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

Here you go. I'll post the Spyder3 when I can get to it. The Huey Pro is posted someplace within the 5 threads.

 

I've used the Spyder2 for a year and switched to the Spyder3 ( Thanks Mangosango) recently. I cannot use the Huey Pro calibration. It effects the Windows Fax and Scan system if you can believe that. Googling shows others with same issue- screen calibrations effecting this service. Very strange.

Edit: have you guys noticed when editing a post the attachment option disappears? Where did that paperclip go?

 

Thanks again for the help

 

Hey guys so I just got the Cooler Master U2 cooler today and I was wondering if there are any recommended regions for fan placements ... I ended up getting U2 instead of U3 because Amazon reduced the price for me from about $21 to just $5.44 for some reason .. (I have a Promotion Applied = -$16.01) on my order, and no it wasn't gift card balance .. I called up Amazon and talked to them for like 30 minutes and even they couldn't figure out what promotion it was ..

Anyways, so for $5.44, U2 is a pretty good deal, hehe

 

Looking down through the keyboard there are vents on the lower left and center of the bottom of your VAIO. Since there are no other intakes on the bottom, those are the best 2 positions.

 

I just recieved my fenvi sata tray to replace the BD drive with a second ssd.
the thing is that in Win 7, this second drive gets somehow disconnected after a minute or ten. when I reboot all is fine again..
I noticed this while copying over my virtual machines
How do I get to keep this drive available, is there a magic trick?

btw: great forum here!

 

So, you've got SSD in your main slot and another in the optical bay using the Fenvi caddy?

It's supposed to be as easy as plug-n-play. The SATA drive in the optical bay should not be ejecting. Have you tried the same using HDD instead of SSD to duplicate the problem? Of those of use who've made this change, you're the first to post that kind of issue in this forum.

Hmmm....

Additional thoughts... it's not the optical SATA slot, as your BD drive would have problems. If it's the caddy, then the HDD will have the same problem as the SSD. What SSD did you get? Am I right in assuming that you have TWO SSD's. If you only have 1 SSD and 1 HDD, you should have the SSD in the main slot and the HDD in the caddy.

Hmmmmm....

 

yes I have 2 SSDs,
both are OcZ Vertex 2, the first one (80gb) is used in the main hdd slot
the second one (320 gb) is then mounted in the fenvi tray.
I can't even see the second drive any more in the Matrix storage manager tool, not even after a reboot..
will try this evening after remounting the fenvi tray.

 

Matrix Storage Manager? What Intel driver are you running?
Windows button > type "Device Manager > IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers > Intel blah blah blah > right click "properies" and navigate to driver tab. MSM is like 8.9.something and we're up to 10.1.something which is MUCH more suited for SSD's and will yield much better performance out of your OS drive.

You do not need ANY storage solution software from Intel, as it's designed to benefit RAID and has no benefit for dual drive setups that are non-RAID. You should unistall the Matrix Storage Manager, let your machine reboot as necessary, then manually update the driver to this file:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&ProdId=3172&DwnldID=19601&ProductFamily=Chipsets&ProductLine=Laptop+Chipsets&ProductProduct=Mobile+Intel%c2%ae+5+Series+Chipset&lang=eng

I think this is a good starting point.

 

hmm, I have done what you suggested.. but the ssd in the tray keeps disappearing. in the same time I saw some interesting entries in the event viewer: ID 9 IaStor - device did not respond within the timeout period & ID 51 - disk - error detected during paging operation
Maybe I should mount this ssd in an external enclosure and then run some error checking on it? damn it's brand new..
thx for all the help already

 

I download a lot of divx movies off frostwire. The program is installed to my ssd and all of my downloads write directly to my ssd. I usually copy over my media to my external drive every couple days, but does the excessive writing to my ssd really degrade the drive much faster than regular use? I hate leaving the external plugged in it never stops spinning

 

Just FYI, the numbers you quote are for distant vision. I have 20/20 in both eyes yet I need reading glasses, albeit low power. This is because of a condition known as presbyopia which is waiting for you after 40.

 

I got something similar, its called oldagealitis!

 

Does the drive show up in Disk management? My fenvi 2nd hdd bay sometimes glitches, causing the HDD to never show up until I connect the drive using an enclosure. I usually then have to assign it a drive letter to it, allowing it to work with the bay adapter. You should definitely try connecting it through an enclosure!

