Sony SZ750 Win7 64bit clean install (should help on other SZ's)

guys,
I have the most interesting problem with my sz750n, and if someone can help, i'll be owing a drink.
Few days ago the speakers stopped working, out of thin air, i didnt do anything in particular, im running W7RC. The interesting thing is that if you plug in the headphones, the damn thing works, there is sound in the headphones, but when you unplug them, there is no sound on the speakers what so ever.
I called the dudes from sony, and as you might know, they asked for 49 bucks so they can speak to me , very creative. The guy was cool and kind a secretly shared some info without the bucks, he said that i should check for "default" sound output in the control panel in sound options, however this didnt help either, in the sound option it says speakers/headphones, are already set as default.
I went that far and disassembled the computer entirely to see if there is any loose wires or something, or because i had nothing better to do, (the insides are super neat) all ok there as far as a visual inspection goes
any help/suggestion?
Cheers

 

I am betting your system "defaulted" back to the wrong out

Go into Control Panel then sound. Click to highlight the speakers, then at the bottom set the drop down to "default device".

 

When i go in to there, the speakers/headphones is the only device, and the "set default" button is not operational, you cannot use that button, i suppose since there is only one device, it doesnt give me the option to change it.
Im up all night (my conditional reflex for falling a sleep, playing an episode of TOS or TNG doesnt work without sound), i was using your guide with a clean W7 ultimate install, no luck what so ever, everything works except the speakers, im afraid it might be a hardware problem.
Im trying again with another clean install, if you have any other ideas, ill be trying them.
BTW on the official sony esupport site, it says you can install w7, and they give this guide, and in the guide it says first driver you need is the "audio" so the speakers can work, however under the drop down meny for operating systems, under any w7 system, it doesnt give any fraking audio driver, do you have any idea what driver they are referring to?
thanks for the help

 

You need to reload your sound driver.
You should have Speakers and headphones.

You might get away with just deleting it and restart. It should find it again. If not, you get to go on a driver hunt.

If that fails, my advice is reload your system and see what it finds (maybe image it first so you can come fright back. It's possible the sound system is messed up somehow.


I haven't had to install an audio drive so I'm not sure what Sony is going on about.
If you follow my tutorial, you will get pretty much everything going step by itty bitty step. Sony probably copy and pasted the same information on a few different models.

 

Lad/lass, you are vaio guru!

that fixed it, i dont know how that messed up, i never noticed before, there should have been two devices there, headphones and speakers separately, when originally installing new OS, mine was showing one, speakers/headphones as one device, and now on the mixer i have two separate, didnt had it like that with the RC.
nevertheless it works now.
I followed your guide, i had to expand it a little bit, as far as I can see there was no wireless switcher utility, since i want to be able to use only wifi, and turn off the bluetooth, now that works too. Also i had to install the original bluetooth broadcom driver that sony provides in order to use plantronics plt 510 headphone, so if anyone has problem paring it, thats the solution, just instal the original and the update btooth driver from sony.
I have this small annoying problem, intel hybrid graphics icon in the taskbar, and whenever i switch a battery plan this big annoying green logo comes in the center of the screen, save power->increased performance, and you cannot switch it off, anybody got rid of this? and where is it coming from, is it the driver or anything else from the guide?

 

btw,
we have the same machine, i replaced the hdd too, the original failed the first week, the sony dudes were like, ok we need to get your computer for a month with us so we can replace it! i had to do it my self, 've put momentus 7000.4 7200rpm, the next upgrade will ssd.
this is my third vaio, no matter how awesome these machines are, the support is as they are all working for steve, and as soon as they sell it, its not their problem any more.
nevertheless, every vaio i had circumnavigated the planet with me literally, drop it, thrown it, soaked it, and the damn things just keep on working. These new ones are somewhat cheesy, slick, thin plastic, but still hold up.
Piece of advice, since this fellow is a road warrior it takes a lot of dust, i dont know if this happens with most of the nbooks, or just mine, but there is a considerable difference in the battery life after you clean it, ive done it three times so far, you might think the battery is gone, however you just need to clean it, the difference is about 50% more time. If you are running in stamina mode, you shouldn't hear the fan running, if you can hear it, means you need to clean it, and not only that, all intakes, everything. Just mind the hinges under the "magnesium" lid, ive broken two so far, they are poorly welded.

