Official VAIO Z Core 2 Duo Series Owners Thread

are sony drivers built for asia compatible with english version of Vista? I need to get drivers to install over the Z48 when i wipe out the chinese vista, so i need to confirm that the drivers that come with the laptop (the one that you burn onto a cd) is compatible when i install it over an english vista OS

also does anyone know if the Z48 drivers are the same as Z790? in case the sony drivers that came with the asia version of the z48 does not work on english vista, could i install the z790 drivers in replce?

 

Are the above the newest Z models ?
If so, what makes them better to the Z540,Z520,ect...?

 

I think this battery drain fear/premature wear is getting out of hand. Sony designed the laptop to be used with the battery in its location at the back of the device. The overall weight distribution and balance is likely factored into this as well. Just use it like its intended. You're probably going to do greater damage to the back of the laptop by bending plastic that is dependent on the battery back there to support it. Not to mention you're keeping a portion of the notebook opened up to the air (and dust, moisture, etc) that was not designed to be exposed like that

 

WOW, 1300 for a Z. That's a REALLY good deal. People should go for it before it's gone.
Do the discount models at Fry's have the higher res screens?

All Z5xx, 6xx, and the new 7xx are pretty much the same, expect for minor CPU, ram, and HDD upgrades. You probably won't see the difference unless you benchmark them.

The new 7xx series has some color changes as well (optional red lid, black palmrest).

A few weeks before, there were speculations that only the Z7xx support 8GB ram, but that had been proved wrong. The 5xx and 6xx can also support 8GB ram with the correct Micron ram sticks.

 

Those are refresh models to the one's you mentioned (Z540, Z520). Those models at Frys Z620, Z670 are being phased out - that's why they've reduced those prices intensely to make room for the Z7's, which will be the newer models.

What makes them better, I guess, its' capable of running Vista 64-bit, whereas the Z5's are equipped with 32-bit. In addition, offering more ram and slightly higher CPU just to name a few.

 

Only the Z7`s are 64 bit ?

 

Z6xx series officially supports Vista 64-bit, drivers are on the Sony site.

 

The interesting thing is that with Z7xx, you can ONLY get Vista 64-bit (32-bit is not offered)...

 

bump for more info

 

The easiest way to try Windows 7 is just upgrade OS rather than clean install. Any how you can clean install Win7 once retail versin is out. Everything including Norton Internet Security worked perfectly. Ofcourse you have to use some workaround for SPEED Mode brightness functions.

 

WARNING THIS IS INCORRECT!!!!
to a certain degree... people please read the Windows 7 RC agreement carefully.

to sum it all down
UPGRADING TO win7!
If you are running vista you have the option to install windows 7 by 2 means.
1. a clean install (you need to download/install drivers/software and everything else
2. an upgrade which simply upgrades the OS keeping all the drivers intact along with your files.

WARNING! this upgrade option is not available if you are attempting to upgrade from Windows 7 RC!!! only if you are coming from vista! if you have the 7 rc, and want to upgrade to the full OS you have to perform a CLEAN install!

As stated on the RC site, Microsoft specifically warned customers not to install 7 on primary machines since they would not be able to upgrade the OS and would be forced to perform a clean install....

Sorry for shouting that out, but seeing as 7 is almost out and many people are curious about that and the RC i dont want to see anyone making mistakes they'll regret for not waiting a few months.

I'm not saying that installing drivers is impossible, however if you are too squeamish about it, then just wait for October.

 

Figured i'd also throw in some information about battery life.

Just by not using your battery you may think you are in fact saving it, but batteries (lithium ion included) suffer from drainage even on the shelf. Its actually a warning to all customers who try to purchase batteries for old devices from which they can no longer order original parts from the manufacturer and are stuck ordering from 3rd party sources (warehouses and whatnot).

As for keeping it plugged in or not, as someone mentioned, when the system is designed it is designed with that battery in place, Depending on your work environment you could be putting a lot of unnecessary stress on the system to save a few minutes of battery life. As for the underclocking (i'm not entirely sure how definite the settings are in vista's/sony's power management
but I do know that you can in fact disable the "speedstep" technology of the processor from the bios (assuming it supports that, and if its still called speedstep).

