Should I buy a Sony Z?

I am thinking about buying a soon-to-be-old Sony Z with P8700.

Anyone regret their purchase? Among other things, I am banking on the display being excellent.

Thank you!

 

The "display being excellent" depends on what you're looking for.

High DPI means sharper text (if you set the DPI right, that is).

It's very vivid, which is good if you want vibrant colours, and not so good if you want colour correctness (like when needing to match the colour of a physical object for subsequent print-out).

The colour gamut is very high, but skewed, so while it has a huge amount of possible colour nuances that can be displayed, there are also colours it can't display at all (like Pantone yellow or red -- there's too much blue in the red). If you're thinking of Illustrator work, it may not be ideal. But if you just want a large range of colours without matching them, it may be ideal.

Like almost all notebook displays, it's only 6 bits per colour, not 8. That means it has 262,000 colours, which it dithers into 15 million. Some see dithering artifacts, most usually diagonal "stripes" when moving windows, but for a few specific colours, there's also a visible pattern.

The horizontal angle of viewing isn't bad at all.

The vertical is, though. You won't ever see the same exact colour at the top and bottom of the screen unless you move the display really far away, and if viewing at any vertical angle at all, the colours will be off. It's not worst in class, but far from best (Don't believe me? Check out lagom.nl's tests.)

Speed? Excellent. There's little to no visible afterimage, even with "strobe" images.

There's also no moire "crawling" effect, and the image is rock steady for a notebook.

All in all, I'd give it 3 out of 5 stars. It's worse than pretty much any desktop monitor, but better than most notebook displays. Just not one of the very best, unless vibrance and high resolution matches your perception of "best".

 

Thank you for your review.

By an excellent display, I meant by notebook standards. I want something on par with that of the MBP 13", or the HP Envy 13", both of which I think have excellent displays. Most others (in the 13" category) just seem to look about the same to me.

My requirements are a 13" notebook with a high-quality display, excellent battery life, and fast.

 

I love my Z display, and I would say it's better than the macbook pro display.

 

and this is coming from someone who owns an MBP?! wow.

 

i bought it last month and sold it. i could not stand the battery drain problem. i need the laptop to be on the go and not always plugged at home. the screen diagonal lines is somewhat annoying.

im patiently waiting what mbpro has to offer. and also seeing how the new Z pans out. early adopters is often not a blessing.

 

The (old) Z has a screen that's in most ways better than the (old) 13" Macbook Pro. But that's not saying much. Both are machines that sell primarily on design and being different, not on feature quality.
I'd recommend that you note down what exact things you want to do with your laptop, and define must-have- and nice-to-have requirements based on that, and exclude what isn't good enough.

Will you need four people looking at the screen at the same time? A Macbook pro would be awful for that.
Will you need to make printouts where the colour on-screen is close to the colour that's printed out? The Z screen won't work well.
Are you editing video, and need 1920x1080 resolution to make pixel perfect menus or overlays? Neither will do, but the new Z might.
Are you going to use Adobe Photoshop / Lightroom? The older Zs don't have 64-bit OS support from Sony[*], and you may have to hack it, or be content with 32-bit Vista, 3 GB of usable ram and very slow Adobe apps.

[*]: In short, Sony don't provide upgrades for their computers. They have a model-based release system where new features appear on new models, and are not made available to older models even if the hardware is near identical. Except for bug fixes, what was released at the time of purchase is usually what you get stuck with, unless you can hack it yourself.

 

What Z models don't have 64-bit Vista or Windows 7? I am looking at used ones and assumed all Z models had this, so now I want to make sure I get one that does.

 

arth1, when you say "old" Z vs. "old" MBP, do you mean the Z that's about to be replaced compared with the MBPs that are currently available for sale today? I would assume you mean the MBPs released prior to June 2009, because I think the displays on the ones available today are quite nice, no? I was trying to compare the about-to-be-replaced Z with the current MBP, and I would be quite shocked (in a good way) if they were superior to the current MBP display-wise.

Also, I sort of think people are become way too obsessed with resolution. I understand its important for obvious reasons, but it was only a few years ago that 1200x800 resolution was standard for a 15". Honestly, if I could just get that on a 13", I would be perfectly fine. The idea of having full HD on a 13" to me is just ridiculous.

I'm mainly looking for decent brightness, sharpness, and good colors -- not so much how many pixels they can cram onto one panel per se.

