Official VAIO SR Series Owners Thread

This is an owners thread with 150+ pages and lots of great information. By now someone has definately answered your question already. So try searching this thread instead of repeatedly asking the same question. That is the purpose of an owners thread.

 

what's your problem? I DID search for the word "ATI" but it is probably too short.

 

thanks Tony. That's a bit of a bummer isn't it? I was hoping to get around 5 hours with a new laptop. If you get 3:30 with rmclock then battery life is not that great.

 

there's a thread on this, somebody said ghe customize option should be there again by today.

 

Hi,


I'm thinking about buying a configure-to-order VGN-SR290.

On the premades the ATI card lists as 256 vram.
If I look at the .pdf for the custom one, the only ATI option is 3470 256 vram

But....

When you click on more info on the configure-to-order page under Graphics (3470) it says
"With ATI® Radeon HD 3400 Series graphics with 128MB of dedicated video RAM, ..... "

Can anyone who's bought a configure-to-order VGN-SR290 with ATI HD 3470 confirm whether it has 128 or 256mb vRam?

Thanks,

Chris

 

According to the System Information window in Vista, my SR290CTO (ATI HD 3470) has 256MB of VRAM.

 

Thanks a lot go_ahead_ed. I was hoping that was the answer

 

LOL man. My previous lappy was an FS760W and it would give me 1 Hr 15 min of battery life if I used it judiciously. compared to that 3 hr 30 min is like hitting a jackpot.

I did a test the other day in VAio Optmized mode, with the monitor at 62% brightness, wifi on, internet browsing and word processing gaveme 3 Hr 43 min of battery before it went to sleep. I can probably try "Power Saver" Mode and get excess of four hours (Where the monitor switches off every three minutes of idle use)/

 

It's definitely 256.

 

They dont let you choose ATI graphics with night Black color in the CTO. what does the color have to do with the graphic card. If they limit the CPU or something i could understand that.

They must have too many titanium gray shells. :/

 

what? I just went on sonystyle 1 minute ago and was able to choose the ati. its on there under "graphics". $50 upgrade. and that was with night black.

 

What is a good laptop bag for the SR? I'm not looking for a sleeve, but a good bag that has nice tight fit to it, and can carry a book or two.
Thank you,

 

when you pick ati it automatically goes to titanium and doesnt let you select black. For me atleast.

 

hm, your right. It's doing that for me too now. !!

 

I just found out this cool thing in the Synaptics software that gives you four tap zones at the corner of the touchpad. Maybe it's something that is in all laptops, but it's new to me. I put a PgBack and PgFwd tapzone, so I can quickly go back and forth between pages. The software lets to give a bunch of other commands, too. Looks nifty.

 

Conversely, if you want titanium grey you must get the ATI graphics! I actually really love the grey but do not want not the card, as battery life is much more important to me. It's subjective but the grey looks fantastic in person. It's not a boring neutral grey, it's darker and very classy.

The black is great too, and it looks like that's what I'll get. I think they're both good - hard to choose even.

 

I don't really mind, the battery life is enough for me, and I'm not even running at optimized settings, I usually have the brightness on 6/8, wifi and bluetooth on, browsing internet, itunes playing music, aim and msn messengers open, etc.
If you use the laptop with the power saver settings, you might get close to 4 hours. But 5 hours is probably not possible to achieve.

btw, undervolting doesn't really improve battery life by a lot, i would say 10-15 minutes at most.

Really?
Maybe Windows 7 will have it not sure, but I am looking forward to it

 

When I'm at home, I take out the battery from my VAIO SR and I put it on AC power. I don't want to leave in the battery charging when I have the comp plugged in and in use for fear of a decreasing battery life. Is that a correct way of preventing a short battery life for my lithium battery?

Also, when my comp was on AC power one day, it was accidently unplugged and my computer thus experienced an improper shut down. Is there any way of assuring that my VAIO is okay? Is there any sort of recovery procedure that I should take? If so, please let me know. Thanks in advance.

 

You can leave the battery in and turn on the Battery care feature in the laptop. After you turn it on, the battery will stop charging after a certain (50, 80, or 100) percentage. You can turn this on in the VAIO Control Center.

No, if that was just once, the laptop is okay (but you probably lost any unsaved works), besides that, don't worry about it.

 

does it really work. It wont charge the battery at all? Its it like the battery isnt even there. Cause i always take it out even though you told me about battery care

 

Yes, it'll stop at whatever percentage it is set at. I switch between 100%/80%, so it doesn't keep trying to charging again once it drops down a few percentage points, so I'll put it at 100% to charge, then I'll put it back to 80% once it's done. I haven't been using my battery much, so that's why, all the loss is from normal drain on standby.

 

isnt it bad to charge it a lot?

 

I have a question for oldtime owners of the SR.

What all stickers do you still retain on your SR? I have removed all except for the small postage sized labels "Full HD 1080P", dlna, "ATI Radeon", "Vista", Centrino 2

I am guessing at some point I will get rid of the dlna and engery star stickers but retain the HD, Vista, Centrino, Radeon stickers.