 

it does, I had it formatted from there.
but the thing is the drive in the bay only shows up for a few minutes after every cold boot. it's like it is not getting power or something

 

Why not try swapping the two drives to see if it also happens with the 80GB drive in the fenvi caddy (i.e. to rule out that the 320GB drive is faulty)? You'll have to load windows on the 320GB for this, but I think it's worth checking...

 

yeah, was thinking of doing that too.
task for tomorrow

 

External hard drive has just failed. Just a good reminder to backup on external drive, and discs as well. I did.

 

Don't do it... I purchased one in November, and I couldn't be less happy with the laptop.

a) Squeaky noise is horrible and they can't/won't fix it
b) off center keyboard gets annoying
c) mouse pad is way too sensitive... you'll find yourself typing all over the place
d) most important... support SUCKS!

 

As I've stated before, this in not a Sony F fanboy club but here's my take on this post. a) I am assuming you mean the fan noise when you say squeaky noise. This cannot be fixed. Majority of owners have no problems with the fan knowing their laptop stays cool and therefore no overheating issues. Horrible to some and not an issue for most. If you mean a squeaky spacebar it will go away. b) Off center keyboard? Is this your first keyboard with a numeric keypad? It kind of has to be on the side. What other design can you think of? The keyboard is one of the best features on the F, solid feel and great looking. c) track pad - some have complained but not many. I've included Touchfreeze and this may help. d) I own computers from three major manufactures and my experience is that they all are basically the same, getting great service sometimes and horrible service the next. Try escalating a work order to second level often get you a more competent rep. You may want to try off hours or vice versa, or just call again- it's the luck of who you get. If I were a rep for Sony, not sure how I would be able to help you in stating 'My laptop has a squeaky noise, my off centered keyboard is annoying, my track pad is too sensitive HELP ME'. Just another opinion here.

Touchfreeze: Annoyed when you are typing a document and accidentally the palm of your hand brushes the touchpad, changing the position of the cursor in your document or accidentally clicking on an option. It automatically disables touchpad while you are typing text. JPride find.

 

I bought my F13 two months ago as a desktop replacement. It is the coolest laptop I've ever owned (close to my old thinkpad followed by a macbook pro), it is also my first vaio.

My only two gripes is that the video card is weak (gt 425m) for such a powerful laptop. Even the next model F (the 3D f-series vaio) comes with almost the same gpu in terms of capability.

My second issue is that "VAIO Update" does not work or does not get the updates fast enough and if it updates, it updates VAIO utilities and other crap other than drivers or bios updates. I was hoping vaio update to be comparable to thinkpad thinkvantage technologies but I was wrong.

As for support, I can't say because I haven't had to call yet.

P.S. the keyboard is great.

 

All the more reason to just updates through your esupport page. I get this message, then I can click onto updates. Just more control and info via esupport. I would have been willing to pay more for a superior graphics card as well.

 

Hey Fishon is that SSD a huge difference? what kind of Windows Experience raiting do you get for hard disk transfer rate

 

WEI hard drive score is 6.8. For my work a SSD is a game changer. I speak to clients over the phone jumping around and opening various applications in no time. My advantage of being able to quote prices and have a fluid conversation, without having to wait for whatever to open, or at worst calling them back with the info is priceless. Newer generation SSDs out there, mine is just okay, but very satisfied with solid state. Would never go back. Keeps lappy a little cooler and quieter as well.

 

What would be the best way to clean my screen properly? (EU matte screen on VPCF12S1E)

Thanks in advance.

 

Microfiber cloth. I also use special cleaning wipes.

 

Agree with James on the microfiber cloth $4. I'm also using an ammonia and alcohol free lens cleaner $3. Apply some pure carnauba wax (recommend the paste) to the exterior and she'll look and be clean as can be.

http://www.autogeek.net/motcalgolcar.html

 

Waiting for delivery of a new F but thinking ahead for the future regarding hard drive replacements:

1. Can you do it yourself?

2. Is there a warranty (or Extended Service agreement) issue?

 

Easy to do yourself: How to Replace or Upgrade the Hard Drive HDD or SSD - VAIO-VPCF Series Laptop

Sony has given conflicting information regarding whether this would void their warranty, although the consensus seems to be, technically, yes. However, there is no reason for them to know you even did it if you keep your original HDD to swap back into it in case of need for warranty services and you are careful not to damage anything while swapping drives. Since it is so easy to replace the drive, damage is highly unlikely, but I have seen people do the improbable/near impossible before so just keep that in mind.

