Official Sony Vaio Fit multi-flip PC Owners' Thread

Ah yes, I answered it twice since I apparently sent enough emails to prompt the bot that sends them. Definitely gave a few very low scores when it came to problem resolution and recommended that they send me my order.

Still waiting for my flip, TNT tracking information is terrible! The people on the phones for the local depot were very pleasant however and suggested I call tomorrow to see if it's left the depot. I'm at a business event though so I'm hoping that they'll be OK with my boss signing for it.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

 

You mean for a clean, plain win installation? Just use a Windows 8 image - you can get it from MS. Some stated you should not use a 8.1 installation. So install plan Win8 from an ISO and after you installed all updates there is an upgrade to 8.1 in the Win App Update thingy.

Dunno if Sony has all Flip 13a drivers online meanwhile - you gotta check (they weren't when I got my 13a three weeks ago). After plain installation you'll miss some drivers including WiFi, so make sure you have them handy on an USB stick before you start. No network, no internet, no drivers download

 

I've seen a few people make comments about the power button. Personally I've got no issue with it. Barely ever use it anyway - tend to put the machine in to sleep mode & have the option on for it to reawaken when I open the screen.

Not that I ever do tend to leave the machine in its tablet layout, but if I did, the power button wouldn't be accessible if it was where the assist button is.

But yes, on future designs being able to define what certain buttons do rather than have them preselected would be nice. It would be helpful to have the sort of buttons we typically find on tablets (menu & back) as I'm sometimes scratching my head to remember what the Windows equivalent is now! Even the Fit doesn't have a suitable work-around for this in tablet mode... and personally I find the keyboard overly large at times.

 

I find the power button on our two 14" flips to be a very poor design. It is small, way toward the back on the right side, under the lip of the keyboard deck, it protrudes only slightly so it is hard to feel, and must be pushed into the case to activate it. Both my wife and I have taken to closing the screen to put the computer to sleep, then opening it to awaken it. My wife normally would leave her laptop open on her desk all the time otherwise. I fear we will wear out the hinges opening and closing these laptops multiple times per day.

 

Thanks, that sounds really nice! I'll check for the drivers and will def try this. Does it wipe all partitions? And does it keep the weird 6 partition (or so) setup? Thanks loads, this finally sounds like a solution.

BTW, about the buttons. I honestly couldn't care less about the power button, I use it so rarely that I actually prefer it hidden, since I can't press it accidentally. I guess the placement's due to the hybrid nature of the device, you wouldn't have access to it on the keyboard in tablet mode. I guess it could peek out a little. I guess.

I won't even go into the stupid assist button, I don't thing I'll ever press it, so to me it's simply disrupting the design (I'm a sucker for symmetry), but I can live with it, it doesn't light up, fortunately.

But what the h was SONY thinking when they designed such a measly volume rocker??? It suxx big time, in notebook mode you have to be doing weird gymnastics to get at it, and even in tablet mode I never no with blob I'm pressing... Meh.

Disclamer: I still love the Flip, and wouldn't give it back at gunpoint. But I wish that volume rocker made a bit more sense...

 

Normally that would be true, but the reason I brought it up but didn't elaborate in my review or posts is I take the Flip with me to and from home /work and put it in a shoulder bag. Somethings its only 45 minutes to work but if there is an issue it can go up to almost 90 minutes. And i wouldn't want the laptop to be on all the time in the bag.

For a moment I was thinking "What volume rocker?" I don't see one. Look all over the place and then it hit me ah wait, tablet mode. and I see it now.
Like I said, the power button (and now) volume rockers should be placed on the screen itself preferably to the side since placing it on the top will be a problem if placed in presentation mode. but eh can't do anything about it now lol Maybe in Flippy version 2 (and yes I do call my mine Flippy)

TS

 

DONT FORGET TO CREATE A RECOVERY MEDIA FIRST. This basically means you should use the Vaio tools to create a backup media from the recovery partition. Just in case you have to roll back and you deleted your recovery partition. This topic was discussed a few weeks ago in this forum - I think around page 20-30 or so ... cant remember.