Can people share their personal preferences?

 

I took all the labels off except for "Vista" and "Centrino2", and they'll be going soon. The notebook looks so much nicer, IMHO, without any labels at all.

 

I like all the labels, what can I do?

Also, the battery is meant to be left there, it is also meant to save your when the power goes down, and in fact, that's what happened to you. Always leave it on.

 

Is GSKILL memory a good brand for SR ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231156)? ie have you guys had good results, or should I wait for a better deal to pop up in the future. Most deals right now are for DDR2667, not DDR2800.

 

So here I ask again, can some one help me with ArcSoft Magic-I missing issue, or should i email Sony?

 

I replied to this question of your's like 10 times already
this software is on your recovery discs.

 

My brothers SR just came! I am so jealous, but must continue to wait for Westmere! It is beautiful.

 

The reason I'm asking again is that i don't have the software on the rescue disks

 

what is westmere?

 

cpu
Westmere is Nehalem’s successor

 

I just can't decide between the integrated card and the ATI. It's hard for me to predict how much I will use it for gaming and if I'll use the HDMI out anytime soon.

any inputs?

 

ATI will also lower your battery life a little, so take that into consideration as well. If it was me i would go for the ATI and hdmi. But i have a HDtv and you can easily get a HDmi to dvi cable or converter for cheap.

 

how's the general build quality of this laptop?

 

I guess the build is alright, so far is fine ofr me looks great, but i think i just got unlucky because my keyboard squeaks a little, and i think its only me. It only squeaks a little like 3 keys

 

So much bloatware. Still uninstalling stuff! Since it's for my brother, I don't want to mess to much up so I'm not going to even attempt to do a clean or semi clean install. Have it down to 42 installed programs so far, including stuff I installed for him (Open Office, Flight Sim X, Firefox, SAS ect).

BTW the build quality so far is great. Screen is beautiful (even nicer than my 901's matte LED screen).

 

My keyboard has some squeaky, too, but not consistent, but the typing is louder than my old Dell because of the keyboard style. Dell keys were soft, and so was quiet. These keys I feel are more clickly. Everything is sturdy, except the lid, which flexes, since it's so thin, so have to be careful there.

Nooo..I realize my E button is super sqeaky if I push down on it, =|

 

hi everyone,

i just ordered my laptop a few days ago and its not scheduled to ship for another few weeks. in the meantime i'm debating switching the color, does anyone have any experience with the two silver color choices offered? i think they're titanium and platinum (darker, lighter glossly)?

thanks

 

Hey same here, i didnt know that, sigh, i called sony about a keyboard replacement and they said the warrenty covers it, but should i even bother, cause i m afraid i m just gonna end up with a squeaky keyboard again after the change. And if sony backstage scratches my SR during the change i would be even more sad

 

Wonder if they can send it to you. I dunno, the E key is most often used letter, so it'll be truly annoying for me. I might have to send it in for repairs and add a note for them to be very careful and gentle. Do you have this problem where during panning scenes in videos, there's a bunch of diagonal lines that show up? Reference here ( http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=300340&page=2); pretty noticable if I watch anime, or pretty much any other video, dunno what I'll do about this, though. Would they change the motherboard?

- Eli

 

No i dont think i have the lines, about the keyboard, they said they will send you a box to put the sr in, and mail it to the address listed. But since i live near a sony backstage, i can go there myself to change it. After they change it i think your old keyboard it now sony's. I read that somewhere in the warrenty

 

Ah, haven't heard of Sony Backstage yet; there is a location near me. Do you know how this works? Do I have to call Sony support first to say I have a problem, blah blah get a number? Or can I just call up the store and walk up to them? I can show them my video problem, too, and see what they can do about it.

 

just wondering, does anyone have the Sr290 with the extended battery and the 3470?

im just curious about the weight of such a system, as well as the battery life and i searched the entire thread and nothing came up

thanks in advance

 

Yea you have to call sony support first, i was lucky and got a pretty good experience with support, anyways, after you tell them your problem, they will read the warranty, make you wait like 5 minutes or so, tell you yes we can fix it, and they offered me 2 options, 1st was to send me a box and ship it to the nearest backstage or you come in. They also give you an event number which you need for sony backstage

 

Cool, thanks, Garmin! I'll call them after my finals this week, hopefully I'll actually be able to get in touch with them. Last time I sent my Lenovo back to get 'fixed' they did scratch the surface

 

did you tell them that they scratched it?

 

I passed it on to my uncle. The laptop had a display problem, sent it to Lenovo twice and they say they can't replicate the problem, so I gave up on them. The scratch was really minor; you have to look pretty close to see it. Lenovo laptops (The T series) have this textured surface, and there was a light scratch.

Aig, I found a key that actually sticks down if I push hard enough and it was stuck in place for like a minute until it finally popped back up. .___O

 

Hey guys, Just want to let people know I'm selling my SR290 CTO for a good price for the specs.

Check it out in my sig!

 

does anyone knows of a plastic skin protector for the keyboard?