Official VAIO Z Core 2 Duo Series Owners Thread

well a lot of it will be for law school. But i am also a pretty avid gamer, so i would want to be able to play at least some of the newer games if possible.


handle as in eye sight?? well i am only 25, pretty sure i can handle it.

 

Okay, just checking.


Lawyers...

 

I use home and end to highlight whole lines of text - this is espectially useful when programming and even word processing. I would press shift and home, for instance to grab a whole line ... on the new Z layout i would have to press 'shift+fn+left arrow' - pretty ridiculous and defeats the efficiency of using home the way i do anyway

 

It would be nice if they made an Fn Lock key!

 

so if i am concerned with gaming, is the 256 important and worth the added 200 bucks or so??

or is the reality that this card probably cant handle most uppend games anyway, so it wont make much of a difference??

 

I totally agree. Although if we're able to remap the keys, maybe it wouldn't be quite as bad (once we got used to it).

Still, I'd much rather have the dedicated keys...

 

OMG!!!! I'M GOING CRAZY!!!!!!!!!!!

When can we see some thorough hands on reviews from websites like Cnet?

 

Yeah I'm crazy anxious as well!

 

^Haven't you read this?
Hands on Review - The new Vaio Z


_______________________________
Just teasing... Sorry, I just had to do this Me can't wait either...

 

Hi,

I want to use the Z in a dock with the DVI connection, and I'm trying to find out what resolutions will be supported. Does anyone know what the limit on the resolution output by the 256MB NVidia card will be?

It's important to me as it'll spend a lot of time plugged into a 24" 1920 x 1200 monitor (with the lid closed and internal screen off).

I've already called Sony, and the pre-sales rep put me on hold to check and came back and said it wouldn't go beyond 1600 x 900. I challenged this but she told me she'd checked specially for me.

This seems strange to me for a 256MB card and isn't even the Full HD advertised. She also said that this is the case with every laptop from every manufacturer...... hmmmm....... is this true?

(I can't test this on my current laptop as it has a native 1920 x 1200 screen in it already, just running off a 4 year old 128MB NVidia Quadro card)

Anyone got any more info on this, or experience of previous Sony laptops going beyond their native resolution when set to external screen only?

All help much appreciated....

Stephen

 

Hands-on with the Vaio Z Series (VGN-Z11VN/B)

 

Isnt that hands on really old?? Anything new???

 

I mentioned this in another thread, but the carbon on the Z looks and feels "slightly" different from the carbon used on the SZ. Take a look at the webcam photo. You'll noticed that the carbon is speckled and is more noticeable throughout the Z's case, whereas on the SZ, I've never noticed this; not that this matters. I was also told the carbon on the Z is more durable due to this slight change in variation.
View attachment 21854
Also, in the next photograph, the left and right clicker placement are almost at the very edge. When I was trying out the Z, I found the finger I used to left and right click slipped almost every time I pressed on it. FYI.
View attachment 21855
Did anyone noticed these?

 

yes i did notice the speckles actually today was going to mention it but wasnt sure if thats normal for carbon fibre. kind of looks weird if the palmrest doesn't share the same speckles.

 

Let's start talking about the Raid0 option - does anyone know how this works? Is this a special drive that they made with like 2 slabs of flash memory in there, or is this 2, honest to goodness 2.5" drives inside of this....

i guess the real question is can i get the z w/o the 'as expensive as your laptop' option, then open it up and put in my own drives and raid0 them? I cant find any details anywhere on the net.

 

I usually use the thumb of my thumb to hit the mouse buttons on the trackpad. I wonder if it too would slip off.

 

I have the sz 150p that only has uh 128mb or something and it runs 19x12 fine. Actually i think you only need like 32mb or something to run that res - don't listen to reps, they never know anything

 

Hi!

I think the rep was probably told that the internal screen would never go beyond 1600x900 and mistook it meaning they can't do it externally. Every laptop I've owned was capable of higher external resolutions than the internal one, but some laptops cannot break out of their aspect ratios. My Toshiba M200 cannot do widescreen even on external monitors, for example.

I'm very much looking forward to the Z... I preordered mine a couple days ago after deciding to go a little over my original requirements of 12" or smaller screen. It looks so nice! Just a wee bit pricier than I wanted, but the specs warrant the price. Mid-August feels so far away...