 

^ hands down the Z display is better than mbpro. for photography, Z has the edge...

 

I just love the idea that you find ridiculous. If it is the Z-series (among the new Vaio options) I decide to go with, then it will come with the full-HD screen, and no other way.

 

I wouldn't mind full HD on something the Z's size - we have settable controls so why the complaint...?

The Z's LCD though is extremely flexy. In my case, I'm seeing dying pixels here and there through no fault of my own. I bloody carry the thing in a case, which then goes into another case where it is NOT subjected to pressure or hits.
And YES, I do the cloth-between-the-palmrest-and-screen hoopla after my first scatch appeared and before the first of the dying pixels... This despite the fact I wasn't even given a cloth with my Z (from 3rd gen on that seems to have changed)

I've got a free 2 year warranty and planning on getting the LCD replaced and various other build problems fixed (clicky palm-rest to chassis issue) a month or so before the warranty expires. All these issues came up when the Z was less than 6 months old...

There is one thing I learned during my short life... Never EVER get the latest and greatest. As previously mentioned, early adopters WILL suffer from something, so best one stays patient with the new Z. Alas, we have sayings like 'patience is a virtue'. The new S and F series are an example - I'm reading they are having some teething problems with those models these days...

So to answer the question of the thread creator...
I would wait a wee while (2 months max) for the first of the clearance sales to start. The old Z will start selling cheap once the newer Z is brought into circulation. My plan was to buy the best 5th gen I could here in NZ, but I think I'll just stick with raising enough money for a SSD upgrade.

 

If you're in the US, the following factory install applies:

Z5xx - Windows Vista 32-bit (Home Premium; Business + Win XP Pro downgrade disc; Ultimate + Win XP Pro downgrade disc)
Z6xx - Windows Vista 32-bit (Business + Win XP Pro downgrade disc); Windows Vista 64-bit (Home Premium; Ultimate + Win XP Pro downgrade disc)
Z7xx - Windows Vista 64-bit (Home Premium; Business + Win XP Pro downgrade disc; Ultimate + Win XP Pro downgrade disc) + all 3 should qualify for "equivalent" Windows 7 upgrade discs
Z8xx - Windows 7 64-bit (Home Premium; Professional; Ultimate)

Note:
1) For the Z6xx & Z7xx with regards to Vista Business, I may be wrong with the bit (32 or 64) version.
2) Win XP Pro downgrade disc is not included for any Vaio Z notebook that comes with a SSD drive &/or Blu-ray optical drive.

 

How long did your battery last? Sounds like one of my Digital cameras that I have from Sony.

 

Thank you so much!!!! So it looks like I want to stay away from the Z5xx used ones and go for all the other generations. If I get the XP Pro downgrade, I wouldn't mind that too much, as I would downgrade. If I got windows Vista 64-bit, I would upgrade to Windows 7.

 

yep, I have z690, the 1600x900 resolution is very "fine", I have 20/20 vision, and 6'0' tall, after 4-5 months of using the Z, I increased the DPI to 125% to help my neck pain, from the hunched straining.... I find it fascinating to see that the newest z series is 1080p...., although I agree that resolution is kind of overrated now....If I had to do it over again, I would reconsider getting something with slightly larger screen, maybe a 15 inch, although by that time, I would be complaining of weight....

 

Arth 1 may have too keen of an eye than most people. I love the screen on my Z, it is very much comparable to the macbook pro screen (keep in mind they are mostly glossy coating vs the semi glossy matte coating the Z has).
Under non-ideal lighting, the screen on the Z wins hands down.

No, the screen does not use IPS panel. However, the PN panel on the Z is as good as it gets on a laptop. The vertical viewing angle is less than perfect, but show me a PN panel laptop that has great vertical viewing. The horizontal viewing angle is great, when compared with other laptops.

Overall, for an average consumer or business user, the screen on the Z is absolutely stunning. If you do graphic design, I guess you probably won't care about any laptop screens other than a IPS panel.

 

The first generation Zs don't have Sony support for 64-bit Vista or Windows 7.
The second generation Zs don't have Sony support for Windows 7.

In general, anything from Spring 2009 or newer will be fine, otherwise probably not.

 

One more thing to note is that all Vaio Z series notebooks can run 64-bit Windows since the CPUs & chipsets included support it. It's just that in the case of the Z5xx series, they come factory installed with 32-bit Windows, which means that you may have to purchase your own 64-bit Windows software to install if you want to use 64-bit OSes.

