Sony FZ4000 CTO with Penryn CPU's out! Unusual deal too hehe

http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs...Id=10151&langId=-1&LBomId=8198552921665308446

What's funny is that if you pre-order now, you can get -$100 off the total price of the laptop by UPGRADING to 3GB of ram, and -$200 off the total price for switching from the third "Blu-Ray Read Only Drive" to the second "Blu-Ray Read Only Drive" lol. Add $20 for the new Penryn CPU, and you're golden.

 

lol thats weird

 

I think it's a heck of a deal. -$300 for a better sony laptop? Doesn't get much better than that...

 

I was looking at that today as I think this is my next purchase. I assume the bluray thing is a mix up right now and it should be 200 more for the burner option. I noticed the same about the ram....i was wanting a 1 GB selection since i was going to use my own ram that I have for much cheaper. We will see in the next couple days what happens

 

Huh? New Centrino label/sticker?

 

it's definitely a mix up of their order options, and sony will be correcting the page soon. I just want to know if sony has to honor those people who order the upgraded versions for lower price! that would be pretty nice...

 

Heh, I love these kind of mistakes

 

i think if you already paid for it they have to honor it.

 

Why did they skip one number? unlike Sony to do this...
What I meant was, the new FZ is FZ4 instead of FZ3?

 

if you look i believe there are also fz3 options... there were last night anyway but i thought the same thing..

 

Page has been corrected now. $200 for the Blu Ray reader and $400 for the burner. Also, 3GB RAM is now an added $100. Still, the prices keep falling for better hardware. Not too shabby.

I am waaaaay too tempted by this. I have a VAIO SZ460. I could ebay it for like $1100 and get a faster, cooler (temp) notebook with better graphics, Blu Ray, HDMI, and wireless N for ~$300 out of pocket. About the only things I'm really attached to with my SZ is the LED screen and fingerprint reader. I think I would survive. Man I hate talking myself into these things.

Anyone want a great condition SZ460N for $1100? It's got a warranty with accidental damage until March '09! :wink:

 

I really wish it had better screen resolution to compete with the dells. Im still in between the FZ4000 and a dell xps M1530 with 8600GT. Still leaning towards the sony though.....just need a deal on the sony and it would be a sealed deal

 

Yeah I've been eyeing the M1530, but Blu Ray is $500 and for me personally I don't need write capabilities. Also, from my experiences, Dell doesn't last very long. Touchpads die, buttons break, hinges loosen, fans freak out, and cases are heavy and less than sturdy.
My only question now is whether I will care about the 8400M GT vs. the 8600M GT for casual gaming such as TF2.

Here are the builds I'm looking at:

Sony FZ4000 CTO
$1489.99
Polished Mosaic
WLAN 802.11 a/b/g/n w/Integrated Bluetooth®
NVIDIA® GeForce® 8400M GT
LCD 15.4" WXGA (XBRITE-HiColor™
Blu-ray Disc™ Read Only Drive
160GB SATA Hard Disk Drive
2 GB DDR-SDRAM (DDR2-667, 1 GBx2)
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.4GHz) (wooo!!)
Norton 360™ All-In-One Security (60 Day Trial)
Quicken® Deluxe 2008
Video Standard
Photo Standard
Microsoft Works
No Engraving
Standard Battery (BPS8)


Dell XPS M1530
$1599 (No Blu Ray) after $594 instant savings
Tuxedo Black
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T7700 (2.4GHz/800Mhz FSB, 4MB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition
Glossy, widescreen 15.4 inch LCD (1280x800) & 2.0 MP Camera
3GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz (2 Dimms)
Speed: 160GB 7200rpm SATA Hard Drive Free Fall Sensor
Slot Load DVD+/-RW (DVD/CD read/write)
256MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8600M GT
Intel Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-card
Dell Wireless 355 Bluetooth Internal (2.0+Enhanced Data Rate)
56 WHr 6-cell Lithium Ion Primary Battery
Integrated Sound Blaster Audigy HD Software Edition

 

My price range is 1800-2200 and I would like the bluray burner...right now the dell comes out a little cheaper with the discount but if sony gets a 200 off discount i will pick it up no question about it. I plan on switching the harddrive out anyway and would do the same with the ram if sony would give me a 1 gig option. Then it would be perfect!

I am pleased with my current Dell 1405. It has held up great but I am ready for a update is all.

 

Lol, I hope you americans don't an option of an 8600GS DDR3 . Us UK and europeans are lovin' it!!

 

I don't really get the point of a blu-ray read only drive in the FZ with the resolution that it has. you won't be able to tell the difference in quality between DVD and Blu-Ray with only a 1280x800 screen. maybe on the dells, but not the FZ. if I were to go blu-ray on the FZ that I would go all the way and get a Blu-Ray burner in case I needed to burn massive disks in the future. Otherwise the Blu-Ray just seems pointless to me.

so, "Transfer", if you just want to be able to read blu-ray disks that's fine but if you opted down to the DVD drive then you'd be looking at 1259.99. not bad.

