Sony Vaio Z i5/i7 Official Owners Thread

I have my Z since a few days, everything seems fine (except for squriking from the bottom and loose battery).

But what's your experience on battery life? I went through about 3 complete cycles and the battery should be fine, am I right?

But battery runtime with all power options (I could find) turned on, stamina, 40% brightness and just surfing with WLAN is just below 3h!!! I've expected 4-5h!?

Have I forgot something, is the battery crap or is this normal?

 

Did you use the silent mode setting and power saver?
Did you also disable bluetooth, the auto brightness setting and the backlit keyboard in the vaio contol centre?
You could also try putting the Intel GMA drivers in max battery mode.
If you have the model with a dvd drive did you power that off?

 

Is there really a Run PC Decrapifier? lol.....

I would exchange it.

Is it really that bad? How often do you have to polish?

 

rmcx,

Thank you a lot for valuable input regarding FSX! I am also an avid fan of this simulator and it is absolutely amazing to see how well Z can run it! Wow!

FSX on the go, I love that!

regards,
borys

 

I haven't ordered my new z yet (waiting to see it in my local Sony Centre) but if the sound is anything like my old one I'm not surprised you're complaining about it. Apparently there's a better driver around that might help (can't check it myself as my old z series had a nasty encounter with a bowl of soup!) Anyway I recently bought a NXT soundbar and find it excellent - connects via single usb plug. It's 10 inches wide so fits flush with my 10 inch netbook probably won't look as neat on the z though.

 

I'm a big fan of CCleaner, which used to go by the name Crap Cleaner.

Replacing the stock speakers with upgraded ones is very doable. They are taped on the keyboard lid.

 

ehosey2, would you mind posting your suggestions in this thread?

 

It's called PC Decrapifier....yep....it exists.

Removing bloatware is an option for those that didn't or couldn't get Fresh Start.
I read an article on CNET about removing crapware....just google the subject and you can probably find the article.

I wonder if there is a better way to remove crapware....I know that Best Buy's Geek Squad charges a fee to remove crapware from new computers. I would like to find a good way to just do it myself....and the article is the best guide so far.

 

i have the i5-520m and on 6/8 brightness i get about 5-6 hours surfing web. probably 3-4 watching youtube and other vid. on stamina. just using itunes and word about 6-8 with wifi still on. no bluetooth on ever.

 

All the Z models are identical in terms of that materials used for the lid/chassis. The "silver" model is just silver paint, the black model is black paint, the premium carbon is clear matt coated and the signature series is clear gloss coated.

So why do the clear ones cost more? well since the coating is transparent, they would have to select lids that don't have any displeasing kinks or separations in the fibers, and the painting process seems to sometimes involve a grey or brownish tint in the resin as well as a blue speck and probably a final coat over that. On top of that, the edge of the carbon is feathered into the black surrounds. Basically yo are paying for $50 of painting labor.

You can see waviness, feathering, tint and speck in this picture of my old SZ.

I hereby sentence you to reading my painfully long post on carbon fiber composites:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=6053198&postcount=1942
a) all carbon fiber is mixed with plastic, thats' why we call it "Carbon fibre reinforced plastic"
b) it's all "real" carbon fiber. The only difference is how long the fibers are. Long fibre unidirectional fibers are higher performance than short milled fiber.
c) Since the lid is the only place it is practicable to use long fiber composite, Sony used it there. It is not cosmetic. The clear paint, however, is.

 

Congrats and look forward to the review, but you need to start a new thread or post it in the old Z thread -- it's just so hard to find post in this thread right now.

 

that's a good price... what's the cheapest anyone has found outside of sonystyle?

i ask as i'm getting a Z brought to australia by some US relatives in june, just need to buy it first!

 

As I may have said.. I dont think this is a driver/soundcard issue... because it sounds STUNNING when plugged with the headphone or any speakers as a matter of fact...

its the actualy speaker that sucks. to put it in an example.... i cant skype without maxing the volume (without headphones and external speaker of course) while i can skype with only 20% volume on my old SZ. i can even watch movies with only 10% volume on my old SZ.

