Sony X Series Official Owners Thread

Hello, after some testing, I believe Shaughani's observation is quite possible correct and I wonder why I did not notice it long time before, though I too had this suspicion during the last weeks: The X gets considerably hotter when plugged in (and this is *independend* of power schemes, i.e. it cannot be explained by a power scheme's cpu restriction when on battery.)

Now this is really something to look into. What exactly is causing the heat? I have not tested this enough, but it seems like it has nothing to do with an ongoing battery charging process - but this is s.th. I will look into further, these days.

What else could be causing this additional heat when plugged in? Either certain "processes", be it OS related or internal/firmware related(???) are off when on battery, or the mere circuitry and transformers (especially the charging module) causes more heat when plugged in. (BTW I should also do a test with battery removed.)

Moreover, might this in fact be an issue that was tackled, silently, with the 2nd generation vaio update? Who knows. Certain folks here seem to complain less about the fan than others. May this be because they use in on battery mostly?

I'd love to hear feedback from other forum members, please consider doing some tests too, it's no work after all, just unplug the battery a few hours when doing comparable work, and see if you notice a heat difference in coretemp -- coretemp is a must-have anyway. Or simply pay attention to the fan. And be sure your power scheme has idential processor settings for AC and battery.

Matthias, the vaio fan's enemy #1

 

Actually I have looked into some of the questions you are asking during the past few days. I have a general difference of 6-8C between being plugged in and running on battery (probably more if the fan wouldn't kick in), I'm using speedfan to measure temperatures.

The battery is not charging and it makes no difference whether it is in place or not. When the battery is charging the temp goes up way more, the fan is working to keep it at 60C.

This really makes me want to compete with Mattias above mentioned title as the vaio fan's enemy #1. Thanks for the reply!

 

what programs are running when temp goes to 60°C?

ps. i am now using battle encoder with 50 ms sleep wake cycles and 50% limiting. seems to work well and keeps temp down.
http://mion.faireal.net/BES/

 

- Install jeonghun's graphics driver (see above in this thread)
- Make sure you're running the Balanced power-saving mode (or Performance)
- Use Win 7 basic theme
- Remove Office "Click to Run" version that comes with the X. It's a weird virtualized installation that is slower than a conventional full version.
- Disable search indexing, install Everything Search instead
- Remove all security/AV software
- Un-install any unnecessary programs that run on Startup
- Use Chrome 18 with Adblock Plus and Adversity Antisocial, or try Opera.

For me, those basic steps result in modestly quick web experience, albeit one that isn't as snappy as my work machine. On the other hand, Office 2010 performance is excellent. Playback of 720p video in Windows Media Player is HW accelerated too, so watching movies isn't a problem either.

 

New, proper, testing of battery charging temperature: I shut down all programs (except speedfan), which with my current system leaves me with 40 processes running. While doing absolutely nothing with the computer the termperature stabilizes on the verge between 52-53C with the fan keeping it there.

Windows power options makes no difference since the temperature it not related to CPU usage, I am now having some tabs in chromium (COMODO Dragon) open and COMODO firewall running and the temperature is still 53C.

BES looks like interesting software and I will definitely try it, thank you for sharing! But I doubt it will do me any good since the problem is not CPU load.

I red about the stick-something-in-the-fan method are you sure it is not doing anything bad? (as long as you keep an eye on the heat of course)

 

>>>
EDIT: I just downloaded speedfan and it will report temps for core 0 that are afaics always exactly 10°C above the ones core temp reports. this doesnt really matter though, as long as we all are comparing temperatures reported by the same program. let's always specify which program we are using. all my temperatures are core 0 temps reported by coretemp. i dont know which temps are correct, coretemp or speedfan.

so speedfan typically reports ca. 50°C on my machine too most of the time. nothing wrong with your machine. fan should be running, at low speed, with that temp. just like mine.

speedfan also reports temp1 in addition to core0. currently temp1 is approx 5°C higher than core0. 55°.
i will observe temp1 in the future to tell if it is of relevance to the stick-tape-in-the-fan method. btw. i put my little piece of tape into the headphone jacket when not in use stays ther nicely.

what i am saying is, i want to find out if temp1 will go up faster with s.th. sticked into the fan, as opposed to loading the cpu on max. i will be reporting. volunteers may want to do the test too. thanks.
<<<
---------------

my stick sth in the fan method does work and imho does not do any harm as long as as you dont leave it unattended and and use it for temperatures of below 42°. the fan kicks in at 37 mostly. extending this to 42 gives you much more silent time. but you need to be at the pc and have coretemps overheat pop up active.
however since my vaio gets up to 58° when doing very very hard work and does NOT get shut down, the pc DOES get shut down at i think 44° or so when blocking the fan. i dont know why this is but it should be a sign that things are not as easy as they seeem. however, please realize that at e.g. 41°, the fan is running very low, and at 37 its not running at all. i doubt that blocking the fan at these temperüatues will do damage, not more than doing very heavy work and loading the battery at the same time, after all.

