Official VAIO FW Series Owners Thread

@Tetoonworlf,

Basic idea is these programs freeze your system drive so all changes are discarded at bootup or optionally kept if using Shadow Defender. I do not run any antivirus programs for my machine using Shadow Defender and I have The Bat! as my email program which is very secure. But I would not recommend anyone get rid of their antivirus on my input here but this so far has worked well for several months. Will have Windows firewall enabled though.

Gary

 

Does Sony planning on releasing a newer model with the HD3650 by the end of this year? (and possibly some other improvements...)

 

The FW-190EEH I received today has the wrong hard drive in it. It's a 250gb 5400rpm (Fujitsu MHY2250BH) instead of a 200gb 7200rpm (which is listed on Sony's site). Sony admits that there must have been an error somewhere, possibly in marketing.

By the way, I spoke with Newegg, and they were great. Issued a return # within a couple of minutes. No problem.

Sony on the other hand has been a major pain to deal with. I'm too exhausted from dealing with them to go into the details.

Bottom line is I can send the unit to Sony to have the hard drive replaced, or return it to Newegg.

I'm not a happy camper right now.

 

Does anyone know whether or not Sony is planning on releasing a newer model with the HD3650 by the end of this year?

 

low chance of that, maybe next as a special model. they did that once with the FZ and AR in the US(upgraded the GPU and something).

 

soundsgood...best of luck with that. Newegg might be faster than sonystyle, but you run the risk of getting another comp with the 250GB harddrive.

 

Thanks. And exactly what I'm thinking too. Easier to just return it and re-buy... but it sounds like they might all have the 250/5400 drives.

 

well you cant really return it, either it goes to a nearby sony approved workshop and returns in about a week, or you send it to newegg for a swap, in which case hopefully its not a batch issue.

Sony guys did realize that this is the wrong drive on the model right? or were they trying to tell you the specs for the model was wrong and it was supposed to be a 250GB HD @5400?

 

Yay! Just got my new FW this afternoon. Been waiting anxiously ever since they said it shipped last Thursday!! It's been a long wait.

I'm dead chuffed with it. Really love the hi-color widescreen and it's going to be awesome for doing graphic design. The keyboard is great, has a nice feel to it. The touchpad seems fine, however, I'll be mostly using a mouse. Doesn't seem to be a lot of the bloatware and I'll probably keep most of the vaio software.

This is my first laptop (although I've got 3 desktops in the house that I've built, my husband thinks that's excessive ... really? ).

Anyways, I'm going to start loading my software and see how it really performs. I'm so excited!! So cool.


nic

 

Actually, Newegg is allowing me to return it if I wish to, due to Sony's mistake. Again, Newegg has been great... it's Sony that has been a problem.

The Sony guys are confused. Very confused. I spoke with 3 different guys. Two in the Philippines and one in San Diego. For about an hour an a half all together. Basically, they don't know. The guys in the Philippines were totally clueless (huge waste of time). The guy in San Diego admitted that the website says 7200 rpm, but doesn't know what is really *supposed* to be in there (aka: the marketing info might be incorrect).

I can send it in to Sony for a hard drive replacement... I'm just not sure if it's worth it. I'd hate to go through the hassle then find out they gave me some cheap crappy 7200 rpm drive.

What would you guys do? Any suggestions?

 

given the harddrive you have now, even the crappy 7200 would perform a bit better.

I'd say figure if you wanna wait the couple of days its gonna take to get the work done.

 

it seems that they dont coordinate with other departments at all. come to think about it, when i opened up my FW to upgrade the RAM it had 2 1GB sticks instead of 1 2GB stick as advertised on sonystyle.ca *shrugs*

 

dave, how is the wifi? good reception?

 

excellent so far, in saying that i've only used it around the house so far, but my router is upstairs and i've used it in the basement (2 floors down) and i've been getting full bars, and the speed is a little bit weaker than my Ethernet but i'm not loosing sleep over it

 

yea wifi has been outstanding for me too. though i generally switch to ethernet when i'm downloading large files.

 

hey guys, just got my fw140D (with an atheros card) yesterday and realized htat downgrading to xp is impsosible so i decided to go with vista64 business.