 

For the past 3 days, my Z690 has been @#$@ up..... It would work fine for the first 1 hour and then it would freeze up, I have to do a hard reset and it would start freezing up even before windows would load. It did this consistently only after an hour and once it started it would immediately repeat. It would give no warning or error message and when this occurred, all of the lights on the outside of the laptop would not be on. It behaved just light a hardware problem. I tried windows safe mode, system restore and several diagnositic problems.. After an hour on the phone with customer support, it appears that it is the 2 gb extra Crucial memory chip that I added 3 months ago has gone bad. Since taking it out, the computer works fine again.

Just wanted to share this, so if anyone else has problems they can try the same solution.

I am very pleased, the VAIO is working great...now to attempt to get Crucial to send me another memory stick..

 

I went to SonyStyle to check out the new Z7's. The Bordeaux Red really looks nice and I think they had the Vaio Signature Collection on display - never seen anything like it before. The pattern on that lid is not bad. I do like the red and the premium carbon overall. However, IMO, the back aluminum palmrest looks to dark against those chicklet keys - it's very black overall. I still like the gray gunmetal aluminum. It's too bad they couldn't offer both choices somehow someway. Oh well.......

 

Or another easy way to do it is just create another partition and install Windows 7 RC on that. I've been dual booting Windows 7 and Vista 64 bit for 3, 4 months now. I rarely boot my vista partition. The clean install of Win 7 runs very snappy, it saves me the hassle of cleaning up the factory installed Vista.

Same thing happened to my desktop. It took me a while to realize that it's a ram error. I replaced the ram and everything went back to normal.

Thanks for the info!

 

Doesn't really matter now. I got rid of 7 after my chaos. Though I liked the fact that it was running a clean system, despite that fact 7 seemed to perform the same (on a performance scale) as the factory installed Vista, which has alot more bloatware running in the back. The only thing I noticed was better was slightly faster startup times (by about 10 seconds, which I guess comes down to the 'bloatwarelessness'). So I don't really see the need at the moment for an upgrade to 7. But then again, it all comes down to personal tastes I guess.

Just curious, does anyone know, if we upgrade from Vista to 7 (and NOT do a clean install), wheather we will retain the software Sony labelling? Like still being able to use Vaio Update centre and have the Sony support info and logo in My Computer Properties? Or do people here just want a clean install...?

 

I will be getting my Z250 tomorrow and I plan on wiping the SSD and installing the new RTM (7600) build of Win7 immediately.

Should I do an upgrade instead of a clean install? What are the drawbacks of doing an upgrade over a clean install?

Thanks!

 

I'd personally go with a clean install. That method should prevent bloatware from hogging the CPU.

In terms of pros and cons, well...
If you upgrade from the OEM vista, then all you need to do is insert the disc and upgrade (and you SHOULDN'T have to install extra drivers etc, but not too sure with the RTM release, may have changed...). But upgrading means you will probably be stuck with the software that Sony stuck on at the factory.

Going for a clean install means that your system (theoretically, though not in my case) should be faster. But then, the downside to that is you need to install the drivers by yourself, which should involve sourcing the drivers (exe files from Sony's support site, x64 are harder to find for some countries), installing them in the correct order, and making sure you restart after each driver installation (when it tells you to).

Hope that helps.

 

Hey all,

I've been enjoying my new Z for the past week now - loving it thus far .

I have a question though..
I just installed Macrium Reflect Backup (free), and notice that under 'Partitions', I have the following-

Disk 1 - Hitachi HTS723232L9S <298.091 GB>
1 - Recovery, Type=Primary, Capacity=13.753GB
2 - NO NAME ( C: ), Type=Active, Capacity=284.336GB

I created the recovery discs as soon as I received my Z. When you create these discs, doesn't that delete the recovery partition from the HDD? If not, is it safe to delete this manually, and how would I go about doing that?

Sincerely appreciate your input, as I'm already down to 190GB free space remaining and I haven't even begun to load my music/video files on the machine yet. If that 13GB is safe to delete, that would free up some more space.

Thanks in advance.

 

So I got my Vaio Z45x just 5 min ago.