and yes, i tested again, and running on battery definitely lowers temperatures. that's clear now.

shaungani, please install coretemp just to see if it reports the same temps. if you are sure the speedfan temps are fine, dont bother.

when you go to taskmanager and sort by cpu, whats the typical idle percent and whats the most cpu consuming process?

Installing jeonghun's graphics driver is certainly something one can do, but imho its unlike this will solve the issue since others dont have this problem either, withoun that driver.

 

I installed coretemp and now I agree more with what you are saying. From my first experiences speedfan seems to add 9C to the values of coretemp. Before reading your post I had done some additional testing. As when doing the battery charging test all programs were closed, processor usage 0-1% during the tests.

What I did was:
1. Putting the computer to sleep and let it cool down.
2. Woke it up on battery power: temp went up and stabilized at 40C
3. Plugged in power and removed the battery: temp went up and stabilized at 45C
Not even the mouse pointer were moved during the test.

Windows power options (WPO) were set to High performance (passive) and Vaio Control Center (VCC) were on Silent Mode. As I said speedfan is not displaying correct temperatures and I will redo the thing tomorrow with readings from coretemp. My guess is that would also give a 5C difference by just plugging in the power.

Still there are things which differs my experiences from yours. For example coretemp is saying 42C and the fan is still silent. I switched to balanced in VCC and it still shuts up.

 

I've just tested my X13 (Z540, Balanced power mode) with Coretemp. Plugged in it idles at 29-30C. This is with Outlook, OneNote and Chrome open but not doing anything. When I load a web page the temperature spikes to 38-39C but the fan is not activated.

Unplugging the power, the temperature does fall and settles at 26C. So you're both right - there is a real difference in temperature.

 

Coretemp (CT) probably is the true temperature since waking up the computer after a long sleep indicates approximately room temperature and not 10C above room temperature.

My X apparently have a good day today since charging with no CPU usage gives me a temperature of 41C CT, and the fan is still silent. (VCC balanced, WPO balanced). Actually some web browsing while charging brings the temp up just a couple of degrees (43C max) and the fan is still silent all the time!

I whish this would become its general behaviour =) but this is really a personal computer with personality so you never know, apparently.

Edit: I wonder what lowers the CPU temperature more; restricting the speedstepping multiplier by reducing the max CPU usage in Windows Power Options or lowering the FSB but still allowing the multiplier to go up to 14x so that the maximum frequency is the same in both cases. I will do some testing on this when I find some time.

 

I am not a tech, but to me it seems this is a design flaw. it does not only seem to be the case with the X but with other laptops as well. -- namely, that running the computer plugged-in seems to cause a signifiant heat increase of internal components. Obviously there must be a power transforming unit within the laptop that runs hot only when plugged in, and that also enables charging the battery while simultaneously running the pc. this unit will run hot, both when charging the battery and when not. Only when on battery, it seems to stay cool. This is really absurd. They could have put this unit somewhere within in the chassis where it will not affect cpu and mainboard/hdd temperature that much. Or am I mistaken? Temperature is so much less when running on battery. I actually believe I should simply buy a second X and run on battery all the time. would solve all problems. charge overnight. two batteries will give enough power for 1 day. buy a spare battery when they start to wear to much. bam, i would have a silent ultralight computer.

I really thank quiff for reporting how this is on an X13 machine, as opposed to my X11. So at least the plugged-in/out difference is identical. If the X13's are overall cooler, I can't really tell. Currently I'm on battery, with Opera and WLM opened, and it's at 31 (machine has been running all day) and silent.
However I NEVER saw it be silent at 40 for more than 1 minute. the fan will ALWAYS kick in when _37_ is exceeded for more than a minute or two.

 

hi everybody. I gave it a try as well (temp check).

