Sony VAIO VPCZ2 WWAN

Sony made a MEGA mistake not offering Verizon as a choice for embedded WWAN.

AT&T and Sprint are your choices. I selected Sprint because they are just a little better than AT&T in my area. I had to set up a Sprint account (all my lines are with Verizon). That took 3 days for a business account.

So now Sprint is telling me they do not recognize the MEID (ESN) on the radio. They are telling me Sony did not send the paperwork to them that somehow identifies the device ESN.

When you get your Z2 there is a nice little paper that says you can choose AT&T or Sprint. It says absolutely nothing about the ESN.

So I've been waiting 5 days now for Sprint to figure this out. Twice they told me to send the machine back to Sony. After I transferred all my data and got the machine up and running. Thats not gonna happen.

So now I'm told it will be another 3-5 days because Sprint has to contact Sony to get the ESN for this card.

So I'm looking at 2 weeks to get mobile broadband set up with Sprint.

What a complete joke and waste of time. I hope Sony feels the pain of making this switch in their pocket books.

 

As the world is a bit bigger, I must say that these problems apply only to the US. European models are free to be used with any operator available.

So let's not generalize...

Besides that, this is the 7th thread about this I see here in the last 2 weeks... maybe it would make much sense just using one of them.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/603356-vpc-z2-mobile-broadband-where-verizon.html

 

Seriously? I thought Sprint was WiMax, which would mean it's driven by the Intel 6250? Unless if I'm horribly wrong, here...

 

no WiMAX support on the new Z only 3G will work

and to the OP why you are creating so many thread on the same issue?

 

Because I find it hard to believe I am the only one who is having this problem.

This is my 5-6 Vaio. If I didn't like them I wouldn't keep buying them. But Sony made a horrible decision to make this change. Even still, with all the bright minds here I cannot believe no one here knows how to figure this out.

I just got off the phone again with Sony. Managed to get to someone in San Diego. Asked them for the ESN. They gave me the same # off the back of the machine. Sprint tells me this is a bad # because it ends in a 3 and should end is a 0 or 2.

So now i'm in a holding pattern until 8/31 so Sprint can again tell me its a Sony problem.

Someone here has to know whats up.

 

So tell me how to buy a European model and I'll return this one.

Lots of suggestions here, but nothing concrete. A little help would be nice.

 

• fly to europe and get one from retailer
• ask a friend in europe to buy one for you
• check out ebay
• try contract european e-tailer ask them if they ship to usa

 

Thanks Captain Obvious.

 

You've had help in the several other areas you've raised this issue.

 

Well, if you can replace the WiFi card in the Z2, then you can replace it with the Intel 6250 It is a normal 6200 WiFi chip + WiMax built in

 

What may be a mistake for you is a business decision for sony. in general, in the US, electronics are cheaper than other parts of the world and furthermore in the US, the carriers rule too much.
maybe verizon asked too much moolah for having their contract licensed to sony. in any case, there's not much you can do unless you really take apart your laptop and figure out a way to integrate the h/w and s/w required for it to run on verizon. (and i dont think starting a new thread every day is the solution to it!)

 

Actually, works the other way. Carriers pay to be added on machines. This is also why bloatware is always going to be around.

Same principal tho

 

I guess that depends on the market share of the other party for dell, hp, lenovo..probably. sony is not that big in the US so verizon/at&t would rule the roost.