Sony Vaio Z i5/i7 Official Owners Thread

Absolutely no way to overclock the CPU?

 

Do we need motherboard / BIOS support (serious question)?

I thought of another crazy mod: someone should try building a in-laptop water cooling solution. We can start with the space normally occupied by the optical drive

 

I wasn't looking to upgrade, but the new model is tempting me. I use mine for work, and need a lot of processing power and fast disk access. My Z48 is brilliant for this, but the 128 looks like it would cut down my wait time even more. By the way HN usually won't negotiate much on Sony, was it the book you threw at them or a knife?

 

First: No it's not possible.
Second: Why would you want to, whichever one you picked will already be really fast (even i5 is faster than almost anything on the marked).

Temps aren't that low and a laptop isn't made for overclocking. If you need more speed buy a faster model / laptop.

 

Would strongly suggest you go up at least one level on the SSD capacity. Several people have said that by the time you get through with various software overhead, you will be disappointed by how much is left available to you.

Also, without the WWAN, I don't believe you get GPS.

 

I agree with upping the SSD to 192G.

If you want you can balance that out by just ordering 4GB RAM since you can always increase that 8GB anytime you want.

Also, if you choose Windows Professional instead of Ultimate, two things happen:

1) You save money while giving up almost nothing -AND-
2) You get to choose the 'Fresh Start' option (which is much better imho than getting it with all that garbage-ware installed)

 

I'm configuring a Z at sonystyle.com, and for the SSD's I can either get 192 as a 128+64, or 256 as a single drive. There isn't a choice for getting 256 as 64x4. Is there going to be much performance difference between the two-drive or single-drive set ups?

Also, is the i7 just not available anymore? The configurator only shows the i5.

thanks

Kevin

 

It appears the i7 is in short supply so I see that option kick in and out.

The single drive 256G actually refers to is a single physical drive comprising two logical 128G drives which make a x2 RAID0 array.
The 192 comprises 3 logical drives of 64GB each yielding a x3 RAID0 array.

Benchmarks indicate that x3 beats x2 in terms of data rate in and out of the drive, write speed, read speed... (outside of benchmarks I don't expect you will see the difference so much).

OTOH 256GB also beats 192GB (in the obvious way )

So, your choice on that one and know that no matter which way you go, I expect you will be very happy with the results.

 

Where do you order so that you get a PS3 thrown in?

 

The free PS3 is a World Cup Rebate Promotion being run by Sony Australia. I'm still waiting for mine to be sent to me.

 

Nice!

I give it a try but I'm not sure what to think about...

First the Windows Task Manager still says my CPU is at 100% when for instance I run OCCT. I guess that the Windows Task Manager scales accordingly to the maximum process performance?

Second it certainly works because under OCCT the CPU temps reaches 56°C+58°C instead of 77°C+79°C.

However I'm not under the impression that the battery life gain is that interesting... I should keep this setting for a while before making my opinion, though.

 

Or even better: if you really need more speed buy a desktop

 

Has anyone tried the new Nvidia beta driver 256? Does it improve gaming performance? link: NVIDIA DRIVERS 257.15 BETA

 

I can honestly say this is the coolest laptop I have owned; not that I have pushed it constantly at max but for everyday useage my previous laptops used to run hot on the lap, this is cool by comparison.

Cheers,
T

 

will that even work for vaio z?

 

Apparently, some Vaio F users reported that this new beta driver improved performance by 10fps! Want to know if it does work for the Vaio Z

 

could you guys provide any basic game benchmarks

such as
CSS/HL2
COD 4
SC2
Crysis

any info on the gaming would be good. Like can it play new graphics games such as Crysis on Low-Med ? well? as in playable and you would enjoy?

 

Sandy - Okay

I've asked before in this thread too. It's also frustrating how there are very, very few videos of Sony Vaio Z 2010 gamings performance on Youtube. Compared to m11x which has a gazillion videos.

Maybe Vaio Z is just not selling that well, or gamers don't buy it

 

I'm wondering about in two or three years. By then 256GB would be very, very little.

In fact I think I have 100 GB of music alone, and 50 GB of HD Video Podcasts.

Yeah, external hard drives are great, but it's really limited storage, for a power user.


Maybe I dont understand what it's like because I have never even TRIED a SSD machine in a store... Unless Netbooks count!

 

Hey all

I got my Z 2 days back. Very happy with it.

I really appreciate all that is going on this forum. I have been following this thread since the begining and it helped me in my decision.

Just an update for all you guys. There are new drivers available on the japanese site. One of them is a BIOS update which was updated today.

Link here
VPCZ11AFJ | ????? | ???? | VAIO | ???

Nvidia drivers on this link are dated 13/04/2010 and the ones on US site are dated 24/02/2010

Link here
VAIO : Sony Europe

Z12 in Europe has newer Nvidia drivers 01/06/2010. I guess if the hardware didn't change the drivers must work.
http://support.vaio.sony.eu/computing/vaio/downloads/preinstalled/index.aspx?l=en_GB&m=VPCZ12S9R_B

BTW first 2 links were posted here by other people. I just saw the updates. I don't want to take the credit away.

