Rumored Vaio Z 13 Refresh??

I recently read the Vaio Z 13 was to be refreshed October 6th in Japan to be followed here in US. The one stand out item was one USB 3.0 port. I checked the Sony Japan site and to my disappointment there was no Z 13 with a USB 3.0 option. I know the new Seagate 1.5 TB GOFlex USB 3.0 portable drive has an express card adapter that should work with this laptop as a workaround but when spending top dollar a USB 3.0 jack would be nice. So WHO KNOWS SOMETHING??? Thanks
John

 

1) Intel currently does not support USB 3.0 on their mobile platforms.
2) The Z13 came out two weeks ago, do you really think they are going to refresh it so soon? Refreshes come about every 4 months approx.
3) It is not totally forbidden to say "Hello", present yourself, or use the "search button".

I leave you with all the information you need here.

 

Intel does, just not natively. They haven't, and will not, stop ODM/OEM from using a 3rd party chip to add in "internal" USB3.0 support.

Though it's always nice to have

 

How do you explain USB 3.0 on the F series then?

 

Intel is focused on light peak, their own transfer platform. I persist: the Intel southbridges will not support USB3.0 until at least Sandy Bridge for laptops, if that.

We have no way to know for sure, but unless Sony wants to cram an internal 3.0 controller somewhere inside the Z in its next refresh, we won't be seeing integrated 3.0 until at least January.

Just my 2c.

 

I saw on the forums that the AKE usb3.0 expresscard sits flush, but does it give the same performance as a native port, and would it stay firmly locked in place if you wanted to just leave it in there forever? If so that would be perfect.

 

The Z's expresscard port is limited to PCI-E 1x, I don't know if this is limiting the speed of USB 3.0 or not.
From my personal experience I know that USB (at least 1 and 2) is much slower in realworld than in theory, so I don't think, that the PCI-E will be limiting.

 

Nope, since it will be capped to the PCI-e 1x speed. But it WILL be enough for the fastest single HDDs you can get at the moment. If you plan to use a cutting-edge SSD or multiple drives in an external RAID array, the ExpressCard interface will bottleneck.

 

I kind of thought with the recent reviews of the Z 13 that this was the refreshed version. I really appreciate the response and info particularly about the express card slot as a USB 3.O. I know the Z13 doesn't have an eSATA but how does that perform against the PCI-e1x. Guess I need to call Seagate but the implication is with their GoFlex 1.5 TB portable USB 3.0 there is no bottleneck with either eSATA or PCI with their adapter cables (which are pricey). Any thoughts?

 

OK, so I just called Seagate and their SATE1 cpi accessory $79.97 (PC Connection $59.95 when they get them - a week) is supported by the Z13 and has the USB 3.0 chip in it so performs as as dedicated USB 3.0 port would. (approx. 10x USB 2.0 data rate). If you buy the PCI card it comes w/ a USB 3.0 cable that attaches to the portable drive so you won't have to buy another one when you eventually get a PC with USB 3.0 motherboard support. There is one downside. Looks like the profile of the card extends beyond the PC chassis and has some bulk to. So I would porbably only insert it when using. I only need now to get some feedback on the 1080x1200 display as compared to MacBook Pro 13 and the recently d/c Hp 14 Envy Radiant display 1600x900. If the Z13 1080p display is as good or better than the above looks like I'll order one or may wait to see what Mac does with the 11" MacBook Air next week.

 

There is no refresh coming to Z13.

 

How do you mean? As in no Z14?

 

I mean there is no refresh to the Z coming....

 

Oh so Z13 is like the end of the line for the Z series and whatever is next for Sony's ultraportables is going to be a totally new model?

 

Definitely go see an envy14 and Z in person before deciding. The E14 is like a boat anchor compared to the Z, and even though it's bigger it has less expansion ports, and is of very poor build quality. I would only recommend it for people wanting quad core.

A macbook air won't be as powerful as either one of those, and it has only a single USB port, minidisplay port, and headphone jack... thats it. The Z is more powerful than even a macbook pro 15" due to having 1GB of VRAM on the nvidia GT330, and hardware raided SSD's. The screen of the Z is incredibly good and you can choose either 900p or 1080p. Notebookcheck has test data on the screens and I made a comparison right here of them:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-envy-hdx/522692-fight-envy-14-radiance-display-5.html#post6784806