Ode to my VPCZ11.

I just ticked over 3 years with this fabulous machine. You know, I didn't think it would last this long. My first year was not confidence inspiring. The funky keyboard. The constantly loosening screen hinge. In fact, I just took it all apart to tighten the hinge screws again last night. Tight as new again. I predicted that it wouldn't last nearly as long as my Thinkpad X60. Today I love it as much as the day I got it. It's held up pretty well. The palmrests have darken. I've worn the left mouse button clean through to the white plastic and then some. The little rubber feet all fell off last year. Otherwise, it still looks as good as the day I got it. Well, that is until 5 days ago when I started pushing it under a big table at night as it sat on it's little laptop table. That morning after, I saw a couple of little scratches on the lid that I didn't remember getting. Tonight I pushed in again and this time I felt it being scratch. Stupid exposed screw. There's about 10 little 1/4" scratches there now. Until then, the lid was still perfect. I'll call them character lines. They caused me to carefully look over it tonight and inspired me to write this little love note to my laptop. People think that Sony's are fragile. I've taken this laptop with me around the world a time or two since I've gotten it. It's in better shape than my X60 which went through the same. I'm still on my original battery. 3 years of 2 recharges a day. That's unheard of. My X60 needed a new battery every year. I still get 3 hours out of this battery after a 80% charge. Unlike my X60 which was slow near the end of it's life, this laptop still does everything I want with no performance issues. It's the best laptop I've ever had. I have no plans to replace it since I have yet to find anything as good. My Z11 is still my little jewel.

 

Makes all doubts about SSDs in RAID 0 and the absence of TRIM sound almost silly.

Mine is also slightly over 3 years and are now used daily by my son. I've fixed the fan twice, but the first didn't really fix it because I didn't lift the actual spinning fan piece to clean it up and put a drop of oil in there. But after that last fix, it sounds like new again. No rattling whatsoever.

Mine also has a unique flair after a drop from ~1m. The top left corner took the fall so the speaker is now tilted downwards a few mm. I guess I could open it and bend it back, but I'm afraid to break it if I try since the alu got a few tiny cracks by being bent. But it looks very much like the wrinkles you get in the corner of your eye from smiling too much, so they just add to its character.