During win8 install - dunno if you have to remove all partitions or not but I'd suggest to do so from within the Win 8 setup anyway to start with a clean, empty SSD.
So, yes, you'll get rid of the second UEFI partition from Sony (which is a few houndred meg) and the recovery partition which "wastes" several gig of space.

Win Setup will create all needed partitions automatically (which is hidden UEFI, a hidden Boot & Tools for encryption and the C - so you'll end up with 3 or 4 automatically created partitions and a lot more disk space since you don't have the recovery any more.

 

Just got an email this morning, they are finally building my flip 15a, 2 weeks after ordering. (i5, 256gig ssd, 8 gigs ram).
I was going to order a USB thumb drive to copy my recovery partition to. From what I've read in the thread, the flip creates a 17 gig recovery partition. So I thought a 32 gig thumb drive should be the correct size to order.
Can anyone who's moved the recovery partition off the flip confirm the size of the partition it created?

Thanks!

 

Would it work for you if instead of turning the laptop off, you set it to go to hibernate when you close the lid, and wake up when you open it, that way you don't have to deal with the power button?

 

For those of you looking for a 15" convertible, Acer is lunching the new aspire R7-572 with Haswell and digitizer. It is already on Best buy website, and it will be in stores by early December. The i5/8gb/1TB Serial ATA hard drive/Intel® HD Graphics 4400/Windows 8.1, is $ 900. If this one does not have the Wifi issues of the R7 first generation, it could be a good alternative for some people that find the Flip 15 a little too expensive.

 

Could someone please let me know how the Flip 14 and 15 offered at Best Buy website compare specs and price-wise with the ones you see at the Sony websites in European countries.

vaio flip - Best Buy

The Sony USA website does not have the Flip, only the Fit, same in Canada. My local Best Buy does not have the Flip 15 in stock, and the only flip 14 they have is stock, is the one with the i3 processor. So my only option, in addition to just wait, is to order online from Best Buy, but I want to make sure that these are good option compare to what I could get from Sony, either regular models or customized ones.

Thanks in advance for your help.

 

Tbh, I think the pricing is slightly different in the US Sony store compared to the UK one. Certain things are cheaper iirc but others are more expensive. VAT (sales tax) in the UK is 20%

The BB $1,249.99 15A i5, 8GB RAM, is £ 1,399.00 inc. VAT
The BB $799.99 14A with i3, 4GB RAM is £ 739.01 inc. VAT
The BB $899.99 14A with i5, 8GB RAM is £ 859.00 inc. VAT

Roughly speaking 859 British Pound Sterling equals 1407.30 US Dollar.
I think overall its generally cheaper in the US (you lucky sods.) The Sony store is the only place to get them here in the UK


TNT tracking is the best and worst thing. Looked at the tracking today on my flip and it arrived at Stansted airport which is pretty close to me, and then went off in the opposite direction to Slough in Berkshire. Which very much isn't.

 

In Austria (and I guess similiar prices in Germany):

15A with i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD is € 1259.01 inc. VAT
14A with i3, 4GB RAM, 256GB SSD is € 1099.01 inc. VAT
14A with i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD is € 1259.01 inc. VAT

We have 20% VAT, Germany 19%.
The Euro is still pretty strong - todays exchance rate is 1,3615.

Usually within Europe, UK is cheaper to shop clothes and IT (but not for Alcohol )

 

Comparison between two Flip 15 specs:

i7-4500U (1.80GHz / 3.00GHz)
Windows 8 64-bit
15.5" Full HD IPS touch display (1920 x 1080)
8GB RAM, 1TB (5400rpm) + 16GB NAND flash HHD
NVIDIA ® GeForce® GT 735M w/ Optimus™ graphics (2GB)
HDMI® out, USB 3.0, NFC

$1250
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

i7-4500U (1.80GHz / 3.00GHz)
Windows 8 Pro 64-bit
15.5" over Full HD IPS touch display (2880 x 1620)
16GB RAM, 1TB (5400rpm) + 16GB NAND flash HHD
NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 735M w/ Optimus™ graphics (2GB)
Digitizer stylus, HDMI® out, USB 3.0, NFC

$ 1800
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Are the 2880 x 1620 screen, the extra 8GB RAM and the Digitizer stylus really worth the extra $550?