 

I think I read somewhere that the 128GB RAID 0 option was two platters of 64GB sandwiched together. I'm not sure where I read this tho, so don't quote me on that . But I don't think there's room in there for 2 HDDs, unless the SSDs are a lot smaller and thinner than I think they are.

 

Yes, they are two 64gb SSD drives and I'm quite sure they are 1.8", vs models having hard drives being 2.5", a significant difference.

 

READ FOR CTO"ers. I shoulda told u this long ago and I do apologize on mybehalf. Not anyone else's but my behalf, anyway. Do you know what the President of Sony told me when I wrote a letter back to get a refund on my defected CTO? He said Sir, we strongly urge you not to get a Vaio CTO laptop again as there will most probably issue;s again as they are hand made. Thanks you etc etc etc...

 

Oh nice, ur doing pre-law? What school you go to?

 

Well, the palmrest is made of aluminum and it's actually one piece. Only the lid and the area that surrounds the screen is made of carbon so there wont be any speckles on the palmrest. But you can really tell the difference between the Z carbon and that of the SZ. The SZ felt smooth whereas, the Z felt slightlty grainy.

 

loll, I dont understand how my last comment on pre-law school was funny? GEEEEE

 

Don't forget to mention that Sony said they now use Carbon Fibre 2.

 

I think most of us in this thread are under 27. I'm just curious, is there anyone here over 30?

Yea, you got me there.
I was like OM#$@^%!.

That's kinda old...and it's not really a thorough review because there isn't any test done on the Z.

Yes, I did notice the difference between the carbon fibers. Do I care? not really...
I don't get it... What's the big deal about the carbon being speckling?
Does anyone care to explain it to me?

I also worried about the placement of the clickers. But I thought its shape and size make the whole keyboard/trackpad layout look much neater. If you know what I mean. You can't really make it any wider considering the small foot print of the laptop.
I guess we will have to live with the slippery clickers.

Also, does anyone know how much of a performance difference will I see between the Z with 126 mb dedicated graphics ram and the Z with 256 mb graphics ram for gaming.

Thanks!

 

You will see a fair amount of difference for sure. The more graphics ram the smoother the game will run.

 

I wouldnt make that a blanket statement - the memory is just used to parse textures and things like that. If you dont have enough video memory then those textures will be put into the ddr and be transfered back and forth to the GPU via the PCIx bus. It is slower than having it onboard, but not terribly slow.

The main bottleneck of graphics performance is the GPU itself. Most games wont need tons of textures so for maybe 95% of gameplay will be under 128mb mark... for those few advanced games that use more, the slowdown will be the gpu. Of course more memory helps, but i would bet that statistically it wouldn't make a huge difference on average

 

Which is why I said a fair amount of difference, not a big difference dear Vaio Z series friend.

 

No you can't, unless you get the special flat ribbon and the two 64gb platter. Good pictures and explanation here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=275038
However you may be able to fit a non-raid 1.8 ssd in replacement for the hd of a "cheap" configuration.

 

Manni I think you mean 2.5" as the Z comes with 2.5" HDD.

 

Absolutely thanks for the correction. Just too used to my TZ still...

 

Thanks a lot!

That's pretty much what I thought it would be.

If a game doesn't run on the 126 mb graphics ram Z, it's highly likely that it won't run on the 256 mb graphics ram Z either.

I only do some light gaming (halo 1 online...), maybe some Assassins Creed, but I don't care too much about graphics and texture as long as the game can run smoothly.

Of course, I would get a z Z590 cto without hesitation if I have 3k to spend on the laptop. However, the Z 570 is already over my budge by 200 bucks...

 

Not quite over 30, but definitely over the 27 fence.

I'm a bit curious about this Carbon Fiber 2 thing. I'm only familiar with the kind they use on cars, the one with the visible weave embedded in epoxy. The carbon fiber on the Z doesn't look at all like what I'm used to. Also, I've heard the lid on the TZ felt like it was going to break when you moved it, or something like that (not sure if this also included the carbon fiber ones). How's this stuff been on laptops before the Z? Is it super-rigid, or does it wiggle around a bit?

 

What are the pros and cons of getting a SSD other than the obvious con of having to pay $1000+ to get one?

 

Pros will be a very fast system. Applications (and games) will load faster, system boot times will be reduced. Responsiveness increases.

SSD is also more shock resistent. They don't really save power.

Here's a review of a couple of SSDs compared with a mediocre laptop harddrive: http://blog.laptopmag.com/in-depth-with-the-ocz-core-series-low-cost-ssd (Sony may be using the Samsung SATAII)

 

nice thanks - exactly what i was looking for

 

Im 22!!!!!

