Official Sony Vaio Fit multi-flip PC Owners' Thread

Hi Everyone!

I've had my Flip 14 for around 2 months now and did quite a lot of tweaking here and there to make it run as per my liking. Recently, I'm facing a little trouble with my USB 3.0 port on the right side (between SD Card slot & LAN port).

Whenever I connect a USB 3.0 HDD (WD Passport) it won't recognize it and say that the device is not working properly and when I connect it to the USB port on the left (next to HDMI) it works fine. It reads normal USB 2.0 devices and HDD's fine, only problem is with 3.0 devices.

Can anybody confirm if they ever faced the same issue and how to resolve it? I tried searching on Google and found some similar problems with other laptops & desktops and followed the suggestions there but to no avail. Only once it worked and then again it won't recognize my 3.0 external HDD. Any help would be extremely appreciated!

 

I haven't calibrate mine yet, but you can find a review with the 2880 screen here.

 

I got my flip 15 back in January, love the computer, fan noise seems not to be an issue. No bleeding screen. Upgrade to 8.1 went fine. There are a few oddities like Google Chrome sometimes hangs and dies when the computer wakes up. And in Yahoo local news, if I have to type in my location, and a drop-down menu comes up, I cannot select from the menu with the pointer but MUST use my fingers on the screen. But those are not really annoying me.

What is the big annoyance is the synaptics pad -- its driving me crazy. It has dead zones and I keep missing the alive zones. But I cannot figure out how to change the settings. It must be simple, but I cannot find it.

I went to control panel >hardware and sounds > devices and printers > Synaptics SMBus ClickPad > Properties. There are 4 tabs: General, Driver, Details, and Events. I cannot figure out how to get to the setting you describe. Am I in the right place? Please help if you can.

Here are my specs, I did a customization when they still sold those it that way, because I knew I would not have it in me to install the SSD myself . .

4th gen Intel® Core™ i7-4500U (1.80GHz / 3.00GHz with Turbo Boost)
Windows 8 Pro 64-bit
Microsoft® Office 2013 trial version
Fresh Start
15.5" over Full HD IPS TRILUMINOS Display for mobile (2880 x 1620)
NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 735M w/ Optimus (2GB) hybrid graphics
512GB (512GB x1) solid state drive
16GB (8GB x2) DDR3L-1600MHz
Active Pen
No Adobe® Photoshop® Elements software
No Imagination Studio™ software
No additional antivirus software
No installation option
3 Yr Express Ship Protection Plan with Accidental Damage from Handling for Laptops

 

Thanks! I couldn't find that for some reason! Looks like I'm going with the lower res screen then. The 2880 is only 60% Adobe RGB, while the 1080 is ~75%. :\ Extra resolution would have been nice!

 

On mine I went to the mouse properties control panel. The far right tab says "device settings". Under this, click settings. Finally, this settings menu has a "smart sense" section which contains the area restrictions I think you're talking about.

I have the refreshed 8.1 model, so I'm not sure if the properties windows are the same on yours as well as mine.

 

I am quoting my previous post with a wonder if anybody answers or at least notices?

 

Hello,

It seems as if you are someone with relevant experience in running Linux on one of these machines.

I recently purchased a Sony Multi-Flip 15, and I would like to install Linux on it, in a dual-boot configuration.

Could you please provide pointers on _how_ you went about installing Linux?

Things I have found out so far:
I am trying to install from a Debian Live iso, placed on a USB stick using the Universal USB Installer ( Install a new mbr to your USB flash device | USB Pen Drive Linux order to get the VAIO Flip to boot from the USB stick, I had to get into the BIOS (boot by pressing the Assist button from a shut-down state), and change the UEFI boot option to 'Legacy', then save, exit, reboot again using the Assist button, and choose to boot from USB.

I couldn't re-partition my hard-drive from the install (I need to do it a different way I guess, as the installer couldn't shrink the largest partition on my disk)

I had to switch the BIOS UEFI option back to UEFI so that Windows could boot. So even if I get the partitioning sorted out, how does one dual-boot this machine?

Your insight is appreciated!

Thanks,
Duane

 

Which BIOS revision are you at?

 

Hi All! I bought a Flip 13A (rev2 2014.02) model and the fan is terrible, even in silent mode


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I can compare this machine now with Asus Taichi 31 and the Flip is twice as loud I am very sad because other aspects of this machine seems ok.