 

Wow! Thank you! (Rep added.) I see an SSD in my future.

I have replaced hard drives on Toshibas before and this looks like a similar procedure.

I asked because I was under the impression you could not do this with Sony, at least not with the TX and TT. Glad to see this will not be the case with my new F.

 

after unmounting the 320Gig SSD from the fenvi tray and mounting in a spare HDD in it, this one keeps running fine.
I now mounted the 320gig SSD in an external enclosure and noticed that it fails to run properly (eg.: can't even scan for errors, not accessible after 5 mins). So my problem must have been that the largest SSD is not working well, will return it to the shop
thx again guys!

 

Hi guys.
Had a mishap with my Vaio, and long story short the headphone jack is cracked (the outer ring). It still works fine, but feels delicate and I want to replace it before any damage is done.

I'm on a VPCF12M0E

I understand that this laptop possibly has the USB ports and audio jacks on their own PCB and that it should be relatively simple to swap that PCB out for a new one?

Can anyone confirm that this is the case, and more importantly the part/model number of the board itself. Through my research I have a sneaking suspicion that it's CNX 448 - but I couldn't find any mention of my own laptop.

If I can get the part and removing the back is simple, I'm happy to service it myself, but I don't want to remove the back, possibly void any warranties and then end up having to send it off because I cannot source the part myself.


I've been in contact with Sony already, but all I got was first line response. I mentioned that my backspace key is unresponsive sometimes and that would it be easy to replace, and the advice given to me was to reinstall my keyboard driver... So yeah. I think I'm better off doing this myself.

 

Here you go, including part number if you look close: http://forum.notebookreview.com/att...wners-lounge-part-2-f11-usb-audio-board-1.jpg This is from a VPC-F11JFX but I would expect the part to be compatible. Can't guarantee that but you both have USB 2.0 ports.

 

Thanks, I saw that image earlier. It says it's F11 though. Without opening mine up, is there any way to check that this uses the same board?

 

Only if you know someone else with the exact same model as yours who has taken apart their computer and taken pictures or written it down. Looking up the part number online, I see many F12 models that it is listed compatible with. Your specific one is not listed on the sites I've looked, but I am in the US and I am assuming you are in Europe, so you may have better luck looking on European sites since your exact model is not sold in the US. If you really want to be sure that it's the same card you have in your computer, you will have to open up your laptop.

 

I confirm that the part number is CNX 448 on F12 (see my previous post, fourth link to the SonyVaioPart UK).

EDIT: The link: Sony Vaio VPC F S.e.r.i.e.s USB /Audio Board M931 CNX448, part pulled out from an used VPCF12S1E (European) notebook.

 

Because of write amplification, frequent small frequent writes wear the drive faster than infrequent large writes. Things like writing the NTFS journal, your browser writing to its cache, Anti-virus programs, and system event and security logs are heavy hitters.

Most SSD controllers report their current wear level or % of life in the SMART data. I would d/l a tool that can read the SMART data for your SSD and check the current wear level periodically to see how it's doing.

 

F13 owner here.

I installed the BIOS update (R0190Y9). Information about that can be found in this topic around March 12.

Before I installed this update, I had nice options in the Windows 7 power management. There was an option that allowed to set the max CPU %. I created a profile with a max CPU % of 5. The laptop was really slower when I was using that, and it ran really quite. Good stuff when I wanted to use it as a FLAC music transport.

Now I installed the BIOS update and low and behold, the energy options are gone. I have yet to get the laptop as quite as it was in the past. In fact, it is much louder now than it used to be. Now I really miss the Windows power management options. Turns out they were a blessing.

Just to make my case, it was obvious that the old power options really did affect the processor's performance. During installations processes, changing the energy profile immediately affected the speed of the installation progress. To me, that was proof enough that the energy settings really did affect something. And again, the machine did run a lot more silent than it does now.

Now I have 2 questions:

Anyone using an F13 with the new BIOS - can you please verify if the energy options in Windows 7 are limited? Rottweiler maybe? Because if you have the new BIOS and you still have those energy options for the processor performance, I guess a system recovery on my end could help.

On the other hand, if you do not see those processor power options, that is a clear sign that the BIOS update put a limit on Windows 7. Which is a shame.

Only way to resolve this issue would be to go back to the old BIOS (R0180Y9). Anyone have a file???

