Guide to installing W7(64) on Vaio VGN Z

THANKS!!

I have tried to fix this problem in a long time. now it works. the only drivers I can not install is the drivers for my memory card reader.

tinnda

 

Hello to you all!

My hdd died a few weeks ago and yesterday I did a clean install of Windows 7 Professional on my Vaio Z36SD bought from Bangkok around 14 months ago. I had to boot from a memorystick to flash a new bios (modded 5030(?) I found on the forum) to get Win7 installer to accept my new SSD drive.

I followed this guide and everything was working perfectly after rebooting several times, but today the Fn key died after a routine restart. Everything else is working fine including the S1, S1 and Eject buttons and the stamina-speed switch. What could be the cause? Probably some strange driver issue, but where should I look for a solution? The Fn key was still working in the morning.

edit: Vaio event service is installed and running.
edit2: I am using R5031M3 bios.

 

Thank you!
I just signed up to say a big thanks sigma957 for the effort put into the writeup.

Worked perfectly on an Australian Vaio VGN-Z26GN, Windows 7 Professional x64.
+rep

 

Bump!

Getting nowhere with this. Frustration creeping in. Someone please help!

 

Thanks to those of you who just posted to say thanks for the original guide. It's nice to know it was worth doing. I'm sorry I've not updated the guide. Really, ever since installing the Z11 with W7 Pro 64 it's been great and I've never needed to do a re-install. I'm sure there are better gfx drivers around now.
At some point I'll probably update it.

Hi jeeeeesh. I'm the author of this thread. I'm not sure if I can help, but I'll do what I can. When you say Fn key not working. Are you saying that Mute, Volume and brightness are not working from the keyboard?
If so, can you start your task manager and look in the processes tab. Sort alphabetically and look to see if you are running these 2 processes:
VESMgr.exe *32
VESMgrSub.exe *32

If one isn't running that will be a good place to start.

 

Fantastic Guide....64bit works a treat....thanks

 

First of all big thanks to sigma957 for getting this rolling and others who have provided additional support along the way. I have a problem installing drivers for the WWAN.
I Followed the above instructions for the Globetrotter, entered my IMEI No. and was offered "153.driver-4_0_17_0-Signed.zip But instead of finding tcpschema0 and tcpschema2 I had three folders - 32, 64 and NDIS Sample and no installer just (what appeared to be) drivers.
So I went to device manager and right clicked my Globetrotter HSDPA device with the exclamation mark and updated driver. I received a message that installation failed and gained 4 unknown other devices the Globetrotter is no longer shown.
Anyone else tried this download recently?

Marcus

 

You can find the Installer searching around but it didn't work for my Z21.
Try to use the same Signed driver you used for the modem, repeating the procedure for each unkown device. On my Vaio that didn't work either (network part) so I've used this one.

Thanks sigma957 for this very helpful thread!

Dario

 

Thank you, sigma957, for this guide! I'm about to do a clean install on my VGN-Z820G.

Quick question: Since my Z already came with Windows 7 Pro 64-bit, when I install from a Windows 7 Pro 64-bit disc, can I use the Windows 7 product key from the bottom of my laptop to activate the installation?

Thank you!

 

Installed everything and the FN-Keys are working.

But....
How do I get the Vaio Powermanagement profiles?
I've only the 3 default from windows.

Furthermore I am not able to deactivate hardware (DVD-drive, firewire etc.)

Any idea?

Thanks in advance

 

Hi all, what an excellent thread! Thank you sigma957 and the rest of you that contributed! I have a z570 and I'm pretty much decided for W7(64). Can anyone confirm that the sony docking station for the z series works flawlessly with W7(64)? I use it every day so any problems with it and W7(64) will be a deal breaker for me. Cheers!

 

I use it everyday on W7 x64 without any problems.

