Sony Vaio Z51MG/B Graphics Issue

Hi there,

I see some bright minds in this forum who are very well introduced to the Z series and their issues/features. Obviously I need some help...

Starting from the first issue:

Its all concerning the hybrid graphics... Firstly, when I dont use it for a while it turns its display off but it still runs. With a Balanced Power Option Specifications:

Dim display in 5 mins.
Turn off the display in 5 mins.
Put the computer to sleep: Never.
Turn HDD off in 10 mins.

The problem occurs when I wake him up to turn the screen back on. It turns on, with no problems, the mouse moves but the computer kind of freezes. Any clicks from the touchpad do not work or do anything; any keyboard strokes do not work, except for ctrl+alt+del (with a delay). The problem stops in like max. 1 min. of waiting. Throughout all the time whatever has been the picture before the turning off of the display it is the same with no weird things on the display after it has been awaken, but as I said - no control is possible with the mouse or the keyboard. It behaves like a person who is asleep and when you try to wake him up it takes time to get off the bed... I dont like this, although I am like this!

- This problem has been reoccuring on the Stamina mode, still have not tested it on the SPEED (Geforce).

2. The second problem occured just when I was trying to find a solution for the first. While browsing the internet I came around a website and I noticed a significant amount of flickering on the screen. The website is:
http://www.filmschoolrejects.com/features/the-15-best-miramax-films.php
This flickering occured while using the Geforce! I am using the battery power right now and I switched it to the Intel graphics card (stamina mode) and the flickering from this website stopped. Also I noticed some lag when switching between windows on the Geforce?! Isnt it supposed to be the other way around - The intel graphics accelerator to be the laggy one and not produce good animation when using the Aero. I know the flickering should be set accordingly from the Display Settings of the Nvidia Control Panel. Two options were present - 59Hz and 60Hz Refresh Rate - When I choose the 60hz it asks to confirm the options and when I do it automatically goes back to the 59hz??

I hope that is enough. The first problem is the major one and is really annoying. I would be very thankful if someone could give me an explanation or even a solution... Thanks in advance.

P.S. The drivers are:

Intel: 8.16.11.8735 from 16.9.2009
Geforce: The same ^^^^
Something weird: The Monitor in the Device Manager shows: Generic PnP Monitor - Is it supposed to be like this??? I tried automatic windows updating - nothing..

 

That flickering, I'm assuming the page just flickers it's contents (text, images) whenever you move your cursor (or just randomly sometimes)?

The flickering, I can relate to with you. However, I only experienced it when I changed my graphics card WHILE internet explorer was open. Doing so while IE was closed (or restarting IE if GPU was changed when it was opened) fixed the flickering. This was when my machine was running the factory-installed Vista Business x86. Refresh rate has nothing to do with flickering INSIDE a web browser.

I see your settings are set to turn off your HDD after 10minutes. That lag you are saying you get when 'waking up' the machine is normal in that case. Basically, Windows stores just the desktop image of your lappie into the RAM sticks and turns off the HDD (your lappie will pretty much go silent in this case). The mouse cursor is movable in this state. However, trying to start or do anything else NOT on the desktop (ie, start menu), the HDD is forced to turn back on. Usually, when the HDD is turned off, Windows needs some encouragement to get it to turn it back on. You'll need to be agressive resource-wise to get the HDD to eventually turn on. So that lag you are having is not a bug. You can disable HDD-only shut-downs in power management by the way.

I have since clean installed W7 x64 with Sony's ftp drivers and all is fine. Actually, W7 now is yet to crash on me (Vista did, twice in a year, which is still good). Well, W7 did crash once but that was because of a buggy CPU-ID app.

If you recently clean installed windows, I would suggest using Sony intended graphics drivers. If you've installed W7, then follow one of many well documented guides here when installing the drivers (there is an order you must keep to).

If you are running the factory installed Windows (W7 most likely I think, you have the 5th gen Z), I would suggest a clean install. Again, follow the guides here.

Unfortunately, uninstalling and reinstalling graphics drivers I don't think will do alot here. It might, but more likely it will not... I am guessin a recent change to your machine just borgged some settings up for it to suddently start flickering web pages.

Let us know how it goes regardless... Hope this helps.