Thanks guys!!!

 

Hi Guys,

I am an owner of a 2010 Vaio F11. I just did a clean install of Win7 Ultimate using a regular Win7 install disc (rather than a recovery disc) and have noticed that my Windows Experience Index is really low for my Processor subscore. I have a Processor subscore of 4.8 on an i7 Q720. I have installed all the drivers from Sony's website for my device and have no exclamation marks in Device Manager but for some reason I can't get my score to go any higher. I do remember before my lowest score used to be my hard drive with 5.9.

These are my scores:

Processor: 4.8
RAM: 7.3
Graphics: 6.5
Gaming Graphics: 6.5
Primary Hard Disk: 5.9

Can anyone provide any assistance as to what driver or setting I may not have setup properly which is causing the CPU to be so slow? I do remember some Intel Turbo Boost driver being installed on my previous setup but can't seem to find any such driver under the downloads section for my laptop.

Any help would be very much appreciated. Thank you!

 

Hi folks. It's been a long time since I've posted here, but I was one of the original posters to this forum. I haven't been here in so long because I was having absolutely no problems...until now.

After Windows Update attempted to install Service Pack 1 today, Windows 7 won't start. The laptop boots OK, but each attempt of Windows to start brings me to Windows Error Recovery screen. After trying all of the options many times, including system restore, I am no closer to getting Windows to start.

All my important data is backed up, and I have recovery disks that I made when I got the computer. I know I can use the recovery disks or the recovery partition to get a clean factory install, but before I resort to this, I'd like to see if I can just repair Windows 7. If I had received a Windows 7 disk with the computer, I could boot from it and attempt to repair Windows, or do a new install of Windows 7 over my existing copy without wiping my drive. But since we didn't get one with the Vaio F, I'm wondering what my options are. Any suggestions?

 

Microft quietly reported to TURN OFF WINDOWS UPDATE if you have not SP1! In some cases this updating may cause a problem

I used repair discs for repairing Windows. Also you can try to download distributive of Windows 7 and burn dvd.

 

I'm guessing you didn't make a Windows repair disk? Or a system image? Can you boot in Safe Mode?

 

I did make a system repair disk, and just tried it, but it didn't work. Same thing happened with it as with the built in Windows recovery software. Ditto for booting in safe mode, or trying "Last Known Good Configuration"

The only thing I can think to try is to use a different Windows 7 disk to do a repair. Problem is, the only one I have in the house is Windows 7 Home Premium and the install on my Vaio is Professional. I suspect it wouldn't work to use that for repair since they're different versions.

Any other thoughts?

 

Not sure exactly what you mean by this. What can I download for free that would work to repair my Windows 7 Professional? Or do you mean buy another copy? I would just use the recovery partition to get the factory install rather than pay another $200 to Microsoft.

 

You can try here http://mydigitallife.info/2009/11/1...links-ultimate-professional-and-home-premium/
I can't vouch for the files but someone else said it was legitimate. You have to decide for yourself. However I'm not certain a non-SP1 version will work if your install completed. You can try or you can search for a SP1 version.

 

After the BIOS update, I still have the options to set the min and max processor state under Processor Power Mgmt in Advanced Settings - Power Options.

Edit: Since you seem to think you have multiple missing options, I am posting a pic of all the upper level menu options available (the last one that is half cut off is "Battery"). And the second part of the pic shows the sub-menu option you mentioned specifically.

 

I have a problem perhaps someone can help me with--don't have the energy to search through past posts:

When my power supply is not plugged in and my computer goes to sleep, my screen will not come back on when I wake it up. Usually the keyboard will come back, but never the screen. I try FN F7 to cycle screen selection, but this does not work. I have to reboot every time, which is getting very frustrating.

Thanks for any thoughts...

 

Do you have your computer set to hibernate? I don't use hibernate, but usually you have to hit the power button to wake from hibernate, but any key to wake from sleep. How are you trying to wake your computer?

 

It seems to happen just about anyway--if I manually put into sleep or hibernate, it happens--or when it powersaves into hybernate, it happens... If the green is still on, I wake with the mouse--if the amber, I use the power button. Seems to happen no matter what--but seemingly only when not plugged in.

 

I'm a little busy right now, so can't take time to troubleshoot this myself but see if any of this helps you: http://forum.notebookreview.com/son...o-f-series-owners-lounge-371.html#post5880527