Z high-end upgrades (Help Needed)

Hi, I own a Vaio VGN-Z11XN (PCG-6X4M)
Purchased in Greece.

It came with the standard spec
P8600 CPU
4GB RAM
32GB HDD @ 5400RPM
and 1600x900 display

I upgraded with these parts:
T9600 CPU
MemoRight GT 128GB (MR25.2-128S)

I am currently waiting for a QX9300 CPU (quadcore @ 2.53Ghz)

I need some help as I wish to install a second SSD drive and set them both as RAID 0 (I have a second Memoright GT standing by for the upgrade)

Does anyone know how to obtain the ribbon cable necessary to connect two SSDs in RAID?

Also (ideally) I would like the option of backing up to a Blu-Ray.

All I know in that regard is SONY is using a Sony-Optiarc 9.5mm drive but I can't find it anywhere.

Any information on either the ribbon cable or Blu-Ray drive will be greatly appreciated.

I suppose some may go ahead and say I am going a little over the top with this configuration but for editing on-location footage from my RED One this is the smallest package I could find that does the job.
I am also using this laptop to do some VFX on Houdini...

By the way, if you know of a way to upgrade my GPU let me know.

Thanks

 

I looked through Sony's part website, though I couldn't find either of the specific parts you wanted. You should still take a look though:

http://servicesales.sel.sony.com/ec...o?searchOperation=modelSearch&searchText=VGNZ

You might also have more luck searching via the TT model, since it offers both of those features. These parts are very expensive, but it doesn't sound like money is an issue for you.

I really don't think you'll be able to upgrade the GPU - it's built into the mainboard.

 

I looked through both Z and TT high-end models and these are the parts I could come up with (a lot of guesswork)
I figured which is which by looking for models that included SSD drives.
187711211 PWB, FPC-141 FLEXIBLE PRINT
185715911 PWB, FPC-167 FLEXIBLE PRINT
410914801 BRACKET_SSD_RAID

Anything make any sense?
I suppose Bracket is the metal thing that holds both drives (says RAID in the title) and flexible print might as well be a ribbon cable. if only there was a part number...

I'd look for photos in that japanese site but there are many MANY of them around...

 

Holy Cow!
I found the Blu-Ray drive for the Z and it's a whopper!
Here's the drive
184004811 ODD (PCC/BD/9.5/232/S) $1,053.13
and here's the Bracket for it:
345238501 BRACKET (ODD_BR)

That is if ODD stands for Optical Disk Drive and BD for Blu-ray

 

I would advise caution when doing upgrades like this: Intel P series CPUs have 25W TDP, while T's have 35W. SONY makes two (!) different cooling systems for these two CPU types. The differences between them are several:
- one of the brass pipes is thicker,
- there are additional fins below the CPU contact area,
- and additional fins next to the fan (the fins serve as a "radiator" for faster heat removal).

One should not use a 35W CPU with a 25W cooling system. The power output cooling system is designed for is clearly indicated on the sticker located on the brass plate contacting the CPU. You must have seen it when you changed the processor.

Now, the QX9300 has a max. TDP of 45W. So even 35W cooling system will not be able to cope with all the heat. As a result, to prevent the CPU overheating the BIOS/OS will throttle it down and you will not be able to get the CPU running at 100% load for prolonged periods of time. Essentially the laptop will not perform better than with the fastest 25W processor (currently P9500), but it will certainly be less energy efficient and have shorter battery life.

Incidentally, I saw someone selling VAIO Z on eBay with X9100 processor. Whoever is buying it should know that they are never going to get full power out of that CPU in Z (at normal room temperature anyway).

You can easily verify my assertions here by just running orthos while checking the CPU/GPU temperatures in Everest.

Regarding the Blu-ray drive, it's not hard to change. The drive SONY use in Z is M-a-t-s-h-i-t-a (Panasonic) UJ-232AS. Optiarc does not make such drives as far as I know.

 

hey Falang, thanks for the word of caution on the TDP.
To be honest, the T9600 never gave me any trouble. it actually runs at 58°C only 5°C higher than what the P8600 gave me (after 6 hours of operation at full processing power with profiles removed)
The Core 2 Duo (both T and P) have a thermal specification of 105°C so there is plenty of room so long as the vent is not blocked.

Keeping in mind the QX9300's TDP I have been preparing a heatsink/pipe to replace the original one and in my tests with the T9600 I get about 13°C lower after 6 hours of operation but I do not know if I will use it after all.

BTW, if you replace the standard thermal paste Sony puts on te CPU with a silver compound (be very careful doing so) you achieve better conductivity which will earn you a few important degrees when cooling.

On a sidenote, I owned and operated 24/7 for over 6 months an SZ71 and I replaced the standard CPU with an X9000 (44W TDP) and it was a very happy lappy until the time I sold it and the new owner reports no issues to this day.

As for the seller on ebay they should know there's no X9100, there is a Q9100 though and yes, that one runs at 45W...

Thanks for the info on the drive. Google has not been helpful at all but I'll keep on searching.

EDIT: the GPU is removable

 

Hey.nutman..........which Processor Tech. do u use?....the Montevina?(U say u have the t9600 right?........................then how r u sure that a q9300 is going to work on your notebook?????????????

