back to article Sony outs 1080p skinny laptops

More updated Vaio laptops from Sony, this time the Z series - the latter the original Ultrabook, introduced before the MacBook Air and long before Intel coined the term. Sony Vaio Z Of course, World+Dog is making slimline notebooks now, so the new Z's 17mm thickness and 1.2kg weight are not the leading edge laptop specs they …

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  1. Joeman

    Why do they always take photos of Laptops from behind?? surely most people who buy them will spend more time looking at the front of the laptop, than the back??

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      It's marketing people I guess?

      THEY want to punt the logo

      WE want to see the product

      It's probably got one of those godawful glossy screens and an off centre mouse pad favouring left handed people, so they don't want to show that do they

      1. Joeman
        Pint

        LOL, yes, and also stops them having to have specific marketing photos for each country... very rare to see UK keyboards (with " charcter over the number 2) in promotional photos, but US keyboards (with @ over the number 2) often have a different shape Return key.

        1. Dave 126

          Photos?

          Probably computer-generated renders. No need to check for finger-prints or dust, no need to hire a photographer for the day, no need to maintain spotless white backdrops, perfect reflections on the logo...

          Product variations (keyboard, but more commonly case colours) are easily generated, too.

      2. Dave 126

        If El Reg was in the habit of linking to the source material...

        you would probably find a wealth of images from different angles. Sony do seem to release models with matte screens, though.

        Re the touch pad being left of screen centre, I find my arm swivels at the elbow, neatly taking my right hand from the keyboard to the touch pad. Even information displayed on screen usually has bias to the left (look at The Register, for example; only adverts live on the right, Windows Explorer displays lists of files with the file name on the left, many applications have their toolbars on the left...)

        It's the lack of a middle button that drives me towards a mouse, though.

      3. AdamWill

        Nope

        Z's have always had matte screens. Really bloody good ones.

    2. Jamie Kitson

      Photos

      http://www.engadget.com/photos/sony-vaio-z-4/

  2. James 51
    Thumb Up

    Screen resolution

    Excellent to see it shipping with a resonable resolution.

    1. Victor Ludorum
      Thumb Up

      Re: Screen resolution

      Sony have been doing these Z-series with 13 inch Full HD for a while, I guess these are just Ivy Bridge with a little bit of a cosmetic update?

      I really want one of these, they are what I hoped an Ultrabook would actually be - sub 1.3Kg, skinny, full HD. Unfortunately I can't justify the price at the moment...

      Maybe the old Zs will start appearing on the tat bazaar and I can get one a bit cheaper...

    2. Dave 126

      Re: Screen resolution

      Yep, though there are already Vaio Z models shipping with higher-res screens. And with LightPeak connected external docks with Radeon GPUs, too, if your wallet is feeling too heavy.

    3. Fuzz

      Re: Screen resolution

      If you go and look at the Sony store, you can configure one of these latops. The standard screen is 1600x900, the 1080p is an optional extra.

      However the cost of the 1080p screen is only £40 and this is on a price list where doubling the size of your SSD from 128 to 256 (would be about £100-150 in the shops) will cost you £410. So this just shows how stupid the whole 1366x768 screen issue is.

      I am very tempted to order one of these, it's exactly what I want, shame about the cost.

  3. Tom 35

    The normal Sony driver game?

    Can't install the standard GPU drivers, and Sony never release updated drivers?

    If they stop pulling that crap I might think about buying another Sony.

  4. HeNe
    Unhappy

    @Tom 35: If They Stop ...

    Sony has been doing this for years. See:

    http://forums.theregister.co.uk/post/reply/1408068

    They're not going to stop. They just aren't. Too bad, though. It looks like a nice lappy, but... it's a Sony.

  5. techmind
    Pint

    Full HD 1920x1080 on a 13inch screen

    You'd need exceptionally good eyesight and or to sit very close to the screen to really appreciate that resolution on such a small screen.

    1. Captain Save-a-ho
      Coat

      Re: Full HD 1920x1080 on a 13inch screen

      I appreciate it and haven't seen the kit up close yet. It's not a matter of font or icon size. It's a matter of screen real estate, which is always in short supply. About bloody well time that someone start making 1920x1080 more common place on laptop screens, although it's regretable that the kit is stuck with a Sony label.

    2. Jules Wilko

      Re: Full HD 1920x1080 on a 13inch screen

      ...I am sure the only people who have rated down this reply are those with hawk-eye vision...