 

Wow, I didn't know that before!!

Man, that's interesting!!! lol.. jk jk

 

OK guys ive got a bit of a dilemma... ive got to order my Z within the next 2 days... and im just cannot figure out which screen rez to get... The thing is the $200 difference is a lot to swallow... my limit is basically 2100 and my specs with high rez comes to 2300 whereas the low res comes to 2100... Ill be in school and id want to play some games like COD4 and some new ones... but some one said earlier that the 256 vram vs the 128 vram will not make a big difference... also i dont want to regret not getting something... but i also want to be able to read the letters for my school work?...

Can anyone help me with my decision??? Thanks a lot...

 

For gaming the lower resolution will be better. For your wallet too .

 

Why do you say that? I would think games would look better in the higher resolution (assuming the GPU can handle it).

 

Cause I don't believe the GPU is strong enough to run new games at 1600*900.

Unless you're running games that don't require a strong GPU ofcourse.

 

I am/was in the same dilemma; 1366x768 or 1600x900?

So I went to a local store and compared an 11,1" 1366x768 TX (which simply put is said to be about equally difficult to your eyes as a 13,1" 1600x900 Z (actually the Z is a tiny little bit more comfortable)) and a 13,3" 1280x800 SZ (which corresponds to a 13,1" 1366x768 Z concerning 'hardness on eyes').

Well, I felt the TX wasn't too bad and I don't think it'd be hard on my eyes (I'm 22). I rather prefer the comfort of being able to put much more stuff on your screen. I currently have a 15" 1024x768 (yes, a real old lappy ) and often find it a pity I can't see more (of for instance a website) in the vertical direction. Knowing 1) a 1366x768 Z would show exact the same in 'the vertical direction', 2) having seen a 1600x900 wasn't really hard on my eyes, and 3) knowing Windows Vista offers quite some decent possibilities to increase text size (which work perfectly in MS Office programs, the only place you'd probably need it anyway), well that all put me on the decision to get the 1600x900 Z. I'm not a gamer, but the thought that the 1600x900 came with more VRAM etc. was -of course- also a reason to prefer the 1600x900. I understand that reason now 'falls away' since (it seems logical) a 1600x900 screen asks more from the GPU than a 1366x768 screen.

I don't know if what Phil says is true though. The 1600x900 doesn't only have double the amount of VRAM, but it also has "Available Graphics Memory of 1500MB" instead of the "1370MB" the 1366x768 has. Maybe this combination does compensate for the more pixels the GPU has to coordinate?

Anyway, it it's true, then yes, if you're a real gamer, I guess you should go for the 1366x768. If not (or just occasionally), you're not old, and you can afford it, then I feel the 1600x900 is the better choice.

 

For gaming and movies is better the 1600x900 with the 256vram, for text is more usable the smaller resolution 1366x768.

 

I'm pretty sure that Nvidia 9300M at 1366*768 with 128MB will deliver higher framerates than 1600*900 with 256MB.

But don't take my word for it because I am not a gaming expert.

Edit: I did some more research and I believe I'm right. Refer to the in game benchmarks here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=130879
Comparing MBP with Nvidia 8400 128mb 1024*768 vs. 256mb in 1440*900: 139 fps vs. 112 fps.

I'm not looking at synthetic benchmarks like 3dMark because they're not reliable indicators of real life performance imo.

 

However, what if you'd let the game run on a 1600x900 Z at a lower than native resolution? Then you'd probably get higher FPS because of the higher VRAM and stuff?

 

True. But it may look stange. Try running a game in non native resolution.

 

I'm buying the Z here in sweden and the specs that are available are:

CPU 2.33 Ghz P9500 or 2.4 Ghz P8600
Cache 6144kb or 3072 kb
Ram 4 Gb
screen 1600x900 X-black LCD
Harddrive 320 Gb
GPU Nvidia 9300M GS

The one with 2.33ghz and 6144kb costs around $3766
The one with 4 Ghz and 3072kb costs around $3666

I guess it's worth it to pay $100 more for the other one right? Will it be faster? (I don't know much)

And yes, Vaio's are sick expensive here, it really sucks....

 

For only $100 it seems a no brainer. Get the P9500 2.53Ghz with 4GB. Yes it will be faster.

If you're interested in saving money you may want to consider importing from US or Japan.