Official VAIO E Series Owners Thread

My VPCEB3X5E has been dispached!

Some people posted about the issue. I have you got the latest ATI drivers? https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/920...e/10-12_mobility_vista_win7_64_dd_ccc_ocl.exe
Install it over the current ones and restart

 

Interesting choice of words. Dispatched from the shipper, or by you with a hammer?

 

Dispatched from shipper, got a tracking number

 

This is caused by the VAIO Control Center. To solve the problem just go to

VAIO Control Center > Display > and select "Do not apply color mode".

Then go to ATI CCC (Advance) > Graphics > Display Properties > Color > and click on "Reactivate ATI color controls"

Your done! You should see the original screen colors now.

 

i wanted to purchase the sony eb, but i noticed the 1080p display option is gone. I think without the 1080p display, its a dealbreaker for me. Anyone have the standard 1366x768 display for the sony eb?

I'm in the US btw

 

Aether, if I were you, it would be a dealbreaker for me too.

There were so many machines I passed up b/c of no screen options. They all had the lower res screens or came with a NVidia card that I do not want.

 

Could anyone please recommend me some laptop sleeves (for the 15") with good impact protection? thanks

P.S. Merry Christmas to all

 

I use Impact Wrap Sleeve, has been thrown around helicopter and plane holds the last year and not a scratch.

 

Anyone know if the mobo is compatible with quad i7's? VPCEC currently with an i5.

 

I got one iridescent blue model today. It is sweet.

 

Hi,

I am in the UK and am looking at buying a Sony Vaio E 15 and have a few questions about it before I purchase it.

1) I am quite a fanboy when it comes to looks, I have noticed that when customizing the laptop, there are a few different colour options available, I am most interested in 'Black' (not 'glossy black') however I was wondering what type of black this is? Is it Matte black?

2) What are the overall looks of the laptop, does it look good in general?

3) Main problems that go wrong with it?

5) Does this seem like a good deal for £769 (w/o shipping)?

* Intel® CoreTM i5-460M, 2.53GHz
* Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit
* 320 GB Serial ATA (7200 rpm)
* 4 GB 1066MHz DDR3-SDRAM
* Blu-ray Disc(TM) player
* 39.4 cm LCD, 1920x1080, webcam
* ATI MobilityRadeon HD5650 1GB
* Wi-Fi
* Bluetooth

Would be greatly appreciated if someone could answer these questions and if they do have the laptop in the 'black' colour, could they please take some pictures if possible?

Thanks in advance!

 

I am in the US.

I was going to buy the EB390X CTO, but couldn't find the option to change the display.

So I called them to see how to get a 1080 res display, and they told me that they are running out of the them so the 768 res display is the only option. ><

I will have to wait now...

 

Yeah it looks like they've been out of the 1080 screens for a couple of weeks now. You could always go to the 17.3" EC390X since it is still available with the 1080

 

17.3" is too big for me, since I will carry it around.

EB series is the best one I could find that fits my needs.

So, waiting is the only thing I can do.

 

Very true. It really isn't as bad as many think. When someone thinks 17.3", they imagine big, clunky. In actuality, it is very thin and light. It is very manageable to haul around. Still, the length may intimidate most (16" across but just 10" wide).

I guess you'll have to play the wait game for the EB though

 

Does anyone else have a problem with the trackpad on the eb series? Mine is often very jerky and occasionally freezes up for minutes at a time. Possibly a hardware issue I guess, but generally it works ok.

 

The "black" option in the UK is a lovely matte black. It looks great. I haven't had anything go wrong with mine yet.

 

Hello,

I bought a 14" laptop -VPCEA1S1E- in June and since then I am having more and more problems. Since the very 1st day the laptop, sometimes, appears with a black screen when open the lid. Now, even if I don't close it, it becomes black (frozen) and I need to reset it. The lid is very, very weak; Right now I'm typing sitting on my bed and while typing it, the lid is falling all the time. I think the screen is too heavy for a very weak joints. Apart from that I have no complaints, but it's enough for me to regret about my purchase, unfortunately
Anyone had the same problems? Did Sony do something in order to fix these things? I need to call myself, but I'm abroad at the moment, so I would love if anyone could reply to me.

