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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Remarkable laptop for business users, 29 Nov 2007
This review is from: SONY VAIO TZ11XN/B C2D/U7500 1.06G 100GB 2GB 11.1" DVD±RW VB (Electronics)
Spending a month with this laptop on the road has satisfied me as well as shown me the limitations of this model.
It's clear to me from its characteristics that this was not designed for everybody. It's mostly for mobile office use, such as for business and journalism. If you are after a budget or gaming laptop, you are not its target demography. This laptop's strength boils down to several things: size, weight, display legibility, battery life and keyboard. These define the 'ultraportable' market, and this model attacks this territory very well.
Size and weight are immediately noticeable. It's so thin and small, just by how much might not sink in till you see it in real life. I slot this into my small bag for A4 documents and go to work. Despite that the small screen is gorgeous - crystal clear, vivid and metal sharp so that it's easy to see/read. Whatever they've done to it, they've done it well.
Battery life for me is around 7 hours, which isn't as long as stated. I suppose this varies depending on your usage. I mainly use Word, Excel, Visual Studio, Firefox/Thunderbird and mp3/DVD playback from time to time.
The keyboard looks odd, but this alongside the cylindrical hinge design comes from Sony's 505 revision series from several years ago. I think they did the right thing by bringing it back. It feels odd at first, but a week is enough to get used to it. For me it's not as good as IBM's legendary Thinkpad keyboard, but it comes close considering the keyboard is smaller than usual.
Less important for me, but they squeezed in a DVD RW/DL drive, which is a nice touch for such a compact model.
CPU and GPU seem to be the area where the sacrifice comes in, mostly likely to push down the cost and improve battery life. Then again, what it comes with is more than adequate for its target demography; you won't even think about it after opening it.
Then comes the ugly side - the junk software, or bloatware as it's called these days. I fail to understand why they include so much rubbish in what is otherwise a perfectly good laptop. Do they get paid for including all this crap? I recommend that you do a bit of tidying up.
In conclusion, Sony has made a great ultraportable for a niche market, focussing very much on the city-goer's market. The big price tag only goes to reinforce that point alongside its design, which is an icing on the cake - something about this laptop screams quality. It has a clean, subtle design that gives a luxurious overtone. I can't put a figure on why, but it looks so precious, so much so that I'm beginning to think showing it off in public places is dangerous.
It's easy to miss the point of ultraportable's market, because conventionally people look for power in PCs. I would suggest that you consider your requirements carefully before investing in this one, otherwise you will not only waste money, you will likely undervalue its strengths as well. But provided that you fall into ultraportable market, you will be hard pushed to find a better laptop than this - for now.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very portable, long life and brilliant screen. Also expensive!, 28 Dec 2007
This review is from: SONY VAIO TZ11XN/B C2D/U7500 1.06G 100GB 2GB 11.1" DVD±RW VB (Electronics)
The others have written about its good things better than I could, so I won't repeat it. I will just add my own bit about this laptop, which stands out for me.
I use it for photography purposes so my usage is generally limited to Photoshop and other image processing and for that it has paid off handsomely. 3 things that I love about this is the battery life, portability and image quality. They are top notch. Dare I say the screen quality is possibly better than my desktop counterpart which is also a good one. It's so thin and light so it doesn't burden me to carry among other kit I use. Battery life as well it stands out compared to other models I've used as this serves me the whole day on a single charge...!!
I've discovered that the default brightness is an overkill, so I drop it down by 2 notch unless under the direct sunlight. Also I turn off the wifi switch, and together the battery lasts for over 10 hours of on and off usage (close the lid to make it sleep, it wakes up in seconds when you hit a key). Extremely useful for me when I'm out in the field for a whole day.
I'm also surprised that there have been a few negative commends here about build quality and warranty support. I can't help but feel that they've been unlucky or just abused it in some way. I have yet to have problems with mine (thank god for that), but if previous Vaios are anything to go by sony's been very good at it. I think there is a bad impression of their support due to their shaky record on console gaming department, but I haven't seen signs of that leaking into Vaio. As for the build quality, I've been out and about with this laptop for months and it's gotten its share of abuse from me on field trips I make regularly. You would have thought it's broken down by now if it were that bad...!! I think one problem with reviews like this is that on expensive items, people only write a review in frustration when things have gone wrong, and not enough people have bought it who would bother reviewing. So there are bound to be some misrepresentation. Of course be sensible with it, but in my experience its pros have easily outshine everything else.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Around the world - tropics, dessert and scotland!, 3 Oct 2008
This review is from: SONY VAIO TZ11XN/B C2D/U7500 1.06G 100GB 2GB 11.1" DVD±RW VB (Electronics)
I have now had this computer since it was launhed around 18months ago. There are loads of rave reviews which I agree with. The only issue I have had is with the pre-installed vista business which seems to be getting better.
The durability of this machine has far surpassed anything I have had before. It has spent months with in the tropics enduring humidity of 80% and temps of 35c +. It has also been in Norway in winter where tems were -20c followed by 3 mths in the middle east where temps were high 40c to low 50c. Added to this the only protection it has had from knocks, drops and bangs in a normal, small recksac and the sony felt case.
Would I buy one again - YES without hesitation and I wouldn't even both comparing..
If you are looking at this just buy it!!!
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