Sony X for $714 at Microsoft right now. GO!!!! GO!!!! GO!!!!!

Microsoft computers with Signature on sale

 

Good deal for the X, but with the announcement of $999 11.6" MBA, I find it hard to bite the bullet on X...

 

That behemoth!!!!!!! It weighs twice as much.

 

But it runs twice as fast... Makes you wonder which one is the Apple product in this case...

 

Remember that the MBA is only 7 or 5 hours, with a non-removable battery
The X has removable battery and comes with two batteries. The large battery last about 12 hours the smaller one lasts about 3 hours, so a totall of about 15 hours!
I would get the X any they over the Air.

 

A Core 2 Duo over an Atom Z.... HAHA it would run circles around the Atom Z multiple times. And the Nvidia 320m would completely DESTROY the GMA500. The GMA500 might as well be a VESA Frame Buffer as far as I'm concerned.

With the Air's processor and graphics you'd be able to get more done in 4 hours than possible in 12 on the X. I admire Sony for making it so thin, but they SERIOUSLY messed up the performance.

 

The Atom CPU in the X is considerably slower than even the old and slower clocks speed Core 2 Duo in the MBA.

I'm really glad I got the Sony Z122 from the last Microsoft sale a few days ago. Just got it today, it's wickedly fast, completely destroys the MBA's. Well, except for ridiculous thinness, I guess.

-Ed

 

I don't think Sony want you to buy X for performance when they can sell you the Z... It's the reason VAIO desktop and DTR laptops have never been good gaming rigs -- Sony want you to buy a PS3 (or PS2, in the late '90s and early 2000).

X is good for what it's good for -- business application and stuff, you are just not going to finish a powerpoint that takes 12 hours to make in 4 hours because of improved CPU/GPU in MBA. I don't think there are that many people, especially people that have to wait for this kind of deal to justify buying VAIO X, that fit this profile, though.

 

True enough. Just anything with an Atom that costs over $600 is a no-go for me. For the same price you can get an Asus UL series that has very similar battery life, and has way more oomph in specs.

 

I have the top of the line Z, for editing and serious editing and stuff. I see the X and MBA as more of a second laptop, where performance is less of a performance.
Battery life is more important on thinner lighter systems. And the 2ghz atom can handle HD video.
With 5-7 hrs of battery life is what I could get on the Z with an extended battery.

 

The X shares the same GMA500 chipset that's used in the P Series, which is much more efficient than the craptacular GMA950 that was commonly used with Atom CPU's.

The GMA500 can do hardware acceleration (DXVA) for H.264, but doesn't quite have enough juice for high bitrate 1080P h.264.

-Ed

 

For those of you who are interested in this deal, X seems to be back in stock -- meaning they probably found a couple more in the corner of their warehouse.

 

As an FYI - You can also get this deal at their stores.

 

Skip the X. I'm typing on the new Macbook Air right now. It spanks all over the X.

 

The X is not for me and neither is the MBA. The X though is right for some people. Battery life is over 12hrs with the very unconventional extended battery and as bluex noted for ultraportables for some people that is the most important thing. The MBA pulls in about 5hrs. From a design standpoint for some people the X also ticks all the right boxes.

Strangley the watts that the X uses is not that much different from the TT in power saver and in silent mode. I can get the TT to around 5w with wifi on and i've had a look at the X thread and some owners pull in about the same figures.

I would like to see Sony come out with another ultraportable with a more powerful processor. However, if they do they probably will skip these current gen processors and wait until the next incarnation to do so. Battery life should be better and also should performance.

 

Or they could do what Apple did, and wait for last gen processors to get cheaper so they can make more money.

I'm not a fan of the Atom processor in nearly full sized laptops. Just too slow. The Atom has it's place. I have an Atom in my Viliv S5. It's basically a SuperPDA to me, although I have it running WinXP Tablet PC Edition. It's not lightning fast, but it's waaaay faster than my Pocket PC and iPhones.

The Atom is ok in my Vaio P. I think Sony definitely did a great job with it's form factor. About as small as you can make a device with a usable keyboard. While it runs rather toasty, I do like that it's completely silent, with no fan.

 

About the speed, most atom are the 1.2, 1.5 or 1.6ghz atoms.
The X uses a very uncommon 2ghz. So it should be a bit more zippy than the traditional Atoms.

 

Also, the GMA500 chipset that the Sony X (and P series) has support for hardware acceleration of Flash.

Even the original Sony P with the very slow 1.33GHz Atom could run full screen Hulu videos (not at the full frame rate, but definitely watchable)

-Ed

 

You can also get an education discount on Apples - that's an extra 10% usually.

The Microsoft store also does the same discount.

 

The GMA500 has been dumped on by Intel themselves, in favor of the GMA600. They hardly ever release updated drivers to fix the multitude of issues it has. I OWN a GMA500 powered device. It's the Viliv S5 in my sig. While you're correct about HW HD Acceleration, it's half-baked most of the time, needing special tools to exploit it, like PowerDVD. But configured right, I've played full 40Mbps Blu-Ray titles on my Viliv connected to an LCD TV. The thing about the GMA950 was that it was downclocked by 2-300MHz for the notebooks and netbooks, when on desktops it's fine. On desktops I've seen GMA950's play 1080p M2TS files perfectly.

Hulu and YouTube are VERY choppy WITH hardware acceleration on... and that's not HD mode. No Atom Z model can handle HD flash full screen. Promise. (Without being overclocked.)

 

Yes, but GMA500 had pretty decent h.264 decoding back in it's day. I also OWN 2 GMA500 devices, a Viliv S5 (gotta love it's battery life and size), and the Vaio P (1st Gen, don't love it's battery life, or lack thereof, but love the screen and performance for it's size)

Now it's obsolete, of course, but I really like how power efficient the GMA500 was compared to the GMA950. All the graphics power in the world is useless if your little netbook is melting down and has a battery life of 1 hour.

(Well, I guess the Vaio P almost fits that description, LOL).

-Ed