Palmrest paint fading - Sony Vaio Z owners, place your votes now!

Hey guys,

So, since everyone always seems to be up in arms about this palmrest paint fading issue that constantly resurfaces in one thread after the next, I decided to undertake a little pseudo-statistical look at the situation. If you would please, take a quick moment to read each poll choice and vote in accordance with your current status.

Please note that this poll only seeks feedback from owners of Vaio Z laptops for 60+ days! This will help to limit the data to people who have had ample time for the fading to appear under their wrists.

Thanks for participating. This will surely help me and other prospective Z buyers in their decision-making process.

-Steve

 

Starts happening with my ''premium carbon fiber'' Z11. Or rather; it was there after a while (a month) but it seems to have stopped progressing further and is only on my left side of the palm wrest.

 

Hey hxk,

How bad/noticeable is yours?

 

Are we talking about paint color fading, or the palmrest going shiny from use?

 

I don't know; I suppose if the "shininess" is noticeable and distracting enough, you might count it?

 

Here's two pic of mines taken back in June:

Yfrog Album

The fading on the left hand side is bigger now and there is also fading on the right hand side too...

 

Mine has a significant circularish fade on the right side of my palm rest. It doesnt' look too bad though. When I sent my vaio in for repair they stated casually that it probably would be covered if you were worried about it.

 

Thanks for all the feedback thus far, guys. This, along with the durability/reliability of the SSD array, is one of my primary concerns prior to committing to a purchase. Surely as this poll continues to receive votes over time it will serve as a useful revelation to those of us on the fence.

 

Not that bad, you can see it pretty good in most lightconditions tho .. got mixed feelings about it;

- get the feeling ''to be expected'' or something, i mean i use the Z it alot
- i do kinda hate that i payed so much cash and still got such a ''weak'' painted palmwrest. I mean even a acer of a buddy of mine is still looking great -_-.

 

Ah yeah. Mine has gone shiny and is a slightly different color because of that, but no worse than my previous darker laptops, and definitely nowhere near the extent yours has.

 

That's kind of disheartening to hear. My 2.5 year old dell xps m1330 still has a perfect palm rest .

 

mine is perfect still, I'd be pretty po'd if it looked like some of the photos I'm seeing here.

 

easy and cheap solution for any palmrest fading
Amazon.com: Curad PF Latex Exam Gloves - Large - 1,000 Per Case - Model CUR8106: Health & Personal Care

 

Fascinating that no one so far has voted YES to a silver-colored Z...

 

No issue her and will never be one because i don't rest my hands on it, and the fact that i only use a bluetooth mouse unless I have to use a touchpad makes it less likely for me to get fading.

 

The touchpad, on the other hand does show some wear, doesn't it? Mine does I wish Sony Z had keyboard like on 1330, I love typing on it, and it doesn't show the fingerprints that much although it also got worn out. Still, I think I'm starting to like having backlit keyboard, even though I'm a touch typist, I still look at it when typing passwords, so it helps in the dark I also like larger palmrest on 1330, it's little more comfortable for typing

BTW, this Z with battery is so much lighter than 1330 without the battery, that it feels like a brick picking up 1330 after handling Z. The screen is noticeably smaller, though (physically), even though resolution is higher.

I think overall Z is a nice upgrade from 1330, even though performance wise they are not far apart if you have SSD in the 1330 already.

 

What about trying this trick on those greazy Zs? (be careful though, I've heard this is like a micro sandpaper)

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That thing is pretty much guaranteed to destroy paint on the Z's palmrest

 

My launch VPC-Z11 palm rest is doing fine. No sign of paint fading what so ever.

 

I'm not sure how to vote: I was obsessing over the oil stains so I made some effort to clean it. Apparently I'm no longer in control over how much effort I make so I managed to clean off the paint as well. I suppose I should vote 'yes' since I more or less effectively accelerated the process.

I'm looking for the part number of a backlit, fingerprint scanner keyboard. Anyone know please spill it

 

Microfiber cloth + 70% rubbing alcohol with isopropyl is the bestway to go. It practically dries on its own instantly and its an excellent degreaser. Anyone worried about the finish need not worry, I been using it on my 80 dollar laptop-like logitech illumininated keyboard (best keyboard ever). I've also used in a few instances to remove gunk off my BLACK car that i baby very much, more so than my laptop. If the 70% alcohol with isopropyl is good enough for my car's paint and finish, it is good enough for my keyboards. It practically evaporates into the air instantly so you don't have to worry about it dripping inside the latop. try it.

 

The touchpad and keyboard are still fine, no fading at all You like the 1330 keyboard? Personally I think the keys are a little flimsy and my K key sometimes doesn't sit properly. It was like that when I first got it.

Regarding the screen, I haven't received my Z yet but I'm surprised to read that the Z's screen is noticeably smaller, even though the difference is only 0.2". I think I should notice a big performance upgrade from my core 2 duo T7200 and regular HDD.