Download all drivers from here,

http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/swu-list.pl?mdl=VGNFW170JW&region_id=1

following this you will not have the wireless card and another unknown device.
I decide to call sony and ask for the 64bit atheros driver... they say they dont support 64bit for this model... goodie.... so i'm like at least give me the name of my atheros card so i can go google.
"Sorry sir we do not have that information at this time, since it is a new machine we still don't have all the updates. We even talked to our highest techinical support and they could not tell us the answer" "We sometimes use "marval atheros ".. goodie

long story short windows update and these few links will cover all the drivers except for a unknown device which i can't figure out.

download the atheros driver from here (v7.6.0.154 / v7.6.0.239)
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=14833

cheers

 

thanks for your contribution bobo99.

 

Could any new FW owners verify any "high frequency noise" in a quiet room when the cpu is fully load?
Please make sure performance mode set to maximum instead of "battery optimize mode". Just want to verify whether FW is using those left over cheap FZ's fans.

Has any new owner received their FW with XP?
Does Sony let customers buy FW with XP downgrade option?

If Sony reuses the parts from returned notbooks, then Sony is no longer Sony. Sony should sell those returned notebooks at Sony refurbished department.

Is there any different to use external Blueray player through USB instead of internal Blueray player?

Thank you.

 

well im gonna try to answer your questions:
1. No XP downgrade is not an option. You are on your own there.
2. Old laptops get refurbished and sold at a lower price at the outlet.

It is a very quite machine as a bunch of us have confirmed.

 

It certainly seems worth it to get the 200GB 7200. Although the 250GB is not a bad performer. Benchmarks.
( And I send you some suggestions in PM)

 

Thanks for the suggestions, Phil, but no go. I had already tried. The only option with Newegg is to return the unit. And Sony flat-out will not send out a new hard drive. Period. The laptop must be sent to them.

I'm supposed to get a call back from a supervisor. I'll see what they say, if they really call.

By the way, the label on the side of the laptop box says 250 GB. This means that everyone that orders the FW190EEH will have the exact same problem that I am having.

 

Well SoundsGood we're talking about a $20-30 difference here. Maybe it's not worth the trouble.

The performance of that 250GB/5400 is ok. If you would replace with a 3200BEKT you would see some improvement but nothing spectacular.

It may be better to wait for upcoming SSDs (Intel, OCZ Core V2/V3) or the Seagate 7200.4 500GB.

 

I just tried removing all the stickers from my FW and the stupid 1080p sticker wouldn't come off cleanly and left residue. Any suggestions on how to remove it without damaging the finish?

 

High frequency noice is caused by either the screen pulsation frequency or CPU trottleing/load and has nothing to do with the fan. Yes if i put my ear to the keyboard ican hear a frequency noise when in balanced mode while idling. for the rest i dont hear any.

 

try Goo Gone.

 

I would try parcel tape first (that brown plastic stuff). Just stick it over the residue and remove it immediately. If necessary, repeat a few times and with luck the sticky stuff will end up attached to the parcel tape and not your laptop.

If that fails, you could try 50% isopropyl alcohol (available from most chemists). That works to disolve most label glue without being so strong that it risks damaging paints and plastics etc.

Let us know if you manage it OK because I'll most likely be doing to same thing with my laptop when it arrives.

EDIT: To be honest, I don't mind all the Centrino 2 labels etc. It's just the "True 1080p" label that I'd *have* to remove... just because it feels like a lie. I mean, of course you can output 1080p via HDMI but the label seems to imply the display is capable of it. I wouldn't like that smelly marketing bull5h!t under my nose for too long or it would start to bother me.

 

I had the exact same problem with my clean install of Vista Ultimate 64-bit and it turned out to be the camera. Although I've installed the drivers, it was when I installed the ArcSoft WebCam Companion 2 software that it recognised it.

Btw, which bluetooth drivers did you install? I've got two Bluetooth Peripheral Devices that I can't get the right drivers for.

 

Well, it was a $50 difference when I bought the unit... but I know what you mean.

Oh, seriously? I didn't know that. Thanks.

Yeah, good point.

I'll wait to see what the upper level Sony guy says (if I get the call). But after sleeping on it, I think I'll probably just keep it. I don't really wanna ship it across the country to get worked on. You never know what might get damaged during shipping -- or at the repair center, for that matter.

 

Thank you very much for the people who have answered my questions of "high frequency noise" and XP.

When FW just released, I did call SonyStyle. The saleman on the phone said that customers can buy the XP as downgrade option.

