Vaio Z VPCZ1 Clean Install

You are right only "disk data cache" was enabled. Now I have change both disk parameters but score do not change.

 

I did a fresh install and all is working fine. I repartitioned the disk to remove the recovery partion (however I burn recovery DVD's)

There was some DVD software installed as part of the Sony applications (Roxio Easy Media Creator), and I'd like to reinstall it.

Has anyone who has removed the recovery parition and done a clean windows install, then trie to install the applications from the recovery disks, but putting the disks in, running the program and selecting install drivers or programs ?

I want to try this, but am concerned it might try to reinstall the recovery partition

 

I get 7.9 on the index.
I dunno why yours is so low.

 

I have the same problem with a VPCZ118GX/S (3 x 128 GB). I first noticed the blinking cursor boot pause after using VAIO Recovery to return drive C: "to the original, factory-installed condition" (not accurate). The blinking cursor problem continued after performing a clean install.

 

Interesting.

I have the same issue. I thought it was just the fakeRAID initialization causing the deferred startup.

I've reinstalled from the recovery media and done clean installs more times than I can remember, so I don't recall if POST's were faster at some point in the past.

Along with the blinking cursor, the HDD activity light stays lit.

I've reset my bios to factory defaults, rebuilt the RAID volumes, reinitialized the drives with diskpart, still happens.

 

I check this on my Vaio Z VPCZ1. I haven't this problem. Total Booting time about 20s.
PS: 2x64gb ssd Raid 0 (2 partition-25+94,2Gb), W7 Clean install, Recovery partition deleted

 

I had not paid attention to that. You are right: the disk activity LED stays lit while the cursor blinks.

It seems that you have done more with your VPCZ1 than anyone in this forum. If you could not resolve the blinking cursor boot delay, I would not expect another End-User being able to resolve that issue.

To be sure, perhaps someone with a fresh out-of-the box VPCZ1 would count the blinks of the cursor until Windows starts.

Now that I have your attention, I would like to ask you about an issue I am facing after my clean install with Windows 7 Ultimate.

In “Control Panel – Hardware and Sound – Devices and Printers” I get two “Ricoh SD/MMC” Disk Devices identified as drives "F:" and "G:". However, it is drive "G:" the one that recognizes the insertion of an SD card. Removing both “Ricoh SD/MMC” Disk Devices at the Device Manager in Windows Safe Mode does not work because both devices reappear with the next reboot.

I installed the following drivers:

Ricoh PCIe SD Bus Host Adapter Driver Ver. 6.13.2.7 (RIDFMC-00210944-0042.EXE)
Ricoh SD CPRM Memory Card Reader/Writer Driver Ver. 3.1.0.4 (RIDFMC-00204879-0042.EXE)​

Any ideas?

 

What did you do to partition?

 

Not sure on the memory card items. I just install the default drivers and move on. I don't use that kind of memory, sticking with USB drives and whatnot.

I attempted to clear my CMOS by disconnecting the internal battery for a few hours. Didn't help, but now my install of Windows 7 is saying it isn't genuine.

Good times.

 

The cutting edge of technology can make you bleed. My Acer netbook never gave me any trouble.

I wish that I could get to the bottom of the blinking cursor boot delay issue. My HP EliteBook 8530p takes only two blinks of the cursor to get to the Windows start screen. I contacted Sony Technical Support but all their answers seem to taken out of a script from which they are not allowed to depart. Nonetheless, I was referred to a Sony Repair facility for warranty service which I am hesitant to do because I could possibly get the notebook back with a notice that nothing wrong was found with it.

I will continue to research the issue and post my findings here.

 

I shot a video of the first Z1 I had. I think the cursor behavior in this shot is typical and normal

YouTube - Sony Z post time with RAID shown and hidden.

 

1. Recreate RAID0
2. Format RAID0 with ATIH2010 (fast drive cleaser)
3. Create 2 NTFS partition with ADDS 10.0.2288 (25+94)
4. Install W7(without 100Mb part)+drivers+all programs in 25Gb partition

 

If you are doing a clean install, you can simply use the Windows 7 installer to make your partitions. It will automatically create the 100MB System Reserved partition.

If you want to get fancy, you can hit SHIFT+F10 at any point before the actual install to bring up a DOS prompt so you can use DISKPART.

 

I made a new thread on the slow POST issue.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/484384-sony-vpc-z11-slow-post.html

 

Thanks. I let the Windows 7 installer partion the disk space and format it automatically. Reading AGabi's post made me think of the possibility that it may be the Windows partitioning what could be causing the blinking cursor boot delay. Perhaps Sony used something other than Windows at the factory. AGabi used Acronis and did not experience the blinking cursor delay issue with his clean install reporting a total total boot time of about 20 seconds. I should say that I have little technical knowledge or experience and that this is just a speculation.

 

Unless there is some odd requirement for sector alignment, I dunno. Seems unlikely, but I've tried about everything else.