1. plugged in and running:
- opera (4 tabs open)
- total commander
- mpc-hc (1280x720, 25fps vid playing using ffdshow dxva - not so demanding vid)
- watching some pic and reading pdfs in the meantime
- 2 small apps in background: wordWeb, minWi (replacement for sony wireless program)

coreTemp shows 37/38 and no fan at all (test was run for about 1 hr)
then I put my X on the table and temp went up to 39/40 and the fan kicked in (before I kept it on my chest while lying down)

2. unplugged, rest of condition like above (and X not on the table) and run just about 30 min to see the temp behaviour
coreTemp shows ~36/37

I dont know why but the temp is almost THE SAME!!! - maybe I should've kept it a little longer to let it cool down - anyway I will make some more tests on battery later on.

and one more thing: I bought my X while in hong kong so it may be a little bit different (VPCX 128LG)


edit

now I'm confused a little.
I was watching a "standart" avi and the temp was 40/41deg all the time (this I can understand since it was mplayer and this program is using different spliitters/encoders) but what I cannot understand is that the fan was silent all the time - before it started running at 39.

 

pch,
speedfan measures two temps: temp1 and core0.
coretemp only measures core.
there must be a certain algorithm when the fan kicks in. it seems possible that either both temps are considered in that algorithm (speculation on my part), or just one. it may also be that only temp1 is considered, so you only get a correlated temp with coretemp. i have not yet tested it the fan reliably kicks in always at a certain temp1(!)-temperature.

what i can tell you is that you can't do one brief test and then know everything about your little vaio... just leave coretemp AND speedfan running and always keep an eye on them and what the fan is doing. after some time you will notice a pattern - and you may also notice that certain patterns you previously THOUGHT were the case, actually are not.
i have even been wondering if there is a third temp sensor...

 

I have kept an eye on coretemp (CT) for several days now and almost all the time it kicks in at 42C (CT). I however keep it below that critical temperature while plugged in by putting Windows Power Options (WPO) to balanced (Passive cooling 56% max CPU usage) and Vaio Power Options to balanced as well. Since I'm running Windows ThinPC and only have 40 processes running while idle the machine is still very quick except when under extreme load. Yesterday I had the following running: several Chrome tabs, 2 PowerPoint windows, a couple of pdf (Foxit Reader), and a LaTeX compiler and editor running at the same time and the computer were still coping perfectly with everything. And if I would need some more power could just switch to High Performance where I have no CPU max-limit.

What is very important in order to not cause confusion when you test and report your results here is to state what Windows and Vaio Power Options you are using, and if you use Active or Passive cooling or any max-limit on the CPU in WPO.

Active and Passive cooling in WPO obviously uses different algorithms for controlling the fan speed. Possibly also related to the change of the CPU temp. That is, active cooling might start the fan even below the critical temperature if the temperature is rising fast. But this is only my speculations, so far.

I can really recommend the Windows ThinPC, which is basically Windows 7 designed to run on older computers so that Microsoft would not loose customers to Unix in companies which still have old computers because Windows 7 is too heavy for them. Furthermore the name ThinPC really suits the Vaio X =) just like the OS itself.

 

"Active and Passive cooling in WPO obviously uses different algorithms for controlling the fan speed"

There is no "active" and "passive" cooling in WPO and WPO/Windows does not control the fan speed, this is done by Sony software. I.e., that's as far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

What I mean is System Cooling Policy in Advanced Power Settings. Maybe I was too quick to draw conclusions but I just relied on this citation:
"Active slows down the processor after speeding up the fan, and passive slows down the processor before speeding up the fan."
How does "System cooling policy" function work?

 

@Shaughani
where can I buy Windows ThinPC ? - I just cannot find any useful information.

 

I was actually not aware of this since I got the OS from my brother on a USB but unfortunately this is the situation:

"Windows Embedded is sold to OEMs only, Windows Thin PC is being made available to Microsoft’s volume licensing customers. Consumers, sadly, can’t get their hands on either OS legally"
AnandTech - Windows Thin PC: Windows, Slimmed Down

 

Hey guys,
the new Flashplayer (11.2.202.233 ) and Microsoft´s IE9 are a blast!
Finally Running Youtube 720p Fullscreen with Flash.
Try also enable built in Tracking Protection within IE9, so no addon or stuff like this are required,
all builtin quality.
Also having good experience running Windows 8 Consumer Preview, dont install the GMA Drivers, take the stock ones delivered by the OS,
Metro is running gorgeous, some games running not so well, but overall is pretty good.
Damn i love this beatuy full piece of Hardware, looking forward for some edge cutting Slates from Sony for Win8.

 

@Shaughani
as far as I can tell, this policy does not exist on my Sony X OEM Win7 Prof.