 

I glad you got it working.

You are correct in that there is no wireless switch app. to turn off just one set of wireless. That program didn't run when I first started the guide and wasn't that important to me. I simply never added it again. Some of the betas had bluetooth problems. The retail version seems to not have this issue, at least with the bluetooth items I have used so far (which I admit is limited). Also, as I have said a few times on here, you can do 10 Windows installs, all identical, and one will turn out with some weird quirk to it. That may have been what you experienced.

Do you have this battery cleaner running in Win7? and where is it? I think mine could use it.

Oh and the lid on the SZ750n is "carbon fiber", basically a bit recycled carbon with lots of plastic around it. It's tougher than it looks. Mine has been dropped a few times. Various parts inside the base are aluminum and magnesium. For as fragile as the lid feels, it's quite tough. There is footage from Sony testing the Z with a similar lid and it bends a good 30-40 degrees.

Lenovo hinges are no better. In fact, I have had better luck with Sony hinges than any other.



By the way, how was the change to the faster drive, I almost upgraded mine the same way last night and at the last minute I chickened out and decided to just save the money.

Anyhow, I'm so happy you got it sorted.
Hmm, I thought my signature and avatar kind of gave things away, but I guess not.

 

So leslieann,
on the net nothing gives nothing away, unless its a password : )
anyhow nice to meet you, people like you make this space great, just keep on with the great work and charming these guys!
Sorry if i mislead you there, i meant literally opening the computer, disassembling it and physically and cleaning it. I travel a lot, so I have this problem with every computer, dust virtually just builds up, i might find mice and fish too : ) and this is very important. I tried measuring it once with numbers, the inputs were, fan speed, core temp, and power consumption, so if you have clean, physically clean insides, the battery life can go up around 35% or more.
You are right, the lid is sort of a carbon fiber, mine is virtually a scratched black board and looks ugly, this computer is not meant to be hurt that much. I meant the magnesium palm rest, there are 3 i suppose i can call them hinges beneath it, they are welded, so i broke two, but glued them back in place. I disassembled this fellow the first day I got it, i'm just amazed by the neatness in it, every square mm is there with a purpose, there is no excess or uselessness. I don't know if you know the history of the SZ line, but they had a lot of problems due to this nurdyness to make it this slick, there were short circuits, there were broken parts, there was every imaginable hardware problem with it, they finally got it right in the 7th series.
As for the hdd, i see you have 500gig, this means you already upgraded it, as far as i remember our model shipped only with 250 Fujitsu, at least mine did, maybe you got factory upgraded model. I also upgraded the ram to 4 gig, 800mhz. Anyway, if you haven't, i got this drive
http://cgi.ebay.com/Seagate-320GB-2...emQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item4ceded11cb
that was last year, and the price is still the same, which means the hard is still in the game. Before i got it, i made a nurdy research, many will argue, however it will get you as close to ssd as possible, in a budget, and its fast, it reliable, and its not hungry, it gave me around 10% more batt life then with the factory one, even though its around 30% faster. So my advice is go for it.

 

Thanks!

I thought you meant some sort of battery conditioning program. I may have read half a line and jumped down (it happens).

As for the strength, I dropped mine onto a curb. It dented the pccard slot BADLY. It also did minor damage to the left side plastic. I pulled out the dent and I need to pull the side off and glue the retaining tabs, but otherwise it survived quite well. Just picking up my customers computers you can tell they would not have survived the same thing with such grace. By the way, the palmrest plays a somewhat critical role in the overall strength of the notebook, check Ebay and find a new one (they aren't expensive). Otherwise it coud lead to a problem next time it falls. Also, I could swear that part is extruded aluminum but I could be wrong.

Oh, and yes I know it's dense, try getting to the second mini pci-e slot for the WWAN, talk about buried, wow. Granted I have worked on other systems that required just as much dis-assembly, just not as dense (some Dells are horrible to take apart!).