 

Ahhh but who wants to watch ANY videos on a notebook when you have a perfectly good HDTV? I've never understood why anyone would watch dvds (or blu ray for that matter) on a laptop. And a Blu Ray stand alone player = $500. No thanks. FZ with built in Blu-Ray for $200 --> HDMI --> HDTV at up to 1080p. Yes please.

If someone does not have a HDTV yet and they are buying a HD notebook, I think the HD priority should be in the TV display first. I was about to buy HD-DVD for my Xbox but after recent movie studio shifts, it looks like HD-DVD is in trouble. A notebook upgrade sounds nice anyway.

 

ahh i totally forgot about that sorry! i guess you can totally ignore my last post then hehe

 

So what kind of performance increase might the T9300 (2.5GHz) give over the T8300 (2.4GHz). I know the cache size difference, but does that really translate into anything worth a $150 upgrade for 0.1GHz and 3MB L2?

I use iTunes, photo editing, DVD editing, Office, casual gaming (TF2!), etc.

 

macrumors.com has a very interesting thread on this topic. A lot of very knowledgeable ppl commenting on all the upgrades and their relative benefit. Look for a post talking about penryn benchmarks.

 

Great read over at anandtech.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel/showdoc.aspx?i=3195&p=1

Pretty much give you the power details between the two. It makes my mind up about which processor to go with

 

Yeah, I read that article but that is comparing Merom to Penryn. I'm curious about Penryn 2.4GHz vs Penryn 2.5GHz. They are $150 apart in cost.
(and again, yes I know about the cache difference, I'm looking for benchmarks)

 

I just placed my order! I was waiting for free shipping to come up again and it did, so nevermind about the CPU differences. Here's what I went with:

Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T8300 (2.4GHz Penryn)
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
NVIDIA® GeForce® 8400M GT
LCD 15.4" WXGA (XBRITE-HiColor™
Blu-ray Disc™ Read Only Drive (Finally HD discs on the big screen!)
160GB SATA Hard Disk Drive (5400 RPM)
2 GB DDR-SDRAM (DDR2-667, 1 GBx2)
WLAN 802.11 a/b/g/n w/Integrated Bluetooth®
No Engraving
Standard Battery (BPS8)
Polished Mosaic

 

make sure you take some pics of that polished mosaic finish and post it. I have never really seen one just a small picture on sony's webpage.

 

Order status update. I just received a sonystyle email:

"The VGNFZ4000 you purchased on order SWXXXXXXXXXXX has been rescheduled to ship on or about 02/04/2008 12:00 AM. You will receive an email once your order ships."

Sweeeeeeet. That's actually sooner than I expected.

 

Anyone get any word on when these will ship?
i know alot of you have placed your order, and are awaiting the "order sent" emails from sony.

whats taking sony so long shipping these out. alot of other vendors have already started shipping their penryn chip laptops already..

i ordered mine on 1/15, CTO'd

i really hope these new chips save on battery life.. i had a FZ290 that died on me after 1 week, so i returned it and ordered the FZ4000CTO.

the battery life on the FZ290 was horrible to say the least..
maybe an hour max watching a DVD on full power. so sad.. can't even watch a full length movie on the battery life of these laptops..

 

????
Um, see the post above yours.

 

Now when you configure one it say around 2-12-08. I ordered mine on 1-17 and the order still says processing?

 

I got the same mail on my SZ order (with a T9300).

 

I oredered my fz4000 on the 25th and I got an email just now saying it will ship on the 19th. thats kind of a long ways away, does anyone know if sony takes as long as they say they are going to?

 

I cant wait to get my hands on this one.

 

I just got an email yesterday also saying that my CTO will be shipped out on 2/19..

very discouraging..especially when the website originally said 1/28..
now i gotta wait another month for this laptop..

i ordered mine on 1/15 btw.

i wish sony would take responsibility for their delay and atleast upgrade the shipping to 2nd day or something like that..

i think with the free-shipping, its going to take another 10 business days, so if im lucky, ill probably get my laptop in march..

 

Yep. I ordered on the 15th too and I agree that 2nd day shipping is highly in order.

 

Tried to call Sony and get my shipping upgraded to overnight. I was going to pay for it even. They wouldnot help me and said that I would have to cancel the order and reorder. So I cancelled.

 

haha that's real nice of Sony CS.


idiots

 

does anyone know...can the blu ray read only drive write to DVD's and CD's?

now sony has the 19th advertised as the ship date on the website....

 

I hear its a Penryn delay and sony cant do anything about it....other companies are having problems too. I could be wrong though.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/15/intel-experiencing-worldwide-penryn-delays/

 

the blue ray read only drives can write to dvd and cd's also.
i bought a fz290 with the blue ray read only drive, and i was able to burn those medias. i just returned because the fz290 died on me a week later..can't wait for the fz4000..