The VAIO Z Series was born of Sony’s desire to build the ultimate notebook. Feather-light yet immensely powerful, it fused ultraportable dimensions to desktop performance and made precious few compromises along the way. Now, Sony’s all-new VAIO Z has arrived, and it’s ready to rewrite the ultraportable rules once again.
Physically, the VAIO Z bears little resemblance to its former self. Sharp, boxy lines are formed from slices of carbon fibre, to create a chassis which measures a mere 17mm thick. It looks positively delicate, and its 1.15kg weight means it feels just as barely-there in the hand. There certainly isn’t the unflinching tautness of the Apple Macbook Air, and the obvious seams and slight give in the carbon sheets don’t exude the tough, go-anywhere air of Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1.
Achieving such slenderness has required more than just bold aesthetic changes, however. Sony has also done away with two of the VAIO Z’s most notable features, namely the internal optical drive and dedicated graphics.
This is where the novel Power Media Dock steps in. Resembling a simple external optical drive, it crams in an AMD Radeon HD 6650 graphics chipset, and acts as a docking station too. Look to the rear and there’s one USB 2 port, one USB 3 port, a Gigabit Ethernet socket plus D-SUB and HDMI video outputs. Unhook a flap on the dock’s top edge, and you’ll find another USB 2 port for quick attachment of a USB flash drive or similar.
It’s an elegant solution. A power supply feeds the Power Media Dock from the mains, but a single connector provides both a data and a power connection to the laptop itself. Sony’s proprietary implementation of Intel’s Light Peak technology (the very same used in the ThunderBolt ports on Apple’s recent MacBook Pro) then jets all the graphical, USB and network data via the VAIO Z’s single USB 3 port. Plug it in, and the laptop’s screen flickers off and on as the AMD chipset takes over from the integrated GPU.
Warranty | |
---|---|
Warranty | 2yr collect and return |
Physical specifications | |
Dimensions | 330 x 210 x 17mm (WDH) |
Weight | 1.150kg |
Travelling weight | 1.5kg |
Processor and memory | |
Processor | Intel Core i5-2410M |
Motherboard chipset | Intel HM67 Express |
RAM capacity | 4.00GB |
Memory type | DDR3 |
SODIMM sockets free | 0 |
SODIMM sockets total | 2 |
Screen and video | |
Screen size | 13.1in |
Resolution screen horizontal | 1,600 |
Resolution screen vertical | 900 |
Resolution | 1600 x 900 |
Graphics chipset | Intel HD Graphics 3000 / AMD Radeon HD 6650M |
VGA (D-SUB) outputs | 1 |
HDMI outputs | 1 |
S-Video outputs | 0 |
DVI-I outputs | 0 |
DVI-D outputs | 0 |
DisplayPort outputs | 0 |
Drives | |
Capacity | 128GB |
Hard disk usable capacity | 119GB |
Spindle speed | N/A |
Internal disk interface | SATA/300 |
Optical disc technology | External DVD writer |
Battery capacity | 4,000mAh |
Replacement battery price inc VAT | £0 |
Networking | |
Wired adapter speed | 1,000Mbits/sec |
802.11a support | yes |
802.11b support | yes |
802.11g support | yes |
802.11 draft-n support | yes |
Integrated 3G adapter | yes |
Bluetooth support | yes |
Other Features | |
Wireless hardware on/off switch | yes |
Wireless key-combination switch | no |
Modem | no |
ExpressCard34 slots | 0 |
ExpressCard54 slots | 0 |
PC Card slots | 0 |
USB ports (downstream) | 1 |
FireWire ports | 0 |
PS/2 mouse port | no |
9-pin serial ports | 0 |
Parallel ports | 0 |
Optical S/PDIF audio output ports | 0 |
Electrical S/PDIF audio ports | 0 |
3.5mm audio jacks | 1 |
SD card reader | yes |
Memory Stick reader | yes |
MMC (multimedia card) reader | no |
Smart Media reader | no |
Compact Flash reader | no |
xD-card reader | no |
Pointing device type | Touchpad |
Audio chipset | Realtek HD Audio |
Speaker location | Underside |
Hardware volume control? | no |
Integrated microphone? | yes |
Integrated webcam? | yes |
Camera megapixel rating | 1.3mp |
TPM | yes |
Fingerprint reader | yes |
Smartcard reader | no |
Carry case | no |
Battery and performance tests | |
Battery life, light use | 7hr 48min |
3D performance (crysis) low settings | 32fps |
3D performance setting | Low |
Overall Real World Benchmark score | 0.66 |
Responsiveness score | 0.82 |
Media score | 0.67 |
Multitasking score | 0.50 |
Operating system and software | |
Operating system | Windows 7 Professional 64-bit |
OS family | Windows 7 |
Recovery method | Recovery partition |
Software supplied | N/A |
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