New Sony Vaio Z speculation/news thread

it ain't cool unless its i7 lol.

 

Also 25% more L3 cache!

 

I have many accessories left over from my previous Z and am relieved i'll be able to reuse everything except the VGP-BPL20 ext battery which i'm selling.

I'm quite confident that the AC19V32 ac adaptor will carry over, along with the CKZ2 leather sleeve and VGP-FL14 privacy filter. I also hope that the noise canceling headphones from the Z12 will carry over. Always nice to have an extra set.

I'm curious how the new sleeve for the VAIO S series will fit htis new Z since it seems much better in person than the Z leather sleeve. 13.3" Leather Carrying Case | VAIO® Carrying Case | VGP-CKS4/B | Sony USA

 

The new Z is much thinner than the SA/SB though (16mm vs 23.8mm), so there's about 0.8 cm of space for the Z to wiggle around in the case. Not really too much of a problem anyways, I use Macbook Pro cases for my Z1.

 

Are there any official specs on thickness with sheet battery attached?

 

Does Sony charge your payment as soon as you complete the order, or do they wait until the laptop ships?

 

Yes.

VGP-BPSC27 : Battery & Adaptor : VAIO Accessories : Sony Asia Pacific

It's 7.6mm, so if you add that to the original 16.65mm, it's 24.25mm. Roughly 7 sheets of paper thicker than the SA

 

I just noticed something weird... on the Hong Kong VAIO Z launch... Link here - http://www.eprice.com.hk/nb/talk/1037/1886/

If you look at that link and scroll down, the images in the system and benchmarks say that it is using a AMD 6730M instead of a 6650M, is that an error on Sony's part or ?

Here are the links to the pictures btw :
http://timg.eprice.com.hk/hk/nb/img/2011-07/13/1886/alexchow_3_fecd972a84eb9085ee3ee94e76e86561.jpg
and
http://timg.eprice.com.hk/hk/nb/img/2011-07/13/1886/alexchow_3_0133932b948d1ebae7c685bd300ad956.jpg

 

The i5 will run a bit cooler and increase your battery stamina a little bit, but of course it's not the trailblazer the i7 is

 

i think if you are doing regular stuff (ie. web browsing, skyping, im, etc) it will consume same amount of power.

so i think it is nice to have extra power when you needed.

does anyone know what WWAN card is? and what is the wireless card?

 

unfortunately, i dont think this is the case between the i5-2540m and i7-2620m, especially since they are both dual core

correct me if i'm wrong, but from what i understand...
when the i7 is not stressed, it will run at a lower frequency equal to that of the i5 and therefore draw the same power

when the i7 is stressed, it will drain power faster, but will finish the task faster too and return to idle state to save power; whereas the i5 will take slightly longer to return to idle

ps. do all of the signature editions have premium carbon finish? i'm looking specifically at the $2.8k one, not the $4k+ one
i already looked through the specs and it isnt mentioned anywhere

 

yes that is what i'm trying to say : )

for the signature collection. i think it just a premium price dunno what is all about

when i bought my Z11 i have to get the sig collection in order to get 1080p. for a year+ i only used about 60GB of hdd and never use a blu-ray since the speaker is so awful. so since Z21 has $100 option for 1080p i think i will go with 256Gb, cd/dvd and safe a load of money : )

 

No, you need to make back-up disks (2 dvd's), plus most of the file are on "manufacturers" partition (5-10 GB).

Not a big deal to me as I always format laptop and do clean install of windows. I just don't like crapware most manufacturers put these days.

The only thing with clean install, you need to follow order when installing Sony utilities (Fn keys, volume, brightness) as they are all software driven, not hardware keys as with for example IBM.

Cheers,
Miki

 

Re: Battery Care Function

I use the battery care function on my Z135 frequently at 80% - familiar with it. Now, in reference to the sheet battery for the Z2, when it's attached, and battery care is "allowed", does it care for both internal and sheet battery? Or will it only care for the internal battery? Thanks.
__________________

 

good question, I'm also interested in this.

 

Lot of reviews out already.
Some interesting points:

a) Shallow keyboard received a thumbs down !
b) The 6650M seemed to perform worse than the Nvidia Gt330m in Z13, maybe Sony underclocked the 6650m ????
c) Heat seems to be a major issue and also fan noise
d) Z2 has 5.1 speakers with a sub woofer but sound quality still not great!
e) Great battery life
f) Best in class screen
g) No more the performance king, with much cheaper laptops scoring better in benchmarks

In short its a letdown! No Editors choice or 4.5/5 star reviews like the Z1 recieved

 

really dissapointed in the review of the speakers.
seems like they've put terrible speakers in, in an attempt for bragging rights with weight and size

and can't you order it from the US without the PMD??????

 

b): Are you serious? That is terrible if it is true.

EDIT: Check out this benchmark right here:



The 330M on the Z1 was barely able to hit 7000 3D marks even with the modded drivers and overclocking. The Z2's 6650 scored 7925 points.

 

when the Z1 EVER a performance king? the high-end alienwares sure whooped its in benchmarks.

 

In its form factor, it was, and still is! Compare it to the MBP 13", X220, or anything else 13".