The Seagate I have is a cheaper model that I yanked out of an external drive. It's faster than the Fujitsu on transfer rate, but only a tiny bit faster on access times and I know it uses more juice. I just don't trust the Fujitsu, I keep it as a spare for various things in the shop, like test installs or temporary storage and such. Nothing important. I trust very few hard drives as I seem to see everything coming in for replacement all the time with Seagate being the most consistently reliable.

Hopefully, I can just go SSD soon. Give it 6 months they will be reasonable in price. They are starting to come back down. If I find a customer to pawn this off onto I will probably upgrade it, otherwise I just wait for SSD.

 

Hi All. Found this thread while trying to get everything working with my SZ-750N and Windows 7 Pro x64. Have some of it fixed, but other seemingly simple things like FN Keys (brightness, volume, S1/2) are not working. In fact, the VAIO Event service crashes when I try to use them. I realize I am likely looking at a reinstall which is fine, but since LeslieAnn has mentioned she is working on updating the guide to include the new drivers Sony posted on the support page I am trying to wait for that.

Also, LeslieAnn, in this forum do you have the option of updating the first post? I found it a little confusing that there were references to step 13, but no such step exists in post #1. On other forums the first post can be updated in such cases. I slogged through much of this thread while getting some other things working but never found a post with a complete "current" guide.

I also want send props your way for all the hard work you and others have put into this. I'm loving my SZ750 and see no reason to upgrade if I can get Windows 7 Pro x64 working! It's a great little machine, especially using an SSD. I'll contribute to the effort if I can.

Many thanks!

 

The first post has been revised a couple times, which is why there is no step 13 anymore. The guide there is the most current.

The only changes I will be making is a couple Sony utilities (which might be the same ones already used, I haven't looked), the mouse driver and the webcam. I will probably re-write it all from scratch though. If you follow the guide, then work from the end back, you can find everything you need.


One of the Sony utilities didn't install properly for you. Which is why your buttons are not working.

As for the crashing driver, uninstall it in device manager, if it gives you the option to delete it, do that. Restart, and let it find it again and re-download the latest from Microsoft. Otherwise the one in the SZ750 Vista 32 will work. However... You have to "install It" which will fail. What you do is empty out the temp directory, install it, then go into device manager, update the driver and point to the INF in the temp directory. If both of these fail, you have a bad install of Windows, which does happen.

You need the two drivers installed before you install the Sony Utilities, so make sure all of your drivers are in first, Otherwise they can fail. Also, if you install them a second time watch the wording. One re-installs. The other will install, but if you run the installer again it will uninstall, so watch the wording.


The only things you won't get working on the 750 with Win7 64bit is possibly WWAN, and the Sony Camera Utility (the camera works). Everything else has been figured out.


It's a fabulous notebook!
Someone else was recently looking for an upgrade (as was I for a bit), but really, except for the newest Z, there is nothing out there that is a significant upgrade to it. In the end he added more ram and an SSD and was quite happy. It was and still is a VERY good laptop, not many laptops can say that when they are as old as these now are.

 

Don't really need the WWAN as it's Sprint and I use my Windows Mobile 6.5 phone's Internet Sharing when needed . And as long as the camera works with Messenger, which it appears to be now even after the cold boot (thanks to earlier info in this thread), I'll be happy resolving the things we know can be resolved. The new Z's are nice, but I actually prefer the screen ratio on our SZ750's (16x10 vs 16x9). Besides, a good Z costs north of 2k.

As for my outstanding issues, if I can't resolve them by the time you redo the guide, I'll reinstall everything using the new guide.

It's actually not a driver that's crashing, but the service itself. Here's the entry from the Windows Application event log:
Faulting application name: VESMgr.exe, version: 3.1.0.13250, time stamp: 0x45b868bc
Faulting module name: unknown, version: 0.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x00000000
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0xeb35e902
Faulting process id: 0xeb0
Faulting application start time: 0x01cac6c7e6d4ef5e
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Sony\VAIO Event Service\VESMgr.exe
Faulting module path: unknown
Report Id: 4a573979-32bb-11df-ad64-001e3d397460

Don't know if that gives you any ideas - I'll probably tinker with it as time permits.