Would the 2880 x1620 screen consume much more power than the 1920 x 1080? I’m thinking about battery life here.

 

IMO, forgo the 2880 res and 16 GB and put the $$$ towards a large SSD drive. Unless you're doing something really intense you won't need more than 8 gigs and the 1920 screen is really quite nice.

 

Excuse my ignorance, but what kind of impact, and how big of an impact would swappind the drives have in this particular Flip 15 i7?

Would the benefit be different in an i5 then in an i7, does how much memory the machine has also determine how beneficial swapping for an SSD is?

 

Not a problem. The drive you listed is what's known as a hybrid drive, it has a very small SSD and then a 5400 rpm mechanical hard drive that makes up most of the terrabtye of space. This means things like booting up and suspend / resume will be very fast, but when you need to access other areas of the hard drive, say for large files or you have many applications open, you'll be reading and writing to a 5400 rpm drive. The speed difference between a 5400 rpm drive and an SSD is very significant, I would guess exponential. I know when I put an SSD into my desktop from a 7200 rpm drive I had, it was noticeably faster. Also keep in mind an SSD has no moving parts, so it's not vulnerable to drops. The downside is an SSD will have a shorter lifespan than a mechanical drive, but you're still talking many years of life. Again, it's my opinion, but of the things you were wanting to spend more money on, I doubt you'll notice the RAM upgrade from 8 to 16, the screen you will certainly notice, but I debate it's usefulness when most applications aren't written to scale to that resolution (nor are most websites), but what you will most certainly notice is the difference in the hard drvie vs. the SSD.

I can't really speak to the difference between and i5 and an i7. I do know they both do some kind of speed boost when necessary where as I don't believe the i3 does.

Hope it helps.

 

Making a recovery media copy first is very good advice. In addition I make Image copies from time to time. I make one when I've done a lot of upgrades and don't want to repeat that whole process from scratch from the recovery disk.

I did all the Windows 8 upgrades, then installed Windows 8.1, then installed all of my PC applications and downloaded some new Start Screen apps. I made some user customization changes. Everything is working well. Then I made an image copy of the disk. This will allow me to restore the computer to that level should I run into problems.

 

Thanks for the great explanation?

Does anybody knows if the images, video, graphics and/or text, display on the 14" (1920 x 1080) resolution, look noticeable different than the ones display on the 15" (1920 x 1080). are they pretty similar or things look better on the 14".

 

You're quite welcome?

 

ha-ha Sorry about the question mark, I meant exclamation point (!)

Thanks again!!!:thumbsup:

 

I've been following this board for a while: while I was deciding whether to buy a flip, after I ordered one, and while I was waiting for it to ship. Now I felt a need to create an account on here so I can vent. I got the laptop on Monday, it's now Friday, and the laptop is broken. I could cry. I absolutely LOVED it and thought it was the best thing ever. I spent hours transferring my files from my old laptop because that one is half-dead, and now my new laptop is full-dead! Today all of a sudden, the screen started flickering, then going off, whenever I moved it at all, especially if I tried to 'flip it' out of laptop mode. Then I would have to hold the power button to restart it in order to get the screen back. Then tonight the screen flickered off, and now it won't turn back on! I am furious. I am going to have to send it back! But I loved it! Ahhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

 

I'm looking to get the 15 inch version for reading (ebook) textbooks in tablet mode (most tablets are too small to really do that) and doing schoolwork. Do y'all think that's feasible? Stuff would be a little zoomed in as I can't see very well, btw.

 

I got my Vaio multi flip 15 A with 2880 yesterday. After I updated it to win 8.1 I recognized, that the virtual keyboard and the Windows Key doesn't work in tablet mode. In Notebook mode both is working correct. After deleting the keyboard driver and a restart the Vaio the keyboard worked in tablet mode till I switched to notebook mode and back. After that the vk doesn't work again. The rest is working without problems.

 

Downloaded the vaio care updates today in the UK including a wifi update!
... no noticeable improvement to the fan or wifi unfortunately.
Using online speed tests I get about 6-7 mbps lower on my Vaio13 vs a much older Vaio AW31S (which is also much quieter).