 

I am not sure but some reviews have mentioned that the 6650M is not performing as expected. PCmag managed a 3DMark06 score of around 5000.
Here's what PCMag wrote:
" While powerful on paper, the 6650M didn't live up to expectations and wasn't nearly as impressive as the Nvidia GeForce GT 330M in the Sony Z1390X. Its 3DMark 06 (5,206) and Crysis (24.2 frames per second) scores were only about 10% percent better than that of the integrated graphics built into the Z214GX's Core i7 processor. I suspect that Sony might have dialed down speeds of the 6650M on purpose so that it didn't overpower the laptop. "

@Generic User #2
The Z1 had one of the highest PCMark Vantage score last year of ANY laptop ~ 12000. The M17x had around the same figure I guess. And in all other benchmarks as well it consistently scored equal or better than desktop replacement machines with core i7 840qm and even 920xm processors.
I am referring to application performance alone and not gaming.

 

Looks like the delivery of my custom new Z got delayed :| (UK, London)
Was supposed to be this week...

Following our previous correspondence we wish to inform you of a change to the expected shipping date of your VAIO
laptop.

We now expect your VAIO to be shipped to you between 15.07.2011 and 20.07.2011. Please accept our apologies for any
inconvenience caused.

 

lol, are you serious? 5.1 speakers?

 

He probably meant via HDMI output

 

No I was talking about the laptop speakers. There are 5 tiny speakers + 1 sub at the bottom. You can check out the Cnet review, they have mentioned it there.

 

^ I didn't know the Z2 came with 5.1 speakers...thanks for the info!

Sonystyle Hong Kong also took off the teaser page for the Z2.

Good thing I filled it out a few times...

 

Yes but its nothing more than a gimmick really. In reality they are worse than Z1's speakers

 

And the Z1's speakers sound worse than my phone's......

 

It's odd to see how reviews contradict each other

Power Media Dock?????VAIO Z???????????????????

on this review you see a completely different behaviour.

In addition 24.2 frames for crysis in low setting 1024x768? This is 10% over then integrated graphics? THis means nearly 22 frames.... which is a value too far away from reality: integrated graphic with those settings must reach nearly 40 fps ... totally strange. (also thinking that 6650M shoul eat crysis with more then 100 fps with those settings... something completely wrong..)

 

^^
Seems like PCMag received a defective unit or something. All other reviews do not mention anything of that sort and the 6550M is working as good as it should

 

Hi whats your custom spec

 

funny thing is, they took so many things out of the main unit, yet they couldn't make decent speakers. Why not keeping old ones?

As much as it sounds stupid, I really miss mic-in jack.

Cheers,
Miki

 

Is the 3.5mm headphone jack in the Z2 a dual mic/headphone jack?

 

^ it's correct

 

i7
8gb
premium carbon
backlit keys
win 7 pro
1080p screen

no pmd
no sheet battery

£1869ish

 

cool what hard drive and why no pmd dvd drive etc. great price anyway..

 

^ I am guessing a 128GB?

 

^ i think your guess is right.. and I would say, 3rd gen

 

Yeah hard drive 128gb, if i need larger I suppose i can swap it out with another SSD at a later date.
No disc drive because I can't remember the last time I even used a disc.
Would have been nice to have a better gfx card integrated but tbh the PMD gfx card isn't enough of an upgrade to merit the additional cost for me. I do most of my gaming on my desktop with its ATi 6990

Mainly went for this system over any others because a 1080p screen in a 13 inch laptop is unheard of and I develop on the machine (visual studio etc) so I need lots of screen space.

I'm lugging around a custom build core2duo Clevo laptop to work every day at the moment and its a bit heavy with integrated optical drive and huge generic chinese power supply

EDIT: And yes, its 3rd gen. Good guessing

 

^ ... you mean, upgrading with a 256 or 512 ssd only by Sony.. right?? Cuz' with other ssds there's no way at the moment..

 

No color options at SonyStyle US? what the hell. If they don't have colors... I am not going to buy a stupid $3K computer that I don't need. Stupid Sony.

 

^considering your last posts these days I think you still will.

 

I was thinking maybe the gold option isn't available yet because they don't have a gold sheet battery. Stupid reason, but could be true. The black sheet battery matches the other 3 models.

 

Maybe the included noise cancelling ear buds are even better than VPC-Z1's?

As much as I love a decent speaker, I find it hard to be too critical of Sony since they included noise cancelling hardware in the Z and give you a pair of ear buds to go with it.

 

I have a pair of Klipsch Image S4's and will be getting m audio av40s soon so it doesn't really both me =D.

Apparently sony did some magic to the audio output to make it sound better to make up for the speakers as well.

 

I figured, it's just convenient when the software comes on a separate disc. Is the Sony Utilities drivers posted online, on a disc or how would I clean install? (I usually do this too)

 

I have to wonder if Sony isn't going to add colors, the US site just went up yesterday and seemed to be evolving over the day. Prices changed and specs were added. I don't see why they wouldn't sell the gold version in the US and I still can't believe they are charging a $700 premium for a "limited edition" Signature model that is exactly identical, incluidng color, to a CTO.

 

The finish is different. sig models get premium carbon.

And I think that was just yesterday while they were updating the site without shutting it down. Pretty sure everything they want up is up.

 

Different behaviour in Europe where every color is available in CTOs

 

I just checked with Sony again, smae story. The Signature model is the same as the CTO down to the color -- they were surprised and said the only difference is that the CTO would ship more quickly. I still think something is screwed up. I noticed that the different grey shades offered (indigo, etc.) are gone from the site.