 

Version 3.1 of Vaio Event Service that was part of the original Vaio notebook utility depends on the DMICALL service, without which will crash. Unfortunately, the DMICALL service is Windows 2000 compatible only and will not run in x64 (Vista or W7). The latest version of VES is 5.0.0.07130 http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/swu-download.pl?mdl=VGNSZ750NC&upd_id=5021&os_id=49. The newer version will not crash, but all is not well, not all function keys work with this newer version. There are hits and misses moving to x64 without the full Sony support, we just have to live with some of the limitations unfortunately.

 

You shouldn't be getting that crashing on a 750N unless something else is an issue.

I have been using the setup in this guide for the most part for nearly 9 months and never had an issue. In fact it is so stable it's boring, my biggest issue is once in a while power management messes up allowing something to wake it from standby and not shut back down. That leads me to think there is something else at work here. I just haven't tracked down the culprit.

Is this 64bit retail, or an RC?

Considering your other issues, if this is a retail copy, try a re-install, something isn't right.

 

It's 64 bit RTM I believe - I have a Microsoft Action Pack Subscription and downloaded the ISO image from them. However, I didn't use your guide to build initially, so it is not suspect here. I tried to use the steps after the fact and ended up where I am now. The brightness keys never worked, but the Volume keys did at first. That's partly why I said I was half expecting to start over at some point. Just hoping it could be rescued...

Not sure where I would have gotten Version 3 of the Event Service - I only downloaded the files from the Sony site when they posted the Windows 7 compatible files, and then the files from the first post in this thread...wierd.

Sigh - planning on a re-install soon.

 

It may be able to be rescued.
Doing them out of order can be an issue, but re-installing them usually fixes everything regardless of order provided you pay attention to the install/uninstall problem.

It always seemed to me like those drivers were the main thing to have in there first. After that, most isn't as important.

 

I'm working on updating the guide.
For those wondering about the new Sony stuff, DON'T!

After you install everything you will be left with functioning mute, volume up and volume down. Oh, and a "handy" Sony control panel linking to common control panel functions. The "S button" control doesn't work and when you hit advanced, it's in JAPANESE! That's it.

Sony clearly put a lot of effort into this. (yeah right)

This guide is by far better, however I'm looking at how things can be improved and swapping a few things out.

 

You can have a peek at my guide linked in signature to make use of the S button and AV mode button. Although it's for the FZ series, the Sony utilities used should be the same.

 

This has been a problem with the SZ (getting those to work).
The problem isn't that the button doesn't work, the problem is the config utility doesn't run.

Only one version has worked that I have found.

 

Any one have 'switch on when lid open' in vaio control center? When your laptop sleeps or in hibernate, when you open lid it switches on automatically..
This option never appeared for me in Windows 7. I discovered this option only when i went back to Vista, actually, never noticed it before (when i was using Vista prior Windows 7 experience)...
I definitely miss faster start/sleep on Windows 7..

 

Is this on 32bit or 64bit?

I don't think it's there. Some of the utilities had to be swapped out because they were incompatible with Win7 x64.

 

It's 32 bit.

My windows 7 seemed very stable, but for some reason i had 2 blue screens, almost in a row. That was an excuse for me to go back to Vista, on which i have around 40 minutes of battery life more...

 

If you find it in 7 please let me know.
I have never seen that, but it seems familiar. I didn't stay with Vista very long on my SZ.

 

Guide has been updated to version 3.0!!!
I re-wrote almost half of it, what a job that was.

Changes are significant, but in terms of the notebook operation they are small. As mentioned, you can ignore the new Sony downloads. I don't know why they bothered.

Included now is:
Updated driver pack download
Printer friendly version of the guide
Mouse drivers are up to date, and includes scrolling, and eternal scrolling.
More links to helpful threads (as suggested by Rachel)
Nvidia popups are gone
More about other SZ models and 32bit vs 64bit.
Troubleshooting section, with most of the common issues people have had.

Included is stripped Registry tweak for those with other SZ models to fix the brightness adjustment. Other models needed to use the Universal Extractor to pull this out, now it's included in the pack already pulled out.