Thanks in advance and kind regards.

 

Anyone knows how to remove the keys of eb16fg to clean the dust under them ?

 

Hello forum members!
Can anyone provide me with a bios backup (dump) of this model VPCEB290x? as my laptop is dead due to bad bios update. I have an eprom chip programmer but the files provided from sony website are no good. Please. my only hope is to write the file from a working unit. Thanks!

 

Hi!
if you are good with tools yo can try to open it and tighten the hinge with a small wrench
For the screen you may check the signal connectors between the motherboard and the screen I m guessing the two problems are related since the signal cable for the video goes trough those hinges. If the connection is good you may also try a different video driver from ati assuming that you have a amd board.

my guess it is better to send it under warranty as it may also be a hardware problem, fan problem, bios problem ..hope this can help you

 

Hey guys I just got my Vaio a few days back:

Sony Vaio (White)
Intel i7 640M
17.3" 1080 LCD
6 GB DDR3
500 GB 7200 RPM SATA
Blu Ray Writer
1GB ATI Mobility HD 5650

It's awesome, but I have two things bothering me:

1. The screen has a very small viewing angle.. does other Vaio models have similar issues with the screen?
2. Does anyone know how do I connect my 5.1 Speaker System with my Vaio? I don't see any 6 channel outputs on my laptop, and my Speaker System (LG) does not haev HDMI output

Any ideas fellas?

 

Must say the the "Iridescent Blue" is stunning as well. I was worrried it might be too loud or obnoxious, or that - like candy - it would taste good at first but get old very quick. Not the case - if any one is on the fence about this color, I was, too, but no regrets after living with it a month.

 

Does anyone know how the USB ports are assigned? I would like to configure just one of my ports not to power down to save energy, but when I look through at the USB Controllers in device manager, I see 2 Generic USB Hubs and 1 USB Composite device. The generic hubs are Port 1, Hubs 1 and 2 respectively down the list, and the USB composite device is Port 2, Hub 3. The actual physical ports, of course, are on the right side of the case. Is there a way to tell which USB port/hub goes to which physical USB connector on the laptop?

 

Hey friend, I have the same model. It is very true that the screen has a tiny viewing angle, vertically. Not too bad side-to-side.

About multichannel output, there really is no other way other than through the HDMI. But, you could look into buying a Soundblaster external soundcard or X-FI express card (I believe that one has multi-ch out through optical as well). I plan on buying the express card in the future.

 

anyone ? Please

 

Hi there.. thanks for teh reply..

I am kind of not so happy with the screen... i also have a HP Elitebook... smaller screen but same resolution.. but i must say it makes the vaio screen look way inferior.. even in the vertical plane, the viewing angle is pretty wide there..

 

worked great, thanks

 

I was wondering about the mouse driver aswell because it doesnt have the multitouch scrolling feature like you get on the macs
can you get this in the vaio's?

 

Hi - I have the same 17.3 model and agree that the viewing angle is not great - however having it for a few months now I have got used it and it dosent bother me as much.

Another tip is that if you have the screen tilted slightly more to the back the vertical angle does improve.

It's not a major issue and over time you won't even notice it!

 

This may be a dumb question, but I recently followed VAIO Care and ended up linking over to file downloads available for my model (VPCEB390X). The link was at esupport dot sony dot com. It prompted me for my VAIO's windows version (Pro 64) and - voila - a ton of up-to-date drivers appeared for download.

The missing item, however, was a scan of my drive that would tell me if I indeed had these up-to-date drivers already installed. One thing I really liked about my old ThinkPad was that available drivers were automatically compared to the installed drivers via the TP software. If Sony doesn't offer this type of system scanner, then I may be hopelessly spoiled.

Is there a way to see if I need to update these drivers without slogging through the Device Manager, etc?

 

I got myself a vaio vpc-eb36fg/l

It has been a satisfying purchase although the speakers are its weak point. However, the Full HD screen and the 1 GB 5650 more than makes up for it. I had some trouble with detecting my track-pad detected while installing Ubuntu 10.10 but appropriate drivers ( fetched with aid of a USB mouse ) solved the problem.

