HDD in Sony Vaio Z series?

Hello,

The new Sony Vaio Z series only comes with SSD option for North America. Is there anyway to either replace the SSD with a HDD or to add a HDD after purchase? I need plenty of internal storage and even the 255GB SDD option in Z116GX/S will be insufficient.

Please advise,

Thanks in advance.

 

The physical interface to Sony's SSD seems to be proprietary (or at least, uncommon). Also, the space where those SSDs sit is smaller than a 2.5" drive, and so far I don't think I've seen someone put a 1.8" drive in there.

I got the HDD option by ordering from Conics.net. Unfortunately the HDD replaces the optical drive, but at least we know, from dimension6's posts, that we can swap the HDD with our own. Buying from Conics (in Japan I believe) has the advantage of having more options (e.g. 1920x1080 screen), but at a higher cost. SonyStyle in other countries don't ship overseas, so I could not order from their websites. I suppose the other alternative is to travel to the country which sells the configuration you want, then buy it there.

 

I would be very interested in the Z series if I could confirm a way to swap the DVD drive for a 2.5" HDD.

 

I think the biggest issue probably is the ribbon connector, based on pictures of the HDD and DVD, the ribbons are different. I believe the HDD and SDD connections are to the same interface on the motherboard, but it's different for the DVD. Someone else with an actual Z on his / her desk should probably confirm this

 

the Z115 model available in Asia Pacific does not have a built-in optical drive. In its place is a massive 500gb HDD.

 

As Ascend stated, you can get one in Asia, specifically Japan (not sure if HK, Malaysia, and other parts of Asia offer this), with or without an SSD with either 320GB or 500GB HDD in the place of the optical drive.

This is preferable to me as well since I have practically no need for an optical drive except maybe couple of times a year.

Sony Japan does not offer international shipping so unless you can get someone to get it for you, you're out of luck.

There is an alternative and that is to utilize an import service company that will get the notebook for you and ship it to your location. Check out this post if you're interested in perhaps going this route. That's what I did.

 

I went with Conics, I wasn't given the option of having both SSD and HDD... the two seem to be mutually exclusive.

 

Sony Japan offers SSD with HDD. If you specify this option with Users-Side, they will order it this way... but you already chosen Conics I see. I chose not to go with Conics because they were charging about $500 more for the same configuration from my post.

 

Wow that's pretty steep, I thought their markup is less, someone was quoting 10-20% I think. Anyway, I wish I had knew about SSD with HDD, that would have been my first choice

 

Isn't it just a matter of finding a male MicroSATA to female SATA connector? There are tons of female MicroSATA to male SATA connectors available (for adapting 1.8" microSATA drives to standard SATA interfaces) but I can't find the opposite anywhere.

This (and not being able to confirm how quiet the fan is on integrated graphics - my CW is louder than I'd like) are the only things stopping me from ordering right now. A DVD drive is useless to me. I may as well just pull it out and save an ounce or two. I wish Sony would sell a HDD caddie as an option.

 

There are female to male MicroSATA extenders for sale. I wonder if I could solder my own together? I think the voltage may step up from the MicroSATA to SATA however and that could complicate things a bit.

 

DVD+SSD Combo
I don't know if the interface the DVD is connected to can be used directly, or what it is (maybe it's IDE ) If using the SATA interface the SSD is connected to, that connection needs to be shared (unless you ditch the SSD), and I have no idea what that interface on the motherboard is (sometimes I think it's LIF). When the interface connector is solved, there's also the issue of the ribbon: it's currently routed to the SSD, which is in a different position the DVD resides in.

HDD only
The one terminating on the HDD is normal SATA, dimension6 replaced his HDD with an SSD without any trouble. This is the route I'm taking.

Edit: Pics are worth a gazillion words, check out the laptop innards in the post by Chirality:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5980342&postcount=79

Dimension6's pics of his HDD->SSD transformation:
http://www.stewart.gs/vaioz.html

 

Thank you.

 

Does anyone think that a 1.8" MicroSATA HDD would work. I've seen them up to 250GB. It would be slow but it would be alright for storing media and should be rather quiet. I would think it would just plug into the MicroSATA connector that the DVD drive connected to.