A section on the wwan, links to helpful posts (Rachel, Jupillam, and James007bond's posts)

Camera has been fully dealt with in 64 and 32bit, and includes a working "Sony" utility. This is the only thing used from Sony's updates.


I probably forgot something else I changed, but all was done as I re-installed so it "should" work for people.

Those updating from a previous install, these are the changes:
Camera drivers (most probably have them)
Mouse drivers
Camera utility


If anyone sees any problems, PLEASE let me know.
Many thanks to Rachel, James007bond, Jtravers, Jupillam, Aralos1999 for their contributions to this project.
We did FAR better than Sony has.

 

OH!
I forgot to mention, I fixed the static problem for the 5200 series wireless and other higher powered cards.

If you missed it, look here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=469406

 

Grrrrr, I knew something would be missed.

I added one more step to fix the Nvidia/Intel SLI popup.
This step has not been added top the driver pack, but you can easily add it.

Current version is 3.1

 

Thanks again for all your time and effort! Gonna have to give this another try pretty quickly here.

BTW, I am back to having the volume/mute keys working, but no brightness or S1/S2 keys. I am now getting that goofy nVidia/Intel popup too. Should I rip out all the existing drivers/apps before starting my rescue operation? And Should I just concentrate on the sections that aren't working for me or will I miss something important that way?

Thanks...

P.S. Would be cool if we could put a "sysprep-like" image together of a working Windows 7 system on an SZ750N (without license key of course) to distribute - wonder if that would be any kind of violation?

 

You're very welcome.

It would be a violation, sort of, maybe.
MS offers 30 day trials or at least did and you can still kind of download a trial, I can look into it.

I wouldn't worry about ripping them all out. Realistically, just start from step one and go. Do the whole thing, it won't hurt. Just be careful of notebook utilities (I think) as it will cycle between install and uninstall. If it wants to uninstall, leave it and go to the next step. Everything else will just over-write and should work fine.

Obviously you can skip anything entirely unrelated, like the mouse or the Nvidia driver itself but throughout this thread we repeatedly saw people skipping steps thinking it was un-important then wondered why it wasn't working. If you want fully functioning, as close to vista as possible, ALL of these are needed. If you didn't install it before, do it now. I didn't include anything really optional if you want it as close as you can and as clean as you can.

The brightness, if it is ONLY the brightness setting not working, is almost ALWAYS the Nvidia registry tweak.


I will look into the pre-made disk, if I can do it legally, I will. I just need to find a utility to make it. It would be really cool if I could make it build a restore partition with the image on it but that may be over my head. A self installing disk would be nice though.

 

Well, still not complete joy...

I went through the guide as follows:
* downloaded the new driver pack
* had previously downloaded both 64bit Camera and Nvidia drivers
* did the prelimiaries (changed view on Control Panel, view Hidden Files/Folders, uncheck hide extensions, checked automatic driver/icon downloads (didn't disable sounds though)
* Checked for Mass Storage Device Controller in Device Mangler (not there, previously handled)
* Clicked to update Display adapter driver, was also previously handled so it did not find anything to update - BTW, the Intel GMA Driver for Mobile appeared in control panel after doing this the 1st time so I'm pretty sure it worked
* Disabled power settings in Intel GMA Driver for Mobile applet
* Had previously done the microphone fix (not an issue at this point)
* Installed Sony Shared Library from your new driver pack
* Installed Control Center from your new driver pack
* Installed Notebook Utilities from your new driver pack (What do you mean by "change compatibility mode" exactly? Change it in the file properties/Compatibility tab before executing it? If so, change it to what? i.e. Vista SP2?
* Didn't disable the beep for setting changes - for now I like the audible feedback
* Skipped Step 8 (don't need camera software at the moment)
* Performed Steps 9, 9B and 9C for Battery Care
* Installed the Nvidia Registry Patch from your new driver pack
* performed Step 11, but I had previously installed the correct NVidia driver (190.40) - rebooted both times anyway in case a previous step depended on it.
* Skipped Step 13 since camera is already working (previously handled)
* Skipped Step 14 (Webcam Companion Software)
* Skipped Step 15/15B (HD Protection driver/software) since I am using an SSD
* Performed Step 16 (Sony Alps driver)
* Performed Step 17 - it seems to have worked as no annoying nVida/Intel popups since.

