Official VAIO FW Series Owners Thread

What if I simply remove all the other bloat ware except for WinDVD? Will this slow down or speed up the computer?

 

I just got a FW490 CTO and was wondering if we'll be able to do a clean install of Windows 7 when we receive the disc?

As for my experience so far with my new FW490, no problems and I'm enjoying it.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5041480&postcount=41
Apparently so. The CD itself isn't bootable however.

 

Okay, thanks.

I'll assume that on the disc with the drivers/apps, that I'll get Windows 7-compatible versions/updates for Office 2007, Norton Internet Security 2009 & WinDVD?

 

@ dampfnudel: when did you order? where do you live?

@ chiggerfruit: what's your order status? still processing?

Mine still no update ever since they shipped out from the warehouse, estimated arrival 8/12...

 

Ordered on 7/14, shipped from San Diego on 7/20, delivered here in New York City on 07/24 by FedEx.

 

No update on my FedEx tracking since it left on Friday night either, but I wouldn't be worried about it, Midtown. Mine's supposed to be here on Thursday.

 

Midtown, I think it has to do with the FedEx Sight. I orderd something online a while ago and was shipped Fedex and it arrived before It updated online for me.

 

Sorry for the change of subject, but look what I just found while moseying around Sony's b2b business site: a page for unlocked drivers which Sony provides for business models (and the FW is a business model) for use at our own risk http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/select-system.pl?PRODTYPE=1,24,72&DIRECTOR=DRIVER&TC=b2b

I think that this might be useful to many on the forum for many different reasons. I know I have read several postings in the past complaining about locked drivers. And yes, there are drivers there for XP. I suggest that one not use the auto-detect but simply choose the model on the drop-down menus.

Good luck!

 

The FedEx site? I know it's Home Delivery. I have never used that service before. I'm thinking maybe there are no stops yet, since it's coming from San Diego to my place in Florida. But I guess I'll be prepared.

I'm also still waiting to be charged on my order. It says I have paid on the status page, but I haven't been charged, and it shipped Friday.

 

two more days to go, hopefully I'll get my laptop on Wednesday...

@ Derrida: tried the site, but no unlocked drivers for FW490...

 

I ordered my fw490CTO July 26th and it was supposed to ship August 4th. It still says it's processing. I have called Sony the last few days and they say they are unable to find the status of it and are going to email me when they find out anything. It's been 3 phone calls starting 6 days ago and still nothing.

 

I ordered my FW490CTO on August 5th with an estimated ship date of August 18th. After reading many posts about how people who ordered in July still haven't received their's yet, I chatted and emailed Sony. The representative kept on saying that I should probably get my laptop 7-10 business days after I ordered it. Does anyone know if the warehouse problem affected only people in July or August orders too? I'm kind of worried because I leave for college in about a week.

 

We're all in the same boat (I believe anybody who ordered their things the week of the 20th with an estimated ship date of Aug. 4 got screwed). Call Sony again, and ask to speak with management. They'll tell you they don't have a number to contact them directly because their system is set up via email. If they don't offer it to you already, ask to speak with someone who can track down your order and perhaps give some more details on the matter. That person will probably tell you that your computer hasn't even been built.

1) Ask for compensation if they don't offer it to you. It'll come in the form of overnight/expedited shipping (I'm not sure which one it is since I was told different things by several people).

2) I was told this had to do with a problem in the warehouse involving debit/credit card authorizations. If this also affects you, ask that they reissue the request for authorization. This will take a few days. Once you see the pending charge in your account, call back and follow up (this is what I'm going to do later today).

3) Harass the hell out of them. You're going to be told multiple things because a lot of the people in customer service don't know what they're talking about. Write them, try to chat with them online, and talk with them so they know you're riding their asses. Plus, you'll hopefully get a much more broad picture of the situation.

Hope that helps.

 

Rather than "harass" the entry-level agent, ESCALATE to a higher level of management. And email [email protected] and ask that a manager get back in touch with you.

Remember: In all customer service situations, the entry-level person is not equipped to handle the exception to the rule; they handle the rule, so to speak. The managment level handles the exceptions.

What you are discussing is an exception to the way things usually operate: an unusual delay in shipping/building the product. Sony generally does the right thing when you get to the level of management which has the authority to assist you with an unusual situation.

Not surprising that, if Sony is having trouble building the FW490s on time, it might not have all ancillary aids up yet, either. I'd say check back later at that site -- but remember to enter the model numbers of the FWs on the b2b site which most closely resemble your configuration since the site is ONLY for business models of Vaios.

