Sony CW i3/i5/i7 Official Owners Thread

looks like my battery is starting to degrade... can only get about an hour of battery from it nowadays

 

Same is happening to me, 10 minutes off charger and battery is at 70%. Sony no longer sells batteries so now im trying to decide if i should get a 3rd party battery or sell this laptop and get a new one. New laptops last so much longer on battery.

 

Hi, I have a friend who has a VPCCW2S1E Sony Vaio. The HDD seems to be on its way out - S.M.A.R.T indicates pre-failuire or old age, it takes nearly 20 minutes to boot into Windows. Just got a few questions, I tried to search but the function isn't working.

How easy is it to replace the HDD?

Would it be viable to replace using an Express card 3/4 along with an SSD (then an external USB 2.0 HDD for storage)?

If that is possible is there anyway that Windows 7 OEM that you get with the Vaio would be able to be installed on the SSD to boot from?

Thanks for anybody that can help.

 

Replacing HDD is super duper easy.

One screw on the bottom and the hard drive comes right out.

I replaced my HDD (it failed hard) with a SSD and it only took about 5 minutes and no other tools besides a screwdriver.

Im not in front of the laptop now so I cant give you exact location but its on the bottom and it looks like a rectangle about the size of a 2.5 inch HDD.

 

Any idea on if its possible to install Windows 8 + drivers on the VPCCW28FX?

My assumption is to use the windows 7 drivers from the clean install, but I could be wrong.

 

I have the same question. Mine is a VPCCW21FX that my wife uses. I would rather update to windows 8 rather than doing a fresh install. Anyone tried it yet? No windows 8 drivers on the sony site.

 

I have a VPCCW22FX . I did the Windows 8 Upgrade it went smooth and everything works great. Was very easy, no issues with software or periphs including a wireless network printer. I also run Crash Plan backup service and that survived the upgrade without needing to do a restore or migration.

 

Has anyone repaired or replaced the Power Jack on this laptop? Mine is getting flaky, and it has a lot of play in it. Does this model need to have the power jack soldered on or does it attach with a cable to plug on the mobo? I can do both, but it seems the part is available both ways. I want to avoid taking it apart until I get the part.
VPCCW22FX

 

I have an odd problem. My CW always thinks it is on battery power even when it is plugged in. If I hover the mouse over the battery icon it will state that there is XX% left.

Here are the other issues to help rule out the typical solutions I have already ruled out.

Originally I thought the battery was bad. I keep the laptop plugged in 99% of the time (100% now). A couple months ago I noticed the batter draining even though it was plugged in. Then I noticed i no longer got the charging battery message when hovering the mouse over the batter icon. I also never get the AC plugged in icon any longer.

Here is some additional info on the problem to help rule out the common issues I have already researched online:

If the laptop is plugged in with a battery I get the battery percentage.

If the battery is removed I get a no battery attached icon. The laptop still thinks it's on battery power even though there is no battery and it is running on AC power.

I bought a battery that needed the bios update. Because my original battery was below 15% it would not allow me to do the bios update even though the laptop was also plugged in. I had to return that battery.

I bought another replacement battery that did not need a bios update. I am using it now as it came charged. It will not charge when plugged in on AC power.

I just purchased a DC jack and replaced it thinking that would solve the problem but unfortunately nothing has changed.

I decided to try using the bios update on the old battery I returned and even though I had a battery installed with enough juice the software would not update because it though I was running on the battery and it needed to be plugged in to do the bios update.

While plugged in the battery does not drain and the laptop is being powered by AC power, not the battery.

If I unplug the laptop will work fine via the battery. When I plug in and unplug the AC power the battery icon in the system tray remains unchanged. If I put in my totally dead batter that ran down to zero I get the battery led on the laptop fast blinking. Otherwise the battery led will not light with the other battery that still has a charge.

I think i mentioned everything. I am thinking it's some sort of motherboard issue and I'll just have to live with it until I replace but was hoping I could fix this issue somehow.

I'm getting ready to do a clean install of Windows 7 thinking maybe that could be the problem. I have re-installed the power management drivers and software and that did not do anything to solve the problem.

I am running Win 7 Home Premium that came with the laptop originally. Totally stock i5 configuration for this mode. VPCCW27FX/B

Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated... hope to hear from some of you.

Thanks in advance.

 

To those having issues like I had with my CW with freezing while watching HD videos and browsing (see previous pages).

I am happy to report that Sony has rectified the situation. They offered my a replacement laptop which I accepted, and I no longer have any sort of issues with freezing. I will post how I went about doing it, but keep in mind your results may be different.

Since the laptop was out of warranty, I paid the fee to have it repaired (~$179 flat rate for anything). Sony had it for two weeks and replaced the mainboard, but unfortunately that didn't solve the issues with freezing. I called tech support again to open up a new case and was offered to either send my laptop in for service, or speak with someone in customer relations that may have a different suggestion (since this would have been the fourth time I brought the laptop in for the same issue). Apparently there was some miscommunication/wrong advice given to me, but after waiting for four months, I finally got in contact with someone in customer relations.

The offer was to send the laptop again to have it fixed, which I was open to, as I knew going through customer relations, that this issue would be addressed. Dropped it off a week before Christmas Eve and at the end of the week I called for an update. The update was the hard drive was replaced and they were waiting for factory install cd's to come in. Everything was quiet until the end of the first week of January, where I got a call from customer relations saying that in addition to the hard drive being replaced, they found something else wrong and that rather then fixing it, they were going to offer me a similarly configured laptop, once some research was done. After two days, they offered me a 14" premium Sony Vaio E series laptop (model SVE14A25CDB) with the following major specs:
- Intel Core i5-3210m, 2.50GHz
- 8 GB of RAM
- 750GB HDD
- Backlit keyboard

Naturally I accepted it, but I'm sure if I wanted another model I might have been able to pay the difference. After having this laptop for a month, I am happy to report no issues at all!