Almost everything (that I care about) is working - only the brightness controls and S1/S2 buttons stubbornly refuse to work. This is for both the Stamina and Speed graphics settings. And I don't get any errors in the application or system logs - just nor response. The Volume up/down/mute keys work, so does that mean the Event Service is working? Could the compatibility mode issue I highlighted in red be the key to getting these going?

(BTW, the link to the NVIDIA Graphics Driver Registry Patch under " Individual Files" returned 404 Not found when I tried to download it individually)

So...I'm still wondering if starting from scratch would help.

Would love to have a working SmartWi to individually control WLAN and Bluetooth, but I understand there is none for 64 bit?

Anyway, I can live with these things for the moment but would like to fix them someday. Thanks again for all your hard work and for any other suggestions you might have.

 

This is no longer needed.
Glad you caught it, I will have to remove that.

Event service IS running. Something is either conflicting or simply not working. A clean install based on the guide may help you find what is conflicting. It should work since everything else does.

What is conflicting? I have no idea, I would be interested to know.

Some of the links got chewed, I'll check that tomorrow as well. I already had to fix the Nvidia Driver links, I guess more got damaged than I thought.

If you have a way to image your drive, do that. Then do a fresh install and see what you get.

Read back a few pages, I think someone did it or was experimenting with it. I meant to check and include it, but I forgot. It was quite early in the morning when I finished and I had been working on this for almost 12hours at that point. :SLEEP:

The guide isn't perfect, but it's getting there.

If you do a fresh install and all of it works, as you install things, keep checking and restarting as you install (be sure to rebooot).

On my desktop I had a problem with the ACPI giving me bluescreens. It would run great for weeks, then bluescreen twice in a day, then go weeks again. I spent months looking for the issue. Ever search for ACPI crash? There are millions of posts. The other issue while searching was that the I.D. number given couldn't be found anywhere, except two places which had it for XP but not Win7 and both said it was a bad hard disk,which I knew was wrong. Finally I said heck with it and bought a new motherboard. That worked great... Just long enough to go past the easy return point, then it too did it.

Finally, after all that, I gave one final go, I installed every single item on my step one step at a time, rebooting between each and doing the one thing that seemed to crash it. This took me 3 DAYS. Finally I declared it stable, thinking the restarts between installs had fixed the problem. A month later I needed Photoshop CS3 and realized I hadn't installed it when I rebuilt the system. I put it in, and immediately blue screened. Why is Photoshop even messing with ACPI? Now that I knew the culprit, I did some more searching and found answers this time. Come to find out Photoshop CS3 has an issue with ACPI on the Intel P45 chipsets. I put in CS2, and everything worked perfect.

Sometimes you just never know.

 

Hey Csilvest,

I was just going back through the thread and noticed you said you THINK this is the RTM or retail version. There was an RC that the brightness NEVER did work. I wonder if maybe this is what you have.


Click Start, type regedit and press Enter to open the Windows registry
Navigate to the registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion

In the right pane look for:
BuildLabEx
The rtm version of Windows 7 64bit will say:
7600.16385.amd64fre.win7_rtm.090713-1255
I bolded the important part.

If you get something different then that is likely the problem, you probably have one of the RC's or a test version that isn't compatible.
Considering where you got it, it's likely one of the two, more than likely the older RC. Many pirated versions are built on these early versions as well. Some even claim they "updated" them to the current version, which is likely incorrect.

 

You don't need the config utility to make use of the S and the AV mode buttons (if applicable to your SZ). You can look at the registry tweaks in my guide to make use of these buttons.

 

It's easier just to use the older software, they work perfectly fine.

It just annoys me that Sony did ZERO testing with this software except to say it doesn't crash on Win7. Doesn't crash, and works properly are two different things.

 

More minor updates to the guide.

Added more troubleshooting regarding bluetooth and brightness problems.
I also fixed a lot of broken links.
Updated to version 3.3

Also in it is a link on how to get Smart-Wi working on the Sz750, you use the Vaio FW Smart-Wi utility.