 

Both run on the 1066 bus and both belong to the Penryn family.
And both belong to the Centrino 2 (formerly Montevina) category
Both use the 479 Micro-FCPGA package type
And both support the GM45 chipset according to intel's website.
I am not saying Q9300, the one I am talking about is the QX9300

BTW, my T9600 when plugged in is running at or about 2793MHz
When on Battery it SpeedSteps between 1596MHz and 2793MHz
Speeds reported by CPU-Z

 

I bought one of this laptops on eBay and you are absolutely right! It took me a while to figure it out. If the CPU is run for about 30 second or so, performance is up to par to what it should be, but then, when I run a long video rendering task sunch as video conversion, it takes munch longer than it should. This is also verifiable by running CPU benchmarks for example on SisoftSandra. If I run CPU benchmark tests consecutively one after the other, each result is lower than the previous as the CPU gets hotter and hotter. Then, if I wait a few minutes and the system cools down, the results are higher again when freshly run.

Sony is NOTORIOUSLY aggressive when it comes to throttling down CPUs to avoid overheating. I remember having an old Pentium 4 Sony laptop a few years ago (first machine that had a DVD Burner in it) and OMG, that thing was junk. As soon as there was load on the CPU it would be throttled down to like a 1/3 of its native speed... slowest laptop I had ever had with a fast CPU... it was horrible!

Anyway, all this said, I have a couple questions. Is it somehow possible to disable throttling on BIOS or via another way?

My point here is that the fans don't even run fast nor does the laptop get hot. The system starts down throttling itself much earlier than it should. I bet this will even happen with lower clocked processors.

There are 2 things I would like to do. One is to install a software called SpeedFan, that allows manual control of fan speeds. That way hopefully when rendering video overnight (H.264 conversion that I do for work) I can leave the laptop plugged in with fans on a higher setting to remove extra heat.

The other thing I want to do is that I KNOW, the thermal compound used in ALL mass produced machines sucks. I would like to open the Z, remove the heatsink and replace the compound with ArcticSilver 5 that will make things MUCH better. Does anyone know where I can get a disassembly Manual for the Z or how to get it open? I have no idea how to reach the heatsink and CPU.

Thanks for the input. I will want to try to get this done and then will re-post results here.

 

For now i can only answer your questions and guide you step by step
but when i open it again to upg the cpu i can post photos
so what do you need to know?

also, i replaced the compound with arctic silver and that helps a bit

 

Thanks a lot for your help... well... I dont know the basics starting off with of with which screws to take off to start removing covers and components to access the heasing and get it off... any help and guidance will be greatly appreciated!!!

 

How are you measuring your temperature? (RMClock does not provide accurate temp readings for these processors.)
Are you using orthos to stress the CPU?
What is the temp in the room?
Could you post a screenshot?

In the meantime, here in a composite image I created to illustrate the differences between SONY Vaio Z series cooling systems I described earlier:



Next, here is an example of a factory brand new VGN-Z590 with Intel P8400 CPU exhibiting overheating due to improper CPU-heatsink contact. Observe the saw-like pattern in the graph (screenshot from Lavalys Everest 4.60). This is what's happening: once the CPU core temp reaches 102°C, the BIOS throttles it down and CPU temp drops, then BIOS allows it to run at full speed, temperature quickly rises again to about 102°, and the cycle continues. A CPU-Z running concurrently in a separate window shows how the CPU speed keeps jumping back and forth between max (2.26 GHz in this case) and 1596 MHz. If you do a search you will find that several people on this forum have reported seeing CPU core temperatures reaching 100°C on their Z laptops running orthos. I personally have seen two Z590 with this problem. So this is not just a fluke. In the graph below orthos was run 6 min 25 sec., temp in the room 22°C, no undervolting.



Now, the graph below shows this same VAIO Z590 notebook but the original CPU was replaced by P9500. The shape of coper pipes was adjusted to insure there is no gap between the heatsink and the CPU surface. The heatsink was polished and thoroughly cleaned prior to the installation and arctic silver 5 compound was applied to both CPU and Intel GPU heatsinks. Orthos run over 46 min, temp in the room 23°C, no undervolting.



Max temp reached 90°C during the run above:



So before making any changes/upgrades I suggest investigating what exactly the temperature of the CPU is. Also, since the cooling system in the Z picks up heat from the nVidia GPU it is useful to do a stress test for it too. I used FurMark. GPU max temp is 92°C:

What about this: http://ark.intel.com/cpu.aspx?groupID=35431

 

Before making any changes I strongly recommend making a serious attempt at understanding what is happening with the CPU and the 2 GPUs. A good place to start would be getting reliable CPU and nVidia GPU temperature readings while doing video encoding. Video encoding will not normally stress the CPU and RAM as much as orthos, but you have an added GPU workload. Without seeng good data it's all mere speculation...

 

falang, thank you very much for your detailed information first of all and for sharing your in-depth results with us I assume that the cooling system for the Z is designed for 35W heat removal (not 25W), right?

