Sony SE Owners' Thread

Can anyone comment on the portability of this notebook (versus say a MacBook Pro 15")? I'm looking for a nice laptop to do programming on the go and the Z is too expensive. I need a high resolution, and this one looks nice and has long battery life w/ the slice. Any problems using this notebook on your lap?

 

Hello everyone, I've been lurking the forums for awhile now trying to find a laptop to replace my old Toshiba after it's 4th birthday.

I think I've settled on the Sony SE after reading this thread and seeing it in stores today. The screen was by far the best I've been able to find in my price range.

I had a question about RAM after talking to a guy who was also eyeing the SE at the Sony store. He suggested they might use a special RAM because it is so lightweight.

Is it hard to add an extra 4 GBs myself to the empty slot? Does anyone have any recommendations on what is the best place to buy an upgrade?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I apologize if I missed this question being mentioned earlier.

 

The SE uses standard RAM modules if I am not mistaken.

 

Oh, okey.. thanks for the reply!

As u say, hopefully they will fix this. Cause I really want 6Gb/s in the future..

 

Crucial's Memory Advisor tool is your friend. (You don't have to buy their brand, but they let you know what sort of memory you need to get).

RAM upgrades on the more cramped (and equally thin) SA/B models are reported to be easy so you shouldn't have any problem. Just make sure you buy the 4GB configuration, not the 6GB one

 

Is there any way to fix it?

 

This laptop is pretty light and very comfortable to hold on your lap. I don't know how it compares to MacBook.

 

Just go into the Intel graphics configuration screen and uncheck the box for Intel Display Power Saving Technology or at least move the slider to the middle instead of the far right. That should resolve it.

 

Deleted.........

 

Thanks for the quick replies. Once a cheque comes in, looks like this will be my new computer.

Cheers all.

 

Some news about the SATA II - III issue.

I installed the latest BIOS R2084H4 -> still on SATA II
I downgraded to R1030H4 -> SATA III, CrystalDiskMark seq. read speed = 484 MB/s.

The R1030H4 does otherwise not work reliable on the SE (Fan, touchpad) hence I upgraded to R2084H4 again.

As summary: hardware OK, BIOS sucks
hope Sony will fix this soon.

 

Does Dell have to amend their "XPS 15z: Thinnest 15" PC on the Planet" claims? I believe the SE is the same thinness.

 

Hahahaha, beyond this, Samsung Series 7 is 0.94" against 0.97" of the Vaio and Dell XPS 15z.

They are not the thinnest anymore. But no, they didn't change their website yet ^^

 

Forgot about the S7... maybe Sony/Dell can say "thinnest FULL HD 15" PC on the planet".

 

I'm pretty much set on this laptop but I have one quick question,

Is the internal battery easily replaceable? If someone could provide the model number that would be perfect.

Thanks!

 

So I got my laptop earlier this week. I figured I'd use it for a while before posting back about it, but first impressions are extremely good.

I managed to fix several things that kinda bothered me thanks to this forum - touchpad drivers, screen refresh, the sata 2\3 BIOS thing etc... you guys are a veritable goldmine and I'd like to thank you all for the great advice

Regarding the touchpad - i have no understanding for why Sony is including their own 'retarded' version when the synaptics own drivers work better. It's ridiculously easy to fix, but it's an inconvenience that can be easily avoided.

Also:
A convenient "workaround" for those of you who find the 40Hz refresh rate flicker annoying: use nircmd(search the link for "setdisplay 1024 768 24 90" to find the command) and make a shortcut to set the screen refresh, and map it to the VAIO button/put on desktop, and the refresh is back on 60Hz with 1 click, instead of navigating through 3(?) menus. Props to moralar for the links!

Also, all you need to do is unscrew 2 screws, slide the bottom service panel off and push a lever, and the default battery comes right out. So yes, its very easy to replace the battery if something should go wrong. The model number is VGP-BPS24(couldnt find a link in the US VAIO store, but its probably there somewhere). Its a standard battery for the entire S-series AFAIK.

 

What is your solution?