And, of course, this thread is for all FW owners and I did find drivers for earlier models that I checked, thus the FW series is not absent from that site.

 

I got am email saying today they basically lost my order and have to resubmit it. SO it will take another 5-7 days, but they upgraded my shipping to overnight, big deal. I ordered this on July 26th. It's now August 11. My neighbor ordered one August 5th and it's already been shipped and on its way. Really Sony? Really?

 

Finally! ordered my laptop on Sunday Aug 9th........saved on tax as it was tax free weekend here in NC and also some dough using the student discount......

Was confused between the FW and HP's HDX 16t with the NVIDIA Geforce GDDR3 130 M GT graphics card

But I think made the rite decision!

My Configuration is

Product: US-VGNFW490-LBOM
Component: No additional Photo Editing Software
Component: 16.4" widescreen with XBRITE-FullHD™ LCD technology (1920x1080)
Component: Quickbooks Simple Start 2009
Component: 320GB SATA Hard Disk Drive [5400 rpm] (Reg. price $30.00)
Component: No Fresh Start
Component: Microsoft® Works
Component: Standard Capacity Battery
Component: Norton Internet Security (30 Day Trial)
Component: WLAN (802.11a/b/g/n) with integrated Bluetooth® technology
Component: ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD4650 graphics card with 1GB vRAM-great for games and movies
Component: No Engraving
Component: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor P8700 (2.53GHz) (Reg. price $100.00)
Component: No additional Video Editing Software
Component: Blu-ray Disc™ playback
Component: Chocolate Brown
Component: Microsoft® Windows Vista® Home Premium 64-bit
Component: 4GB DDR2-SDRAM (DDR2-800, 2GBx2) (Reg. price $20.00)

Description: VGN-FW490 Configure-to-Order
Ship Method: Standard
Estimated Ship Date: 08/18/2009

Cant wait to get my hands on it

 

Hopefully they actually ship it when they say to do unlike they have for me. It's been 1 week past the ship date and they just said they have to resubmit my order and start over.

 

Update: Just got off the phone with a supervisor. Mine is shipping in 5-7 days, they finally got the issues with the bank figured out so I am billed and they start production of it today.

 

Good news. Patience is a virtue. My sister got her FW CTO last week, and suffice it say, it's a really nice computer. You'll be happy.

 

Hey everyone just got an email saying that they are building my Vaio. Looks like process is working again. Would be awesome if it would ship before the 18th!

 

They just started building mine today even though I ordered it on the 26th:/

 

Yeah I hear ya Micro. Hope you get yours soon too. That just ain't right to have to wait that long to find out they goofed up.

 

Anyone Know how long it takes from the time they start building it to the time they usually ship is?

 

Ditto here. Though i was hoping it would it would have been at least shipped by now. Oh well. How long does it take for a vaio to be built?

 

Update on mine: Because my ship date was changed from 8/12 to 8/18 (I ordered 8/4), they upgraded my shipping to overnight. I just got an e-mail today saying the laptop has entered production. So... I'm guessing it'll ship around the 18th, but at least it'll get to me faster.

 

5 - 7 Business Days is an estimate. But since they screwed up with your order, it gets priority.

 

When you guys got your Vaio was the HD partitioned for backup/restore? I know Sony used to do this.

 

I have an early FW (140E). It came with a 250gig 5,400 drive (but Fujitsu). I heard the drive ALL the time. Not because of that, I put in a 320giig, 7,200 drive (WD Scorpio). I never hear the drive now, but I also loaded XP Pro on the new drive (of course it came with Vista, shudder). So, I think it was the drive that made the difference. I don't think the OS would make a true difference, but Vista, as loaded on my FW, was a real pig.

I have an Eco screen, but since the FW was my first laptop, I can't compare to the HD screen. It's the nicest screen I have (or have seen on other folks' laptops). But then, I'm not into 'video stuff'. I don't even own a TV anymore. I watch DVDs (no Bluray) on my FW, and it seems fine to me...

I really like my laptop and it's the nicest one (physically) that I've seen. I care nothing about Sony as a company (except negatively), but I'm happy with the laptop. The fact that Sony locks down the BIOS and has crippled all their laptops regarding Hardware Virtualization (is that the term?) means little to me, as I can always dual boot if needed (if I load 7 on this). However, it's poor moves like that that will ultimately hurt them. So, I'd look for alternatives whenever I bought another - but I'm spoiled by how much I like the laptop physically (the keyboard).

 

my dad ordered a vaio in june and it took only 2 days to build it

 

It took mine 2 days to build and 5 days to get here.