The only way I can stand to use the Vaio13 is by putting it on "Silence" mode. Kind of defeating the fact that I shelled out more for an i7.

Really disappointing for such an expensive machine...

 

Damn it! Sometimes the virtual keyboard works,sometimes not. It seems, that it works, if I use it directly after wake up. If I switch to Notebook mode and than back to tablet mode, it doesn't work.It looks like an known RDP bug, where sometimes the Windows- or the Ctrl- Button stucks. So I think it isn't a Hardwareproblem.

[EDIT] Ah, ok, it's not the CTRL-Button, it's the ALT-Button. If I switch from Notebook to Tablet mode it's like I permanent hit the ALT-Button.

[EDIT again] Now I got it. I hope I can describe it in english...
If I rotate the screen complete, bevor I change to tablet mode, everything works fine. But if I rotate and switch to tablet mode in one turn, some Buttons where hit, bevore the hardware keyboard is deactivated. In this case, the ALT-Button stucks and the space button is hit one time. You can see, that all Buttons like space, alt etc. hit, if you switch to tablet mode. Does someone at sony test there hardware, bevore they sell this stuff?

 

Sony : SVF13N1C5E uppdateringar | Ladda ner uppdateringar för SVF13N1C5E | SVF13N1C5E

Finaly, a BIOS update for 13". Anyone tried it out yet?? Is it what we hoped for?

 

It was not what I hoped for. I have had my SVF13N1C5E for some weeks now, but I seldom use it because of the fan noise (waiting for a fix). I only used it for surfing in tablet mode, not for real work as intended.

I do not know if the Standard/Perf mode get better, never use those modes (I don't think the Flip is useable due to its fan noise in non-silence mode).

When it comes to the Silence mode it... got worse. Briliant... Now the fan cannot decide if it should be on or off (even when I just leave the flip idle). It can be in intervalls of a couple of seconds. And when the fan is on, I think its noisier...

DO NOT RUSH this update if you ask me.. but as I said, I have not used this computer much...

nej, jag får nog ta och returnera hårtorken....

 

One thing though, if I recall correctly the flip in silence mode (i have a i7) got clocket to 800 MHz, and not exceeding that. But I really never stressed the cpu. Now I run a CPU stress test and it is now clocked at 1100 MHz (in silence mode) and sometimes doing a burts up to 1200-1300 MHz... But to a cost, noiser than Before the "fix"

For you that have not updated yet, is Silence mode clocked att 800 MHz?

(I run WPRO 8.1, if that somehow would matter)

/ Thomas

 

Just manually performed the 13A Bios update. It was stated to be specifically for the fan.
Interesting that it did not show up using Vaio update.
The fan is still present in Standard mode but running a lot slower and hence quieter and not as high-pitched.

 

Well I got the Flip 14A out of its box last night, finally

Gorgeous machine. I do like the all black look (I got the black obviously).

Just a few quick impressions because I haven't done much more than install W8 last night :

- Installing Windows on these takes a looong time. I have done other brands like Asus and HP, which took a lot less time. Almost 3 hours just to get Windows up and running, then another hour to get updates - not including 8.1 (I have a not-so-high-speed connection). I set up a Fit 15 about a month ago for a friend and it took just as long, maybe a little longer because he didn't have the bloat-free W8 like I have. Those with SSD drives will surely get his task done in half the time (or less).

- Speaking of "Fresh Start" (W8 Pro with less bloatware) : it's pretty nice. The only "junk" I had on was a trial for Office 2013. It also had Java (which I remove for security reasons) and Adobe Reader. ArtRage Studio is there also but we need this program. There are the usual Sony VIAO utilities, and that's it.

- The fan : yes, there is a fan !! It's like a mini hair dryer lol. Ok, I know it isn't a fun issue for a lot of new owners, but I don't mind it that much. I haven't done the BIOS update yet.