 

Hi maysiu, what video driver (W7-64) did you use for you Z540? The z540 and the z570 (mine) have a video card different from Z590, so I'm afraid the driver provided by sigma957 in the first post won't work. The eSupport.sony.com for my model seems to have the driver at a first glance but when you try to download it I get the following note "Drivers for this component are not available for download. The drivers for this component are included (in-box) with the Microsoft® Windows® 7 operating system and are automatically installed during the Windows installation" and nothing is available for download. Any advise will be greatly appreciated

 

Great! thank you for the quick reply Metsn!

 

Hi skouskou, could you please send me a link to the nVidia driver you used? I guess is not the same as in post 1.

 

I would say it'll be the same driver, as all VGN-Z are using N9300 GPU, the only difference is the amount of memory.

But in general I wouldn't use those drivers on the first page, as they're quite outdated. I downloaded latest versions of specific drivers for the latest VGN-Z from European and US support page, used latest GPU driver from Nautis, some drivers from HW suppliers (mainly Intel) and even some Sony utilities from VPC-Z

 

thank you for the input Metsn! I searched sony support for the VGN-Z 530 540 550 570 590 and none of those had the driver. Which VGN-Z series model would you suggest? Which driver do you have? cheers!

 

If you want to stay on the safe side and don't need newer drivers for e.g. games or new CoreAVC compatibility, just download latest GPU drivers from Sony. You could choose any specific version from the VGNZ8XX series...

 

Ok, thanks! I don't use it for gaming and don't care about advanced compatibility features. I rather stay on the safe side.
Cheers

 

A couple more questions...
1- if i don't use the sprint wwan card do i need to install Smart Network or SmartWi? BTW i have the z570
2- i would preffer the speed/stamina switch, brightness, S1-2, eject buttoms all working. but would like to avoid as much as possible sony extra programs. Do i need to install the Vaio control centre and Setting utility for those functions to work?
cheers!

 

1) You need those also for turning on/off bluetooth
2) Yes, as those settings for S1/2 are in Vaio Control Centre.

 

And how did you installed nautis´ driver package for 64bit win7? deinstallation of the old driver or update and sign after installation?

 

1) But that could be done with W7 (somewhere in control panel) right? if I had no choise but installing them which one is best (Smart Network or SmartWi) considering that i don't use the wwan at all? I remember you mentioning SmartWi did not have an issue with bluetooth..
2) And what about Setting Utility? is it necessary?

Thanks!

 

Complete uninstall including using Driver Sweeper and than installing and signing Nautis's package.

1) I guess so. Don't know where though. And you're right, I'm using SmartWi, because it doesn't have the Bluetooth issue.

2) If I remember clearly, the Setting Utility installs the actual settings for Control Centre. You can check, how many settings you'll have in Control Centre without Setting Utility. Don't miss event service though, that's very important.

I like to keep my system as clean as possible as well, these are quite essential Vaio apps though, so I wouldn't try to save some memory on them.

 

i guess i'm going a bit on the extreme spartan side here. i followed the installation guide till the shared library step and now I have the stamina/speed switch and Fn buttons working flawlessly. I generally don't use the S1-2 and eject buttons so I'm thinking on bypassing: Event Service, Smart Network, Control Center, Setting Utility, Fingerprint Soft (don't use it) and Power Management; and go directly to install: Alps touch pad, Memory stick and Memory card. Any thoughts? If this works it'll be the ideal setup for me. I currently have only one exclamation point in the Device Manager under Other Devices\Base system device

 

Interesting. I would think that Speed/Stamina button will not work without event service...

 

I even get the on-screen indication lables when switching between Speed/Stamina and the same for the Fn buttons (Volume, Brigthness, zoom, etc)

 

Good for you then I just noticed, that if you use bad version of event service, it breaks the Stamina/Speed button function...

 

Quick update. I installed: touch pad, memory stick and memory card drivers. All is working OK (knock on wood) and I don't have any unrecognized devices in device mger. Maybe the latest updates of W7(64) include the driver for the fingerprint sensor? it appears to work but I haven't tested carefully (i don't use it anyhow). I see this as an option for those who want a minimalistic install and are willing to sacrifice S1-2 and eject buttons. Now if I could only get the dedicated buttons to work without installing Event Service, Control Center, and Setting Utility that would be nirvana ... any ideas?