 

I did a reload, and found something interesting...

The camera works with the Microsoft driver now.
It seems that MS and Sony have corrected the problems we used to have.

Also, I put a note on Sony's support forum (yes, they have one and someone actually watches it, it's hard to find though) and posted a note about the new software functionality. I also asked for an updated Nvidia Driver. Since while they support Win7 X64 now, they/we don't have a working driver for it from them yet. I also noted SmartWi is not working.

I don't have high hopes, but we will see.

For those wondering about it's location:
http://vaio.sonyelectronicscommunity.com/vaio/forum/
I have no idea how I found it, but it was listed on the Sony site somewhere at one time and it is an official Sony site. I think they are still testing the waters with it.

Funny, they claim they don't support Win7 on Sz series, even though based on Sony's websites, they do.

 

leslieann, what problems are you having with the Nvidia driver? I can help you out, since I did an extensive testing of various Nvidia drivers/ Sony utilities for my FZ, and found a 100% working driver (195.62 driver from lv2go or modding the driver yourself) with the newer Sony utilities.

 

The latest driver we have access to easily is the 190.4 from Laptopdrivers2go which works fine. I may try and tackle a newer one soon.


My reasoning for what I did was to push Sony to put out an official Sony Driver that is easy to install. I personally haven't a real need for it, but if they are going to support this notebook with Win7 X64, then they should support and not drag their feet. Most people with this notebook do not know what we know.

This guide provides a nearly 100% working system with Win7 74bit. If we can do it, Sony can. Instead they give you a taste and leave you with a crippled notebook. If you try loading up the drivers and utilities they provide, your system will be a mess.

You cannot adjust brightness, use the S buttons, use the WWAN, you cannot even use the Nvidia card with what they provide. I don't know if you can even switch it on.

 

I tried to follow the steps on post # 1 carefully for Win 7 ultimate 64bit but still no luck with FN keys....I am going back to 32bit...

this is on SZ760N/C

 

Straight out of my registry, the Key you referenced:
7600.16385.amd64fre.win7_rtm.090713-1255

Thanks for the suggestion though.

 

Hi LeslieAnn. Looked in Post #1 for the link you mention above, but didn't find it. Would like to give it a try!

 

Kudos to all the guys working hard for the Windows 7 testing.
Why can't Sony be like IBM in the past. Even Apple supports Windows 7 on their lagacy hardwares.
I will never by another $ony again.

 

I would try the re-install, something is not right and I am out of ideas. Sorry.

It's in the issues, however I found out that the second link is dead. See my next post though.

 

Okay, a few big things to report.
Some great, some good and some not so good.

First...
NEW Nvidia driver!!!!!!
I downloaded the newest Nvidia drivers from laptops to go, and found that their new generic INF, supports our video cards. It also eliminates the stupid Intel Nvidia SLI system. So that means we can now update to the latest Nvidia drivers. I haven't run a Windows test on it yet as I have been focused on other things, but I did however get it in and it is working.

Second...
I also re-installed my WWAN card tonight
Why is this big, well, because I got a few things working.
I have Smart-Wi working. This means independent bluetooth and wifi control.
I even manged to find drivers THAT WORK for the card.
I also found an Access Manager for Verizon that works with it. So technically we could use Sprint or Verizon on the SZ750 (I think). I MAY even get the GPS to work.

Now the bad news.
The FN button for wifi doesn't work (big deal)

The drivers take some effort, you know me though, I will try to make it as painless as possible when I have it figured out. The second bad part is that the drivers are 32bit and I have yet to get it to even acknowledge that there is a GPS module in it. However, this could be due to too new of a Verizon Access manager, last time I had to use an older one (which took some effort to find). Older ones had a GPS enable switch, newer versions do not I will have to search Sprint for a utility and see what they have.


Anyone want to play (help)?
What I am using and current status:
Win7 64bit Smart-Wi from a VGN-FW486J
Win7 32bit Location program from the VGN-FW486J (it doesn't seem to have helped). I had hoped this woudl enable the GPS.
Verizon Access Manager, as mentioned an older one is what I used before when it worked, if intermittent and poorly. If you download from their site I used the second version from the very bottom, it is for a Dell 5600 and is the Verizon Manager 7.2.1. All of the 7.2.1 are the same so no big deal. When they ask for a phone number just put anything. It doesn't verify. I will try and find an older version though or Sprint as this may be the key.