- I have the 500GB HDD (not SSD). Someone asked a few days ago if the 500GB drive is a hybrid or not : mine is, it says so on the box and I remember seeing it on the Sony store when I ordered. However, it seems as though this may have changed very recently and it is possible that they have run out of 500GB hybrids and are now installing regular 500GB HDDs.
With this hybrid, W8 boots up from cold to Desktop in just under 20 seconds (I use Windows Defender as antivirus). That's pretty decent for a HDD. I'll shave some precious extra seconds off once I install the SSD in this thing.

- The 14A is a little heavy for a tablet, but then again I didn't buy this with "tablet use only" in mind, so it's fine. We have an iPad at home so of course the 14A feels heavy compared to that. I can't get any work done with an iPad on my lap though, haha.

- The Power button location : I don't mind. I found it on the first try, without having to look, just by feel.

- Sharp edges : well, yes they are, relatively speaking. Will I slice the roast with it tonight ? Nah. Will I cut open my legs when using it in tablet mode ? Nope. They could have specified smoother edges for the machinists though. No big deal for me.

- Screen : gorgeous. Angles : no problems here.

Tonight I'll create the Recovery media and then install the 8.1 update. I ordered a 480GB Crucial M500 (SSD) and will hopefully get it early next week.

I'll try tablet mode a bit more tonight as well. More impressions to come

 

Hey,
does anyone know if I can set the FN keys to be standart, and I dont have to press FN if I want to use them?

 

Thanks for the update, Mark!
I have also ordered i5 8GB, 500 GB HDD, it's coming on Tuesday. I have also ordered a 500GB Samsung 840 SSD drive, and planning to do clean windows reinstall on the SSD. However, there seems to be a lot of confusion going on with both Windows 8 and HDD vs SSD differences.
Could you please describe your process step-by-step - this would be very helpful!
Thanks,

 

Jackie, Sorry to hear about your laptop troubles. No manufacturer can put out 100% quality devices as there is always the possibility of infant component failures. Glad you liked it so much. I'm pretty happy with my 14". Just a time setback for you. Soon you'll be back on track with a new one I'm sure.

 

With much delay on the standard shipping, I received my Flip 13, only to have major software issues with Windows. I'm enjoying the device as now the Flip is stable, but when I first started the device, a few seconds of on time would instantly shut down the Flip, I'm trying to update everything and verify all windows apps, since Windows store doesn't work and I can't update to 8.1 right now, so I'm trying to find a way to fix the store right now.

 

I ordered my custom Flip 13A at october 14. I get it at november 14. When I finally get my Flip, first I updated Windows 8 to 8.1. It goes well. Soon after that I moved to living room and noticed that there is bad wireless-problem when Wi-Fi gets weaker. I'm glad I ordered early. I get 4 years warranty and I have noticed that price has go up after that. Maybe too pricey now.

I write these user experience to Sony community:
I buy Linksys WAP300N wireless access Point to extend my wireless network at my home. Now my Flip (SVF13N1C5E) works perfectly. Access Point is now very near maximum 3 meters.

But as I mentioned before. My Flip has very big trouble at weaker Wi-Fi. I have used different devices at my home Wi-Fi at same room. Even my Sony STR-DN1040 works in wireless network without any problems. But Flip not. I was on journey at last week. Weak Wi-Fi bothered me there. My friends laptops and my mobilephone works on free Wi-Fi. Flip found Wi-Fi and connected (showed one or two bars), but even it is connected no pages opened at all. Or very very slowly. It was real pain. When moved to another place and get better signal everything is fine.

Now I have 100% Wi-Fi -signal on my living room and Flip works everywhere my home very nice. So this problem is mostly solved to me. I just updated Bios to R0220VA. Maybe fan is now a little quieter.

Fan and weak Wi-Fi are only complaints I have. This computer is very nice. I like it more every day. And I noticed I use more touch screen. This is very handy in tablet-mode. On my trip I tried camera too. It looks a little funny when using it, but results are good. I take pictures from a few documents too. Those are very good.

Flip interested many people. And everybody likes it. I must show many times how to flip the screen. It gets "wow"-effect every time. Only, when I told price, they were not so excited.

