Sony A-170 First Take

Good news, I got the notebook one day early. Here are my first impressions:

Pros:
1. Screen is huge and beautiful, colours great, crisp and sharp. The text is very small in native resolution but thankfully Sony has a hot button which switches to a lower resolution which looks excellent. This is the first case that I have seen lower resolution on a notebook lcd that looks perfect, zero distortion. I have not watched a dvd on it yet but I am sure it will be excellent so basically with this monitor you have the best of both worlds, large fonts low res when using text applications, high resolution for video and gaming.
2. Beautiful design, well hidden inputs, very stylish or should I say sony stylish, also speakers and av dock look great
3. Keyboard nice feel, easy keys, a little clangy sounding though.
4. Quiet machine, but I have not pushed the CPU

Cons:
1. No printer port on back, fortunately I got the av station (which I have not opened)
2. Feels a little warm under my left hand (had the same problem with HP ZT3000 that I tested and returned)
3. Poor manuals and back up. There is sparse written manuals and I have to burn cds to make back up of the software.

Feel free to ask questions, I will post a more detailed review once I have more time.

Here are the specs:
1.7 ghz dothan
80 gig 5400 rpm hard drive
256 mb ram (I will purchase 1 gig of ram direct because Sony prices too high)
CD and DVD RW
AV port and speakers

 

Thanks for the quick take, make sure to keep us posted. As for the printer port...I'm fine with those going away. I'd bet that within a year, few, if any, will support legacy ports like that. There's just no need really...

Anyway, good luck!

Editor in Chief http://www.bargainPDA.com and http://www.SPOTstop.com

 

Seems like a good overall machine

I've had the same problem about the warmth too on my Gateway 450x, 'cept if I push it to the max, it get's so hot, you can double it as a frying pan [V]

Hope yours is on the contrary though

 

Sorry, but it's not true that the screen looks perfect when running lower interpolated resolutions, it certainly does not. We have have one in for review, and yes the 17-inch WUXGA is by far the best notebook screen in the world, but it can't avoid the laws of physics - displaying an image with the wrong number of pixels is never going to look good. It may look better than most, but it doesn't actually look good, especially compared with when running correctly.

As for text being too small, well it's not IMHO, it's just fine, so loong as you bump up the font size and icons to large in display properties it looks stunning. FYI the DPI/pixel pitch of the screen is more or less identical to a 15-inch UXGA notebook screen. If you are not comfortable with that DO NOT buy this notebook as it would be a total waste of the stunning screen to run it at non-native resolutions.

Our unit has no problems with heat anywhere on the chassis regardless of load.

 

Following are a few of my initial observations about the A170P

Unpacking:

Unit packed very securely and arrived unharmed. During unpacking, I expected to find more printed documentation. I discovered most of it is on the computer hard drive except for a 42-page “Quick Start” Manual. When unpacking the speakers, use caution when handling as the fabric is fragile.

Setup:

Setup was uneventful. Everything went together as expected. The Sony speakers appear to have a proprietary connection to the AV Dock so attaching standard speakers will require modification to the plug. Everything looks very nice together!

Use:

The screen is absolutely gorgeous! No bad or stuck pixels and the 1920x1200 resolution produces very beautiful images as well as small print. Adjusting the DPI to 133 helped make the text it readable to my 51 year-old eyes. However, this does create issues with certain dialog boxes and other applications. Manual adjustments were also required for screen brightness correction. The keyboard is very good, large well-placed keys with good feedback and no “springyness”. The other computer buttons, lights, keys and ports are intuitive and construction as well as design is first class. Door covering ports on rear of unit is appreciated. Overall system response is very good. Much faster than the 866 Mhz Pentium 3 it is replacing. Connection to Apple Airport Extreme was uneventful and appears stable. Haven’t yet tested Bluetooth , CD/DVD functions or any of the AV Dock features.

Summary:

A well-made computer that is better as a desktop replacement than a portable and a showcase of Sony’s industrial design prowess.

 

Ok, now I have notebook for past 2 days further observations:

1. Screen: I do prefer in 1900x1200 vs lower resolution, text is smaller on some web pages but still much clearer than lower resolution, so I adjust text size to extra large on some web pages and have increased the dpi a little and overall very good. Colours fantastic, the blacks are deep, very bright, also I watched finding nemo dvd on it, it almost looks 3D, excellent. The satellite speakers sound great too when watching the movie. Screen reflection not an issue, yes it is more reflective than traditional notebook screen but it does not bother me at all given how much better the screen looks.

2. Heat under my left hand no longer a big issue, it appears that it was hot when battery was charging up for the first time. Since then it has not been hot, just a little warm on the left side.

3. Sound. Fans very quiet, however, my hard drive has been making a regular "light" clicking/pinging sound even when I am not accessing any files. It is the 80 gig with 5400 rpm, I am worried that the drive has been damaged in the Fedex shipping. I called Sony they said it would be no problem to exchange.

So aside from harddrive issue, I am pleased so far. Sony has built a very nice notebook with complementary home entertainment setup.

 

Has anyone thought about installing a better hard drive such as the 7200rpm Hitachi 7K60? I'm considering it, but it is more complicated than I thought. The hard drive seems to be underneath the left hand rest, but I don't really know how to remove the cover. Removing all screws doesn't do the trick. Any advice? Might people in a computer repair shop know how to open it?

I love the screen as well (just one dead pixel so far), I had a Dell Inspiron 8200 before, and am used to 1600x1200.

Does anyone know why the fan is running constantly? It's very quiet but I guess that decreases the battery life a lot. A fully loaded battery lasts only 90 minutes, and on my A170 the task bar icon says that the battery is charging always, even though it's 100% loaded.

Since I'm complaining there is no built-in microphone. [ ] Are the 'silver' parts really a magnesium alloy? It looks pretty much like plastic to me.

 

Screener,

My A170P with the same drive has the "regular "light" clicking/pinging sound" also but only when accessing files and apps. You may have something running in the background that is causing drive access during apparent inactive drive cycles. My guess is that this sound is normal and nothing to worry about. It is a nice computer isn't it!

 

Yeah, installing the 7k Hitachi is probably worth it, haven't cracked ours open so not sure how hard to swap. As for the charging icon being there the whoile time, I wouldn't worry, it'll probably settle down eventually.

I've also been wondering about the so-called magnesium chassis, it mostly feels like plastic to me. Also, be warned the silver external chassis parts scuff very, very easily.

Finally, I really wouldn't change the DPI setting from default, it screws no end of things up (look at you task bar icons and you'll see they are slightly blocky if you've tweaked the DPI) - essentially XP is only built to display at a fixed (96)DPI, the abikity to cahnge that it really a fudge for very specific applations. I would recommend changing font and icon size to large (not extra large) in display properties>appearence. Then try that fro a week and I bet you'll get used to it. Once you have, you won't want to go back. I guess i find this Sony easy to use because my main notebook is a 15.4-inch, 1,920 x 1,200 system, so this panel is pretty comfortable for me.