BIOS R1030H4 -> SATA III, CrystalDiskMark seq. read speed = 484 MB/s (Crucial M4 256 GB). However R1030H4 does not work reliable on the SE (Fan, touchpad) hence I upgraded to R2084H4 again.

What I detected is a bit strange. Using the latest Synaptics driver with BIOS R2080H4 (my initial one) caused some quite unreliable two finger scrolling (when starting the scrolling position was often set to the end of the document). With BIOS R2084H4 I feel the scrolling behaving much better (not as good as on any OSX touchpad but usable). In addition I installed TwoFingerScroll just for getting right mouse click using two fingers, this is missing even using the latest Synaptics driver. The mouse buttons are the only really bad pieces of hardware on my SE.

 

Wanted to ask the forum if anyone would consider using the SE as a desktop replacement? I'm looking at using an SE away from home for 2-3 months and am looking for a desktop replacement during that time.

Any feedback is appreciated.

 

Depends on what you do on your desktop. If you're a hardcore gamer... I'm not sure the SE will work for you. But if you're like me and do database application programming, office docs, light graphics, web stuff... it should work.

I stopped using a desktop at home years ago and I don't think I'll ever buy a desktop again.

The SE is actually my new desktop notebook... which is why I can give it a pass on the battery life. It's just so light, I bring with me more than my other ones.

 

The fan noise under heavy CPU load is pretty loud, though it's not so bad under heavy GPU load. If you'll be running CPU-heavy tasks for long periods of time, that is something to consider.

 

Interestingly enough my HP Envy experienced the same two-finger-jump-to-bottom scrolling oddity periodically. Not sure if it was a pressure thing or what - most of the time it scrolled fine.

 

+1 - My Envy is 5.1 lbs and the SE (at 4.4lbs) is noticeably lighter especially is you compare the power brick weights. Id say it's the best bang for the pounds (at least for now).

 

Not a solution per se but more of a peace of mind, I guess? was a bit tired when I wrote that post. I guess Sony will look into the matter and that's the "fix", instead of having to wonder why they don't have SATA 3. I am going to sniff around a little bit, though. If I find anything worthwhile I will definitely post back but so far you guys are the best lead. Besides, there isn't much to be done since Sony hasn't released driver downloads specific to my model.

 

If any of you are in the Seattle area, the Microsoft store in University Village currently has a deal through Monday for 25% when you spend over $1000. I just got myself one from there - I didn't go in looking to buy but that deal was impossible to pass up. FYI - they don't have any configuration options and they only have it in black. It's the i5 model with the 6630m and blu-ray and slice battery. Listed at $1299 but with the deal it's a little under $1000. It only has 4gb of ram but that can be upgraded cheaply and easily.

Does anyone know a good WiDi adapter that works with the SE?

 

Excellent tip. Just picked up the same at the San Diego store and saved a ton. Thanks!

 

Hello,

Can someone confirm that fan is silent in idle/writing in Word (eco mode or anything like that)? Ofcourse mine will be configured with an ssd.

Thanks in advance,

Mark

 

I received my CTO today, it also had a minor assembly problem. The battery panel was not inserted properly (three tabs on the wrong side of the chassis).

I noticed it contains a new touchpad driver dated 10/26.

 

The Sony site only has 9/2/11 and it says version 15.3.2.4 which is the same version as my 6/9/11 driver.

What version is yours?

 

Has anyone found a good case or sleeve to go with the SE yet? It seems to be a rather awkward size in terms of finding anything that fits well. The best prospects for sleeves that I've found are the Macbook Pro 17" sleeves, but they'll leave about 0.5" of slack in both horizontal dimensions. The Sony online store has a rather paltry selection of sleeves, none of which fit very well or at all. I didn't check their "professional" bags/cases, but the bags I did look at don't fit either.

 

Subscribing to this, does anyone know a good case for this baby ?

 

I had a Targus sleeve that fit an Acer Timeline 15.6" (it was a 16" sleeve) and the Acer is almost the same dimensions as the SE. I'll repost when I find the brand.