I suppose it has been deactivated by sony, which would make sense because sony has their own fan/cpu management software via vaio control center (silent mode etc.). as i already pointed out, to my knowledge, only silent mode will throttle cpu when things heat up. (and I do not recommend silent mode for that reason - you should instead have a powerplan that will limit cpu e.g. to 80% or 70%. That will give you control about your computer's speed, and not some software algorithm. alternatively you can use coretemp and then you will notice that suddenly you cpu wont go up to 2,0 ghz anymore. point is, the temps at which silent more starts to throttle cpu are so late (pc already heated up to some degree) that it really doesn't make all that difference if the fan is running "medium fast" or "just a little bit less than medium fast", at the cost of cpu power. it makes no sense. silent mode has NO effect on the amount of time that the fan will NOT run, only on the intensity, and that intensity is neglectible (i am comparing to balanced. maximum mode on the other hand will always give you way to aggressive and unnecessarly aggressive fan speeds.)
once again: point is, the very reason your X is heating up typically IS that you NEED maximum cpu at those times. and just then, and ONLY then, you throttle down the cpu with silent mode - makes no sense. it would make sense if balanced were significantly more aggressive in fan speed, but it is not.
the reason you are seeing those cooling options probably is because of your thinpc installation. (!!!please correct me if i am wrong and all other users find those cooling options on their system!!!) (i also havent researched if these options are theoretically accessible via registry.) the main point however is, do they have any effect on the x's fan, or even on cpu? I doubt so. Unless of course they are actually identical with the silent mode etc. - switches in vaio control center... however, vaio control center has 3 options as opposed to 2 (passive | active) in windows power options. (i havent actually seen those 2 in practice yet, i only read about "passive | active", so I guess there are just 2. which would stand against the "identical-theory".

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

for the summer, i have been googling passive cooling methods at bit but did not come too far.
i was wondering about using cooling elements (that we use for picknick boxes etc) and but the pc onto them. I was also wondering about seating the pc on a cool-water-filled pad or something. you could simply have 4 pads, and keep 2 or 3 of them in the freezer and interchange them once in while. Or as I said, some "water pads" in the fridge... donno.
i found e.g. this Liquid cooling laptop pad helps your laptop stay cool - SlipperyBrick.com
and that
Vizo EZ Surf notebook cooler review - Results and conclusion
but i really did not do an extensive google search.
I doubt the EZ surf is a good idea, and same goes for the pad - see one of the comments that it at least did not cool as much as claimed (surprise surprise). but you cut have 3 of them and keep one in the freezer?
probably best to ask in pc cooling / modding forums for that. there's also SPCR &bull; Index page of course, and noteably
SPCR &bull; View topic - List of fanless laptops

 

Hello, I bought a second-hand vaio X and it came with this adaptor, which is sold for the Vaio P actually:

VGP-AC10V2 : Battery & Adaptor : VAIO Accessories : Sony Asia Pacific

It has 10,5V 1,9 A (20W)

My other Vaio X on the other hand has a 10,5V 2,9 Adaptor

VGP-AC10V5 (VGPAC10V5, VGPAC10V5.CEL) : VAIO & weitere Computerprodukte : Sony

with 10,5V and 2,9 A (30W).

The seller claims sony must have given newer X's the 20W adaptor.

Is that true? Has anyone in this thread got a 20 W adapter with their Vaio.

I would be very grateful for feedback. you may also PM me instead of posting. just tell me date of purchase and whether it's a 1,9 or 2,9A adapter.

Interesting in any case, it seems like the guy actually did use the 1,9A adapter with the X, since he also sent me 2 additional car and another 3rd party adapter, all of which had 1,9A. It would be cool of course to use that mini adaptor with the X

I still fear it's potentially dangerous to have a 20W adapter provided Sony never actually sold these with the X. On google, I found no correlation between the X and the 1,9 adapter (vgp-ac10v2).

thanks

PS. I should note the seller's girlfriend used to have a P, so I have the idea they mixed up the adaptors...

 

My X13 is as late as they come - I bought it after the X was officially discontinued. The power brick is 2,9A.

 

mine is from asia but the charger is also 2.9A.

 

@Matthias

I have the X11 model with the Z540 Atom (1,86GHz, FSB 133MHz) which may explain our disagreement in critical temperature (when the fan kicks in) and temperatures in general. Apparently my model is allowed to run a little hotter while yours produce a little less heat.

The Active and Passive options in Advanced Power Settings - Processor Power Management (where you control the max CPU percentage) has always been with me, also in the fat windows 7.

 

hello all!

some comments:
- thanks to all who replied to my adapter question. seems like there actually was a batch of Vaio X with wrong adapters. they even put outbreak boxes to the Xs, the seller tells me. makes no sense.
- the active and passive cooling options neither appear on my 2009 X11, nor on a fresh recover of a 2010 X11 (home professional).

