Sony VGN-TZ11XN/B laptop

Simply the best

I'm fortunate enough to have one of these, and I really can't praise it highly enough.

My previous laptop was a bulky 15" HP and I thought the screen on this may be to small to work with, how wrong was I? this laptop is perfect, wether your a sys-admin or a globe-trotting director.

Becareful when upgrading the memory, the system has ONLY 1 memory slot - so you need to take out the 1Gb it comes with and replace it with a 1x2Gb (you can't just buy and additional 1Gb).

Also just got one

Very impressed with the look, feel and battery life. Didn't think there was much point going back to XP so I just removed most of the installed apps. Why they don't allow you to start off with just a clean install of Vista I don't know. Once most of these are stripped out performance is more impressive, with Vista welcoming you to sign in before it's time to take the teabag out.

Performance generally is not very impressive, but it was never going to be. I bought this specifically to take on travels with a digital camera - and with a 100gb HDD and built in SD reader it's perfect for that.

The fingerprint reader is also pretty neat, allowing you to log on/lock Windows with a swipe, and also to save website username/password combinations to replay later with another swipe. And I can't believe the review didn't mention the Webcam?! Possibly because it's so unobtrusive they may not have noticed it was there.

Rubbery

That's a Sinclair Spectrum-style rubbery keyboard, surely? Albeit that the keys are black, and they do not have RANDOMIZE and LOAD and VAR written on them.

Bought ... and returned

had the top spec one of these in the day they were released in the UK. Seriously not worth it, esp' with Vista on board. It took 5 minutes from power on to a ready desktop. Hopeless. Any app not recently used took similarly ages to load, despite 2Gb RAM and despite turning all the Aero features off. Product returned and Dell D430 with XP purchased instead. Do not be tempted unless you just want something to pose with. Also of note, you cant power up whilst docked with an external Monitor and Keboard etc without opening the lid, which then flips the display back to the laptop screen - v.irritating.

and how is this different from the TX series...?

Having been the happy owner of a TX3 all these specifications are familar to me - dimensions, weight, screen size, battery life (consistently 8hrs in my experience), DVD-RW. The only thing that's changed is the processor - TXs only had a core solo, but even with a core duo the processing power is reportedly poor so why bother?.

For surfing the web, emailing, writing documents and watching movies these laptops are great. No-one is going to be photoshopping or video editing on a laptop with an 11.1" screen so processor speed seems moot.

Even the least tech-savvy of users should have figured out by now that you only reboot when you have to, and just Hibernate the rest of the time for a ~20s spinup time. Though it's worth pointing out that hibernation mode takes priority in the BIOS startup, so if you do want to use the quick media mode you will need to shut down properly.

Sadly my employer provided me with a Dell Latitude 420 (i think) which I am compelled to carry around with me. It feels like a brick in comparison.

If I were in the market for a lightweight sub-portable, I'd save my money and go for a TX instead...

Did you buy your own?

Were these personal purchases or company kit?

Grr, VGA

I'm trying to figure out why laptop manufacturers continue to put VGA ports on instead of DVI. You can convert DVI to VGA with a US$5 adapter, but to convert VGA to DVI (or HDMI) you need something much more expensive (US$300+). It seems especially glaring in this case since I can't imagine using the small screen full-time.

It seems that Apple is the only company that's thinking since all their laptops have DVI. Considering the MacBooks use the same Intel GPU, that can't be the issue.

There is something close and cheaper

Fujitsu-Siemens P7320 is pretty much everything the Sony is without the silly price tag. Hopefully have one to play with soon, the P7120 was a cracker so hopefully the trend will continue.

Just got the model up

Don't know if it's any cheaper for you UK-fellows, but in Australia I ordered the Sony VGN-TZ90 from Japan. It's the model up; and the performance is notably better for simple processing tasks;

Main Changes:

- 2GB ram standard

- 32GB SSD HDD

- Wireless a/b/g/n

And with the extended battery (quoted 18hr, haven't had time to test that yet); it's quite an amazing thing to use. As for people above comparing to the TX- core 2 duo isn't a faster clock speed, but does result in faster performance for myself (running linux tho; kernel-level stuff on one core, user apps on the other...)

Also worth considering, the Flybook V5 HSDPA

Cheaper, faster, tablet and laptop form factor, and built in HSDPA 3G comms. Just as cool and classy looking too...

Great for portability but frustatingly slow.

I got one recently. It is disappointingly slow but a great toy otherwise. Dr. Haq

what's new

Isn't this one fairly similar in size, specs (and price) to last year's TX3, now replaced by the TX5?

Herbert