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So we are nearing the end. The French and the German webshops stopped selling the flip line at all, the UK webshop stopped top sell the 11 and 14 inch versions, and the only available, only preconfigured 13 and 15 inchers are out of stock


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I found something interesting solution: Notebook FanControl 1.0 [Vorstellung] NoteBook FanControl (NBFC) - ComputerBase Forum Does anybody tested it? I will try it at night, maybe will work until Sony give us a new BIOS! I have 8 days to return the machine if i cant tolerate this problem. :hi2:

 

first i had bought silver 13A model and its fan was noisy but was not getting warm.
its MB was stopped working at first month and sony gave me right to choose new computer.
i decided and got black model. now its fan is a bit quite but it gets too warm. its hot i mean while gaming for example pinball game from MS Store installed. it nearly burns my knee or hands when touch left side of computer.
so i guess fan or air cirucmstance is not well designed so it gets warm or gets louder.


BTW i tested the application you share and did not work on my computer.
it reads my model SVF13N12STB correctly but can not manage fan rpm or speed anyways. so i deleted it directly

 

I am trying to get a clean install on my 15" multi-flip (since my language is set to Chinese and it doesnt allow to change in settings)
- after formating everything works perfect - I only have trouble finding the cache buffer again.
Has anyone managed a clean install with hybrid drive?

Intel® Core™ i7-4500U
Windows 8 Pro 64-bit
15.5" (2880 x 1620)
NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 735M w/ Optimus (2GB) hybrid graphics
1TB HHD + 16GB SSD
8GB DDR3L

 

15A arrived, looks good so far, though I didn't tested a lot yet. But the HDMI connection to the external wqhd DELL U2713HM seems to be a problem. I've managed to set resolution to 2560x1440, though only on 40Hz, on higher frequencies the display shows popup that the resolution is unsupported..., and when compared to other computer (w7, ordirary grafics card GT610) running on same monitor on 60Hz my eyes don't like the 40Hz very much, seems to me blurry and not very pleasant. When compared to native 15A display, even more apparent difference. Though I don't know if it is caused by the card, HDMI cable (1.4 highspeed ethernet), windows8.1, the frequency, or simply by the fact that it is not supported by one of the devices.
Has anyone tried, achieved to connect 15A with high resolution display (2560x1440) with propper frequency over HDMI? Has anyone achieved to connect it to this particular DELL U2713HM?

Thanks for any hint or tip...

 

I'm running a Dell U2711 with a Kumo 1.4 HDMI>HDMI cable.
After setting the Timing Standard to CVT-RB 2560x1440@60hz it works like a charm.
Not sure if the U2713HMs HDMI port differs from the U2711 - but they both seem to have the same problem, that Dell configured them as "TV" ports with a max. resolution of 1920x1080.

Could be your cable perhaps?
Do you use the other computer with the same cable?
You're using and HDMI>HDMI cable and not HDMI>DVI?
From reading about the issue earlier a number of high-speed HDMI cables weren't really up to it - the Kumo was the only one I found that was confirmed to work.

 

I noticed today they took the 15" out of the Canadian webshop.

Geez, are they really not going to release the 11a in Canada before they stop selling them altogether?

 

Anyone with Flip 11a want to chime in on battery life? I noticed in the Flip 11a thread some have said battery is user replaceable, but then videos I have seen on the internet show otherwise, which leads me to believe replaceable battery(like 256gb SSD and 8gb of ram) are regional. If that is the case does the US variant possibly have a slightly larger battery?

 

Has anyone been able to swap out the HDD? The only one available where I live has a 5400 rpm and the techie said it needs a special tool and they don't have one in Victoria BC. We'd have to ship to Ottawa. The reason is that I would like to have a cloned bootable drive to swap in case the 5400 dies. Does anyone know if you can boot and run the flip from a USB port in case the drive dies?

 

A quick follow-up to my earlier post.
Received an HDMI to DVI-D cable today and ran into the same problem as you. Will only work at 40hz.
This cable only transfers on a single link (from what I understand HDMI to DVI compatibility only applies to single-link).
Probably means your current HDMI cable also isn't proper high-speed.