Thanks for the advice btw, but i reckon ill pass... the soundbar will kindda... kill the point of getting the sleek Z.

other than the sound i have no problem with the Z.

BTW I "fresh-started" my Z.. any advice on what i should do(tune) to make it long lasting and maximise the performance?

i7, 192GB, 8GB Ram

 

hey

please let us know once you find a compatible ram that will work on the new z...sony really wants to make it hard on us to modify these z dont they lol

 

The PortableOne guys do it for their Sony units for $30 or so. I don't see one for the latest Z but I would guess it's only a matter of time.

Here's the link for the previous Z:
http://www.portableone.com/_e/P1_VA...ecovery_Set_Windows_7_Professional_64_Bit.htm

 

Not only games on the run...

An earlier post of mine shows that it will do my development work up to 3x faster than my i7-920 desktop. I'm making an effort to transition to the Z 100%!

About the only thing remaining for me is to be able to run my triple monitor setup reasonably well. I am currently experimenting with the Diamond USB/DVI device for that. Will report on progress as I get there.

 

What better driver?

 

I'm afraid I can't remember - saw it mentioned on one of the enormous threads here - forgot to bookmark it. Personally I'd say the sound quality is probably limited by the the necessity of having to have small speakers due to space constraints.

 

I don't recall the exact steps, but there was an option to bypass 3rd party apps in the Recovery CD sequence. This is in addition to the option to forgo the System Recovery partition. I don't remember seeing this in the older Z recovery environment.

It installed the Sony Drivers but didn't install Norton, office, works, etc.

I'll see if I can repeat the result tonight.

 

Nah, I mean I bought my Z already fresh started... what i was saying was any additional steps.

i saw a few somewhere in this thread but forgot to bookmark it. something like disable defrag. update RTS. what else?

cheers

 

Well there's my list. Maybe this is the one you were thinking of? (I've added one more due to feedback from STxVAIO):

Mods to brand new Vaio Z11:

1. Download and install latest Intel Rapid Storage (RST) drivers. Ver 9.6 or higher (To enable RAID 0 TRIM).

2. Enable write-back cache (Speedup): Intel Rapid Storage: Manage | Advanced

3. Turn on VT (virtualization) in bios (Just because there's no reason not to unleash amazing virtualization prowess).

4. Turn off Windows weekly defrag schedule (Why thrash on the poor ssd?).

5. Turn off boot time re-arranger: In Regedit: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction\Enable -> “N” (For same reason as #4).

6. Bloatware removal. Can be facilitated using tools such as "Revo Uninstaller", "PC Decrapifier", "CCleaner", "Autoruns"

 

I would like to know what you think is the cause (just in case I run into it as well ).

 

The only thing I ran into was the camera software.

 

thanks heaps man. this is the list the list i was looking for. I managed to do everything but bootoptimizefunction i only have one option under bootoptimizfunction on my Z. which is "default" i dont have any other entries. which is weird because im staring at it on my SZ and there is indeed an entry called "enable"

 

are you able to play some games like company of heroes, age of empire 3, trackmania nation during 45 minutes without burning your laps on this model ?

 

Hi Treofred,

I think all Z's are made in Japan to a 'base' level.

CTO's are then added to based on what options were selected by each customer. While pre-configured models come in from Japan and are routed out without modification to customers.

Stefan

 

the base of ANY laptop will burn your lap if you play a graphically demanding game. i play MW2 often and it does release a lot of heat but only around the vent. the rest of the base, all keyboard and palmrest itself dont get hot.

btw i play mw2 on full graphic, 4x AA and native res

 

