Upgradibility on New Sony Vaio S?

I have just purchased a 15.5" S Series Custom, only upgrading from the default options to the 640m LE 2GB and i7-3612QM quad core.

Does anyone know if this needs a 7mm drive? Or if a 9.5mm one works? I have a normal 9mm 256GB Crucial m4 so I'm hoping this works.

Also, I plan on adding memory, as it has 4GB soldered on, with an open slot. If I add a 8GB for a toal of 12GB, would I be losing any performance because it is not in dual channel mode anymore? Would it be better to add only 4GB for a total of 8GB instead?

Finally, I plan on upgrading it's wireless card to either a killer wireless-N 1102 or 1103. If I choose to go with the 1103, is it possible to do a 3rd antenna mod? Or is it better to just save my money and hook up a 1102 normally?

Thanks NBR!

EDIT: Is it true that the new vaio S's have an intel centrino 6235? If that is true, that's almost a top of the line network adapter and then I will not need to upgrade it.

 

Why would adding 8GB make it not dual channel? The memory doesn't have to be the same size to be dual channel, and adding the 8GB would actually make it dual channel because it'll be the second stick you add.

I would like to know more about the wireless card though, and how many antennae come with it.

 

On the canadian sony site this is the wireless card

WiFi Adapter : Intel® Centrino® Wireless-N 2230 (802.11b/g/n)

 

Oh. Forgive me, but asymmetrical (asynchronous?) dual channel takes no performance hit?

That's disappointing I browsed through the drivers on the NA site and it offers a download of the intel advanced-n 6235 driver...hmmmm. Highest end wifi+bt offering by intel. I guess I'll find out when this ships next week.

 

No idea the info was taken from the pre-config S13A on the canadian site but the US site for a pre-config s13A shows this

WiFi Adapter : Intel® Centrino® Advanced-N 6235 (802.11a/b/g/n)

 

Well, one of the sticks will be bottlenecked by the slower one, so it's best to get the exact same timings and speed. But other than that there shouldn't be a downgrade in performance.

EDIT: Also, it looks like the US version comes with Advanced-N, which means it has two antennae. Now I'm wondering if it'd be easy to add another antenna to use Ultimate-N or a Killer card. Or hopefully they put in a third that's being unused?

 

Alright thanks everyone so far! I guess I will not need to end up upgrading my wifi card, and then sticking in a 8GB stick of 4GB+8GB for a total of 12GB doesn't impact performance vs 4GB+4GB.

Final question remains is, I have a m4 SSD at 9.5MM. Will that fit? Or do I need a 7MM drive.

 

I read in the large SA thread that it takes 9.5mm because someone said you'd need a gap filler for a 7mm drive.

 

I have a 256Gb Crucial m3 9.5mm ssd, I just removed the black plastic spacer in the middle of the case to make it into a 7mm ssd that fits perfectly in my ThinkPad t420s. So even if the S15 have 7mm hard drive, it well not be a problem.

Cruical also sale 7mm ssd by the way.

 

Sweet! Thanks for the answers everyone! I'm excited to recieve my S15 now

 

Kinda piggy backing on this thread, will performing these upgrades void the warranty? I know you can just swap the parts if you ever need to send it in, but I thought there was a sticker that helps them know whether or not you tampered with the parts?

 

there is no sticker. swap away.

 

Wait really? Then how do they know?

Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk 2

 

they won't know. just put the old ones back in whenever you want to send your laptop to SONY for warranty repairs. the HDD and RAM are upgradeable. other components though, not as much.

 

Waiting for your review

Should be no problem, I'm using 4+4 in my SA though, since 8 GB is already too much for me. Dual-channel technology nowadays does not require you to put in two identical pieces, but the performance will be bottleneck on the slowest one. DDR3 is already very fast anyway.

 

It looks like new SE's DVD drive is not removable, i.e. no chance to replace with second HDD or SSD caddy.

 

Guys, does anybody know if you can install drivers directly from Nvidia? I would love this laptop if I can get updated drivers, but if I'm stuck with 6 month + old drivers from Sony, it won't work at all for games.

 

I'd love to know this too. As soon as your Vaio is a year old you don't get driver updates any more.

 

Like I mentioned elsewhere, you can edit the .inf file of the Nvidia drivers to make them work on the S15 no problem.