 

So what must be done to use brightness controls with the nautis´driver?

 

The brightness controls work without any issue for me in Stamina mode. Doesn't work in Speed mode though. I use 100% brightness in Speed mode all the time so I don't care much anyway...

 

So in Nauti`s thread there was a tip for editing the registry to bring nvidia brightness to work...can someone give me a hint on that?

What about the switch? switching from nvidia to intel is ok, but reswitch to nvidia doesn´t work for me...

 

Everything still working fine w/ my spartan W7(64) installation, and the lappy is snappy as hell. I have one issue though... some times (randomly) when trying to stop USB storage devices (memory stick, external HDD) I get the message "Windows can't stop your ..... device because a program is still using it. Close any programs that might be using the device, and then try again later." even though all the programs are closed and I'm not using ReadyBoost... any ideas? (I realize this might not be the right thread for this question but I don't see a more fitting option)

 

Guys,
I'm new here.
My brother just gave me a Sony VAIO VGN-Z56LG from Korea.
I want to clean install Windows 7 64bit.
I would like to seek your help guys if this guide and drivers from page 1 are applicable with my Z series VAIO because this is from Korea.

Thanks so much for your help...

 

Yes it is, you'll just have to extract those drivers with tool like UniExtract, as they have version protection.

 

Even the bios R2170M3 would be compatible with my Vaio?
Ok so much sir

 

Any VGN-Z bios would be compatible with your machine...use the latest you can find on US update page

 

Cool!!!
Thanks so much for that!
I will reformat my Z and update everything

 

... unless you need EFI boot, which was disabled in later versions.

 

are the drivers on the first page the most updated ? it seems I can't find new threads regarding a clean install of win7 64 bit on vaio vpcz1.

 

No but you can find the newest ones on Sony support and hardware manufactures sites...

 

My HDMI sound is not working when connected to an HD TV. Could anyone provide a link to the most updated Nvidia driver that solves this problem? I'm currently using the Nvidia driver from SONY website. Everything else seem to work perfectly. I have a Z570.

 

I used this guide way back when to update my Vaio Z90US, and it worked like a charm. Thank you very much! Unfortunately, I just got my computer back from the shop where they had to replace the motherboard. Naturally, I need to reflash the bios to get this thing working again in Windows 7. The problem is that none of the bios executables from "Index of /pub/VAIO/WIN7UPGRADE/" are working this time around. I'm guessing that my new motherboard is different from my old one. When I try to run the R2170M3 bios update that worked for me last time, I get the error "InsydeFlash can not load the driver. Please close all applications. If you are running this utility in Vista, please run as administrator." It makes 3 attempts to run, and then gives up. I am running this as admin with all programs closed. Apparently my current bios is R2166M3, but that one doesn't support the screen brightness control or Speed graphics setting. I really need to get this bios updated. What is this error? Any suggestions?

 

Hmm, just realized something. I was attempting to run R2170M3 after installing Windows 7. Does this bios update need to be installed from within Vista?

 

Well I think you'll be on safer side if you'll update your BIOS from DOS anyway. I upgraded to the latest version of hacked firmware that way without any problems.

 

Glad to hear from you again! I have no idea how to install BIOS from DOS. What do I need to do? Thanks for helping me out, again!

 

Here should be the latest bios version with advanced menu. You'll need to flash it with flashi*t (without *) from bootable USB flashdisk with DOS.

 

Thanks again, Metsn! I ended up actually restoring everything back to Vista to get the bios exe to run. It worked, and now I'm reinstalling Win 7. Hopefully everything should be fine.

 

Glad to hear that My MB was exchanged as well btw...seems to be quite common for VGN-Z. Curious how long will the new one resist...

 

have a weird issue, all my fn s1 s2 keys work. But i can't adjust brightness, but the brightness bar shows up but won't move.