Sony SR19VN pictures & comparison with SZ screen

Had a chance to check out the SR19VN today. The silver looked classy. It had a Hitachi 7K200 harddrive, one of the fastest harddrives available. Very nice choice of Sony.

The LED screen is not the same a the on the SZ. While the SZ is definetely brighter, the color accuracy of the SR is much better in my opinion. The SZ has this faded/ washed out looks to it's colors. The SR does not have this. It colors look like a double lamp FW (which is a good thing).

Vertical viewing angles on the SR were also better than on SZ. As you can see on the little video clip.

However, I am not sure the brightness was good enough to work comfortably out doors. It may just be enough.

I did notice that 1280*800 is not a lot of screen real estate. I usually work with XP and Vista seems to need a lot more. Overall a very nice laptop.

Forgot to bring my camera to the store, so all pics and vid made with low quality cam on phone. Vid plays with VLC player.
Vid: Video000.3gp

Pics:

 

Nice. Did you by any chance check to see how it's handling the heat? Was it as noticeable as the other poster has said?

 

Forgot to check. But everywhere where I did feel it felt normal.

 

Thanks Phil for the comparison. The SZ screen is not calibrated well, and gives an almost cool blue for the default whitepoint. Calibrating the SZ monitor, even just using your eyes (versus a real calibrator), makes a noticeable improvement. The Hi-Color screens I've seen are all on the opposite spectrum of the SZ, giving a very warmish-red white point. I feel the warmer white-point is easier on the eyes, so it's good they switched the lcd - even though there is a loss in brightness.

Lastly, did the SR have the purple AR coating like the SZ?

 

Phil, how were the viewing angles on the double-lamp HiColor FW? I forgot to ask in the other thread.

As you know, I noticed that the vertical viewing angles were lousy on the FW's single-lamp Eco screen... so I'm very interested to know how the HiColor compares.

 

P.S. -- I don't suppose you checked the hard drive on the FW, did you?

 

Nope. I may do if I go back, they're getting BZ tomorrow. But don't count on it.

Definetely better.

 

Thanks PhilFlow!

Yes, @rmtschanz is right. The SZ is not calibrated correctly; that's why there was a registry patch that tried to address the issue:

 

>> As you know, I noticed that the vertical viewing angles were lousy on the FW's single-lamp Eco screen... so I'm very interested to know how the HiColor compares.

As good as the SR?

 

Not sure. Actually I think not because the viewing angle on SR seemed extremely good.

That's very interesting. So this gave natural colors?

 

Yeah, it was exceptionally good.

 

Well,

Never actually tried the registry settings, only Adobe Gamma. My settings give natural colors. But the FZ hi-color screen was brighter and gave more vivid colors due to the wide gamut.

With the SZ, you can use PowerStrip to set the chromacity values for the white point in Adobe Gamma. This produces an overly warm tone, probably from the purple AR filter. A bit of tweaking and I am able to get it around 6000-6500K with my eyes. From this page:

http://www.imaging-resource.com/ARTS/MONCAL/CALIBRATE.HTM

I'm able to get highlights out to 252, shadows down to 9, and a gamma close (visually) to 2.2.

 

Ok interesting I never gave it that much time when I owned a SZ. I just tweaked with the gamma settings in the drivers.

It's a good thing that the newer series look better default.

 

the new SR series laptops looks like a Dell now with the silver chassis

the SZ looks so much nicer in comparison

 

I have an SZ and i certainly don't think that the colour looks washed out or faded and i didn't do anything different to the screen. The colours are true to life and i don't have any complaints.

People will always likely to have a difference of opinions when it comes to displays.

 

Philflow, did you notice any light leakage, especially when viewing from different angles? This may be a long shot, but have you or any other person previously owned a screen with an IPS panel, such as the Asus v6va or the Lenovo T60 and can compare the viewing angles, colors, and contrast of it to the SR?

If not, how does the SR compare to the macbook pro's (last two generations) LED screen?

Thanks.

Also, does anyone sell the silver/black keyboard option online? I've only seen the black/black and silver/white combos.