So to summarize:
- If necessary, pay the fee for out of warranty repair
- If a repair is made, see if it fixes the freezing, if not call and open another service request. If no repair is made, call and complain!
- If after three attempts to resolve the issue, speak with someone in the customer relations department.

 

Good result. I am starting to have the problem mentioned on the previous page of this thread: "the display goes black and then back to normal with a balloon saying "nvidia display drivers have failed but has successfully recovered." but recently I got a balloon saying "kernal mode driver has failed but has successfully recovered".

I have the latest video driver. I recall there was an issue with the NVidia chips that are used in the GT300 series - I think they were overheating or something. Sony issued a BIOS update but people said it just made the system fan run faster. Anyway if the problem continues, I may have to send the notebook in for an out of warranty repair. Are you in the US?

 

Battery drain mystery solved, after 3 years of ownership. I bought a 3rd party OEM battery to replace the original it came with. ZERO battery drain. Even after a week, turned it back on and 99% battery. The old one would have either had about 20% or been totally dead. It appears to be the integrated control chip in the original batteries that was causing the problem. Back to getting 4 hours of life! I was about to toss it because of the battery drain, tired of dealing with it. After a new battery and a SSD upgrade it feels like a new laptop.

 

Same here. Once I replaced the battery no more battery drain issue. Which battery did you buy?

 

Just to update my post above: I reinstalled the latest video driver and it has been working fine ever since. No freezing, no error messages. Been a couple of months without issue.

 

can you tell me which battery you bought and where? my original battery wont last more than 40 minutes at this point. looking to replace it asap.

 

also, anyone have a link to the factory restore images ? or am i out of luck?

 

Amazon.com: Battpit™ Laptop / Notebook Battery Replacement for Sony VGP-BPS13/Q (No additional firmware modification needed.) (4400 mAh): Computers & Accessories

Cheep enough to get two...

 

I really don't know where to ask this, so I'll start here hoping fellow CW27 owners might help...even though this thread is basically dead.

I'd like to update my video card (nVidia 330M) drivers to a version more recent than what Sony offers on its support website. The reason for this is I'm trying to get CUDA enabled in a video editing program I'm using.

The problem is it's not possible to simply download and install the latest drivers off the nVidia website. The installation doesn't even start and gets aborted. Apparently Sony doesn't allow that and only allows updates to come through them.

So, if you've updated your video card drivers to something more up-to-date than what Sony offers, please reply! It'd be great to learn how to do this and what to expect, positives and negatives. :hi2:

 

Ugh. I should have paid the extra $10 for a battery from BattPit. You guys are really getting 4 hours out of that thing?

My original battery was giving me maybe 30-40 minutes' use, so I picked up a new battery for a total of $40 from the ebay user "portportal." It was plug & play and supposedly 4400 mah just like the original, but where I got at least probably 3 hours off the original when it was new (okay, I don't remember exactly as it's 3 years old now), the one from portportal barely lasts an hour when I'm doing nothing but surf the web (no video, no music, screen at half brightness, not up- or downloading anything). I might as well have kept using the old one. I expect to get a little less life out of the battery since I replaced the 5400 rpm hdd with a 7200 last year, but I should still be getting over 2 hours of solid use.

And this sh*t has the gall to tell me 1 - 1.5 hours is normal for this type of battery when I write them about it! If you're going to replace your battery, do yourself a favor and stay away from portportal.

(...re the user above, I haven't tried to update vid drivers but if there's a beneficial update to be had, I'd like to know how to get it too.)

Edited to add: CPUID and BattStat report 42-43% wear on this 'new' battery, so actual capacity is <60% designed/claimed capacity.

 

display out! but me like that

 

So quick update and an FYI for anyone that cares.

I had asked about upgrading to newer nVidia drivers other than the ones offered on Sony's official support site. In my case, I just needed my drivers to be version 257.21 or newer so that I can use CUDA in a video editing program I'm using. My main concern was having a smooth upgrade without any random system freezes/errors, faulty display, weird colors, or loss of hotkeys (e.g. volume/brightness).

I managed to upgrade to version 266.64 and have been error-free and with working hotkeys.

The link for the driver is below. You will also need to download the modded INF file and use it to replace the original one that comes with the driver. Read around the linked forum below or research to understand what I mean.

Again, this driver version and upgrade were for my personal needs, and not even for the latest and greatest driver version, but I'm just leaving the info here for future reference in case anyone wants to try.

Download: v266.64 Windows 7/Vista 64bit | Sony Mobile - 26x Series GeForce Driver Releases - LaptopVideo2Go Forums

 

I have upgraded my hdd to an SSD and the responsiveness of the laptop is insane.. i was thinking to upgrade my cpu to an i5 560M but concerned about the motherboard not recognizing it due to different multiplier of the cpu. thoughts?

Thank you.

 

Has anyone else had any problems with their SD card reader? Mine says "Windows cannot verify the digital signature for the drivers required for this device... (Code 52)" - I've never tried to use it before so for all I know it could have had this message all along (got the laptop in 2010). I tried installing a 'new' driver from the Sony site but that appears to be the same driver and didn't help; I tried uninstalling the device and restarting, to no effect. Don't know what else to try.

Also, even if I get this to work, can it handle SDHC cards?

 

please ignore

 

Has anyone successfully upgraded one of these to a i7 quad core? Like a 720QM, 740QM, 820QM, 840QM, etc.