Does the Sony FS Allow High-End Upgrades?

On the Sony Style website, the only available RAM Upgrade was PC-2700. The only RPM available was 4200.

If I get the simplest form of the Sony Vaio FS (VGN-FS500), will I be able to upgrade it on my own with a Hitachi TravelStar 7K60 60 GB hard drive and 1GB Ram PC-4200 ?

I called Sony and they said something about not being able to upgade this far because the motherboard won't be able to handle it or something along those lines. Was this just out of lack of experience/wanted me to upgrade through them or are they correct?

Also, if the upgrades are possible, will keeping the slower stock ram in the machine slow down the 1GB I plan on adding after? Would it be better just to take out the older RAM entirely?

Thanks alot for your help!

 

You can put pretty much any drive in it. But it's not that simple when it comes to RAM. FS suports DDR 1, so you need to take that into considaration. Since memory settings in BIOS are litarary inexistant, one must hope that memory frequency is set accordingly to SPD, timings probably are.
I would go for two new 512 MB sticks of good PC3200 RAM from OCZ or simmilar.

 

Vaio FS uses standard 2.5" notebook HDs, so yes, you can easily change the HD.

There is no notebook or desktop PCs that can have multiple RAM modules running at different speed at the same time. FS only supports DDR1 PC2700. So if you put a faster DDR1 RAM, it won't run faster than PC2700, and it is possible that your system will become unstable too.

Btw, FS supports dual-channel RAM, so you should consider using a pair of identical RAMs.

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>FS only supports DDR1 PC2700. So if you put a faster DDR1 RAM, it won't run faster than PC2700, and it is possible that your system will become unstable too.<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>
Since the chipset supports DDR400, faster modules shouldn't be a problem. Even if the two modules aren't rated for same speeds it should still work using the slower setting.

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by OwcA

 

From 915 datasheet:
<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>10.2.4 DRAM Clock Generation
The GMCH PLL generates two differential 166 MHz, 200 MHz or 266 MHz clock pairs for every supported SODIMM. There are total of 4 clock pairs driven directly by GMCH to the 2 SO-DIMMs.<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>
and
<blockquote id='quote'>quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>5.2.33 CLKCFG—Clocking Configuration
Memory Core Clock control
0 = DDR333, DDR400 (Default) (DDR533 @ Vcc = 1.5 V)
1 = DDR533 (for Intel® Pentium® M processor 90 nm, 2 MB L2 Cache,
533 MHz FSB support at Vcc =1.05 V)
Please refer to the Mobile Intel® 915 Express Chipset Family BIOS Spec
for details on programming the DDR PLL VCO Change Sequence.<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>
---
<blockquote id='quote'>quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>You'll probably get unstable system if you mix DDR333/CL2.5 with DDR400/CL3 RAM.<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>
Not if DDR400 is rated CL2.5 at 166 MHz.

 

Page 243:
The Mobile Intel® 915GM/PM Express Chipset supports three memory channel organizations:
- Single Channel configuration for DDR 333 MHz devices
- Dual Channel Asymmetric for DDR2 400/533 MHz devices
- Dual Channel Symmetric for DDR2 400/533 MHz devices

Also, if you check page 295-296, Intel only provides tables for DDR333 and DDR2-400/533.

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Not if DDR400 is rated CL2.5 at 166 MHz.<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>
True, they will need to confirm that before mixing the ram.

 

True, but they also disavow dual channel for DDR 1 while there are strong indices that a number of Sonoma offerings in fact run in this mode.
If you think about it, everything needed for higher frequencies is there (also GMCH registry settings don't imply any exclusiveness). The lack of official support may be due to the fact that DDR400 offerings for notebooks are not wide spread. I couldn't find any data whether JEDEC certification for PC3200 SODIMM exists or not.

 

Also true. Now if only someone can provide benchmark numbers of DDR333 vs DDR400 on Sonoma.