 

I owned the last two revs of the MBP and a couple MBA's and the display on my SR is the best of the lot. The MBP's displays were really good but they were a touch grainy, had uneven backlighting, and the infamous yellow band at the bottom 1/3 of the display. I had a couple of different MBA's with different display manufacturers. I liked the MBA display over the MBP due to a little more pop/contrast in the MBA display. The MBA's also had a touch of grain and uneven backlighting. Say a lot of things about Sony, but one thing they do right is use very good quality displays. I would not say the SR display is as good as a Flexview, but compared to the majority of notebook displays available it isn't bad.

 

Wow. Okay, somebody's gotta do an in-depth comparison of the SR's screen vs. the FW's HiColor screen.

Inquiring minds want to know...

 

From what I've read and seen in pictues the FW HiColor display looks like an awesome screen. I would be willing to wager that while the SR display is really good the FW HiColor is better.

 

I really wish I could see an FW HiColor in person, only the Ecos are on display near me. And the SR screen blew away the FW Eco screen.

 

If the FW Hi-color screen continues the excellent track record of previous Hi-color screens, the FW screen is better than the SR for viewing angles, color gamut and contrast (in the same vein that the FZ screen is superior to the SZ screen). However, the CCFL Hi-color screen's main drawback is the relatively short half-life of the lamp - 10 - 20,00 hours. You can replace the lamps, but I'd classify 95% of people who own a laptop will not do so. LED backlight is superior in this regard, offering 70 - 100,000 hours half-life of the LEDs.

 

From what I've seen, they come really close. I could not say who wins it. But I did not really compare them to eachother. If I go back this weekend, I'll let you know.

Check the harddisk, compare the screen to sz, anything else?

Well I did a poor job of putting it into words. Rmtschanz did much better. I was referring to the 'cool blue' look.

And and I do see this in every SZ I see. But different people will like different calibrations.

I don't know, I've never seen the purple coating.

 

I did not notice anything, but keep in mind I was not looking for it.

I'm not a fan of the LED on the MBP I've seen because it lacks vibrance in my opinion. The SR is very similar to LED on MBA, but the MBA is brighter.

I did not know they existed. Maybe US only.

 

I'm tempted by an SR19VN but I'm not overly keen on the Silver/Black colour scheme.

Will other colour schemes become available in the UK? If so, would anyone know when?

If not for the SR19VN might other versions of the SR be released?

 

Just one more thing -- let me know which laptop size I'd prefer. Kidding, of course... but I am torn on which size laptop to get. I love the small footprint of my 12.1" lappy, but I need a larger screen (and I'll be giving my wife my external monitor once I get a new laptop).

The FW is probably a good size for me since I work from home and almost never take the laptop out of the house (except for maybe in the backyard). But I'm a bit concerned about the large footprint, so I'm conflicted. Is it too big? Should I go for something smaller?

Check on that for me Phil, would ya?

 

That answers your question for me. If I would (almost) never out of house I'd go for at least 15". I find a 15" also much more comfortable to use when I'm sitting a on a couch.

The only reason I'm looking at 13" is portability. The FW is not too big a footprint imo.

PS. I did not go the store. Weather was too nice not to enjoy it.

 

Funny you say that. I happen to be sitting on the couch right now with my 12.1" laptop on my lap, and I'm realizing that a slightly wider laptop would be more comfortable. Then again, when I'm at the kitchen table with a plate of toast on one side of the laptop and a cup of coffee on the other, I really appreciate the small footprint.

Thanks. I'm kinda torn now between the FW and a regular sized 15.4" laptop (like the Dell m1530, as an example).

Sorry about the weather!

Oops -- I just re-read that sentence... HAPPY about the weather!

 

The Xbrite Hi-color and SZ Xbrite screens have an anti-reflective coating to reduce glare and the glossy mirror effect. This coating is purple-ish in color, and up to this point, has not been featured on Xbrite-Eco screens. The SR is featured as having the Xbrite-Eco screen, so I wonder if they use the coating.

 

The SR does have a coating and in this instance it is green. This may one of the reasons why the SR display has a warmer look that the SZ.