- recommendation for BES users (battle encoder)
check out Index of /archive/BES -> beta version -> v. 1.6.0 test 3 (place into path of installed current release version)

combination "copernic winkey -> win-c"
+ path\to\bes.exe
+ parameters "C:\Program Files\Opera\opera.exe" 50 --toggle --minimize

replace opera.exe as you see fit, and adjust 50 to 1...99 as you see fit (20....80 makes sense usually)

the programmer was nice enought to add toggle commands etc. Great! (thanks to mion, the programmer)

 

Hello everyone!
My name is Andil and I'm new to this forum,I have recently bought a vaio x13.
I have litterally read every single post of this thread, wow lots lots of info I have manage to get,thanks a lot to everyone,but I have some few questions though:

-mmmsheen, thanks to you I was able to understand more about unlocking and activate the gps,but still is not working,with the one-click internet its say "insert sim" but my model does not have the sim slot,any ideas?

-I just discovered that the virtualization (VT) on this laptop is disable,anyone knows how to enable it?is it from the bios?

Thanks in advance for any answers

PS. My vaio is the US model VPCX131KX

 

Hi guys,

I have just bought a secondhand X118LG, and after installing W7 and the Gobi 2000 driver and app, the app tells me no device found and I can't see the Gobi in Device Manager. Is it possible that the WWAN module has been removed? I'm quite certain the X118 comes with WWAN. If so, is the slot for WWAN mini PCIe? I have a spare HP un2420 module on hand.

Thanks!

 

as far as I can tell if you do not have wwan then you do not have gps (same device is responsible for it)

yes - you can turn it on from bios

 

Hi Forum,

while looking for an Alps Touch Pad driver that would enable two-finger-scrolling, I came across the set of drivers also mentioned here.

So far, I have tested the topmost driver in the list over there, on the X, and it works. While it seems that this driver does not offer two-finger-scrolling (at least I haven't found any such setting), it does have a setting that adds momentum to the mouse pointer -- which is a very nice feature!

Because in the linked thread people are talking about one of these drivers offering two-finger-scrolling, maybe some of you guys would want to test some of these other driver versions (other than the first in the list which I have tested) whether any of the other drivers actually have two-finger-scrolling.

Because this would be rather a killer feature for the X, IMHO.

Cheers David

 

OK, the second driver in the list (Version 7.6.2015.1203) has a) pointer momentum and b) two-finger scrolling.

The latter however is ridiculously bad (compared to a Mac or to a Synaptics trackpad). This drivers two-finger scrolling seems to be somewhat bearable only if the trackpad touch sensitivity is set to maximum.

Hth
David

 

hello david,

thanks for those touchpad comments! actually I have been trying to speed up the cursor beyond the maximum by tweaking the registry settings for mouse accelaration, but it did not seem to work. cf.
Using the Mouse Class

Before installing the driver (the first one, 7.109.411.103/ 7.9.411.103) I'd like to ask you if it has any disadvantages or lacking features as compared to the original alps driver. thanks. and with momentum, do you mean a higher accelaration, right? (there is already an accelaration slider in the original driver's config, i.e. is there an additional slider with that driver's config?)

 

Hi Matthias,

I have not seen any disadvantages!

"Momentum" actually is "Trägheit", i.e. you flick the pointer and it keeps going for a while after you lift your finger. Very intuitive and convenient.

Cheers David

 

@mmmsheen


http://dl.dropbox.com/u/32136358/mmmsheen 13x7_attempt10.zip
link not working

 

hi david,

thanks for clearing things up. that pointer behavior doesn't really sound as if it will speed things up, though...
so does the driver allow for an increase in accelaration beyond that of the current driver (or is all it can do in addition to the current one gracefully slowing down the pointer after one lifts up one's fingertip?)

okok, i should install it, i am just being lazy... still hoping for an answer though

danke!

matthias

 

Hi Matthias,

all I can say is that I'd NEVER want to miss the momentum feature again that this driver offers. It is like flicking a pool billiard ball and the pointer keeps going until it hits the screen edge (depending on the amount of momentum you give it of course).

If only this driver had a decent 2-finger scrolling feature as well (this is barely usable unfortunately) -- that would make the X SO much more usable.

