml
About the Embedded Controller, which is that little piece of hardware that control all this functions, you can use RW-Everything under any Windows OS to dump its registers, which contain information about your hardware and settings.

Thank you for paying attention, don't forget to reply to this post if you need further instructions.

 

Hi, I don't know if this ahs been posted before, but as the thread is huge, i will make a brief new post in hope for assistance.
I own the sony VPCF12M0E/B
And currenlty have bsod problems everytime during start up. It has been happening for the past few months, i contacted sony, and i did a bios reset and it seemed fine, but as it happens during start up i usually put my laptop on hibernate to prevent it from happening again. When it does happen, the bsod, i usually, do a start up repair, or a do load last good configuration and it usually fixes it.
Just last night, it failed, bsod about 15 times, every time i try to start up, any ideas?
Thankyou

 

Hey guys,

OK, this sounds weird. The other day, I noticed a tiny plastic piece laying on my desk. It was loose and looked kind of broken. I suspect this comes from my VAIO laptop, maybe it got damaged or something. I don't know.

What I am suspecting is that this plastic piece comes from the VAIO AC adapter. The AC adapter is the only piece that I move on a regular basis. So maybe something got dislodged or something.

Now I do notice that the AC plug is a little loose when plugged into my laptop. And this tiny piece that is on my desk looks like some kind of isolating piece for the metal connections.

So anyone that has a VAIO laptop... can you please check the metal pins in your AC plug (the piece that gets plugged into the laptop) and the metals pins in the laptop itself? Because the power pins on my device or all plain without any plastic isolation. Maybe this got stripped or something. If you could reassure me that your power connection pins are indeed "naked", that would give me some peace of mind. Because right now I don't know if my AC plug was loose right from the start. Thanks a bunch!

 

In case I misunderstood your question, I just took a picture:

 

Try to put recovery disk #1 inside and let it to check windows. Not sure about steps but it must be simple. I definitely know that there is a startup trouble resolver. Just don't forget to choose an option in bios to boot from DVD-Rom

 

Thank you very much. As it turns out, my plastic isolation around the metal connectors inside the laptop did break. I will have to get the laptop repaired as it is not safe to operate it without the tiny plastic piece that is supposed to wrap around the metal connectors.

If I had not noticed that tiny piece laying on my desk I would have never noticed that there was a problem with the connectors. There were, however, some random hard crashes during the last weeks. So I suppose the connection is really affected by the looseness of the cable. Too bad I will have to ship in the laptop :/

 

OMG OMG OMG! I just got mine Sony Vaio F12S1E 3 days ago, and it have this stupid whistle coming from the fan, it just sound like air going through somewhere, like some pipes. Somebody put the file in "part2" of this "thread" and it's just complitly exactly the same whistle i got. What shall i do, anyone help, should i ring sony for repair/. What they will actually do? I read alot, people send it few times like with no result, so is there fix this days, it's not a knew laptop, but i though since f11 series this one should be ok, please advise anyone...thanks...and sorry for my english_)

 

I spent many hours on internet looking for my new notebook and finally I bought VPCF13M0. I deliberately avoided full hd display 1920x1080 cause I think the dot size is too small on a 16.4 display and I dindt pay much attention about the difference between "Vaio Display" and "Vaio PREMIUM display". VPCF13M0 has a 1600x900 "Vaio Display" and I really have to say the quality is definitely disappointing. Contrast is really poor and I find quite uncofortable even to read text! Besides this the fan seems to be a bit noisy even when the processor is not under heavy stress.

 

sure about air?

try to turn off aouto brightness in vaio control center for contrast and use extended battery or cooling pad