To sum up some preliminary impressions:
The keyboard cover is all black (like the 7xx models). It comes with a screen protecting cloth. The plug-in for the power adapter seems to be wobbly...

While starting up, the fan addapts nicely to the work load, yet not bothering me... we will see

The display appears to be not evenly lit at the edges.... :/

Got a P8700 2,53Ghz CPU ... :/ ( but to be perfectly honest, I am not going to run anything on this laptop, that is in need of a 6MB LV2 cache)
Comes with a WiFi Link 5100 module... :/

The keyboard is great for typing...

Now I have to leave for work. I will upgrade to Win 7 64-bit this evening.

 

When you upgrade from Vista to W7, will there be any traces of Vista still lurking in the hard drive? Or is the upgrade to W7 the same as if you purchase a notebook with W7 already installed? Thanks.

Fry's got their first Z720D/B $1849.99 - $100.00 rebate = $1749.99
Specifications:
* Intel Core 2 Duo P8700 2.53 GHz Processor
* 3 MB L2 Cache, 1066 MHz Bus speed
* 4096 MB DDR3 (PC3-8500) RAM Max: 8GB
* 320 GB (7200RPM) SATA G-Sensor Shock Protection Hard Drive
* 13.1" Diagonal (1600 x 900) XBRITE-DuraView LED Back Light Display
* Approximate Unit Weight: 3.3 Pounds

It seems like Sony may be phasing out the lower res. (1366x768). Can anyone verify that? I've yet to see a Z7 with the lower res. The only one I know of is the Z610.

 

Geeee,

When you upgrade from Vista to W7, you will only see and get W7... Vista would be totally gone.

 

why dont u wait till the official release of the win 7 cd?
it would be more stable than the RC version, no?

 

I can still do a clean install at that time

 

Windows upgrades only alter the files that is relevant to that Windows. So simply saying, anything Vista related (that is created and added by Microsoft) should be altered (replaced, added, removed) to the requirements of 7. But knowing microsoft (think the Office trial that comes preloaded with the Z), I am pretty sure some bits and chunks of Vista not required in 7 may still remain.

 

Just got a z46 and notice one funny thing, the system will reset to max after reboot or resume from sleep even I reduce it 50% using key board.
Any thing wrong? or it is normal?

 

Unless you've tested the recovery disks you created by performing a recovery with them, you can't count on them. A handful of people here had the burned recovery DVDs report "Unknown Error (-NNN)" during restore. Considering how few people use the recovery DVDs, that's a very high amount of failures.

I wouldn't worry about the restore partition when you have 190 GB free.

 

When using the brightness controls, the value does not get stored permanently.
You have to set up default brightness settings for stamina and speed, on mains and on battery. You can do this through the Vaio Control Center.

 

If you want to try Win7 from CLEAN- Vista-INSTALL, the easisest way is upgrade it. You don't need to worry about anything, just sit back and relax and the upgrade process does most of the stuff for us.

After Win7 retail version is out, SONY comes up with suporting drivers and you can do you clean install (if you want to)


Pros:
TPM fucntionality works
UPEK Fingerprint software woks
Antivirus software works
All your settings and stuff will be retained
No need to go through the hassle of changing compatibility mode in all drivers before install

Cons:
It is not a clean install

 

Don't count on it. Sony's M.O. is to release a "new" model with the new drivers, and wrap their drivers in an installer package that prevents them from installing on older models (and a license that makes it a copyright violation to extract the drivers through other means to get them installed on older models).
This serves Sony two ways, by driving the sale of new models, and reducing the support for old models. The flip side of the coin is that customers will only put up with so much.

 

Thanks! I didn't know if there would still be traces of Vista still lurking around the system. I've never upgraded and have usually kept whatever OS is in the pc when I bought it. Good to know.

Last question on this: Once upgraded to W7, there would be no need to search for drivers, is that correct?

 

Should I upgrade in STAMINA or SPEED mode?

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't the sony site for Win 7 transition stated that drivers will be available for older models? I know when I looked up my Z690 it said there will be drivers to download.

 

*grml* the Z45x does not come with Acrobat Standard 8... and almost worthless software only...