Enjoy.

 

Dude, these Nvidia drivers are not new. They are still version 188.80, even for Z12

 

Along with the dates, the file sizes are different because of which I thought they are different. Unless something changed why would file sizes be different ?

 

Hey, thanks for posting the links Do you know what the BIOS update does? I did the update, from the BIOS screen I don't see anything different.

Also, for the Nvidia driver, the Z12 looks to be the same. For the Z11 update in April, I downloaded and it installed without showing the version. Although the device manager reports the same version as before, when I right-click on the Desktop, there's no longer a slight delay before the menu appears. Previously, I believe this delay was attributed to the Intel menu (or something). So, my guess is that something must have changed.

In any case, installing the April Nvidia driver was heart-stopping: the screen went blank, I had to do a hard power-down and was all prepared to do a restore. Luckily none of that needed to happen

Edit: I noticed something strange. Under Nvidia Inspector, my previous GPU BIOS version was 70.16.51.00.02, now it's 70.16.51.00.0A. Interesting...

 

Google translate from Japanese to English gives this :
"BIOS update program provides a process to change the password."

 

When will the Z12 hit American shores? the US sony store is just listing the Z11 with only i5.

 

Thanks for the help

For the heck of it I also installed the Z12 version, hoping for another bump in the GPU BIOS. Alas, it remained unchanged...

Edit: There is definitely something different about the April version. After installing the Z12 June driver, the delay when right clicking on the desktop showed up again.

 

I am also waiting for it. Hope its soon. Want to order it before I go on a trip in August !....

 

MicroCenter is now stocking the first refresh preconfig. Z122GX/B in Black. This is the first Black-Colored Z I've seen sold in stores in the U.S. Looks like MicroCenter priced it $100 ($1799.99) more than the previous Z112/Silver ($1699.99) with the same specs.

 

Found some interesting videos about Z, on Youtube. I know most of them have been posted before


Vaio for Business - Z - YouTube - VAIO for business - Z Series < This is about the previous Z generation. Pretty interesting

Break the Code Commercial - YouTube - Sony VAIO Z Commercial - The new size of Performance < A man with a tiny laptop, a woman with a giant laptop(size matters?), become engulfed by guy with a perfect Laptop!

Vaio Z 2008 model - YouTube - Sony VAIO Z Series - Supreme Performance on the Move
Vaio Z 2010 model - YouTube - The new VAIO Z Series


The Test Lab: Dropping Vaio Z - YouTube - The Test Lab: VAIO Z Drop Test < A test that shows the Vaio Z falling multiple times on the ground, with the engineers trying to see if the machine is still working afterwards!

The Test Lab: Pressure Vaio Z - YouTube - The Test Lab: VAIO Z Pressure Test < Lots of pressure gets applied to the Display Lid and the Palm Wrist, to see how it affects the machine.

The Test Lab: Vaio Z hinge test - YouTube - The Test Lab: VAIO Z and BZ Hinge Test < The Vaio Z gets closed and opened more than 11,000 times to see if it still would function as it should.

Reinventing the Z: Overview - YouTube - Reinventing the Z: Project Overview < Talks about the goals and challenges about making the new Vaio Z.
Reinventing the Z: SSD and Hybrid Graphics - YouTube - Reinventing the Z: Quad SSD & Dynamic Hybrid Graphics < Talks about SSD, Hybrid Graphics, Backlit keyboard and more.
Reinventing the Z: Concept and Design - YouTube - Reinventing the Z: Concept & Design < Talks about the look and feel about the Vaio, and about the placement of ports and Cylinder design.
Reinventing the Z: Motherboard and Aluminium Core - YouTube - Reinventing the Z: Engineering an Aluminum Core & New Motherboard < Talks about decreasing the weight of the Laptop and making things smaller.

 

Most of them have been posted before but I didn't take a look at them yet

I'm amazed at how they are targeted at the "business" user which usually don't need such an impressive hardware.

I'm convinced that the real, perfect target audience is more of the power user e.g. software developper or graphic designer for instance.

Well I guess it's easier for Sony to get money from the businessmen than from these people unless they are freelancers in which case they are able to buy what they see fits.

Plus such power users are usually well informed and don't need to be targeted by ads to know that such an amazing device exists and could be their closest-as-possible-to-perfect everyday tool.

 

I've been hearing it should be here around the 20th of June.

 

Hi,
I know this has been covered before but has anyone managed to get the full (Sony quoted) 6hr usage in Stamina Mode from the Z series (with standard batter)?

If so, what were your settings.

I have had my Z for a month now & never seen the 'time remain' higher than 3.5hr in Stamina mode.

Also, Sony quote 6hr as per a benchmark, does anyone know how to obtain the details, so we can see how 6hrs was acheived....