 

Hi there cdmazoff

Which model ? We have a few members here who have posted pics while replacing drives/RAM, for 13, 14 and 15 models I believe. I've swapped the HDD out of my 14 in favor of a SSD, without much fuss. No special tools are needed for the 13-14-15 lines, but removing the cover is a bit tricky/delicate. I don't understand why that guy in Victoria said he needed a special tool... because you're only dealing with regular type screws. To remove the cover, one of those spudge tools would be nice, but you don't really need one ; use a guitar pick, an old credit card or similar to try and gently pry open that first corner. Some screws are hidden under the rubber feet/strips, which need to be removed first.
The 15s have one or two flat cables that run across the HDD, so you need to unlatch these first (pressure-type connectors).
If you've tinkered inside a laptop before, then you should be fine.

If you provide us the model #, then someone here with first-hand experience will chime in I'm sure.

Edit to add : and yes, you can boot from USB with these. Don't forget to create your Recovery media though (it can save your behind in a disaster situation...)

 

solved .... the sony wd boost driver is out of date ... just need to update from WD website

 

Do I understand right, that you tried this Kumo 1.4 HDMI>HDMI cable and it worked only at 40Hz?

My cable is ordinary 1.4, on the cable is written "High Speed HDMI Cable with Ethernet"

 

Sorry for the confusion.
Kumo 1.4 HDMI>HDMI cable works at 60hz.
Kumo HDMI>DVD-D cable works at 40hz.

 

What kind of anti-virus do people here use?
Trying to cut down as much as possible on the programs and services sipping CPU and disk usage.

Have been using ESET NOD32 for many years on other computers because, supposedly it was light weight - but from what I'm reading that might not be the case any more? Started out with the included Microsoft Defender on the Flip, but that one seems a bit on the heavy side.
Right now I'm trying out Bitdefender - which seems pretty good, certainly much lighter than Defender, but also trying to do a bit more than I appreciate. Webroot seemed promising, so perhaps it's worth giving that one a go?

Anyone have any experience?

 

I liked ESet as well, but I didn't care much for paying for it. I've been using AVG 2014, pretty happy with it. I haven't noticed any odd slow downs.

 

NOD32 is one of the best AV products out there. Not the lightest but not the heaviest either.

Defender not light ? Really ? I think it's the lightest of the bunch. It does use a bit more RAM than some others, but processor and disk usage are low.
BitDefender is known for being aggressive (too aggressive for me), but perhaps it's right for you.
Avira (Free and Premium) is quite light and a slightly better performer than Defender.

I use Windows Defender (and Security Essentials on Windows 7) because it is enough for my needs. And it is the lightest, in my opinion. If your surfing habits are on the risky side, then I would recommend ESET NOD32.

 

Just went to the Sony USA website and most of the flips are out of stock including all the 13" models.

 

I just tried out a 13" in store with the stylus and found it very difficult to write with due to it not rejecting my palm. It seems the pen to needs to be ridiculously close to the screen to start palm rejection while the surface 2 (again in store use only) was very easy to use with palm rejection very early.

How do people find the stylus in real life usage? I'll just be note taking and crude diagrams, nothing fancy. The size and flip mechanism really appeal to me over something like the surface and it's lighter than the thinkpad yoga. But if the stylus turns out to be frustrating to use that kind of defeats the purpose of picking the Sony Flip.

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So what do existing users think about their 13A purchases? Has the BIOs and software updates toned down the fan enough for you to not have any buyer's remorse?

 

Thanks for the feedback!
I gave NOD32 another go, and have been testing it together with Defender, Bitdefender and Webroot.
None of the products caused any noticeable slowdown, but I was looking to find the one with the lowest CPU/disk usage to both keep the fan under control, and to extend battery life as much as possible.
My testing has not been scientific in the least, but from observation while repeating the same tasks, NOD32 was by far the heaviest, followed by Defender. Bitdefender was not bad, but had a tendency to start scanning the drive at the exact same moment the system would start defragging the hard drive (I'm sure I could have changed the schedule somewhere), and in general being a bit more intrusive than I appreciate. Webroot on the other hand, is extremely light and has been staying out of the way - so for now, I'm sticking with this one.

For my other computer where battery and fan usage is not much of a concern I'll probably just keep using NOD32 till it's time to renew again. I appreciate their far less aggressive sales efforts, and in general just staying out of the way and doing it's job.