Cheers David

 

hello, I have installed the driver now, as far as I can see, there is also a new option for touch sensitivity (finger size) (or has this been there with the sony driver already?). The Momentum Mode is referred to as "Inertial Motion" (which is English in turns, too), in the German alps config.
I found this to be convenient for long distant mouse movements, however I have some (placebo?) feeling that the normal accelaration is stronger too, with the new driver.
What's worse, the momentum/inertial mode has, imho, negative effect on short distance accuracy, to a point where unintended mouse clicks, when working fast, get likely. Also, one has to do a lot of correcting with short distances. If momentum mode would only come to effect when strong accelaration was done before (long distances), it would be great, but I caution everyone that they might not get what they hoped for. I for one have disabled it after some testing.

 

hello, there's a bug in the above-mentioned touchpad-driver, but I've found a solution.

here's the solution: never set double-clicking speed to the maximum (to the right). always leave one step to the maximum.

here's why: when set to max, even though it will usually never produce unwanted double-clicks, it will produce, for some strange reason, two clicks when clicking the scroll bar, thereby scrolling down 2 pages instead of the intended one. this only applies to certain applications. it happened with a 3rd party notepad replacement and it can be reproduced with window's original notepad.exe. just paste a couple of screens of bogus text and see for yourself. it does of course not occur when you click exaclty unterneath the bar. if you have 10 screen pages of bogus text, scroll right up to the top, and then click the bottom of the scroll bar. it will then do 2 pagedowns, instead of one, which is extremely annoying and which is why I am posting this for the well-being of the X community

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

and here's some more good news: the fujitsu alps driver is MUCH faster than the sony alps driver. I've tested it side-by-side.
--> !! the benefit in pointer speed is gained simply by installing the driver and setting pointer speed to max, just like with the original sony alps driver. one move and your pointer will go much further. GREAT. --> YOU DO NOT NEED TO ENABLE THE ANNOYING MOMENTUM FEATURE, you will have a much faster pointer anyway! in fact i tested it besides another X, and i was wondering how i was able to live with that slow pointer for 2 years. --> I really recommend this driver (7.109.411.103/ 7.9.411.103) to everyone.
(btw I also suggest you take a look at the scroll-by-moving-in-circles feature, which can also be found with the original driver, of course. whilst it looks stupid at first, there are situations where it comes in handy.

 

Interesting findings.

And yes, the Fujitsu ALPS driver (first driver in the list -- Version 7.109.411.103/7.9.411.103) IS very good (probably as good as it gets with that ALPS crap anyway, as compared to the amazing Synaptics Trackpads). Don't use the second driver from the list. While it has two-finger-scrolling (sort of), it will not work after a Standby Resume.

To me, that Pointer Momentum feature still is something I'd not want to miss again. I even searched the web high and low to find something similiar for my desktop PC (to no avail).

One more interesting thing is that even the very latest Synaptics (!) touchpad driver installs and works without any problem on the X. However unfortunately, for some reason only Point and Click work with that driver, and none of the advanced Synaptics features.

Possibly it is only a matter of some *.ini file or hex editor hack to make the Synaptics driver work on that alps touch pad!

 

Intel EMGD 1.14 has been released. I wonder if mmmsheen and jeonghun can work their magic so we can see what the new driver has in store for us.

 

sorry for the late reply, hardly login here nowadays.
suppose you should already have tried it.
anyway, i find windows 8 is not much different than windows 7 and the metro is pretty useless in my opinion and s have switched back to windows 7.

is the brightness problem solved already?

 

legend has it, an X dies somewhere on the planet for every day that passes with no postings in the X-thread. Mine died last month (RAM). I replaced it, with another X, of course. It will take quite some time until an adequate, idential form/weight-factor ULV replacement will hit the markets.

I am so happy with my new old X. Note: The screen had noticeably darkened over time, my new one is a good deal brighter. -> I recommend you auto-switch off the display when not in use.

 

Annoyingly, my X after only about half a year (of not much using it) has evolved the habit of switching on the fan if I only LOOK at it

Honestly, if my X was in standby overnight and I press the power button (of course it is ebsiflutely cold then) -- the first thing that happens is that it switches on that annoying fan, in the very second that I push the button!

This happens even when the Vaio Power Management is switched to "Quiet" mode. Of course it also can't be a dust problem since the CPU is at room temperature in this case.

Honestly, I am prepared to do a permanent matchstick hack, or some other hardware modification to the X in order to get rid of that bl**dy fan noise.

Cheers David.P

 

Open it up, unplug the fan, buy an old X when this one burns out?

Sorry to hear about your machine dying matthias. My last Vaio was the S series and it lasted over 5 years. I hope my one year old X has another four years left in it.

Designing and manufacturing such a computer surely isn't profitable. Will Sony even be around in 5 years to embark on it's next quixotic laptop project? To be honest, I don't think we'll see another 780g 11" machine with a premium display and full connectivity any time soon.