 

Hi All,

When I flip from Laptop to Tablet mode my 13A flip reduces the screen resolution from 1920x1080 (and increases the size of icons etc), I assume to make it easier to use it in touch mode. When I then go back into Laptop mode from Tablet mode it doesn't change back (despite setting telling me it is in 1920x1080). Now I actually prefer the tablet resolution which a few websites tell me is 1455x818 (which isn't an option in the screen resolution settings?). Is there anyway to just make it stay at that resolution in all modes? Or has someone found where the settings that govern the flip from one mode to another are as I can't seen to find them.

Thanks

 

If it's just the larger icons and font that you like then try this
Making the text on your screen larger or smaller - Microsoft Windows Help

My 15A arrives tomorrow. So excited! But annoyed that I'll get it at work and then I won't be able to have a play with it until I finally get home at about 8.30pm after my dance class.

 

It seems that TechnoBuffalo has a Flip 14 and did an unboxing so i assume a full review will be forthcoming soon. But what confuses me about that video and I made my comments on it is that he titles it Fit 14a which to my understanding it is either Flip 14a (for US versions) or Fit Flip 14a for overseas versions. He also states that the series range from $500 + depending on model. That I know of the least expensive one startes at $749. Then to make matters even more confusing, the model number on the box he shows is SVF14N11CXB. No where on the Sony site does that model show up for sale. The only place it does show up is in the support section, which btw shows a bios update for that model.

Things that make you go hmmm.

TechnoBuffalo Fit 14a unboxing.

TS

 

Got my 13A this Friday and am happy with it but having a few stupid issues: -

1) I've updated to Windows 8.1, however since doing this my Wi-Fi connection keeps going to "Limited" and I have to disconnect it then reconnect it. I'm connecting to an Apple AirPort Extreme. Is anyone else having similar issues?

2) I'm a bit old fashioned and prefer to run at a lower resolution (1,368 x 766). However everytime I use the Flip function it changes to 1,920 x 1,080 and I have to change it back manually.

Is there anyway to keep this from happening?

3) I'm not a big fan of multi-touch gestures and turn them off in the touchpad settings and enable vertical edge scrolling. However everytime I restart the laptop it reverts back to default and I have to change the settings again.

Again does anyone know how to keep this from happening?

Other than the above I'm happy with the laptop. The noise is a bit of an issue, and it does get a little warm at the bottom.

Thanks in advance.


Martin

 

Thanks. It's just such a hassle that I don't feel like dealing with right now. I'm incredibly off these last few days. I just realized that I didn't even put the right number for pi in my name on here! Hopefully I'll get this laptop fixed and my brain will go back to normal. Sony customer service said that I should send it in for repair, and I pray it doesn't take long, since I'm moving 1000 miles away right after Christmas and don't want to deal with getting it sent to a different address or not having a laptop when I arrive to my new city..

 

Hi there Asiansniper911

Sorry to hear about those problems you've had. From your description, I'm not sure what went wrong. One thing for sure : if you can't get the Store to work adn can't update to 8.1, you have to get that *fixed* soon. Just a couple of things :
1) Have you been able to get all updates for Win8 ? And all updates for apps ? You need to update everything (Windows and apps) before the Store will offer you the 8.1 update.
2) If you still have problems, have you considered using Recovery to install Win8 again ? I know this can be a pain because you lose your programs and have to back up your data first, but it might just solve whatever problem occured the first time. Just a thought...

=======================

Hi twospirits

I just looked quickly at the YT video. I have the exact same box and it says "Fit 14A" as well, not Flip. I'm in Canada. His box sure had a lot of ugly tape on it ; mine only had the small white strip of Sony tape. My black box was slipped into a second brown box for extra protection (tight fit, no bubble wrap or anything)

=======
=======

I haven't played with the 14A today, but last night I did the Recovery media, then the 8.1 update and looked around a bit. I do have a BIOS update listed as "Critical" on the Sony support site, which I have to install (tonight).