The reason that I keep requesting people verify any noise from FW because I used to own FZ a month ago. But it has returned due to VGA port no signal, heat near palm rest and "high frequency" noise. After Sony received the notebook, they verified it is the fact, so they did give full refund plus round trip shipping Fedex fee.

I went to local stores like Bestbuy, CircuitCity and MicroCenter and so on. Most tech people told me that Sony and HP both have those "high frequency" noise. HP is much louder. Sony can hear in library or quiet office.
They suggested to wait for Centrino2 because Sony may redesign the notebook inside out. They also said that a lot of customers hear those noise, but just ignore it because they do not use the notebook more than 8 hours daily in library or quiet office.

The volume of those high frequency noise is from high to zero, then zero back to high volume. If the volume were stayed flat, it could be ignored easily. The FZ is using NVIDIA 8400M GT and T9300 (2.5GHz) and 7200rpm disk.
Someone suggested to use Intel integrate GPU and "P" series CPU with 5400rpm disk to make the notebook as cool as possible in order to avoid the fan running offen.
Cannot use battery saving mode, the notebook is bought for it maximum performance, especially library and office can use cable instead of battery.

I do want to buy Sony notebook, but need to fix the noise first. I have Sony notebook since Pentium II which is very loud, but it is "constant volume low frequency noise" which is reasonable, so I bought it. Do know most computers has noise, but that "on/off/on/off" high frequency noise is too much for 8 hour daily.

It take too much time and effort to order FW and finally may need to return it through FedEx even full refund.

Someone mention that the blades of Lenovo's fan is designed by using the theory of the wings of birds. It is super quiet. But Sony display is the best. Sony notebooks is for multimedia, why Sony don't spend more money to make their mutlimedia type notebook super quiet in addition to super good display, so customers can watch the movies without noise.

Thank you again for people who do the noise verification.
(If I were FW owner, I would immediately verify any noise in quiet room within 7 days, so it will be sure that the FW will not get louder and louder after few months past refund time frame!)

 

i didn't install the bluetooth drivers :S my vista64 business picked them up after the fresh install. My webcam is installed as well after using "arcsoft WEbcam" but I still have an unknown device. When I unplugged the FW this morning, it booted in and told me that I dont have the proper driver for my battery and that i should put my laptop in hibernate mode in order to preserve system performance, is this possible ?

EDIT
The battery thing was an issue with sony's ISB battery check tool, removed that which is ok. Last thing was the mousepad driver.

64 Bit vista installed without any missing devices. Sweet

 

Undervolting your CPU could reduce fan noise too, because the fan wouldn't need to work so hard.

 

Unless you call booting Vista 3 seconds faster spectacular

 

Ahhh... I see. In that case, no big deal. I'm usually opening the blinds around the house during boot-up anyway.

I'll still not thrilled with the fact that Sony made this blunder. Advertising a decent hard drive then providing an inferior one it is not good.

And I'm very unhappy with Sony's customer service in the Philippines. I know that people complain about Dell, but trust me -- this was worse.

 

Thanks for the advice about sony's live chat, really appreciate it
But since I was really anxious to get back at the best calibration possible,
I simply went at the best buy where I bought it, chose my victim ( the fw on display) and wrote each of the configuration of the ati catalyst control on a paper and it worked.

As for the palm rest question, it's quite simple, it's not hot.
Just yesterday, I worked 3 hours and no problem. Maybe for some sensitive type but really....not hot.

As I do not have an external LCD, I can not verify it at the time being but I'll try to...at some point.

 

Could anybody try it on gears of war?
And thanks again for the info.

 

Soundsgood:

Other than the hard drive issue, how do you like the hi-color screen and the FW as a whole? I am trying to decide between the new egg FW you have and the HP dv5t?

 

Hey guys, here's the HD Tune info:

FUJITSU MHY2250BH Benchmark

Transfer Rate Minimum : 1.8 MB/sec
Transfer Rate Maximum : 51.9 MB/sec
Transfer Rate Average : 36.0 MB/sec
Access Time : 26.5 ms
Burst Rate : 55.7 MB/sec
CPU Usage : 15.2%

 

Super_1919,

Thank you for the replied. SonyStyle Live chat is better than phone call because at the end of the chat, there is a popup windows asking for your feedback and rating of services without asking your name and address. All the chat messages is logged too, so the Sony employees will provide a "non-rush/polite/detail/reasonable" answers when doing chat. I think that Sony has software to monitors the feedback rating. When there is a bad feedback rating, they will pull out the "chat message log" to verify whether the Sony employee is o.k. or not for continue employment! Just like those Japanese robotic animation. It is the way to optimize the service using the power of computer! Dell may don't know that otherwise Dell service will not be rated......