 

@david
dont let coretemp's temperature go past ~44 °C with the fan manually arrested. it will shut off the machine with no warning. try to stay under 42. i have NO idea why it tolerates only ~45°C when the fan is arrested, bu 60° when its running. a mystery. either there is an additional independent temp sensor that leads to shutdown and that is at a place that gets considerably hotter with fan haltet -- or there is a sensor that detects if the fan is actually moving and than there's an algorithm "if fan doesnt move even though it should AND temp is above 45, shut down machine..." well...

install coretemp to see exactly when the fan kicks in (watch over 1 week to get a feeling), an report it here.

to halt the fan, use multi-layeres scotch tape. this will nicely bend when you open the display (a stick gets in the way), while still being sturdy enough to halt the fan. you can place it in the headphone jack when not in use. don't ever forget to remove it when you do more demanding cpu tasks.

check out battle encoders new command line toggle feature

C:\_me\system\admin\BES\bes.exe "C:\Program Files\Opera\opera.exe" 40 --toggle --minimize

and combine with copernic winkey, e.g. win-c, and use yawffer.

set coretemp overheat protection to 44°C -> popup.

i have 3 different coretemp installations (just copy the program folder) with different setting setups, one e.g. without overheat protection (too many clicks to change in manually all the time), one with 44°, and one that will freeze certain programs when 46 is exceeded.

to quickly switch, i use autohotkey. whit fan haltet, i use this:

Process, close, CoreTemp.exe
Sleep, 500
Run, "C:\Program Files\Core Temp\3\CoreTemp46.exe", C:\Program Files\Core Temp\3\, hide
Run, "C:\Program Files\Core Temp\2\CoreTemp.exe", C:\Program Files\Core Temp\2\, hide
Run, C:\_me\system\admin\BES\bes.exe "C:\Program Files\Opera\opera.exe" 40 --minimize
Run, "C:\_me\system\admin\Balanced (optimized) (100).lnk", hide

----------

yeah i know I'm insane. but it works. quiet machine most of the time.

however, note that i have the suspicion that my new vaio x heats up somewhat less than my old, and i do think this might be due to dust.

nevertheless, i don't know what's the case with david's pc. all i an say is that my new vaio, just like my old one, very soon kicks in with the fan and heats up very quick from room temperature. and you need to know that temperatue behavior is NOT reproducible. same situatiion, different temps.

pluggin out AC is also a good way to reduce heat afaic.

if you hate fan noise, check out this fanless chinese air clone: Windows Netbook PC - Nav 13X Overview

seems to be a lot cheaper here: http://www.techtoys2go.com/mba-d16
there are user comments on that site. they seem to be selling a version with a glowing apple logo for the chinese market, this would be illegal in europe/us of course. the version they are shipping seems to be without logo. which is good luck, because who, in their right mind, will want an apple logo... i love htc and sony, after all. as htc puts it in their slogan, _quietly brilliant_ that's beautiful. a shame that doesn't resonate with most ppl.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FX6P44hZbNEe

 

Thanks guys for the ideas. Sorry it took me so long to reply -- somehow the forum doesn't seem to notify me of replies anymore.

Strangely, my X now stays quiet AND cold ALL the time! I don't think that I have changed anything (other than REMOVING all that ALPS touchpad driver stuff because it just didn't feel alright).

I have no idea what it is that suddenly does this fanless magic. I am even in Performance Mode in the Vaio Control Center Energy Options.



--
PS: Whooaa Matthias, I can't believe my eyes with this Nav 13x stuff over there! I must get my hands on one of these for sure!

 

@nav 13x: it really makes me angry that sony did not manage to make the X fanless, or at least build in some heat-pipes etc so it would not be silent only at *very* high load. if these guys can make a fanless atom notebook at THAT price (and there are also some netbooks i think from asus(?) that are fanless too), why can't sony? it *might* be due to the slim design, but I doubt this, since the P is fanless too. For sure they should not implement a fanless design like the P has, that will throttle down CPU when it gets too hot and there's nothing you can do. (At least I hear that's what the P tends to do, I don't know how severe this is) I wonder if the Nav X does throttling too when it gets hot.
Main reaons I am not getting the Nav X is it's screen, I want a higher resolution with a 13" book.
I'd be super-interested in your review, should you buy a Nav X.
Here are some tips for the Vaio X (and the Nav for that matter) to make most out of the screen:
- autohide taskbar (now that's obvious and a lame recommendation, okok..)
- in Opera:
--- use the toolbar customizations to add an addressbar, and this address bar will be able to fit within the same line as the tabs and the nav buttons
--- use Z1-Ultra skin if you like, you can find an active tab somewhat easier
that way since active tabs are a tiny bit larger.
--- deactivate status bar. the most relevant status bar info (url of links) can be configured to appear on mousehover over link anyway)
--- this configuration is much better than fullscreen for various reasons.

