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My VAIO #7 - Champagne and Chocolate... The Best!
This one is my VAIO Number Seven!
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My screen name, VAIOFancier, says it all. I was fortunate to buy the VAIO VPCZ22UGX Signature, with champagne exterior and chocolate interior, right before the online Sony store stopped carrying it.
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What a wonderful machine! Carbon fiber aluminum case, contrasting interior, solid state disk drive, 4 oz. lighter than the comparable-sized MacBook Air and only 2 oz. heavier than the 11" MacBook, and unlike the Macs, full HD display.
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Tiny little refinements abound, such as the slightly-recessed keyboard to reduce likelihood of scratching the display when opened, a hinge that provides a slight forward tilt to the keyboard when opened, an earphone jack positioned closer to the front of the machine than the back [unlike the VAIO S], and a finger print reader that works very reliably. There is a lighted keyboard and an auto-brightness sensor for the display, adapting to the current ambient light level.
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Boot up is really fast and battery life is over 4 hours on 80% brightness without the sheet battery added. Key travel is less than normal [1 mm vs. 1.8+ mm typical], but keys solidly bottom out, so I can type firmly, accurately, and quickly. I have been completely satisfied both with the right shift key and the track pad mentioned in some other reviews.
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The one concern I had about buying this is that I wanted an integral Blu-ray disk [as in the VAIO S]. The VAIO Z uses a separate Power Media Dock for optical drive, graphics accelerator, and additional ports. I could accept the outrigger of the dock in exchange for the smaller, lighter laptop, but I did not want to have to plug the dock into AC, so I asked both Sony Technical Support and the Sony Chat Support whether the dock could run off the laptop battery over its connection [though at a shorter battery life]. In three separate inquiries, I was told that it could.
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It can't.
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However, I have solved my need for a Blu-ray drive using a USB-powered third party Blu-ray drive [I use the LG Model CP40NG10, about $100, and it gives full Blu-ray speed and quality while powered by the laptop].
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I am also starting to use both the SD card and the HD Duo Magic Gate solid state memory card slots, which can hold up to 128 GB each. One can hold my entire iTunes library [so I can move it among my various VAIO machines, all equipped with Magic Gate] and the other, if I figure out how to do it, could hold at least 10 full-HD Blu-ray movies that I can transfer from my Blu-ray disks, hence avoiding any dock.
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In all, this is an excellent PC and I feel most fortunate to have purchased this particular Signature model a week before they stopped carrying it. The others that they carry offer the same [or even more] memory, so the capability that I am enjoying is still available.
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April 21, 2012
Body, Beauty, and Brains!
The Sony VAIO Z series is the high-end of all high-end laptops, and this Signature configuration is fully featured and won't disappoint (maybe except your wallet). It has everything you'd look for in a premium ultraportable (fast 2nd Gen Intel Core i7 that rivals much larger gaming machines, beautiful 1920 x 1080 native resolution and full HD graphics, 256GB SSD, Blu Ray playback on the included Power Media Dock which also has its own AMD Radeon graphics processor.
I have only ever owned high-end ultraportable laptops because I need full power in the smallest, lightest possible profile for traveling with limited physical mobility, and this is by far my favorite. Slim, yet durable. Lightweight, yet luxuriously appointed. And the Core i7 plus 6GB RAM plus SSD make this not only blazingly fast (boot times take about 25 seconds and full shut down times are absolutely insane at under 11 seconds), but also extremely quiet. The machine doesn't get as hot as some laptops with spinning HDDs.
All in all -- well worth if you have the means.
March 5, 2012
This Sony Z Laptop is not as good as previous ones
Sony has taken a step backwards in this latest Z series ultra portable. I've used the VPC-1190X which has everything built-in including an optical drive and weighs 3 lbs. Even the NVidia graphics are built onto the 1190X motherboard. Now Sony has chosen to move the ethernet port, optical drive, and AMD graphics to the docking station. This is a major sacrafice just to save one half pound weight. I use the Sony Z 1190X for at home technical support so the lack of a built-in ethernet port and optical drive is a big negative.I would recommend buying another less expensive 13.3" Sony notebook.
January 12, 2012
Vaio Series Z - Signature Gold
I had a 15" Sony laptop working as a desktop replacement and recently replaced it with the Signature Series Z (gold) and connected it to two 22" LG monitors, Bose computer speakers, and a Seagate 320GB external drive (USB 3.0) to the power media station. Everything works great except the Bluetooth intermittently drops connection with my Sony wireless mouse. Very easy to disconnect and travel with the Series Z laptop but when I'm home the two 22" monitors provide much more functionality. I could use more USB ports on the Series Z laptop because when it is connected to the power media station there is only one available USB port.
October 22, 2011