 

I used Acronis just to install W7 without 100mb partition and to resize RAID without unallocated area. Maybe cause in specific SW (Fo example-antivirus)

 

Is that 100 MB system partition necessary? May I just delete it?

 

Don't delete it!!! W7 can't starts If you delete it.

 

Could you post a DISKPART of your SSD array?

 

Feel free to delete the partition - Windows 7 will start fine without it (having this setup here).

 

Keep the install DVD handy, you will need to do a startup repair.

 

Posted here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/484384-sony-vpc-z11-slow-post-3.html

 

Let me re-precise that:

If you are doing a fresh install it is safe to remove the system partition.

If you are removing the system partition after installation you'll need the dvd to do a one-time restore of the boot files and you have to move the whole windows partition to utilize the freed' space.
But be warned: Although this worked for me several times it happened that the move operation crushed the installation, so [insert standard backup disclaimer here].

 

globalist

Are you installed unofficial MS W7 Updates? These are updates lunched on factory system.
Windows6.1-KB974624-x64
Windows6.1-KB975599-x64
Windows6.1-KB976781-x64
Windows6.1-KB976782-v2-x64
Windows6.1-KB977419-x64

 

Thank you. Not yet. I took a look at the DISKPART of your VPCZ1 SSD array. Is it signficant that the Primary Partition with Windows 7 installed on it have the 1024 KB offset?

 

I don't know. I think it depends were located W7 boot files.

 

A 1024 KB offset shouldn't be the reason for the blinking cursor delay. I do have a 1024 Kb offset with 100MB system reserved primary partition in my FZ, and there is no delay during start up.

 

With my limited technical knowledge I was trying to suggest the possibility of quite the contrary: that if the Primary Partition on which Windows 7 is installed does not have the 1024 KB offset, it may take longer for the PC to boot.

 

I have made several clean install, but I have never been able to restore the original function of a special button the one with such an approximate symbol : ◫ that is close to the VAIO button.

Could you please help me ?

Its original function was quite good, it was organizing windows quickly.
But now it just does an ugly & useless windows magnifier...

I tried to change it through the Vaio Control center but unsuccessfully....
And what about the ASSIT button, no function anymore ?

Stupidly I haven't made DVD backup of initial installation , I even didn't know the windows serial on the factory windows installation was different from the sticker under the laptop.

 

Thanks for the guide. Anyways, I can't find drivers for my model on the US Sony site. My model is a VPCZ11V5E, not a VPCZ112GX. What are the differences except the SSD? I suspect european models to have different names but to be the same, this case, which one shoud il chose in the list here?

I was not able to burn reinstallation recovery disks from the Vaio Recovery Center (my Z is a HDD version and when trying to burn a blank DVD, my USB optical drive doesn't recognize it. I've tried reinstalling it, updating drivers, but I didn't solve the problem), so I'm very cautious and I would like to be sure the clean installattion of Windows 7 will be fully functional on my Z. I think that, except from the HDD instead of a SSD, it should all the same drivers, but can someone confirm that?

Here is my config, to help identifying my model:

- i5 540 m
- 8 GB RAM
- GT330 M 1 GB
- 500 GB 7200 HDD
- 1920 x 1200 resolution
- WWAN

Thanks in advance for your help. It's kind of an emergency since I need a fully functional laptop for the forthcoming days, and it would be great if it was without the hundreds of Sony crapwares.

 

Nevermind, problem solved! I used a mix of european drivers for VPCZ11C5E and US drivers for VPCZ112GX and it worked fine! Now I'm just trying to figure out how to restore the "Organize windows" in the custom key section of Vaio Control Center, because as MikjoA, I see that this option has disappeared.

 

I bought a VPCZ11C5E a few days ago (custom built, with 256GB SSD and no fingerprint sensor or wireless WAN). I bought it from SonyStyle Spain, since I'm living here temporarily, but I decided to reinstall Windows 7 to both clean the useless pre-installed programs and to change the system language to Brazilian Portuguese.

I tried to follow the first post's driver installation order. I downloaded the drivers from the link (US site), but not everything worked; for example, the ethernet driver I downloaded did install but in device manager it kept saying the ethernet device wasn't recognized.

After I was done with everything, I still had some unrecognized devices; also, some FN keys weren't working (e.g. brightness); I couldn't set battery saver or the special key's function in Vaio Control; Aero wasn't working; I kept getting the "incompatible battery" error someone mentioned in this topic.

So I went to the European (UK) site and downloaded all drivers. I proceeded to install everything again; some just installed over whatever was in the system previously, and some setups uninstalled the current version on first run and then I'd re-run it to install the European version. Now mostly everything works.

Note that the UK site doesn't have Vaio Care and Vaio Update available to download, so I installed the US versions I had downloaded first. They do install, but Vaio Update (after a session of self-updating the first time I ran it) doesn't work very well, giving me an error when it tries to fetch the update list.

Now, besides the problematic Vaio Update, two problems remain:
- Vaio Control doesn't save settings correctly. Whenever I reopen it, it seems to be back on default.
- Aero still doesn't work (no option to enable it). This is what bugs me most.