Hey everyone. I've been reading this thread from the start. I just got my brand new Sony Vaio Z (i7, 6GB, 1080p, 256GB (Quad), 3G,...) which I ordered yesterday here in Germany (10% student discount). Really quick delivery.
I am writing this on the Vaios awesome keyboard. So far I can say:
- I got diagonal lines as well. They are visible when you move your eyes over the screen or move the screen or your head. Not too annoying though. They are prominent at 40, 59 and 60Hz settings.
- The cooling system makes an annoying noise, but is very quiet so you can hear it only when your in a silent room.
- The temperature is very pleasant, not hot at all... Though the air blown out is very hot, but that is what a cooling system is meant for i suppose .
- With windows dpi setting at 100% everything is pretty much unreadable unless you are like 15cm close to the screen but I love how sharp everything gets when you set it to 125 or 150 percent.
- Sony installed so much crap on the laptop that i decided to wipe it off right now and install a clean Win7 Pro, which I get for free from University. (Via msdnaa)

 

hi martinring,

i'm pretty much going for the same configuration as your Z (also in germany), so just a little question: did you order directly from sonystyle? just asking because of the 10% student discount)

thanks

 

No i ordered at notebookcenter4students... they list it at 2245,- which is 10% off from 2499 at sonystyle. Also they got it in stock and sonystyle says something about 4 to 5 weeks delivery.

 

By the way... they say dual-ssd, which confused me a bit... but its defenitely quad. that was the first thing i checked in the intel drivers.

 

Arghhhhhhh! Z is totally out of stock in HK. Sonystyle... none, and I emailed a couple of authorized reseller there and got the thumbs down:

 

sounds great! is the color really black like in the description (and not in the picture)? and is the drive dual or quad? maybe you can even take some pictures, still not sure which color to get

thanks so far


EDIT: just read about quad. nice!!

 

also @ dod13

I sent the PM to yellowfrizbee because I was trying to keep the thread on track and not deviate too much. That is all, but here is what I was thinking, because I use IE8 and this fixed my freezing issues with the web browser.

I had suggested that the freezing might have been caused by IE8 web browser and the freezing issues with add-ons, and explained to her about resetting IE8. But as I found out, yellowfrizbee is using firefox web browser so if anybody can help her that would be great.

 

I can take some pictures and post them later. But I dont have my camera here right now. The color of the palmrest is like in the pictures at the sony pages. Its not really black but a dark gray aluminum. The lid is real black though which kind of doesnt match very well. I think the silver one looks better, but you can only get it at sonystyle which is more expensive and after what ive been hearing will take veeery loooong.

 

some pictures would be great! i thought the silver and the carbon one also has a little bit different palm rest color... but maybe it's only a viewing angle thing. dude that's complicated!!

 

Didn't want to quote the whole long post. But I work on inventory systems and I agree with you, it probably does do that. It also probably is SAP, because only SAP would be that dumb

It should work that As soon as you receive the product in the system the inventory receive and backorder process should run one after the other. Or in this case, since Backorder would always be shipped before new orders, backorders should be included in the formula to determine items available. That way it would never show as available. It really is simple, but SAP is not simple, which is why that would be my guess - lol Or it could be a Sony only system, which homegrown systems never work out in favor of the company.

Do you have a SonyStyle Store near you? Then you can go see if the display models have what you are seeing.

That would be awesome, since I got it from BB it did not have the fresh starts, so I will have to do it myself. I get it on Friday, so I figured I would start making lists on what I need to do when I get the PC

 

As I've mentioned before, I ordered the VPCZ11FHX/XQ on 2/8. Ever since then, my scheduled ship date stayed at 2/9/10 and never changed. I called Sonystyle customer support last week and was told 3/31/10. Yesterday, I emailed them again and they said they just received 51 units and were filling orders in the order in which they were received and I was #8 on that list, so mine would be shipping. Today, the order status changed to Ready to Ship.

It would appear that they've allocated the 51 units to pre-orders and may not have a date for restocking yet.

 

Can the battery be upgraded to a larger capacity like 9-10 hrs?

 

can anyone who has a 1080p screen comment on the battery life? I want to know if I'm missing too much for not having a 1080p option in the US (other than the overpriced signature model)

 

So how long does it take for Sony to update their drivers? I do think they need to update their drivers/software. I can't change my colors of the screen because its supposedly is connecting to an external monitor(its not -.-)

 

∞

/10chars

 

I just called SonyStyle.se to see what the "no longer available" meant.