Cheers,
T

 

I think Sony looks at the z, and thinks the main thing setting their laptop apart from others is the size/weight. There aren't other professional looking laptops that have similar specs in that size group. As a consequence, they're targeting it at people who would are willing to pay a hefty premium for that benefit - those who are constantly traveling and needing to use the laptop while in transit. Those who are constantly in meetings where you need an unobtrusive and small laptop (and super quiet, woops). They might think that the power user generally would prioritize for a slightly larger, but more powerful, laptop than the z.

 

How good is headphone output compared to previous Z?

 

Turn brightness down, also u can lower the Hz and 64 bit color to 32 in the intel control panel.. Also turn off wifi. Just by turning the brightness all the way down, My Z sometimes reports over 8 hours, which was surprising to me.. Usually, 4-5+ hours surfing net/watching videos is easy to achieve just by turning to brightness down

 

I am unable to find the post but ZoinksS2k had left some part of his disk unallocated as a precautionary measure for SSD performance degradation.

I want to do the same thing but I have a few questions :
1. Inside windows disk management there are 2 things "unallocated space" and "free space". Are they the same ? Will having "free space" have the same effect as "unallocated space" ?
2. Will allocating 15GB as free be enough for the 192GB SSD configuration ?

 

Do we have any Z11/Z12 owners with the FHD screen (1920x1080) here? I am wondering how it looks if you change the resolution to 1600x900. Does it look crappy like LCDs typically do out of native resolution, or does it look like a regular non-FHD screen?

I ask because I'm worried the incredibly tiny 1920x1080 won't be usable all the time (DPI adjustments don't always work too well), but I'd hate to pass up on the sexy FHD option and regret it.

By the way, here's a video showing off the 1920x080 resolution and some comparisons to 1600x900. (Not incredibly useful, but interesting.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPKZ2S_Jm-g

 

How do you know? "Business" includes a lot more than MBAs in suits, you know. Like programmers and engineers.

 

How does one get into the BIOS?

Also, I'm trying to recover the space to get my recovery partition. The problem is that every partition software that I boot off, the trackpad doesn't work. In gparted live the screen is also really messed up. I'm using the stable release from sourceforge. Any ideas?

 

It will look crappy like LCDs typically do out of native resolution. It's an LCD display.

Well you have several options to make the thing comfortable at native resolution like changing the DPI, using the Windows magnifier and so on. So I'd say go for the FHD if you're unsure and willing to pay the extra fee... Keep the 1600x900 only if you're on a budget or if you're sure it's enough/better for you.

 

I concur display backlighting seems to suck a lot of power.

Using 40Hz refresh instead of 60Hz also provides a noticeable battery life increase for no noticeable difference in common tasks.

 

F2. It's written in the user manual, you'll find it in electronic form on the Z's SSD/HDD.

 

Have you taken a look at the videos? In these ads I don't see anything else that MBAs in suits. Maybe I'm too much into clichés but ads are usually about clichés and there is not the least tip that it would be something else.

As for programmers and engineers, I already stated that they were probably more the perfect users of the Z.

 

So I did a clean install of Windows 7 x64 on my VPCZ114G/X and I'm having problems with the computer freezing when it should be sleeping. It happens in both stamina and speed modes at random and the power light will stay green and the fans never stop spinning. I have to do a hard power down to get running again. Any thoughts? Oh, and I don't use Norton anti-virus.

 

I'm getting a new Bios update on my Z.

not sure what it does but its:
VPCZ1* 「BIOS R2074C3」 UPDATE PROGRAM 2010/06/11 2499KB

 

Welcome to the club,

1) Regarding the vertical lines try dropping to 40Hz that should eliminate the lines and as well increase battery life.

2)Regarding the ESC button, its the same with mine slightly elevated.

3) Regarding the lid, I don't have that problem but I do have the right hinge slightly higher than the left hinge and others have noted that cosmetic issue as well.

4) If your palmrest doesn't begin to wear out after a month consider yourself lucky as well if you're viewing flash videos online in fullscreen don't be surprised if the screen goes black and you need to do a hard reboot. Right now I'm hoping Sony makes an aluminum palmrest as mine is showing wear after a month of minimum use and they bring out a new driver that fixes the black screen of death issue. I knew over a month ago this was going to become a big issue.

Cheers.

 

Dropping to 40hz doesn't eliminate the lines

 

Has anyone sent in their laptop to Sony using the extended warranty? How long does it usually take them to fix it if there's some physical damage? My laptop won't be delivered to the repair center until Tuesday, and I leave for Japan Friday after (not in that week, the week after).

 

Woohoo, just got my hands on a Z12 from Japan. Sweet. Except... need to reinstall Windows on it, but can't, for the life of me, find the original applications + drivers... created the recovery DVDs, but nothing in them of note.

Can anyone assist? I know the original drivers are in \Windows\Drivers, but where do I find the original apps? (Event Service, VAIO Settings, etc)?

Thanks!

-pN

[edit] looks like vaio-link has them all, but what a hassle to re-download everything - why did they change the structure of the recovery cd? my TZ had everything on dvd #2...

 

You'll just have to install the neccesary software so you can use Vaio Recovery Center. Through that app you can install all your drivers / sony apps, but it requires that the recovery partition is still there (since it gets the soft from there).