Please post any info about your new FW when available.

Thank you very much.

 

The screen is amazing. Even my wife called it "impressive", and she couldn't care less about this kind of stuff.

Hard to give too much of an overall impression yet, since I've only actually used it for a few minutes, literally. Still haven't installed anything except for HD Tune and Firefox.

But so far I like it a lot. Was there something in particular you wanted to know about?

 

Either they've sold you the worst hard drive ever, or your lappie was doing some other stuff at the same time. I'm guessing the latter
How to improve score: Try terminating as many processes as possible using ctrl-alt-del. Turn of virusscanner, wifi, firewalls etc. and do not do anything while HD Tune is running. and don't move

 

My biggest concern is the screen, heat/fan and buying from New Egg. I went to Best Buy and tried the FW with the ECO screen and I thought the screen was too dim.

I have bought from New Egg before and had a great experience. I have never bought a laptop from them and am concerned if I have an issue such as dead pixels, I might be stuck (no pun intended).

Also, did your FW come fully packaged and sealed, etc.? Thanks.

 

Thank you for the suggestion of undervoltage the cpu for less fan activation. It is smart, much better than turn on the battery saving mode.

But the notebook will be used for calculating ton of business data, so I would rather not touch the Intel spec of the CPU. At the timeframe of using 56K modem, someone just increased the PCI bus of desktop PC from 33MHz to 37MHz, some data is transfered incorrectly when doing 1 hour downloading! May be the data file did not has checksum. Except for pure gaming desktop PC, prefer running the computer following the Intel spec.

May be that is why people keep saying notebook for business is boring.

Thank you for the reply and suggestion.

 

I respect your opinion but this assumption is made by many people, and incorrectly in my opinion. Undervolting is completely different than overclocking. While overclocking is going over the specifications, undervolting goes under it. If anything, it prolonges the life of the CPU, notebook and battery. It will either work or not, but it will have absolutely no influence on calculations.

It's 100% safe, RMclock will not even let you go over the Intel specification.

 

Let's try it again...

HD Tune: FUJITSU MHY2250BH Benchmark

Transfer Rate Minimum : 10.5 MB/sec
Transfer Rate Maximum : 51.9 MB/sec
Transfer Rate Average : 40.7 MB/sec
Access Time : 18.5 ms
Burst Rate : 67.4 MB/sec
CPU Usage : 4.2%



Any better?

 

Lot better as you can see you knocked of 30% of your acces time. But there's still a downward spike indicating Vista background processes. Could be anything. Anyway, it's not that important.

 

Oh well. It is what it is, I guess.

 

I have no dead pixels (bought from Newegg).

 

Well, I'm not seeing any heat or fan issues. The palmrest is a bit warmer than my D420, but then again it's a LOT more powerful. I certainly would not call it hot. As far as the fan goes, the only time I heard it was when I was creating the recovery DVDs. Right now I don't hear it at all.

Yes, the Eco screen was not good for me either. The HiColor screen is MUCH better in my opinion. It would be hard to use another laptop's screen now. In fact it's so bright that I think I may turn it down (for the other HiColor folks, what brightness level are you at?)

Newegg was great. Shipped the same day I ordered (can't beat that) and got here 3 business days later, as promised. When I spoke with them about the hard drive problem I thought they'd tell me "Sorry, no returns, period." But nope... they issued me a return authorization number without hesitation, for a full refund.

Yep, the FW came fully packaged and sealed. The Vaio box was inside a nicely stuffed larger box, and the unit is absoloutely brand spankin' new. The build date (on the bottom) is 8/08. The box was a bit crushed (dented?) but the laptop is fine, so no big deal.

I'm not too thrilled with Vista so far. It keeps asking my permission to do things, again and again and again.... Is there any way to turn that off? Very annoying.

Anyway, hope this helps.

 

Try this:

http://www.petri.co.il/disable_uac_in_windows_vista.htm

 

Ahhh.... thanks!