It really meant just that. The batch Sweden was allocated is now sold and this particular Z model will never ever be sold again in Sweden! :-O

I just hope I'll still get mine. I don't believe it until I see it.

 

Oh right! I forgot that the Signature Editions are supposed to be limited quantity runs... But then again, I assumed they would not even allow pre-order to go through beyond what they ever wanted to produce, no?

Otherwise, they're just going to tick off some of their biggest spending buyers (and early adopters!). Would make no sense to me....

 

Hi all! Got my new Z on monday and now i have had some time to get familiar with it. We only got two new Z's in Finland for now and more is coming this friday, so some delivery problems in my country as well. I'm very happy and proud owner of my new Z, i also had last model from Z and i think that this has a huge improvement in all aspects.

Some basic specs from my VPCZ11Z9E/B:

i7-620M, 6 gb memory, 256 gb SSD raid 0 ( 4 x 64 gb ), full hd display, premium carbon, wwan, fingerprint sensor

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Oscar2's must-do list:

Here is my abbreviated list of absolute must-do items on a brand new Z11. What did I forget?

1. Download and install latest Intel Rapid Storage (RST) drivers. Ver 9.6 or higher (To enable RAID 0 TRIM).

One of the first things i did with this laptop, according Crystal Disk Mark 3.0 this driver update also gave some noticiable results.

2. Enable write-back cache (Speedup): Intel Rapid Storage: Manage | Advanced

I had no idea about this, so thanks for the tip.

3. Turn on VT (virtualization) in bios (Just because there's no reason not to unleash amazing virtualization prowess).

I guess this is quite irrelevant if i dont use any virtualization programs.

4. Turn off Windows weekly defrag schedule (Why thrash on the poor ssd?).

Yeah this was turned on in windows 7 by default, so had to turn this off.

5. Turn off boot time re-arranger: In Regedit: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction\Enable -> “N” (For same reason as #4).

This is the only part where i got some problems. When i search from regedit, i can follow that path only till HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Dfrg. After that i dont have a choice for BootOptimizeFunction, only option in this point is "Statistics". So am i doing something wrong and how imporant this boot time re-arranger is for the sake of SSD?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I also run some tests of my own with Crystal Disk Mark and PC Mark Vantage and 3D Mark Vantage. I'll post a few pics from these.

Crystal Disk Mark 3.0



I guess those are normal results for Z with SSD?


PC Mark Vantage




3D Mark Vantage



I also had some small problems. I'm trying to get rid of everything unnecessary such as VAIO premium partners, but it's impossible to uninstall it. Uninstaller just doesn't launch. Any idea?

If there would be an update for Nvidia gt 330M, then it would be downloadable from Vaio Update instead of Nvidia homepages, am i right?

Thank you from the help and answers.

 

Create system recovery disk(s)? I did mine with a single DVD+DL

 

I don't know that much about it myself (the recommendation comes from Arith1), but my understanding is that Windows gathers bootup info for a while (many boot cycles), then when it's ready it does some moving around of files on disk so as to optimize boot time on an hdd. However, these optimizations don't have any real benefit for ssd's, hence the recommendation to turn it off.

otoh it's not like it's moving them around all the time or anything. So even if it is on, it only represents occasional moving around of files, not like the weekly defrag.

 

W-H-A-T - I have never heard anything so ludicrous!!! They stop selling it before they appear in shops etc!!!

I seriously hope I get mine - it's due at a Swedish retailer tomorrow - so was/am expecting it on Friday...

 

I'm just curious that how come someone else have different regedit paths then i, when i dont even have path like that.

But again, thanks for advices.

 

I wasn't dreaming (apologies if this has already been posted).

Select NO here:


Doesn't install most of the junk (Office, Norton, etc) but installs the drivers and whatnot:



Note I said MOST above. Cleaning should be a bit easier/cleaner for those so inclined to do it this way.