Could anyone help me out on this? Any ideas of what I should do...?

Thanks in advance!

 

Run the Windows Experience Indexer. Aero will turn on after a pass is run.

 

I had already ran it (after installing everything) and rebooted. It's showing 6.3 as the index (weird, considering it was 6.4 before reinstalling Windows).

I'm trying to remove and reinstall the NVIDIA drivers and Vaio Control Center.

I forgot to mention another problem in Vaio Control: the option for setting the action of the button between Assist and Vaio is missing.

 

Go into the Windows Advanced System Options, under performance click settings. On the Visual Effects tab, click adjust for best appearance.

Other than than that, you are on the right track with the Nvidia drivers. Uninstall and reinstall.

EDIT: On the S button, the second option gets nuked after installing the "VAIO Application Launcher" (SOAOTH-00000008-0042). Something to do with the Media Gallery app, methinks. I haven't been able to restore the normal operation of the S button after installing it. I don't install the package anymore since I don't use any of Sony's media apps.

 

Reinstalling Vaio Control Center fixed the no-saving issue and also brought back the option to set the S1 button. (What second option? No, I didn't install Vaio App Launcher as far as I remember.)

Reinstalling the video driver didn't make Aero work. However, I went into the registry (HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\DWM); the tips in the following link, plus changing the value of Composition to 1, made Aero work after I restarted the service.
I hope it survives a reboot, and future driver upgrades.

Well, at least everything (sans Vaio Update) seems to be working as intended now. Thanks for the help.

[edit] Aero might have already been working after the reinstall and before I hacked into the registry, I may have been overlooking the option to turn it on. I thought it was a specific checkbox "enable transparency" or something, but looking again at Personalization now that it's on, I see it's whole a row of themes...

 

I have a clean Win 7 x64 Ultimate install, everything works fine, except for the Event Service controlling the brightness and sound keys.

It works most of the times, but sometime after playing something with flash or videointensive the ability to change brithness/autodimming disappears. Pressing the keys results in a looong delay, where the icon pops up and changes setting without it actually resulting in a change. Similarly win+X doesn't change brightness anymore.

I have every original driver/app from Sony installed (bar the media bloatware) and have also updated to the latest versions of Vaio Control Panel, Smart Network and Event Service.

The weird thing is although the Event Service update is listed as 5.1.2.03030, looking at the control panel it displays the older version, which is 5.1.0.012299. This would indicate that the Event Service update has failed to install.

Could someone else verify that after applying the Event Service update, the version displayed in the Windows Control Panel is 5.1.2.03030?

Has anyone else experienced the similar situation and how have you guys resolved it?

 

I have 5.1.0.012299 version in the Windows Control Panel too and 5.1.2.03030 ver successfully installed on my PC.
Check file Version.txt in the C:\Program Files (x86)\Sony\VAIO Event Service.

 

No matter what drivers i try to use the screen brightness indicators on the keyboard never works for me, yet the volume ones do work. I wish Sony just made touch keys and get rid of these stupid assist buttons etc...

 

I have the same issue when coming from standby or hibernation (at least sometimes). You can see the brightness and volume bars going up and down but there is no actual change.

I haven't found a solution yet, but the problem disappears after a few seconds up to half a minute. I think the Event Service just crashes (due to some internal error) and it takes some time until Windows recognizes that it isn't running any more and restarts it.

Just have a look at the windows event log if you see any crash reports.

 

Hi,

nothing in the event log, checked.
Could you confirm the exact version of your installed Event Service? Have you applied the update?

 

Hi there,

Thanks for the tip - indeed, version.txt shows that the update is correctly applied. Do you have the same issue?

 

Code:

5.1.2.03030
32bit/64bit
5.1.0.12290
32bit/64bit
[InstallationInfo]
ProductName=VAIO Event Service
Version=5.1.0.12290
InstalledDate=5-5-2010 09:04:05
UpdateCount=1
Updated1ProductName=VAIO Event Service
Updated1Version=5.1.2.03030
Updated1Date=5-5-2010 09:06:00

Code:

VesMgr.exe 5.0.0.6050
VesMgrSub.exe 5.0.0.4270

 

Yes. I have it. I don't worry about this issue. The same issue is share for all Sony notebooks. My previous CW1 and EB1Z1R notebooks had this issue too.

 

Are there any current known problems with doing a clean install?

 

Sorry I have sold my Z112, i went to pick up another at the microsfot sale today but missed it when i score a good deal i will be back and working on things for the vaio

 

Just did a clean install Win 7 ultimate. No problems so far, THANKS for this guide.

One question i have is whether it is possible to keep keyboard lid up all the time when laptop is plugged in?

 

For me, there was this irritating pop-up that keeps coming up after one of the packages was installed. It went away after installing the next package, so I think there's something slightly wrong with the Sony-recommended install order. It's not a big deal, just keep going

 

Thanks Tofu.

Probably going to try it out tonite