I will venture to open my Z tomorrow and check for perfect contact of the heatsink surfaces and apply ArcticSilver 5 compound. I was also thinking on maybe lapping the CPU and even the heatsink base that touches it... I hear it can be helpful.

My Z is running a 3.06GHz CPU like I mentioned. It only runs full speed for a few seconds and then it starts getting dramatically slowed down. I am hoping that some tweaking on the heatsink and a better thermal compound can help this somehow.

One final note on the use of a QX9300 CPU... to the best of my knowledge (and I may be wrong here) usually the BIOS needs to be upgraded to be able to recognize and properly operate a mobile Quad-Core Processor. Is the Z's BIOS even compatible with the QX9300 without an update from Sony... which I doubt they will freely offer?

 

No. Most of the Z series notebooks have 25W cooling systems in them, as they have Intel P series CPUs (P8400, P8600, P9500, P9600 coming in December). The only ones that have 35W cooling system are the ones SONY sell in China and Japan, and these systems have factory installed T series processor (T9600).

The way I see it is that the cooling system designed for 25W will not cope with 44W (no matter how well adjusted it is) unless you really modify (=rebuild) it. It's like trying to get two horse powers out of one horse...
If you want to design and build a better cooling system for your Z, that is an entirely different discussion. Remember that SONY is in the business of selling notebooks. If they could put a more powerful CPU in there they would do it and they would sell it to you for more money. But for some reason they decided not produce 35W systems outside Japan. My conclusion is: the higher the CPU power, the slimmer the margines of error in manufacturing (i.e. it takes more time to assemble the device, workers must have higher skills, etc.) If you open up your Z you will see that it is beautifully designed, but at the same time the design places high demand on the manufacturing precision.

I am not expecting any such BIOS from SONY (if indeed one is needed) any time soon.

 

I am in Hong Kong and here the Z tops at P9500 (2.53 GHz) as a VGN-Z17GN/B. Oh and , no Blu-ray here either... plus, all models are more expensive and positively no customization of any kind...
http://www.sonystyle.com.hk/ss/product/vaio/index_2_e.jsp

All here is crippled actually. The TT as another example? No choosing colors of lids, no online (or store) optional configurations and no WWLAN module either on any model... for more $$$ than comparable modles when purchased directly from Sonystyle USA. And accessories of any kind?... yeah... right... I find it histerical that the streets here are always full of tourists furiousely buying stuff that are "good deals"... what a joke...

The concept that in Asia (here at least) you can find high-end stuff is totally a fabrication...

Finding any laptop with a 2.8GHz is a rarity... Core i7 CPUs and parts for example? Forget it!... "real" life around here is pale when compared to what's avail in the US and the street price of stuff...

 

For your reference:
kunkoku.com/new/bimages2/z301.jpg
kunkoku.com/new/bimages2/z318.jpg

You should of course check to see if your MemoRight SSD internal components have the same formfactor, since you will obviously need to remove the 2.5" casing in order to stack the bare PCBs together for RAID.

As for on-location editing, you may want to just buckle down and get a half-depth 1U/2U rack (or even a SFF like Shuttle XPC units) + UPS and offload the processing (network/batch render, etc). You'll be able to use significantly better CPUs and step up to RAID-5/6 for better disk speed and security.

Personally, I think there are simply too many factors to deal with and so few options available compared to standard ATX/rackmount that sooner or later (probably sooner) you'll hit diminishing returns despite spending big sums of money. Among my concerns: BIOS/CPU compatability; TDP and insufficient cooling; hardware throttling, system lockups; and most importantly, RAID 0 offers no redundancy.

 

The QX9300 will not work in the Z. Period.

It does not work in all Centrino 2/Cantiga laptops. Only specially designed laptops for QC can utilize the QX9300. The QX requires a much larger heatsink anyway.

Cancel the order, get your money back and wait for the T9800/900s coming out soon.

 

Thanks for the replies so far.
Tomorrow I am getting the Q9100 to test it on the Z for a few days.

The T9600 temperature was at 18C room temp and the reading was taken around 6 hours into it's operation time.
It's been running at 2.79Ghz with both cores at 96-100% is I remember correctly.
GPU was fairly stressed too as I was running Houdini.

Getting a larger solution is not an option, thank you. Size and weight are important.
I already built an extremely compact 6 disk RAID 5 e-sata USB powered solution with six memoright 128GB disks.
And I am happy with that

 

Why we have to spend a lot of efford to change the hardware?
Why not buy a very powerful desktop to work with CPU power hungry software?

 

I need something portable and light
at home I have a few 8 (4+4) core Xeon systems from Boxx.

 

If I were in Hong Kong, I would go to PCL COmputer in Mong Kok or Wan Chai; they import JP models which are the best!
I bought my TZ90s (is ancient now) there last year.

And nutman, I am impressed by you Z upgrades. Very interesting reading! Thanks
Cheers,

 

Good advice. Are you talking about these guys? Will check them out tomorrow if its them and import JP models

 

nutman, I am curious to know how you tests with Intel Q9100 have gone? Could you post any screenshots of the CPU performance under load?

 

nutman, did u buy SSD bracket and ribbon yet? How much are they?