- deactivate aero and use windows classic. it has smaller bars.
-the following tip requires a commercial product. you can get a rebate if you ask nicely, their support is great. --> with actual tool active window manager, you can remove the _title_ bar of certain programs. the configuration requires a twist to work with taskbar autohide:
- Do not open as maximized, but as "normal"
- resize to 1366*768
- alignt to top left with x=0 and y=-1 (!!)
- border title bar, and resizeable frame --> remove
- to access windows menu if needed, press alt-space

I use this config with other programs, too. It does not work with windows live mail, which your probably don't use anyway.

For Open Office, I recommend ctrl-shift j to swith to fullscreen, and then configure the full screen icon bar to have your most needed icons, and place that bar vertically to the left. note that the find function won't work in fullscreen, and the taskbar won't pop up on mouse-touch,you will have to hit winkey.

happy computing with more screen space... it really makes a difference.

 

A warning: Dark gree-blue liquid is emerging from the plug (or the socket at the laptop), it may damage your clothes. Cleaning it off will not solve the problem immediately, more seems to be emerging, possible through heat while the plug is plugged-in. I am not talking about the 220V/110V plug but about the small 10.5 volt plug. If you have any ideas a) what it is, b) where exactly it comes from, and/or c) how to solve the problem, let me know... In the meantime, I am simply cleaning it off every day.

 

Woah, green slime? That's a new one for the X I think

I recently went on one final round of tweaking and got Windows 7 down to 48 process on startup, disabling Homegroup and a bunch of other useless stuff. Browser wise it looks like Chrome is going to help the X owners even more in the future. I'm currently using Chromium 21 (from getchromium.org) and it's very fast. In case you want to try it, I enable pipelining in about:flags and use these command line options:

chrome.exe --disable-accelerated-compositing --disable-webgl --disable-gl-multisampling --disable-logging --prerender=disabled

I've also moved from Adblock Plus to Adblock, which has improved a lot lately. It doesn't suffer from the 'flickering' problem of ABP, where Google ads, for example, briefly flicker in and out of view.

 

I think the blue slime is coming from the plug (it's the original which I have been using for 2 years.) There's still coming more, I think it's the stuff they put inbetween the metal and the plastic. Perhaps it's part of the glue composit. It's very annoying. I hope it will stop in a month or two when I will have wiped it off approx. 50-100 times..

Thanks for the Chrome info. I keep coming back to Opera. I read about problems with 11.64 so I despite a security hole am staying with .62 and this is the best version yet, I am really very happy with Opera at the moment. It's the fastest and most stable version I have ever had, and I rarely encounter website compatibility problems. Typically, problems are caused by adblock on certain sites, so I just turn it off there. My impression is that Opera is faster especially when many tabs are opened. Chrome tends to get problematic with too many tabs. I also dislike the very restricted customizability of Chrome, and the terrible Autoupdate that takes major steps to disable. I didn't make good experiences with chrome(webkit)-based cool novo either, at least the previous versions, when it was still called chromplus, where slow and buggy.
As to Opera, I recommend NOT upgrading when an update comes out, but to wait 2 weeks to see what others say about there experiences. Operas version development is like a stock index, it does up in the long run, but you can get a really buggy release and be stuck with for 2 months, since rollback is not always that easy, it depends on the what has changed.

## My main question however is: ##
Could anyone please give me a hint regarding WMP vs. MPC HC? (windows media player vs. media player classic home cinema)

Problem is, WMP seems much better at playing _wmv_ files, but WMP has much worse a user interface. In mpc-hc, I am using:
vmr 9 renderless,
3d-surfaces,
bilinear.

d3d fullscreen is disabled (hmm, why?!),

vmr9 mixer mode is enabled.

note that colors also display richer, less pale, in WMP as opposed to MPC-HC.

I'd simply want MPC-HC to render videos exactly like WMP, if this is possible...

 

I've found WMP to be better for WMV but for everything else MPC-HC has proved better. It plays 1080p perfectly smoothly. My output is set to 'EVR' with 'System Default' for the other sections.

 

@quiff, i think this does the trick, somewhere else s.o. stated that wmp actually uses evr and that vmr was not well performing on win 7. thanks again, saves me a lot of time testing.