Things that I think I am gonna miss: The aluminum palmrest, 2 earphone jacks, the nice little remote control, and a dedicated media control bar. I got the carbon fiber colour and after reading several threads on this forum, I'm going to put a protective film on the palm rest...

 

I'm not a fan of using alcohol on computers. It's a solvent and can affect your surface finish. I use 70-100% alcohol regularly at work, and I've seen that stuff strip away floor and bench surfaces. I'd presume car paint is more durable and meant to withstand the elements, so alcohol doesn't affect it. If you need to use alcohol as a last resort, 70% is way too high and it should be diluted down to 10% or less. Keep in mind that Windex is only 5% alcohol I think, and it removes grease from windows fine.

But better still would be to use a surfactant such as diluted Dawn (like someone else suggested in another thread) or something mild by Johnson like baby soap solution.

 

yeah, I'm thinking about the protective film. The 1330's palmrest is awesome but it's bigger overall, Z is like an 1"-1.5" shorter when folded (i'm using 1330 sleeve so iZ leaves a lot of space on top). Screen just feels smaller and it's a different format -16x9 instead of 16x10 on 1330 so if it's the same in the width (maybe even a touch wider), it's definitely shorter. But no worries, you'll get used to it

I didn't have any issues with 1330 keyboard but then it was repaired quite a few times and keyboard was replaced at some point My warranty expired recently so I've made Dell repair it once more due to some issues, Dell support is so awesome and Sony is nowhere close to that - I tried fixing a few issues i had with the first Z I got and Sony didn't get off its for a week and half, so I got another one and sent that POS back to the store. All the better because I got an awesome deal on the second one.

However, speedwise I should note that Z is faster in CPU intensive tasks, like HD content playback and games but in regular web-browsing and office work, 1330 will match Z speedwise with an SSD. If Z came with a regular HDD, you prolly won't see the difference either with office stuff.

 

Personally, I am still using an M1330 for my primary machine. The main reason I am contemplating an upgrade is that the newer graphics chipsets, switchable dedicated graphics, and more powerful CPUs will bode well for my video and audio editing work.

However, since beginning my research into the Z, I have encountered numerous concerns. Among them, of course, are the palmrest fading and SSD-related issues. I am still very concerned about the SSD reliability (as well as the garbage collection routines), and I may actually make a similar poll about that next, just to help clear matters up a little bit more.

More than anything else, however, I am concerned about buying a Sony product. Historically, as a technician, I have never been a fan of anything Sony-branded, thanks mostly to their supposedly terrible support and ridiculous, Apple-like proprietary construction. That's not to say anything about the price, which, of course, is fairly ludicrous on its own. I only wish to reassure myself that I will not have to deal with them before purchasing such an expensive and high-end product. Sadly, however, thus far, I cannot say that I am any closer to such a commitment.

If only there were comparable other notebooks available.

 

I've been using SSDs on 1330, my desktop and another laptop for over a year now and I've got 0 problems with them. Pretty sure it won't be a problem with Z either. Palmrest is meh, you can't keep anything in mint condition unless you put it behind a glass and just look at it. Support, on other hand, is really terrible, after dealing with Dell for 3 years, Sony is not even close to Dell's level of experience and support - and says a lot, as Dell is far from perfect.

 

I just hope the Vaio Z won't disappoint me Top of the line specs in a package smaller than my M1330.

I like my M1330 a lot and it was my very first laptop. Too bad the battery died on me a year ago due to my poor battery maintenance. 2 other flaws on my M1330 when I first got it: the CPU whine and the poorly assembled display. The left edge of the screen is loose and you and press on it. I have asked Dell to replace the machine twice for me and none of them were perfect so I had to settle with my current one.

 

Alcohol with Isopropyl

 

Isopropyl is alcohol

 

sgreg was probably referring to plain ethanol

 

Any alcohol will eat away on the paint.

 

Yeah, I've very few qualms about SSD technology on the whole, but what concerns me more about the Z is the fact that it's RAID-0, which A) adversely affects reliability and B) inhibits the use of TRIM and perhaps effective garbage collection. I don't really know, but it concerns me.

 

well, the good news is that even though it's Raid, it's still more reliable than raided HDDs w/o any moving parts. Now, do not mistake Garbage collection with trim - while former does not work in Raid0, GC still does - it does not depend on Raid as it's run internally, independent of OS and drive configuration, it's part of the drive logic (in fact, it's present on ANY modern flash drive including thumbdrives). TRIM is a on-demand OS command which is not passed through the driver in Raid0 and that's why it doesn't work. It also doesn't work in any windows prior to 7 (except if you run with a drive-specific utility and there's none for Samsung), and it's absent from Mac OS.

 

Nah, ethanol or isopropanol, although isopropanol is a little more mild on surfaces than ethanol. But why risk it when there is an almost equally effective alternative?