 

Hey guys, quick question:
I just created a set of recovery DVDs for my Z. I am now about to wipe the drive and install Win7. Will the recovery DVDs function if I delete the recovery partition? I am have an SSD so I'd like to get as much space as possible.

Thanks!

 

Yes but I would make at least a 2nd set of recovery disks and store them somewhere away from sunlight and possible damage. You'll need them if you ever plan to follow through to an upgrade to full Win 7 when that comes out.

 

Thanks. I am also making a second backup of the entire C partition using Acronis True Image. That should suffice as backup. I will wipe the drive after this.

 

Congrats on your Z750, CrackaBoi. I just placed an order with P1 for my Z750 with Intel X25-M 80GB (decided I can't wait until Intel eventually launches their new SSD lineup). Maybe we can compare benchmarks sometime

 

Awesome! We certainly should. I'll be benching it with ATTO and/or HDTune in Vista before I put Win7 on it. Will you be putting Win7 RC on it right away?

 

I'll probably put Win 7 on it after playing with Vista 64-bit (and the Sony factory image) for a day or two... Did you decide on the Productivity bundle or Mobility bundle offer?

 

Nice. I'll probably try to go for the productivity bundle.

 

I totally agree with these comments.

I burned 3 sets of the recovery DVDs for my Vaio Z notebook. I had a chance to test them all out when I first had the machine & guess what? Out of those 3 sets I made, 1 set is faulty. So I personally recommend anyone burning their recovery discs to make at least 2 sets of them to be safe.

 

One thing i never really asked is, since this isn't a custom built desktop and its a sony, (2 things i'm not experienced with in the pc market lol) how bad is the bloatware and how much of it is actually necessary for it to work properly? And does all this bloatware put any strain on the system that you can notice?

 

The recovery disk I burned was faulty too.

 

Oh no.. Fortunately, I haven't had to use the recovery disks yet. Hopefully you guys are just the exceptions. Although my system did crash the first time I tried to burn the discs.

Boatwares? A LOT
Does it slow down the system? Hell Yea.

That's the main reason why I decided to just fresh install Windows 7. In the rare cases where I boot my Vista partition, the experience is night and day. My vista system is noticeable much slower, everything lags, whereas in Win 7, everything is snappy.

I have around 65-70 processes after boot up in Win 7, whereas in the factory installed Vista 64 bit, I have around 95+, and it goes up to 110-120 when I run it for a couple hours.

 

Thanks for your input arth1 and SPEED. I'll definitely make at least 2 more copies of the recovery discs, based on what you've mentioned. (Although a total of x12 DVD-R's is a rather painful amount to have to part with for what one set should be able to manage without issue, haha.)
I'd love to start fresh to be honest with you, as there is just so much bloat on this notebook it's driving me nuts. For such a speedy machine, you really wouldn't know it at times.. Takes its time booting up and shutting down. Even opening programs seem quite laggy, considering the specs. I've culled the running processes and services as much as I can (down from over 100 to 81!).

The reason I don't want to clean install is because my Z came with Photoshop Elements 7 and Premier Elements 7 preinstalled, which are very useful tools to me.

[sighs]

 

12?!! If I remembered correctly, I only had to burn 3 DVDs, not sure if they are double layer or not.

 

Mine used 4 last week.. Which I thought was odd, as I've made recovery discs for an FZ and an SZ in the past, and they only required 3.

So I've already made 1 set. If I make another two sets (at minimum), I'll have 12 recovery discs idling in a dark corner somewhere. Haha..

 

My Z690 also burned out 3 recovery DVDs for each set. I think it depends on which market that Vaio Z is for. If I'm not wrong, alias22 got his/hers in Australia right?

I just noticed one thing. alias22 has got Photoshop Elements 7 and Premier Elements 7 pre-installed but we, owners of Z690 (for example), do not have that pre-installed. That may contribute to the reason why alias22 need more DVDs per recovery discs set.

 

Yeah, I'm in Aus. And you're right SPEED, that may very well be contributing to the amount of discs required for recovery. Though I was under the impression that if I performed a semi-clean install via the recovery discs, I'd lose those apps.

So confused..