 

On the 15A I don't find this an issue at all. It easily senses the difference between my palm and my finger and I can use it just as I would have on paper (but not having to worry about my sweat palm ruining the paper : ). If you rest a knuckle first and drag it, that could lead to some issues. Just testing here now, moving the pen towards the screen it starts to register (the cursor comes up, but it does not draw) around 1cm above the screen, moving it away it keeps registering 2-3cm away before it disappears.

The only downside I find with the Flip mechanism compared to the Yoga and the Surface is for mixed mode - when you need to write at length on the keyboard (and on-screen keyboards gets tired so quickly) and draw something at the same time. The Flip is one or the other - it takes some effort to move between the modes, while on the Yoga and the Surface you can lay the screen down flat and still have access to your keyboard.

 

BIOS back and forth!!!! I have a SVF15N190X.

I had updated to BIOS R0260DD on March 22. But today (March 29) I got popup asking me to update the BIOS, and I though, great! Fixing more bugs, a good thing.

But after I updated, i realized it installed the old R0250DD. And immediately after installtion, there was another popup asking me to update bios AGAIN! So I updated again, BACK to R0260DD.

After that, another popup, wanting me to update again -- but this time I looked carefully at what they want me to update to -- and if I click OK, I am reverting back to R0250DD. So this time I am no falling for it. I seem to have the later edition, R0260DD -- so I am staying put.

But seems It's stuck in a loop. It want me to "update" to an older BIOS version. Any thoughts?

 

Ignore it and it will eventually stop. Your "updater" program needs to be updated to tell the site which bios you have. Same thing happened to me this morning, but now it's stopped. (I did not try to reload the older Bios).

 

I use VAIO fit13A (SVF13N12SH) i5 4200 .128GB SSD. Sometimes It's randomly turn off .
This is common problem on this model? Have everyone got this problem?

 

I just registered to this website for the same reason. Basically this happens to me several times a week. My model is SVF13N1C5E. I checked the temperature after rebooting and it is always at approx 69 degrees Celsius, but drops downs quickly. Once though after rebooting, I could not open explorer and Intel Service manager crashed. Few seconds later blue screen of death (error:0xc000021a). Not sure if that has anything to do with it. I thought it happened only in cpu+fan silence mode, but it also happened once in standard mode (I'm using silence mode more often). I'm now thinking about sending it in for repair/contacting sony, as all software is up to date and basically it has happened since I bought it.

 

So I returned my previous Flip 14 and bought the $1599 Flip 14 with i7, 256gb ssd etc. the model is just as noisy as the first model and I have TWO dead pixels on the screen. I will just live with this but BUYER BEWARE with this model.

 

Well, I spoke too soon, now I'm getting the same issue. Also on 260 and getting notice for 250... but going on the support page 260 is now not listed. Everything else seems up to date. We'll see...

 

Yeah got the notification to "update" (downdate?) to the 250 bios on my 15 today as well. I'm going to ignore it and assume it's a notification error on Sony's part.

 

After having my 14" i7 flip for about 1.5-2 months, I'm finding that the fan is running more often. I'm assuming that all the programs I've loaded are now taxing the CPU more and causing the fan to run since it's apparently tied to CPU speed. The problem is, the fan will start up when the computer is barely even warm and will not shut up for long periods of time. Doesn't help that the fan is naturally louder than most other laptops.

I've done all the updates and things like I was supposed to when I first got it and I've been pretty satisfied with noise, but is this going to be a problem in the future as the CPU takes on higher loads from more demanding apps?

 

anyone here ordered this uk model or the equiv model spec in your country?

Buy Sony Vaio Fit 15A multi-flip Convertible Laptop, Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 1TB + 16GB Flash, 15.5" Touch Screen, Black online at John Lewis

mpn SVF15N2A4EB.CEK

would like to hear your thoughts if you have this one

 

U.S. here. I have this exact same build other than the hard drive (I have an SSD instead of the hybrid).
I'm quite happy with it. I haven't had any fan problems and I use it as my daily machine (software developer).
That price seems a little high vs. what I paid a few months back, $1400 USD. (I added a 2 year warranty and it was about $1600 USD total)

 

good stuff! i'm also looking for a daily work machine (so to hear you use yours as your daily is positive news ) that i can also use as tablet. rather than get another laptop and a separate tablet. work/play split will be about 70/30. downside is prices are high here in the uk but has always been that way so we are used to it . when looking at the sony usa site i think this is the same model you have?

