FE Quality Control

Well 3 months after buying this machine Im rather annoyed with how its holding up, A number of the keys are loosing their letters and are just blank white keys now, The Mute and volume keys are chipped and peeling while the lid of the unit has a number of marks despite always being moved in a neoprene laptop sleeve. The screen has developed a small stress mark in the top left corner and the battery has started slipping out of the unit.

 

This worries me, as I mean to buy an FE once they start selling them with Merom.
I thought Sony were meant to have a good build quality ?

 

Sony most definitely is not one for build quality, or at least materials quality. I think that's the biggest misconception when it comes to the Vaio notebooks.

 

Yeah, their build quality, as far as I know, took a slap in the wrist ever since the VAIO FS was released. That was about a year and a half ago... their quality control is fairly bad since... I can tell they are cutting costs by using the same keyboards throughout their entire product line in addition to huge AC adapters and the lack of recovery CD's.

Now the VAIO lineup is more "plastic"-ky than ever before. I wish their build quality was consistent a la the Z1/V505 series era.

 

I agree the AC adaptor is enourmous, and the palm rest is plastic and looks cheap, Its a shame Next time i'm deffinatly buying a Asus at least they seem to hold up pretty well.

 

It's a shame too, the more I play around with my new system the more I like it, I just can't get past the aformentioned plastic-y issue (I bought it sight-unseen). I've handled cheaper systems that felt much more ridgid and solid. It's contradictory in a sense, Sony comes up with some great ideas, and most definitely some great designs, but the implementation takes away from the end result.

The quality of everything that Sony makes (maybe with the exception of digicams) has gone downhill the past few years though, not just the Vaio notebook line. In the end i'm sure they will lose customers. But, this is what happens when shortsighted goofballs are in charge of big businesses...save some cash now and lose a bundle down the road. What a crock.

And no recovery discs??? C'mon, how much does it cost to run off some DVD's. Yea, I can do it myself (bloatware included of course), but it's the principle. *sigh*

 

then which series according to you guys got better quality?
I thought that the FE series were very HI-quality things.

 

I would stay away from the sony's to be honest, Try Asus they seem to be of much better build quality and you get all the warranty and work through a local reseller as opposed to Sony which have probally the worst customer supposrt of any company I've dealt with and most vaio owners will tell you the same.

 

Do you know if Samsung makes good laptops?

 

****, i might as well forget about gettin that FE in august, even worse thier prices are crazy!!!

 

The best thing to do is to go to the store and actually handle one for yourself, then decide.

 

honestly i was at the sonystore in torornto. and i liked what i saw, except for the latch hook thats located next to the mousepad buttons like i can see that plastic piece breaking in one week. another problem is u cant get an FE with a decent graphics card in canada

 

Ahh, yea the AR has that same latch design. It doesn't feel super flimsy actually...and you keep it retracted when the lid is open. It is a dumb design feature though, i would have rather had a traditional latch.

Have you tried to order from a retailer in the US? I doubt Sony Style USA will ship to Canada, but there are a lot of smaller retailers that might. There is one specific retailer that a lot of people have mentioned on the board, who sells Sony's and has a great reputation, but for the life of me I can't remember the name. Maybe someone else could contribute that?

Edit: http://laptopsinc.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=SFE Check them out, they carry the FE with the G73 GPU and they have a number for international orders, so I assume they ship outside the US. I've read they are great to deal with.

 

In the Sony Fe's defense mine has been working quite well. Then again i treat it better then any other laptop so it's all relevant. I will say it's better built then my 8100 dell, so i'm still happy. It's really the screen that makes it shine, the clarity is top notch. -jb

 

thanks alot man, im checking it out now

 

I've bought the FE690 for a month now and the key pad and the vol and mute buttons are still fine. I'm pretty satisfy with it especially the go7600 GPU. I also love the design of the keyboard. Plastic is ok with me as most things are plastic nowadays. But I might love it better if it's carbon fiber. >.<
The only problem I have with it so far is the norton anti virus that hang all the times!!! Will change to AVG as soon as it's expired.

 

Sony is known for its beautiful displays and nice-looking laptops. That's it. They are not known for producing overall high-quality machines and def. not known for giving good value for your money!! ;-)

 

I've had my FE for 6 months now, give or take, and I love it. The only build/design issues I have relate to the white palm rest (looks nice, gets grubby!) and the fact that I'm already losing the letters on some of the keys. While that's not a huge issue for me- I'm usually a touch typist- I'm mildly irritated that this has happened so quickly. My first Tosh laptop -satellite 1800- was more than two years old before it started losing letters. My Tosh M30X however had pretty much lost it's 'A' key by the time I'd had it a year- fading, rather than totally gone. Six months done the line with the FE, and my 'A' key is eroding fast, with the 'C' key beginning to do likewise.

But really, that's a very minor complaint. I've been able to get an Averatec 4155 ridiculously cheaply off ebay for use as a second laptop, and it'll be interesting to compare the two, especially since Averatec seems to take a lot of flak for their build quality.

..But then, very few laptops these days seem rock solid. Toshiba's keyboards at the moment are terrible- with the A100, I can put my finger on the 'G' or 'H' keys and see the entire keyboard dip in the middle!

 

Well mine has almost entirly lost the A E I O U and the N key is almost gone, The CDRW/DVD drive is useless it refuses to play about 50% of CDs and about 70% of DVD's Ive been told i might be able to clean the lense but its been like that since the day i got it. I dont find the latch to be flimsy at all but i do think the two hinges where the screen connects to the main unit is a joke, even just typing now the screen is wavering back and forward and has about a 5mm sway in each direction before any tension kicks in.

 

Be careful. I don't think Sony provides an international warranty. That means that the notebook you got from the U.S. cannot be serviced in Canada.

 

I know. Sony has been going downhill. Not just Vaios, but everything.
Their "walkman bean" was rated as Cnet's #1 worst products of the year (if you don't count intel's beta voice recognition thing). The last Vaios that were nice were the V505 series, as stated before. The K series declined w/ keyboard letters coming off but still retaining build quality. During and after the FS series, build quality/keyboard started falling down. The first key that's suppose to fall off is the "A" key, then W,S,D (when you play cs)

support is the worst you could ever get. sony fans argue,"Well, EVERY COMPANY's SUPPORT IS BAD!" NOT TRUE. Dell, for instance, has modestly given me everything I asked. I asked for recovery discs, they sent that to me within a few days. I also asked and received a free swiss backpack even tho i missed the july promotion.

iono why sony is still alive today. if you wanted the greatest screen, you could take that $$$ and pick up a fujitsu made of pure Mg alloy. If you needed the best mechanism, you could just pick up a thinkpad from lenovo. if you needed graphics to beat the 7600go on the FE, just pick up an ASUS
Z96J w/ X1600. If you needed bang for the buck, then Dell.

 

Hi Matt,

I believe you're getting the short end of the stick from Sony. Is there any way you could go back to the store to complain about this?

Those problems you are reporting show gross quaity issues...and a design flaw.

I avoid "plastic" notebooks for this reason. I bought an Asus for a sales manager in the company and it's not holding up too well either. (It's "plastic" too.)

There are 3 people who've bought the Sony SZs based on my advice, I would follow these computers closely and share any quality issues if there are any. (I'm hoping that they wouldn't surface, considering the SZs are aluminium based.)

 

Unfotunatly no, I didnt buy the international warranty so I will have to wait till i go back to the US to get it repaired. I plan on selling it at a few months after Santa Rosa comes out and buy a Asus or fujitsu.