 

The possible closest fit I found from Targus was the 16" Impax sleeve. Was this the one you were thinking of?

Targus 16? Impax Laptop Sleeve (Black) | TSS209US

However, this thing has different specs depending where you look online, and Targus's own specs are nonsensical: the inner laptop compartment is 1.65" thick, whereas the whole thing is only 1" thick. If we assume that the 1" is a typo and the correct size of the inner compartment is 15.25 x 10.5 x 1.65, then that is slightly less slack in one horizontal dimension in exchange for a lot in the vertical dimension. (A form-fitting MBP 17" sleeve will have interior dimensions 15.5 x 10.5 x 1.) I also found a post saying the 16" Impax sleeve fit the Dell XPS 15 perfectly, and that beast is quite a bit thicker than the SE.

So I guess what I'm saying is, if this is the one you were thinking of, did you find that the fit was somewhat loose?

 

I have this Case Logic for a 15-16 inch laptop, and its fits nice:
Case Logic 15-16 Laptop Sleeve > Laptop Sleeves > Case Logic

 

Hmm... maybe it wasn't Targus. It had handles too... it came with a mouse. I bought it from Fry's a couple of years ago so it's probably not made anymore... I'll look for it.

 

I'm planning to add another 4gb stick of RAM to get my total memory up to 8gb. I'm looking at the 4gb sticks on Newegg and I'm a little overwhelmed by all the choices. Are they pretty much interchangeable, or are there any brands that are more reliable than others, or that work better with the SE?

 

Hi, thanks for the pointer. The specs say it fits devices up to 1.65" thick. Is there significant dead space since the SE is only 1" thick, or is the 1.65" figure inflated with some kind of stretchiness factor?

 

It has a little bit of dead space laterally, but I think it would be hard to find one that fits the width tightly... besides if you have the sheet battery you'll need the additional width.

 

Hi everyone - I've been thinking about getting the SE for a while now, and it's finally been released in the UK (just last week!).

So I went around to the Sony Centre and played around with the display model - and remembering what I'd read in this thread about the colour display, opened up Paint and drew a filled red (R-255 G-0 B-0) box, which showed up as orange. (It was quite striking especially as I drew the same box on an SB and a F next to the SE and it was nice and red on those.)

So my questions are:
1. Is this a generalised issue?
2. If your SE displays reds as orange, does this bother you, or is it something that you don't notice (given that it's rare to see an entire field of just red)?

 

It looks "reddish" to me... I guess like you said... I don't notice.

There are more people here that are very technical about color quality... I'm not one of them... I just like that it's not washed out like some other displays I've seen.

 

Hi I just wanted to let you know that I've been in contact with Sony about that issue for the last two weeks. Although I own the SA they suffer from the same issue as the SE with the latest bios. With the old bios everything is working on Sata III. As soon as I get an answer that might help from Sony I will post it here as well as in the SA thread.

 

This is a good test; in my experiments, it has convinced 100% of onlookers and even Sony store personnel. Another good one is to go to the Coca-Cola website.

It seems to be. All four SEs I've seen in person (including the one I own) have this issue, and so far we haven't had any reports of a unit that doesn't have the issue. Note that the problem isn't actually confined to red, it's just that the color inaccuracy seems to be the most noticeable for pure red. If you look at pure green carefully, you might notice that it looks kind of chartreuse, and if you look at pure blue, it's closer to Brandeis blue. (I had to go look at the handy chart on Wikipedia to get those color names.)

If it's just a few red lines or something, it's easier to tune out the orangeness and just pretend that the red looks a bit dirty or something. However, as the patch/area of red gets larger, the orangeness becomes quite conspicuous. Even red text, which I have now realized appears in all sorts of places I had never noticed before now, is big enough to look orange. For now, I cope by avoiding material that exposes the poor red reproduction. So that means nice photographs of sun-dappled tropical islands for desktop wallpaper, etc. I'm also resigned to having to do all photo editing on my desktop -- a bit of an annoyance if I'm traveling, but not quite annoying enough to be a deal-breaker overall. I am still keeping an eye out for possible non-Fruit replacements that can fill the SE's niche of light, low-power, high-res, and good viewing angles, while also offering better color accuracy...