VAIO Fit 15A | Flip PC - All VAIO Flip Sony Store - Sony US

the retailer here, john lewis, are very competitive on price and also throw in the '3 Year Guarantee included at no extra cost' which is worth something in itself.

do you regret not getting a more powerful i7? or regret anything else about your purchase? i'll not be using it for gaming.

 

I got mine a few months back when there was such a thing as a configurator and you could do a custom build. I got the i5, 8gigs of RAM and a 256 gig SSD plus a pen at 1920 res.
I've not regretted getting the i5 at all, it's been plenty speedy. It's not really a good tablet replacement if you're expecting traditional tablet functionality (I wasn't), like something to hold in one hand and read on. You'd break your wrist if you tried to do that with this machine. But if you put it on a table or your lap it works fine (as the biggest tablet ever), just keep in mind it will weigh 5 pounds.

My only complaint really is the keyboard, it's a bit spongy for my liking, especially in the center. But I type all day long (coder) so I probably notice it more than most people and I'm told I'll get used to it so there's that.
Other than that I really like it.

 

Mine developed this problem AFTER I had sent it back to Sony to get the fan checked out. As far as I remember it's only happened in Silence mode - which I've largely stopped using (have used it a couple of times without problem - ironically one time when I would have expected a problem as I was expecting watching a film to be an issue... perhaps running off battery helped?). Shame to have to resort to this measure. Sony said I should send it back to them again, but I pointed out that I was not confident that they would fix the problem since they had seemingly created it. I had hoped there would be a new BIOS update as this had been discussed here some weeks ago, but as yet no additional update is showing on the UK site (I think the Canadian site was mentioned as having one, from memory).

 

Do all of you run on the 250/260 BIOS?
My 15A came with R1100DD, but that is perhaps only for the refreshed model?
The Chinese Sony site has references to an R1120DD version as well (not adventurous enough to try that out : ).

Edit: I see the European site has R1120DD available as well now.

 

Hi there KjetilV,

I don't get it. On the canadian support site, for my 1st gen 14A, they have 250 now. for W8 and W8.1. I think they had 260 a while ago, but I'm still running 230.

Looking at the France Sony support site just now : they have no BIOS offerings for W8, and they now have R1100DD and R1120DD for W8.1
That makes no sense to offer two, with no explanation. I do get that those like me with older Flips should stick with R02#0 BIOS, because it appears that R11#0 are only good with W8.1 (older Flips if restored to factory settings fall back to W8, so we need a W8 compatible BIOS just in case).

What's the deal with 260 ? If it is flawed, it would be nice to read about it somewhere...

 

I just chatted with Sony and complained that VAIO update is wanting to me to apply the 250 over the 260 bios. This is what they said and it worked for me, no more prompt in VAIO update:


"In Order to resolve this issue, I would suggest you to follow the steps below
Press windows key and R
In the Run windows type the below line
C:\ProgramData\Sony Corporation\VAIO Update
and Hit enter
Select all the files and Delete the entire folder
Launch VAIO Update and Let me know the status
It was a conflict with Vaio update software, The issue should no longer persist from now"

Their online chat seems helpful if you are having bios questions.

 

A few things don't add up.

If 260 is the viable one, why are they offering 250 only on the canadian site and possibly elsewhere ? This isn't via VAIO Update, it's on the main support site. I did read about clearing the VAIO Update cache in another thread (same as you did there), but this solves the updater glitch, it doesn't explain why 250 is still out there in the wild.

I chatted why a Sony rep about BIOS offerings a few weeks ago (transcript copy/pasted in this thread, back quite a few pages..). At that time, there was total confusion on whether to use 240 or 250 ; one had been issued for W8 only adn caused issues for W8.1 upgrades. Anyway, I don't remember which was which but the rep did say that 230 was the more reliable version at that time. And then 260 came out and I thought this one would solve all the 240/250 misfires. Now 250 is up on support sites and we have a new series of BIOS offerings in different countries (R11#0).

Yeah, I'm confused, and sticking with 230 for now.

 

How can I enter the bios of my flip, I tried several function keys during startup. And how can I recover my laptop ? Sorry for all the questions


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