 

Ok guys, let's help me answer this once and for all . I would like to know if it is possible to use DDR2 ram instead of the slowish DDR ram supplied by Sony? I know FS550 uses the newer Intel CPU Sonoma, so it should be able to support the use of DDR2 right? Has anyone tried to use DDR2? I know that I can't mix both DDR and DDR2 together, I just want to know if I can just remove the 512mb DDR ram and use the DDR2 instead.

Thanks for reading,
Sodown
P.S: Has anyone been able to run Linux on this baby? Please let me know, I'm a Linux fan I don't want to live without it

 

The answer is no. http://www6.tomshardware.com/mobile/20050119/sonoma_alviso-04.html

 

WiG, that is exactly not that kind of answer I would love to hear. I bursted into tears already . Why did Sony bother going through all the troubles making such an awesome looking machine just to house some very low-end hardware? Do you think not having DDR2 would make that much difference? hmm I bet it would. How sad.

 

The only plus in having DDR2 now is upgradability. Performance gains are minimal.

 

I upgraded my FS 570 to a Hitachi 7k60 no problem.

As far as the RAM is concerned, I haven't touched it.

I think PC2700 is the fastest it takes.

 

Webster,

Have you noticed the fan running more since you've installed the faster drive?

 

Hmm, how about DDR PC3200 guys? I mean if we can't go for DDR2 at least we should be able to go for the fastest DDR ram right? Hmm I hope so though. I'm planning to upgrade my FS550 so I would just love to hear from those who know about these stuff.

Also, I'm kinda bumb about the dual channel thing. Can anyone of you tell me briefly how that may differ from the normal/non-dual channel DDR ram. I'm not sure if this has been discussed before, if it has then I'm sorry for making duplicated post and please point me to the correct thread. I'm greatly appreciate.

Take care,

 

I did some benchmark testing of dual channel DDR with my FS70. According to SiSoft Sandra 2005's Memory Bandwidth Benchmark, the bandwidth increase is about 15%.

 

Greg,

You know what, I swapped my hard drive a day after I got it so I didn't really have enough time to notice the difference. I can tell you that the start-up time has increased significantly though.

I also e-mailed the laptop editor at C|NET about upgrading to a 7200RPM hard drive.

They gave the FS-570 only a 6.1 but I asked him about the upgrade and he said upgrading to a faster hard drive could definitely have a positive effect on the system's overall performance.

 

Webster,

How long does it take your system to boot? Did you do a clean install of XP or did you re-install the Sony recovery with all of the garbage on it.

I did a clean install of XP on mine with just the necessary Sony drivers and I boot in less about 40 seconds with the stock hard drive.

I'm just trying to see if it's worth upgrading.

 

Greg,

I just timed it, it's exactly 1 min until it displays the desktop menu.

Keep in mind though, I originally installed an OEM copy of XP Pro.

But since then i've installed alot of programs, including anti-virus and recovered some Sony applications as well.

I think if your starting up in 40 seconds on a 4200RPM that's VERY fast.

I beleive when I first got the laptop before upgrading the hard drive the start up time was around 2 min. That's with all the factory installed programs.

It really depends on what you use it for, faster response time on the hard drive can help with programs such as Photoshop that require it to read and write large files.

If you are just using it for internet and e-mail it's not really that much of a difference.

 

Webster,

I did a couple of tests booting the computer to get an average time to a usable state.

after 2 cold boots and 3 restarts, the average time was 52 seconds, not too shabby for the stock 4200 RPM drive.

and that takes in to account I'm have two users set up and had to make the quick selection of which user.

 

Hello guys,

does anyone know about someone making DDR1 533 MHz SO-DIMM modules? According to what's in the 915 datasheet, it should be possible to use DDR1-533 modules in it ...

I tried some "googling" but found nothing. (But I'm not so skilled in searching so maybe there is a chance ...)

Many thanks

--Tazi

 

the computer is just soso .but it's really very cheap,and it's surely a NB instead of the deskstop!