Sony Vaio SR Car Charger?

Hey guys. Just bought the Vaio SR:

Product: V1NBSU08-LBOM
Component: Microsoft® Works
Component: No Fresh Start™
Component: Photo Standard
Component: 200 GB SATA Hard Disk Drive [7200 rpm] [Regular price $180]
Component: Standard Capacity Lithium-ion Battery (BPS13A/B)
Component: Video Standard
Component: No Engraving
Component: Trusted Platform Module / Biometric Fingerprint Sensor
Component: QuickBooks Simple Start
Component: Wireless LAN (802.11a/b/g/n) with integrated Bluetooth® technology
Component: ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 3470
Component: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T9400 (2.53GHz) [Regular price $200]
Component: DVD±R DL / DVD±RW / DVD-RAM Drive
Component: 13.3" WXGA (XBRITE-ECO™ technology)
Component: Windows® Live OneCare 90-Day Trial
Component: Night Black
Component: Microsoft® Windows Vista® Home Premium with Service Pack 1
Component: 3 GB DDR2-SDRAM (DDR2-800, 2GBx1 + 1GBx1) [Regular price $100]
Per Unit Price: $1,438.99
Quantity: 1
Total Price: $1,438.99
Description: VGN-SR190 Configure-to-Order
Ship Method: Standard
Estimated Ship Date: 09/26/2008

Im REALLY excited... but what type of car charger will work? is there an official SONY one that is good? Just looking for a reliable car charger to buy... Not sure what Wattage i should have tho? there seem to be a lot of 90 W ones.. but i dont want to blow up my Laptop or not provide it enough power.

Thanks!

 

yeah, im interested in the same thing, will the car battery die faster if i plug in my laptop to the charger?
could i take long trips (say, at least 8 hours) with the laptop plugged in?

 

Buy an inverter for your car. No more than 100W (I think that's the limit of the 9V DC supply). Don't plug it in when the engine is not running. Now you can run your laptop as well as other things that requires a standard AC supply. One drawback is the fan on the cheaper inverters are bit loud.

 

im confused. do i need to just get a 12v to 120v inverter? (makin it the Voltage of a normal household plug). Will like 200W be too much? is 90 too low? i wish there was info somewhere on which laptops need what amount of wattage to charge... or Voltage... whatever. Thanks in advance!

 

I got the Kensington 33197 adapter from Amazon for my fz290. With an inverter you change dc to ac then plug in the brick to change it back to dc. With this adapter the brick is not needed and it also plugs directly into ac. I also had to buy the proper power tip for a SONY.

 

yeah... but an inverter would likely work for other things as well? and it has surge protection and all that good stuff.. can't adapters just fry your battery?

 

Yes, the inverter will work for many things. They are handy to have.

 

You can see the rating of your power adapter for your Vaio on the adapter itself. The DC output on my Z adapter is 19.5V at 4.7A (roughly 90W). Assuming 10% loss (conservative for a switching power supply), your laptop adapter input is at around 100W.

Your inverter will have loss associated with it also. You need inverter output at least at 100W, but the input may be at 110-120W to the inverter to supply 100W output. At 12V, this is approaching 10A though the cigarette lighter socket!

So definitely make sure your cigarette lighter socket is rated to handle that kind of power. Most car have a limit of 100W output through that receptacle as it is not designed to handle lot of current. Check that first.

Second, if 100W is the capacity, then see if Sony is also selling a 50-55W power adapter (you may have it already, but like I said, the default for my Z was ~90W).

Granted, all these numbers are for max load on your power adapter. You may never reach those numbers if you are not doing much on your laptop while in the car, but I don't know if I want to take the chance of screwing up my car.