Sony VAIO PCG-Z1WA Laptop (1.70 GHz Pentium M (Centrino), 512 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive)

by Sony

Product Details

• Item Weight: 4.6 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 8.3 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B00017H7S0
• Item model number: PCG-Z1WA
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,327 in Computers & Accessories (See Top 100 in Computers & Accessories)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: February 15, 2004

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Amazingly small and light, the Sony Vaio PCG-Z1WA notebook PC is ready to hit the road with its bright 14.1-inch screen, 1.7 GHz battery-saving Centrino processor (for a battery life of up to 6.5 hours), and built-in 54g wireless LAN for connecting to your e-mail and the Web as you roam the hotspots. This elegantly designed laptop also features a 60 GB hard drive, 512 MB of installed RAM, integrated Bluetooth connectivity, and a combo DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive.

The Basics

• Hard Drive: Though not world-beating in size, the 60 GB enhanced-IDE hard drive offers more than enough storage capacity for road warriors.
• Processor: The 1.7 GHz Pentium M processor is at the top of the Centrino speed range. Because of its design, the Intel Pentium M gets more done per clock tick than a Mobile Intel Pentium 4, thus providing the discrepancy in GHz measurement (i.e., 1.7 versus 3.2). The Pentium M processor is designed specifically for low-power mobile usage, and it features the latest in power-saving technologies--ensuring you push your battery and productivity to the max.
• Memory: The PCG-Z1WA comes with a 512 MB built-in memory (1 x 512 MB DDR SDRAM, 266 MHz)--a good start for power users. It has a maximum memory expansion up to 1 GB (2 x 512 MB), which is a bit smaller than other notebooks, but understandable due to the PCG-Z1WA's size. It also has an L2 cache of 1 MB and a front-side bus (FSB) speed of 400 MHz.
• CD/DVD Drive: It comes equipped with a combo DVD/CD-RW drive, which enables you to play DVD-ROM discs and DVD movies as well as burn data and record music to CD discs. You can read and burn CDs at 24x speed, rewrite at 10x, and read; it has an 8x DVD read speed.
• Keyboard & Mouse: This notebook has an 83-key QWERTY keyboard (with 2mm stroke and 18.5mm pitch) and electro-static touchpad. It features two programmable buttons (one pre-set as maximum brightness and the other as sound mute).

Sound and Graphics
The PCG-Z1WA features an ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 video/graphics card that has 16 MB of DDR SDRAM and offers dual display support (which can work in tandem with the notebook's native display). Its display of 3-D graphics is decent, but certainly not overpowering. The 14.1-inch SXGA+ TFT display has a native resolution of 1400 x 1050 pixels. It also has an sound card that's integrated into the main board, and offers built-in stereo speakers.

Connectivity and Expansion Slots
The PCG-Z1WA has an Intel Pro-Wireless 2200BG integrated wireless LAN that connects using the 802.11g wireless standard. It also offers Bluetooth wireless connectivity, for communicating with peripherals like keyboards, mice, printers, and more. You get a smaller offering of connectivity options (due to the notebook's size):

• 2 USB 2.0 ports for connecting a wide range of peripherals--from digital cameras to MP3 players
• 1 FireWire (also known as IEEE 1394 or i.Link) ports for connecting digital video camcorders and other peripherals
• 1 RGB monitor port
• 1 PCMCIA (or PC Card) slot (Type I/II)
• 1 headphone jack and 1 microphone jack
• Memory Stick memory card reader (compatible with Memory Stick Pro)

It also has an integrated 56K modem (V.92), and an RJ-45 LAN network port (for a 10/100 Ethernet connection to networks and DSL/cable modems).

Preloaded System and Software
The PCG-TR3A comes with the Windows XP Home Edition operating system, and it also features Microsoft Works (for working with word processing and spreadsheet documents). It also is loaded with a bevy of Sony multimedia software: PictureGear Studio and Network Smart Capture (digital photo), DVgate Plus (digital video), and SonicStage (digital music). Other preloaded software includes InterVideo WinDVD, Screenblast ACITD and SoundForge, and RealPlayer One.

Dimensions and Weight
At 12.4 x 9.7 x 1.5 inches (L x W x H), this is a seriously thin notebook. And it weighs just 4.7 pounds with the battery.

Power
The included rechargeable lithium-ion battery offers between 3 and 5.5 hours of life with typical usage. An optional larger-capacity battery will provide double that (between 6 and 11 hours of battery life).

What's in the Box
This package contains the Sony Vaio PCG-Z1WA notebook PC, rechargeable lithium-ion battery, AC adapter, and operating instructions.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars great body, poor saul, April 30, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Sony VAIO PCG-Z1WA Laptop (1.70 GHz Pentium M (Centrino), 512 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive) (Personal Computers)

Great hardware but daddy sony pushes you around with its choices. It starts with a disk formatted only like they want, overflowing with sony useless utilities. It seems impossible to reconfigure it and if you ask them they tell you to keep quiet that they know better than you what you want. Don't even bother to ask to install win2000 you are so used to and know already, it's impossible, the needed drivers are not available.
The best is that it doesn't come with a recovery CD, if you want it you have to purchase it from sony at 25$

13 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Austin not quite right, June 30, 2004

By 

William Faulk (Raleigh, NC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sony VAIO PCG-Z1WA Laptop (1.70 GHz Pentium M (Centrino), 512 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive) (Personal Computers)

While it's true that the Z1WA does not come with a recovery CD, and that Sony will supply you one for $25, it comes with a utility to create your own set of (9) recovery CDs. Unfortunately, the utility to make them is a little brain-damaged. It's supposed to keep a taskbar icon available until you create a set, but looking at it and cancelling makes it go away. Looking and cancelling is also enough to make it force you to reboot with no way to avoid it (beyond letting the "OK to Reboot" dialog languish in the background). It'd be more convenient, for sure, if Sony just spent the $2 to include a set of recovery CDs, but you don't have to spend $25 if you don't want to.

One of my main complaints so far is that the filesystem as shipped is horribly fragmented, making the computer quite slow. Make sure you defrag as soon as possible. It speeds up the computer tremendously. Again, I'm surprised Sony didn't fix this in the factory.

Another complaint is the keyboard. The keys are quite flat and a little hard to touch-type on. Also, the right shift key is the same size as a regular letter key, making it hard to use. Sony should have made the arrow keys smaller and extended the shift to be a double-wide key as it should be, but that's moot now.

Also, it comes with C: (14GB) and D: (37GB) drives from the factory, which seems silly. I suppose it might make it easier to recover, but I haven't tried that yet. But it'd make more sense to me to have the one hard drive have only one letter so that you had only one chance to run out of drive space, not two.

Also, it does come with a lot of utilities that aren't the most helpful. Norton Internet Security seems like too much of a mother hen. Norton Anti-Virus is a 3-month trial, as is Office. I'm sure there are more of these utilities that are doing nothing more than wasting drive space, but I've only had it for about 12 hours now.

The lid can be a little hard to open, too, especially with one hand. There's no latch, just a spring holding it closed and it's a litte tight. It might loosen up with use, though.

Having ClearType font smoothing on as default would probably have made sense, too, but it wasn't.

Other than these quibbles, though, I'm quite happy with the computer. It's quite light, has a nice high-resolution screen (which others with worse sight might find a detriment), looks sexy (especially after you take off the at least six stickers), and performs well. I'm happy.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't do it., April 6, 2005

By 

KennyD "KennyD" (Union, NJ United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sony VAIO PCG-Z1WA Laptop (1.70 GHz Pentium M (Centrino), 512 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive) (Personal Computers)

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