review : SONY VAIO VGN-AR11S(UK model) with BLU-RAY drive

[dognosh]

retailing for around £2000,can be found for as little as £1780
where do i start ?
what a joy
fantastic screen(1920 by 1200 means fonts can be a bit small but you can make them bigger)
fantastic proper keyboard on a laptop
blu-ray dvd works like a trooper
the connectors on it are endless,wifi,network ,modem,HDMI, Svideo,optical out,TV ariel, USB ,express card, PCMCIA,bluetooth, firewire, SD slot etc. . . .
the graphics are good enough to run high end games on it at decent graphics settings
200 gig of HD space

the sound , IMHO, is it's weakest point though it is good it is no way near as good as the Qosmio G30-163 by toshiba
(i connect via optical to a surround system so not a problem for me)
but the vaio beats it on a few fronts :
* the VAIO blu-ray DVD is recordable where as the qosmio HD DVD is read only
* the VAIO can transmit 1080p via HDMI where as the qosmio only does 1080i
* more gadgets on the VAIO
* VAIO looks absolutely stunnig compared to the "i am well built" look of the qosmio

remember before buying either of these laptops that they are in the "portable" catagory(move from one location to another) rather than "mobile" as a true laptop would be

battery life is abysmal

watching blu-ray movies(just got them from USA)on it is WOW
the clarity of faces in fullscreen mode
oh and whatever laptop forget using it's speakers,connect to an external device to hear the movie in all it's 5.1 glory

it has XP media center on it,a version of XP that ,since 2005,is based on XP HOME and has extra media stuff in it,at first i wasn't too sure and nearly upgraded to XP PRO,glad i didn't as it actually works real well

apparently sony customer service is not that brill,but all big companies seem to have that problem,lets hope i will never need them

this is sony's flagship laptop ,so much so that it's blu-ray DVD drive not only is recordable but can also record on dual layer media too(50 Gigs )
a few blu-ray stand alone devices that have been announced by other companies actually don't record on dual layer,only single

my verdict ?
37/42 (3 taken off for sound,2 off for battery)

p.s. rating out of 42 is,i know, different, lol

[Psiweaver]

glad to hear a positive review of this laptop now lets hope it filters down to more mobile laptops and the price comes down.

[davidandrews]

Nice review! Any pictures of your new little toy would be appreciated

Where did you get your cable from to connect to your Plasma/HDTV?

also, where did you get the DVD's? Any problems with region coding (or did you use region free?)

Thanks

[dognosh]

Originally Posted by davidandrews

Nice review! Any pictures of your new little toy would be appreciated

Where did you get your cable from to connect to your Plasma/HDTV?

also, where did you get the DVD's? Any problems with region coding (or did you use region free?)

Thanks

sorry my bad
i haven't connected to external source(except for a surround amp)
my review was about onscreen piccy

got my DVDs from american site,but beware as they are region coded and on my one attempt to connect to external display(plasma via HDMI) i got nothing,though my BD player is currently multi region

www.dvdboxoffice.com

[Blue]

I read a review in a PC Mag yesrterday comparing the Toshiba and Sony. Both close to the same price Conclusion Toshiba Excellent! Sony Poor and how did they come to this.

Sony could not burn DVD or CD (but could burn 50GB) Toshiba could burn DVD and CD but not 15 or 30GB (HD). I would have thought if you were after High capacity on a PC recoding would be a big plus. Let me guess if it were the other way around well BD would rightly so get a bad review.

I dont know how a couple of companies can pull off such a PR victory, but they are.