I have seen reviews quoting as the track-pad being "terrible". I always use the track-pad and I am pretty comfortable with it.

The laptop does not suffer from heating problems unlike most Dells and is quite light weight. However the battery backup isn't that pleasing. You can't expect more than 2 hrs if even reading an ebook with no wireless on and no songs playing.


config -

i3-370M Processor 2.40 GHz
Windows 7 Home Premium ( 64-bit )
Hard Disk Drive 500 GB
RAM 4 GB DDR3
ATI mobility Radeon 5650 1 GB
1920 X 1080 screen

 

Hi - new on this forum.

Getting my first Vaio today
I ordered the EA2S1E CI3 2.26 4GB/500 14" W7HP BLACK with 1600x900 resolution.

Had my eye on the EB2S1E 15,5 because it had the matte black finish - and was cheaper then the 14 inch serie. But a few days ago, the EA was on sale here in Denmark, and I like the higher resolution display. So I will have to live with the glossy black finish.

My first PC - had a Macbook Pro before but it was stolen- so looking forward getting this machine

 

I'm trying to follow this procedure but cannot find the vaiorecv.exe anywhere

 

Just received a VPCEA3X5E. This is a 14" configurable machine with

• i7-640
• 1600x900 LCD
• 320 GB 7200 U/Min
• 6 GB SDRAM
• Blu-ray Writer
• white

Specs and price look perfect. But I'm totally disappointed and after 1 hour of getting to know the machine, I already requested a refund and will send the machine back.

The main reason is the very bad display. It is the worst I've ever seen in any of my recent laptops (Dell, lenovo, Asus) for a number of reasons:

• Colours look very pale and boring
• Image looks like as if you were looking through a tiny mesh, i.e. you can see the individual LCD elements and their separation. Totally annoying!
• Viewing angle is very bad. You cannot look at the screen together with someone else, because colour already start to invert.
• If you look at the screen alone, colours at the top are different from colours at the bottom. Useless for image work.
• Screen lighting is very inhomogenous. There are a number of distinct light sources around the panel and if you have a dark background you can see where they are by black being not black at all.
• That also means contrast varies across the screen and is nothing to write home about.

Not sure if I got a "lemon" but if that is the standard Sony display, then I wonder who buys this stuff. I've seen the exceptional display of the Z-series before and was expecting at least something a little bit close. But this is rather the other end of the spectrum. Looks like the colour display of my stone-age old Nokia mobile phone.

This was the first time I bought a Vaio and I've been searching very long for a strong machine with good looks. Alternatives were

• the new Dell XPS15 (but I found that they discontinued the full HD display and the thing is very heavy)
• the HP Envy (but they also discontinued the good display)
• Apple (far too expensive for what it is).

So in a way this is sad because the specs of the Vaio are really great, the machine is light, doesn't feature a (in my humble opinion useless) number keyboard, comes with an affordable Blu-ray writer and has a nice form factor with 14".

I guess, my search will now restart once more. Just wanted to warn you guys.

 

Something sounds really off. I have the EB but the HD screen is simply amazing - very crisp, vibrant and a lot of fun to look at. One thing you did not mention was the video card driving the screen. I would be looking t that - maybe it's a generic card (can't imagine Sony would not pair off a good screen with an appropriately performing card, however). Also check the screen and card settings. If I were to put money on this, I'd say it was a simple configuration/setting issue.

Is Sony helpful at all with this?

If you do consider other pc's, have you looked at the ThinkPads? They are generally quite awesome, but not as sexy as the VAIO.

 

Well, this is an EA and not a Full HD screen but something in-between at 1600x900. The graphics card is a ATI MobilityRadeon HD5650 1GB.

I checked the settings and everything seems normal: 32bit color depth and native resolution at 1600x900.

In any case, I've never seen a setting eliminating the mesh-like appearance of pixels. In good screens you don't see them (or only with a magnifying glass), in bad screens they pop out. With the Vaio, they stand in your face.

Well, I got the machine today, tested it and was so disappointed that I already requested a return without spending time on the hotline trying to fix a bad display.