 

And you can't download 64-bit drivers from Sony for the earliest models. Some users use drivers from newer models, which they extract using 3rd party tools to bypass the model verification. However, the newer models have different hardware (like the bluetooth module and US WWAN, both of which has changed), and the newer models' drivers won't give full support for everything.

 

I may be wrong but I believe you can now download some (not all of them) of the Sony "official" Z5xx series' 64-bit drivers for Windows Vista &/or 7. The following are 2 links for the Vaio Z590 notebook that you may want to check out:

http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/swu-list.pl?mdl=VGNZ590&SelectOS=49
http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/swu-list.pl?mdl=VGNZ590&SelectOS=36

 

any other comments on the display? =P

 

As long as the perhaps most important driver -- the display driver -- is missing, it's pretty useless.
I haven't heard of anyone who has installed Windows 7 or Vista 64 on a Z590 yet, with everything working ("everything" includes UAC, so no unsigned drivers). Which is pretty sad, because it's only a year since Sony sold it.

 

I love my Z's screen. It's bright and has good color ! But it's something personal.
You should look at it in person to decide if you will go for it?

..you can download the display drivers from Intel or nVIDIA. It's that easy.
The drivers Sony (or any other laptop manufacturers) put on their website actually come from Intel or nVIDIA.

Yes, it is true that software supports from Sony are poor. I'd blame them for that.

But you can't say the laptop itself is the reason that you can't make 64-bit Win 7 work. It's just your inability to make it work.

And I don't agree with your definition of "everything working". To me, "everything working" simply means every functions work as they should do. I don't care about UCA or unsigned drivers. Unsigned drivers are just what have not been certified by Microsoft.

 

Yes, it's that easy but they won't work. We are talking about Sony and Hybrid display drivers here.
Almost Z890's driver work for Z590.

 

Do you have a Z?
The Z has a hybrid Intel/nVidia solution and needs special hybrid drivers that nVidia and Intel do not make available for download.

When installing unsigned drivers, you have to disable UAC (note spelling) and run in "test mode". The group policy on the domain controller doesn't even permit turning off UAC, but I guess you wouldn't find the ability to log in to the corporate network necessary for "everything working" either?

Never mind that if I managed to bypass the GPO, I still wouldn't be able to do my job, which includes testing software installations. If our customers see a prompt after installing that says "The software may not have installed correctly", and this is because we tested with UAC disabled and never discovered that the installer tried to write to Program Files in an unelevated state, we'll lose a lot of money on support calls. Because everything wasn't working.

 

Almost.
And not for Vista-64, only for W7-64.

If buying a Sony, new or used, I strongly suggest that you don't plan on or expect to be able to run any other operating systems than what it was delivered with. I love Sony notebooks, but they are about the least future proof ones on the market.

 

I do have a Z which I bought quite long time ago (I remember in 2008) and it starts with 5xx.
But if you say about the hybrid solution, you should talk about the driver for the button to switch between the two modes, i.e. to turn off one and turn on another. This driver should not be confused with the VGA drivers. It will activate the corresponding VGA driver but it itself is not VGA drivers. And it should be included in the Sony control and utilities.

I am on the 32-bit Win 7 and I installed the vga card driver I got directly from nVIDIA. It works perfectly.

I will be surprised if nVIDIA or Intel need to make any kind of special drivers for the Z.
I don't see any reason that the drivers will not work on the vga cars which use the same chipsets.

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It is just a warning. And yes, some body will call you if he is confused. But that it is not the mistake of the notebook.

I want to insist that the notebook itself has full capability of running 64-bit Win 7 on it.

This is not true. My Vaio came with Vista Business and I am having it with Win 7 Pro and everything is perfect with a clean installation.
I am also running Ubuntu on it too

 

For values of "perfectly" meaning "have lost the ability to switch off the nVidia card and use the Intel graphics instead, which prolongs battery life by about 25% when you don't need 3D".

What you're missing is NvTmmHyb.dll and Intel version of nvBridge.kmd -- that's the library and driver loader by nVidia that allows the nVidia graphics card to be switched off and the onboard Intel graphics be used instead. You can't download those from nVidia.

Other things that have been reported not working after non-Sony-provided upgrades of Z5xx notebooks include losing Sprint WWAN and audio over HDMI. YMMV, but in your case, you lost the entire hybrid mode -- one of the main selling points for the Z.