I'm pretty partial to Sony products and my old Vaio notebook now needs replacing since I've beat it to all shit.



How would this be as a replacement?  

SONY VAIO E Series VPCEB26FX/BI NoteBook Intel Core i5 430M(2.26GHz)
15.5" 4GB Memory DDR3 1066 500GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi Intel HD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834127195

I've played with one like it. Great Vaio.

I personally prefer the next size smaller but just becasue I'm always taking it somewhere.



Z series is my fav. Can't go wrong with a Vaio

I have this one:
VAIO

And love it. The one you are looking at could only be better.

DO IT!

Having supported a few Sony laptops, I'm not a fan.

Why not?



 

1.  One year warranty.  Our Dells and Apples come with 4 year warranties.

2.  Schematics for Sony laptops appear to be unavailable for the end user.  

3.  They seem to break more often than the Dells, Apples and Lenovo machines we have.  

4.  One machine had all the typical Sony problems: bad batteries, bad power supplies, and bad cooling systems.  All these problems were expensive and/or difficulty to fix.

Crap covered in a nice looking chassis tagged with a high price.

Go for the i7 processor and solid state hard drive.

Guess I'm opposite of you. I've owned numerous Dell and HP laptops. I'll never own another laptop branded by either of those companies. I've had a VAIO laptop for about a year now and so far I've been impressed with it. No problems so far with it.



 

Sony...



End users swear by them

Support staff swear at them



This seems to be universal.

Got the new f12 series and love it .... Added SSD and a second hard drive in the optical bay with some easy modification

Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile

A year is about all you'll get out of them.

Well I just bought one on Sony Style website, built up and got a student discount for $1370 free shipping.

Product:US-VPCF1290X-LBOM
Component: Standard capacity battery
Component: Intel® Core™ i7-740QM processor (1.73GHz) with Turbo Boost up to 3.06GHz
Component: 16.4" VAIO Full HD Premium Display (1920x1080)
Component: NVIDIA® GeForce® 330M GPU (1GB VRAM)
Component: Fresh Start
Component: No LED Backlit Keyboard
Component: 4GB (2GBx2) DDR3-SDRAM-1333
Component: Blu-ray Disc player
Component: No Engraving
Component: No Adobe Software
Component: No additional AntiVirus Software
Component: Black
Component: No additional Office software
Component: Genuine Windows® 7 Professional 64-bit
Component: 320GB Hard Disk Drive (7200rpm)
Quantity:1
Description:VPCF1290X Configure-to-Order
Date shipped:07/14/2010  

should be here 07/20

Mine will be 4 years in March. But the fan has been making the death rattle since Feb.
 

If I go with an i7 processor in a Lenovo or something similar, what kind of speed do I need to be looking for?

My old Sony S went 3 years (nearly 4) until I threw it against a wall (got a little angry with an ex).  It was running strong before it made impact.  My father's old Sony went 5 years (IIRC).  He used it for 3 and then gave it to one of his employees to use.

The family ONLY buys Sony.  I tried a Lenovo.  That was a mistake.

Why not get a lesser processor but with a SSD?

My GF got a new 'upper level' VAIO not quite a year back.  Bought the extended warranty through BestBuy/Geek Squad and it was fine for five or six months.  Then, the WiFi died on it so she took it into BB and they confirmed that the card was 'dead' and would have to send it out to California (from Miami,) to have a new card installed.  

Two weeks later she got it back and it worked, but they had to reformat her HD for some reason and called asking her if all of her shit was backed up.  She said no, so they copied things and reformatted/reinstalled all of her stuff just fine.

About three weeks ago, the WiFi started dropping out, the card losing signal.  She returned it to BB and they looked up the previous job order and it was just a 'driver install', but this time they would swap out the card, which we thought they did originally.

She got it back Sunday and it's working, but she's thinking that she'd like a MacBook.  Her VAIO isn't one of the recalled models, FWIW.

I have a VAIO here from '04 and I put in more memory, got a new battery, installed a new HD and it works fine!

Chris

1.  I am using on a daily bases a handful of 8-9 year old Dell laptops.

2.  Our purchase agreement with Dell (and Apple) gets us a 4-year on-site warranty.  When there is a problem, Dell is here the next day with parts to fix it.  

3.  When users buy Lenovo instead, we insist they get a 3-year warranty.  This warranty is not on-site but we have found they can turn around a broken laptop in 3-5 days.  And Lenovo's phone support is excellent.

Check out the Samsung R580.  It's about $100 less, and has dedicated video ( 512mb ).