From Device Manager, I know now that the 500GB HDD is a Toshiba MQ01ABF050H (hybrid). It is indeed 7mm think and has 8GB of NAND flash memory. I looked around the Toshiba site and didn't see 7mm 750GB or 1TB hybrids. So if anybody reading this has a 750GB or 1TB drive, could you please look in Device Manager > right-click on the hard drive > "Properties" and tell us which drive you have ? I'm really curious

I mentionned yesterday that Win8 booted up from cold in just under 20 seconds. Well, after the hybrid drive's controller has had a chance to *learn* a bit more, the Fit now boots in 13 seconds. That is fast for a HDD. I've done this twice in a row. Hybrid drives need a little time to learn which applications load most often and then they can cache whatever they feel is needed to load fast. These little Toshibas seem to work well. Now let's not forget that W8 (and 8.1) have a new feature that allows really quick boot ups ("Hybrid Boot") ; it's like a new deep sleep mode when you "shut down" Windows 8.
I may not get much faster boots with the SSD, but I know that the overall disk read/write operations will be much quicker with the SSD and I will really enjoy the speed all around, not just at bootup.
My other observation from all this is that the "Fresh Start" option really does what it is supposed to do, meaning increased system speeds. The Fit 15 (non Flip) that I set up a month ago needed way more time to boot to Windows ; it has a 750GB hybrid, Core i5 and more RAM than mine (8GB vs 4GB). I won't need a fresh Windows install.

 

Hi there IQ2014

You will enjoy the Evo 840 a lot, I'm sure

I'm not sure I understand your question... so I'll throw a few things your way and hope it answers it. If not, just let me know

About a fresh Windows install : I'm not comfy doing that on a VAIO and I don't have to anyway, because I paid extra money for the "Fresh Start" option (less bloatware) and my Flip just flies because of it. So what will I do ? Like I mentionned some days ago, I have a choice between cloning the HDD over to SSD, using Macrium Reflect or other similar program, or... go with a Recovery install from the media I created last night.

The Recovery partition on my Flip 14A, for those curious, is just over 20GB in size, so I used a 32GB USB stick I bought on special at Staples (Black Friday : $12).
I didn't mention this in my previous post, but I looked at installed partitions via the Windows Disk Management utility and I have 5 partitions installed (well, 5 showing...). I could list them if anybody's interested (I didn't write them down so I'd have to go back and check).

I should do the switch later this coming week, when I get the M500 (SSD) adn have some time to tinker. Right now, my feeling is I will try the Recovery approach to install W8 on the SSD, More on that soon

 

So I got my Flip 14 a couple days ago and so far I really love. Although, that is not to say it doesn't have its quirks. For one thing, it seems to be a bit... laggy. I don't know, just sometimes I would tell it to do something and it would only notice a few seconds later. But this is something I can get used to. One serious problem I noticed is that when ever I try to do a combination that is more than 2 keys long and involves the shift key, it doesn't work. I mean I can't do Shift+End because to do the "End" I have to click Fn+RightArrow, and Shift+Fn+RightArrow doesn't work, neither does Ctrl+Shift+T or Ctrl+Shift+P. However Ctrl+Fn+RightArrow works and so does Ctrl+Alt+Delete so it appears to be the shift key.

Has anyone else noticed this or know of a solution?

P.S. After upgrading to windows 8.1 and deleting bloatware, the fan is quite and there is a callibration tool you can run from the Sony website that will fix the touchscreen (mine was glitchy)

 

Windows store won't open at all, but I'm just creating a recovery usb drive then resetting Windows, I just got the device literally yesterday, so there's really nothing to back up.

 

Got my 14A couple of days ago, 4 days after it was ordered!
After cloning the HDD, I installed the Samsung 840 EVO 250GB SSD. The speed is insane, I love it!
I tried to do a clean Windows 8 install from another image, but had problems with activation and some Sony utilities not working.
If you switch from HDD to SSD make sure to clone it before physically switching them, it will be much easier, i.e. you can do it in Windows environment using standard utilities. If the SSD maker does not provide a cloning tool, you can use free AOMEI Backupper.

 

The 500GB HDD shipped in my 14A was a simple WD blue series drive. It's pretty slow too.

 

Just received mine, looks lovely!

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

 

Guys, has anyone figured what the difference is between the two nibs that came with the stylus? Out of pure esthetics I switched it for the black one, but I actually don't' think there is any... I was hoping it would be more rubberized, well, it isn't.

 

Can anyone confirm that it is possible to upgrade the SSD and/or RAM of the 13A yourself after purchase?
Thanks!