My HD FW is estimated to ship on the 18th...I hope it leaves earlier - I've got a lot of stuff to do.

 

There is a hidden recovery partition - one of the first things that will pop up when start your machine is a notice to burn your recovery DVDs, (for my 285 it was 3 DVDs).
It will take up about 10GB of hard drive space.

 

My FW490 CTO arrived this morning!!!

 

I'm frustrated, mine hasn't arrived yet and I ordered on the 23rd... I keep asking them what is taking so long, but all they say is "final stages of shipping" ... Frustrating. Perhaps it isn't Sony's fault, but I find that highly suspect.

 

sorry to hear about that.
I ordered on July 31st. I heard people in the forum say that there were problems with orders of the week July 20-26.

 

Holy cow man that was fast! Congrats!

 

Just wondering for those who ordered on SonyStyle, did you get an e-mail confirming shipment? I fear that my order has not shipped yet in which case I might as well cancel it. (I'm unable to check the order status due to some problems with their website)

 

Yeah, I got a shipping confirmation via e-mail. But I heard it's not that easy to cancel.

 

I didn't get one for anything, I heard people got them when their machine went into production. I called Sony and they assured me they are still working on it and it still be shipped. We'll see haha. Seriously the people like me who ordered between July 20th and 26th are getting the short end of the stick, should have waited a few more days to order haha.

 

I assume you didn't receive your laptop yet either? I sent them a rather angry email demanding to know my order status as I've been waiting 3 weeks and haven't gotten anything (via e-mail) except an order confirmation. And when I asked last time they said it was in the final stages of shipping, but it should have arrived by now if it had shipped. Looks like we are unlucky to have ordered for such a low price.

 

That is correct. That's the exact same thing here. They said the same thing to me. I find it funny that they ship out other orders ordered days after us with a hitch. I guess we are just unlucky I'm just way to anxious to receive it. I should try to not be since it will probably be awhile.

 

WOO HOO wife called me and said that Sony called saying my FW should ship tomarrow. Lets hope thats true...stay tuned

 

What day did you order? If you ordered the same week as me hopefully this will mean mine will be coming too, and hopefully they give me 1 day shipping.

 

I found out why my laptop hasn't been built yet. Today I received an email saying that they could not get approval from my financial institute so they cancelled my order. So I called them asking about it since that is impossible since I used my debit card with more then enough to pay for it. I called them and asked about it and found out that they cancelled the order because the graphics card that I picked was out of stock(the 1GB). So then I started wondering why they waited 8 days to tell me that it was cancelled. They told since they could not get approval from my debit card. So then I asked why they would try to get approval if it wasn't even in stock.

I was then transfered to a person that I could under stand. I started talking to him about the problem and he said that there was no reason why it was cancelled. So I ordered the same laptop and now the shipping date is the 25th. It went from the 12th to the 18th to the 25th.

This is the first laptop that I am buying that is not a Dell. Does this stuff happen regularly at Sony? Also has this happened to anyone else here?

 

The same thing happened to me too. I ordered my FW 490 on Jul 24 and it was supposed to be delivered Aug 4. On the 4th I called them and they said that they couldn’t run my debit card and that there was some problem with the authorization that it had expired and they couldn’t do anything about it. So after a couple of days on the phone and countless emails later they were able to finally run the card and get the money. Now it is supposed to be delivered by the 20th. Almost a month for ordering a laptop!!!!

 

Hey, this is happening to me too! I just received an email from Sony saying that my order is canceled! Now I will have to call them up tomorrow and do the whole customer service dance.

Anyone got any compensation from Sony for this big mess? I am thinking they should give out gift cards or something...

 

I'm afraid SONY messed up the orders of the week July 20-26.

On another note, where can I can 32bit drivers for Vista/7 for FW490?

 

Just letting people know that my Vaio has been built and has shipped. It should arrive by the 18th. I'm one of the people that ordered on that 6/20-6/27th week and I also got the 1gig GPU. I hope everybody avoids anymore undue complications cuz this was just incredibly ridiculous. I just ordered a TV tuner and Wacom tablet from newegg today and i'm supposed to get them before my laptop from a month ago. Incredible.

 

finally some good news.
which TV tuner did you order?

 

I decided to get the relatively new AVerMedia AverTV Express Mini because apparently AVerMedia TV tuners are amazing for the price. Unfortunately they only made 54mm cards. I almost had to settle on a Hauppauge usb tuner to keep a lower price for something decent until i found out they released this Expresscard 34mm baby a couple weeks ago.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100045&Tpk=avermedia mini