 

I think any well-reviewed laptop DDR3 1333 module ought to be fine. I put a G.SKILL F3-10666CL9S-4GBSQ in my SE, which can be had from Newegg for $18 shipped. While I haven't done any benchmarking or stress tests, all seems to be functioning as it should.

 

i want to ask temperature of SE series when work at full load. Can anyone tell me ?

 

According to some (german) review for the i5 variant under full load:
42°C top side surface temperature.
46°C bottom side surface temperature.

 

Great, thanks for the tip. I just ordered a G.SKILL for $16.99.

Unrelated question: does anyone know how to disable the automatic brightness adjustment? I checked under brightness settings in the control panel but couldn't seem to figure it out.

 

Hello, i would like to ask you guys how is it with swapping DVD drive for second HDD. Is it possible? Combination of SSD and second HDD in dvd drive bay would be nice.

 

That's a good point about the sheet battery; I don't have one and didn't think of it. I found the Targus sleeve that I linked earlier for $16 on Amazon, and it has the same internal dimensions as your CaseLogic sleeve, so I decided to gamble on it. I'll report my findings when it arrives...

 

NewmodeUS, Hard Drive Caddys for Notebooks will have a caddy for that this month.

If you go to their site, you can see a video of how it's done for the SA/SB series.

Their solution is actually pretty cool because you can switch out the HDD and optical drive as you need it just by sliding the different caddies in/out.

 

Funny you mention Newmodeus as just received the hard drive caddy for the SE. Its in stock if you're so inclined. I also ordered a usb 3.0 external enclosure for the blu-ray that came with the SE. I don't often watch dvd's on my laptop but it'll be nice to preserve the option if I wanted to do so in the future.

Last stop on the new laptop purchase adventure is to actually get an ssd purchased -- I know, I know, cart before the horse and all that. This would be my third ssd purchase. My first was an Agility 2 from OCZ to upgrade to my old Dell E1705. After doing an RMA on the first one, I finally got the second working. I don't have much confidence with the OCZ brand right now and it may be due to vendor difficulty with SandForce, but I'll let better versed people debate the issue. My second purchase was a Crucial M4 for my desktop. Once I upgraded to firmware 9 its been flying along ever since. I recommend it for its speed (since the last firmware upgrade) and ease of install and reliability (no issues so far -- knock on wood). I'm anxious to purchase Samsung's 830 series for my SE. The latest hype says it'll bring SandForce speeds without its reliability issues. Unfortunately its so new I've only found "on order" listings online. That'll change with time and I'm not in a hurry so I'll wait it out.

The biggest challenge will be to get the ssd drive configured. The SE didn't include any windows backup media so I can't do an install without purchasing another set of windows software. It kinda upsets me b/c this was a question I asked prior to purchasing and I was lead to believe I could down load it online. I've since found b/c I purchased from a Microsoft brick and mortar store, I need to take it back for servicing, including consults. I can't utilize any online support (I talked with at least two people about this). Taking it in will be a last resort as I'm thinking of resetting the original hhd back to factory preset levels and cloning this image to the ssd. I found this article on Tom's Hardware that seems promising Clone a hard disk to a smaller drive? - Hard-Disks - Storage.

So far I'm loving the SE. It hits the windows sweet spot for me; a laptop that balances cost, size, weight (without the slice), display and battery life (with the slice).... ;-)

Update: I forgot the Samsung 830 (MZ-7PC128N/AM) is a laptop upgrade kit so hopefully I won't have to jump through so many hoops. It includes Norton Ghost and a "SATA-to-USB adapter cable to facilitate easy data migration, along with a mounting spacer so that laptops with traditional 9.5mm drive bays can accommodate the slim profile of this SSD". It also promises to "increase battery life by up to 30 minutes". We'll see.

 

Just use ABR Backup, like every laptop user does:
ABR (Activation Backup and Restore) | directedge.us