      Nice to see it technologically done... But really? Practical? I think not...

  6. Jamie Kitson

    Docking Station

    The interesting bit is the docking station, which adds a better graphics card.

  7. Wile E. Veteran
    Devil

    Looks like....

    Laptops are following the lead of fondleslabs and becoming primarily Media Consumption Devices instead of portable power tools for the creation and maintenance of knowledge, commerce and other societal goods for the benefit of the many instead of the few.

    Why do I keep having visions of the old Max Headroom dystopia with TYs everywhere and instant polling (aka behavioral tracking) providing feedback to the corporate masters who really run the world through sham, bought-and-paid-for governments?

    1. Dave 126

      Re: Looks like....

      Yeah, you woulda thought that the rise of the fondle slab would liberate laptops from being mere content consumption devices... Oh well.

    2. AdamWill

      Re: Looks like....

      Erm...why are you posting this comment on the Z? What's the relevance?

  8. Gordon 10
    Thumb Up

    And as a bonus

    The Z has a nice array of ports as well. This is what an ultrabook should be.

  9. Chris D Rogers
    FAIL

    What about Retina

    Sony and every notebook manufacturer are well behind the curve - if it does not sport a 'RETINA' display as proclaimed by the 'Lord' Jesus Jobs, then evidently its a pile of crud.

    And why are they making laptops smaller - I want a 60in laptop with a 4K retina display - Apple rumour sites even suggest Apple iPad's may support up to a 10K resolution by next week - obviously there is no actual use for this super enhanced retina display, codenamed the iTV Retina Display 10K, but thats not the point - being ahead of the pack is all that counts.

    Moles in Taiwan, Korea and China suggest the new designed battery pack to support this mighty beast weighs in at just under one metric ton, but suggest Apple will sell it with a small motor vehicle for ease of use and mobility - we're reliably informed that the ARM-based APU will be called the AX10,000 - it sports 200 cores and enhanced graphics capabilities in the form of a AMD6970 unit sporting 256K of VRAM - uses can upgrade to 2G of DDR5 VRAM for an additional US$10,000 upgrade option.

    Apple shares closed at US$1 million a share valuing the company at 1,000 Trillion - Sony shares have collapsed on this news and the one time electronics and media giant is now trading at Y10, valuing the business at US$0.99

    Blu-Ray anyone?

  10. joejack
    IT Angle

    Typical Reg

    So, the high-res screen has my interest. Wonder how much RAM it ships with or tops out at? SSD/HDD sizes/speeds? Ports?

    "A shiny new laptop with a high-res screen was released... but we're not going to give you the specs!"

    1. Fuzz

      Re: Typical Reg

      If you go to the Sony website you can order one. No idea how many ports it's got although I know it definitely has at least hdmi and 1 each usb 2 and 3. There is an add on dock with an optical drive and some sort of AMD graphics. I'm guessing this connects over thunderbolt so there must be one of those onboard too.

      Standard display is 1600x900 the 1080p screen is an extra £40.

      Standard disk is a 128GB SSD (listed as 3rd generation I'm guessing one of the newer sandforce based drives) 256GB is £410 512GB is £1100!!!!!

      Standard RAM is 4GB you can opt for 8GB for an extra £110 but only if you also get a 256GB SSD

      The 3G option is 14Mbps for £110

      backlit keyboard is an extra £25

  11. Jules Wilko
    Meh

    1080 on 13 inches??

    How good are your eyes to use this? Seriously??

    No way that is going to be comfortable...

    1080p on 15 screens is a strain...

    It's gone from one ridiculous (786) to another (1080).

    1. AdamWill
      Facepalm

      Re: 1080 on 13 inches??

      Read up on what DPI means. And find the font size setting in Windows. Sigh.

  12. Nick De Plume
    Meh

    Lovely machine, shame about the drivers.

    If it were running OSX you wouldn't be able to change the size of system fonts and title bars. Thankfully it's running Windows, you you don't have to go blind trying to read the small type - if your vision is not 20:20.

    I learned this the hard way when I attempted to resize the fonts on the MB Air I had bought for mom , I could accomplish this only through some hacking.

    But - as was mentioned earlier- the driver support on Sony laptops is Bad. Very little updates, and won't work fully-functional with the OEM drivers. As usual, Sony - brilliant hardware, lousy software support.

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