Drivers.
Lastly, you need the drivers for the modem. MS does NOT have these and these will be a challenge. Things are a mess or I would zip and upload them.
First I grabbed the original Sz750 vista 32 driver. I then used Universal extractor to break it apart.

Inside you will find a Novatel driver EXE. I tried installing it, it didn't work. Also, Universal Extractor failed. So I cleared the temp directory and started an install. In the temp folder it creates an MSI file. I copied that out and then used Unversal Extractor on that. Inside of that is the inf files needed.

NOW comes the difficult part (scared yet?).
To install these drivers is tricky. First put in Smart-Wi then start it. Open Device manager. Now turn on the WWAN with Smart-wi and watch device manager. You have to work fast, I missed the first time, then found if you are not fast enough, just tell smart-wi to re-enable it and continue the driver install. Once you have the first it gets easier and faster as you will see.

Tell the first unidentified item to update drivers, then you have to tell it to locate it on your system and point to the directory using the "have disk" option. Once there, you do not have to pick one, just point at the directory and let it go. It will find the right one.

Once done, re-enable in Smart-Wi again, and update the second, this time you can simply use the browse my system for the driver and it will find it. Repeat for the last 2 items.

At this point you are ready to play.

 

No one said this would be easy, in fact I have repeatedly said it wouldn't.
You will have to forgive me if I don't feel bad for your one failed attempt.

I have about 100 installs of Win7 and over 200 hours invested in this project.

It's also why I have little regard for those who don't bother to read the thread, which can be done in about 45 minutes and answers so many questions. I know because I did it three times on Sunday while looking for information.

(Sorry, I hate being a sourpuss, but posts like this do NOTHING to help anyone.)

 

more or less I tried 10x for the past 2 months. when i checked sony support site, there was support for win7 (all versions) already. so i decided to give it a try again. it was working fine but not all functions are usable.

your guide was pretty awesome...really helped me lot installing the OS.

i think il have to settle with the 32bit version since all functions are working ok and just like the original OS.

thanks again...

 

It's in the issues, however I found out that the second link is dead. See my next post though. [/QUOTE]

Followed the links into the "Vaio sz750n windows 7 32bit drivers (100% working)" thread, tried to download the SmartWi installer linked to hotfile, but got a message saying "This file is either removed due to copyright claim or is deleted by the uploader."

Not to be deterred, I went on the Sony esupport site and found the SmartWi installer download for the model referenced (FW486j/h). Downloaded without incident and installed without errors. However, this SmartWi utility repeatedly tells me to Turn on the hardware wireless switch (which is of course already on) in order to conitnue. Rebooting did not fix the issue. Sigh...

One step closer to a fresh installation.

 

Just noticed something that may or may not be related to my issues. Even though I have installed the Sony Shared Library, it does not show up in the Control Panel Programs and Features List. Should it?

 

this would also be useful for those using the 32bit version with more than 4gb of RAM ----- >> HERE

Tried and tested

 

Some additional info on my situation:

The version of the Event Service that is installed from leslieann's driver pack is the original Version 3 from Sony. Someone had stated in an earlier post that this version won't run on Win 7 x64 - this appears to be correct (at least for me) as when I run with this version and try to use FN Keys, the service either does not respond (brightness controls) or crashes (volume controls). I'm not sure what is different in my system that causes this.

If I install the current Vaio Event Service from Sony, the FN volume control keys work, but not the brightness controls. No crash though.

So it appears the reason I can't get my FN Brightness control keys to work is that I can't get the original Event Service to run without crashing. Not a solution, but at least a clearer understanding of what's going on.

So now the question is why can't I get leslieann's version of the Event Service to run? Hmm...

Possibly another step closer to a fresh installation.

 

That is a hack job.
Yes, it works, but remember, if the program is written for 32bit, it won't be able to use it, only Windows will.

It doesn't show up there. Check in Program Files (X86).