Sony Vaio VGN-SZ94 Cosmetic Notes (Japanese Model)

Cosmetic Notes upgrading from a VGN-SZ90PS (SZ1) -> VGN-SZ94S (SZ6)

Colour (Black/Silver -> Jet Black)
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Now sports a full jet black trim were silver trim used to be.





Colour Touchpad (Silver -> Jet Black)
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Touchpad colour changed from Silver to Jet black to match the new chassis colour. Seems to fit well with the new colour scheme.



Display Screen - Labelling Top (Dark Chrome -> Chrome)
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VAIO engraved letters behind Display screen changed to a more visable Full Chrome Reflection. Previous model logo felt less intrusive.



Labelling Bottem Inner Lid
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Pads - Bigger Pads, Two Big Outer Pads, Two Middle Small side by side SONY logo. More pads added to protect screen rubbing on keyboard during transport.

Labelling Bottom Inner Lid
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VAIO - SONY

Logos swaped and full chrome reflection added. May still scratch with the speed/wireless switches.



Labelling Right Rest Pad
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SONY - VAIO

Faint VAIO logo now present. Could rub off from palm resting.

Middle Lid/Chassis Gap
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No padding -> Inner Black Padding Strip. Between the lid and chassis activity lights a black strip of padding has been added to prevent the scratching produced on previous models.



Lithium Ion Battery (5200mAh -> 5800mAh)
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Battery capactity changed from VGP-BPS2C (11.1V/5200mAh) to VGN-BPS10 (10.8V/5800mAh)



Chassis Battery Clip
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Much better fit and not as loose which caused the rattle.

AC Stick Adaptor
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Lighter and has a neat green LED light when on. Not as portable as the regular AC and brick is closer to pc.



Express Card Memory Card Reader
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VGP-MCA20 -> VGP-MCA20A. New one may implment fixes to large size memory cards.

Motion Eye Webcam
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VGP-VCC2 -> VGP-VCC7 . Smaller size webcam added (VGP-VCC7 0.3mpix ?) More stylish design.



Express Card Dummy Card
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Full - Holes. Changed from a full PVC dummy holder to less bulky design.

Palm Rest
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Another is the very very suttle course nature of the aluminum palm rest. If you place you finger tip on the surface and move it left or right you will find it has smooth surface with a subtle feel of friction. However this seems to reduce with wear.

Vista -> Windows XP Note
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Most drivers from TZ winxp downgrade work without troubles. Use TZ applications as well. Non fully working items include stamina/speed notifcation, Vaio power management, webcam, brightness control (Fn key works but brightness control seems graphics driver .inf dependant) and one IDE controller. Waiting for offical xp drivers before attemping Dual-boot. Using information from a previous thread the following hotfix`s were applied:

msxml6.exe
kb835221
KB835935-SP2
KB893357
KB896256
KB918997
KB938828



Nvidia Geforce 8400M GS plays Lost Planet DX9 average 25fps at 640x480. Low-Med Settings Win XP.



Very good laptop. Well built and sturdy. Hard to think of changing to a different model or brand in this case. New model seems slightly more heavier? Produces glaring looks and admiration when used in public. Unit was aquired through Price Japan.

 

nice pictures.

correct. the old model was 1,69 KG. the new one 1,79 KG. (according to Sony)

Still the lightest 13,3 inch model with DVD drive inside afaik.

 

Yes, nice pictures.

Maybe you can try to install this VCC7 SZ6 camera driver and these VAIO Power Management versions:

TX5 (1.9.00.04120)
G1-G2 (1.9.05.07300)
TZ1-TZ2 (1.9.06.08210)
SZ4-SZ5 (1.9.01.06270)

What's the MachineID DWORD decimal value in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation\VAIO Event Service\MachineInfo registry key?

Make sure that the MachineID string value in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation\SonyPowerCfg matches the decimal value in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Sony Corporation\VAIO Event Service\MachineInfo.

Also, find your machine ID ini file in \Program Files\Sony\VAIO Power Management\INI, copy it to ..\Data and rename it to Data.ini and see if that helps.

 

nice pics.
it looks better than sz's650nc-691nx.

Folks, what do you think, would be there a similar refresh of US SZ6** series ?

 

Success with the camera driver you provided. Thank You!

The machine serviceID is 0x00000054 (84). In SonyPowerCfg its 84 as well.
Note this is using all the TZ drivers and applications.I will have to reinstall Vista to check for the correct ID for this SZ model.

Vaio power management (VPM) is broken at the moment on this install. The Vaio tab is missing in the power management window and i can`t uninstall vaio power management either. The TZ VPM works but shows options not relevant to the SZ series and the SZ4/5 VPM causes the the power management tab not to load. SZ6 Vista VPM corrupts power management tab. I haven`t tried the G1 vaio power management yet

Hmm looks like i will have to try again from a restore point or reinstall win xp.

 

I've notice something different between my SZ360

The new 6 series have 2 more vents @ the bottom front.



Is it possible to get after market SZ6 case? The new black looks really nice.

 

All VPMs that are version 2.0 or over, like the SZ6 VPM, are only compatible with Vista. Notice how all the downgrade VPMs are v1.9.x.x.

Try installing the TZ1-TZ2 VPM (1.9.06.08210) since that seems to work best for your model, and open the data.ini file in the Data subdirectory with a text editor. The first line should indicate your MachineID. If it's anything but ";#84x", where 'x' is an alphabetic character, go to the INI subdirectory and copy the 84x.ini file to Data and replace data.ini with it. Restart and go to the VPM control panel, and you should now see the correct options relevant to your model. If you don't, try the same procedure with the other 84x ini files. In case you'd like to try the ini for my SZ1, it's 66nd.ini.

 

Yes you right. I missed that. Should help with heat reduction.

Sucess. Removed registry entries preventing uninstall. Re-install TZ power management and it detected the correct model by itself. I just had to manually enable VPM in the VPM tab as it was turned off. Might have created my own problems at the start by installing VPM from different models.

The stamina/speed switch notifcation is back now too.



I going to start looking at why the brightness control doesn`t work on either the Intel GMA X3100 or the Nvidia Geforce 8400M GS drivers. The LCD screen being the biggest drain of power this has a big effect on portability. Looking at testing the nvsz.inf from the offical sony 8.4.9.1 nvidia drivers on drivers that support the 8 series.

It seems the missing driver for the IDE controller has been fixed after i installed the intel X3100 drivers from intel website.
EDIT: IDE Controller problem came back.

 

Partial Success on getting Brightness Control. On start up it won`t respond until you go manually into the Nvida Tab and play with the smartdimmer options. VPM will then work with it but there seems to be lower brightness levels missing.



I have attached for testing and at used your own risk as i am new to modding inf driver files. This is only for driver 163.67 32bit XP and only tested on Geforce 8400M GS (PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_0427). Someone with more knowledge might be able to help here. Also attached is a registry file to enable the old Nvidia Control panel and another to re-enable the new control panel.

Bascially it looks like these fields are only added to laptopvideo2go.com drivers on some occasions. Otherwise we will have to modify them ourselves if you want brigthness control in new drivers.

With the intel X3100 it might be the same case in finding the values in the offical sony *.inf driver definition file and transplanting them into the newer drivers for XP.

Maybe wait for offical SZ6 downgrade drivers.

EDIT: Looks like the Brightness (Smart Dimmer on Nvidia Cards) is both dependant on the correct values being present in the *.inf and the driver files having correct mobile card support.

The smartdimmer registry values that were install with the 163.67 were not deleted so it was present when i tried the new 163.74 drivers. Found all 9 Fn brightness values work on the SZ94 now with the new drivers.