Yes, I looked at ThinkPads. Actually, I think they're even more sexy than the Vaio. The white plastic of my machine looks really cheap. No comparison to the matt, dark, black of lenovo. And by far no comparison to the aluminium bodies of Apple. I was rather putting up with that because of the great specs and the great price.

The downside of ThinkPads are their price and the lack of a proper online configuration shop. Sony and Dell lead the way there. But that's off-topic here.

I also looked at HP Envy, but they discontinued their once great display, so that's not an option either. Now it looks like I'll get the new Dell XPS 15. Unfortunately, that doesn't have a Blu-ray writer like the Vaio.

 

hello guys I'm new to this computer thing. My girlfriend bought me a sony vaio EB series for Christmas with the follow specs:

-intel core i5
-4g ram
-500gb memory
-ATI radeon premium graphics (HD 5470)

^ from what I understand this is not the 1080p graphics right? and my question is: is there a way to upgrade it to the HD5650? if so, how? or how much does it cost?


btw the only downside for this laptop is the sound quality :/ i mean I had an HP DV5 series before this one and the sound was 10x better... is there a way to improve this or do I have to plug my headphones all the time ?

 

1080p isn't the graphics, it's the resolution of the screen. Right click your desktop, select "screen resolution" - see what resolution you can set there. Regarding the 5650 - no, it isn't possible to upgrade I'm afraid, the GPU is soldered onto the motherboard.

Re: sound, the speakers aren't all that good but you can improve them a little by doing this:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/6672008-post1894.html

 

Started having a weird problem:

Whenever I use my E series for gaming (ati 5650), a few hours later, the cursor starts being 'strange' - instead of the cursor showing, I see 8 or so triangles (like the very top of the cursor) arranged in a vertical line. This seems to fix itself randomly after a while, and is also fixed by a reboot.

Was going to try and take a picture of it just now when it miraculously fixed itself.

A quick google of this problems turns up with threads saying that this is a sign of a faulty GPU.. should I be worried? I mean, I can live with a dodgy cursor, but not if my GPU is going to pack up completely after the warranty expires.

Peter

 

1366x768

no upgrade then

and thanks for the link

 

You could probably upgrade the screen if you really wanted to, AFAIK it would void the warranty though.

 

Hey guys. I'm looking to get the EB series as well. Here's the customization I'm going with.

• Intel® Core™ i5-460M processor (2.53GHz) with Turbo Boost up to 2.80GHz
• Genuine Windows® 7 Professional 64-bit
• Blue
• 500GB Hard Disk Drive (7200rpm)
• 4GB (2GBx2) DDR3-SDRAM-1066
• ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 5650 GPU (1GB VRAM)
• CD/DVD Player / Burner
• Fresh Start

I want a bigger screen resolution though on a 15.5" laptop. Does Sony NOT offer this in the US?

 

I'm afraid not right now, I have contacted Sony for the same issue, and they told me that the 1080 screen is currently out of stock. They also told me that they do not know when it will be back in stock...

 

I just ordered one of these for my Vaio, was umming and aaring about a hard drive upgrade for ages, so will buy a 7200rpm 750GB disk to replace the 500gb disk in it, put the 500 in the caddy until I again need more storage.

That should yeild a nice performance increase and more desparately needed space! Why not get a 1TB disk and put it in the caddy you ask? Price mainly.

 

Let me know how it goes, I've been considering it myself...

Are you going to hotswap between the caddy and your OOD?

 

I agree. However,combining both the old R222 driver along with Catalyst 10.12 removes it entirely.

 

Those of you who have wiped your E-Series/installed a new HD/SSD, what does your GFX chip register as in Device Manager, Crapcleaner, etc, programs that display your system spec.

Using 10.12, mine shows as 'ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5600/5700 Series' rather than as a 5650. Is this correct/wrong/worth worrying about?

 

It will display at 5600/5700 series for everyone unless you use the sony branded drivers, this is simply because the 5650 and 57xx mobile chips are exactly the same, the 57xx series are simply higher clocked batches.

 

Ah ok, ta for that .