Sony VAIO VGN-TZ150

by Sony

Product Details

• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B000TRGYJ0
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: July 29, 2007

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Road Computer for Expense-Account Business Types, September 25, 2007

By 

David Gurgel (Roseland, New Jersey United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

I am the president of a small technology company and over the past twelve years have had a dozen laptops and tablet computers that permit me to work on the road.

This is the smallest and lightest (2.6 lbs) computer I have owned since I had a Toshiba Libretto ten years ago. (I have another larger laptop now and also a tablet.) The Libretto was great for occasional access but too small for more than an hour's work. This Sony TZ has an amazing, clear screen resolution of 1366 x 768 on an 11.1" screen. The keyboard is fine too. You could work on this for two or three hours without much strain but it can't be your only computer unless your PC chores are very light. When you open the box, you will be amazed at how thin and light it is for a laptop with a built-in DVD. It had a wireless LAN built in and hooking up to unlimited Sprint broadband access at $59 per month was easy.

OK, on a long trip or relaxing on the sofa at home or at Starbucks you will love this. Just don't drop it. It gives you all of your desktop applications; and with the built-in wireless web hardware and the optional Sprint subscription you have the Internet almost everywhere with no fuss. It fits almost anywhere (smallest of briefcases, large handbag, backpack but not your jacket pocket).

Now here are the negatives. It is very light in construction, so get a leather case for protection. Vista is loaded with unneeded gadgets and is perhaps responsible for a less than snappy response out of the box, but once you clear the clutter from the desktop you won't have any trouble doing your work. And then there is the price. A full-sized and more rugged Dell laptop with equal power & larger screen is under $1,000. You are paying twice the price for the ultimate in portability.

If you buy an occasional $99.00 tie at Brooks Brothers, then this stylish item with a nearly perfect form factor may be for you. If you need value for your bucks, there are better choices. I'll keep it but will be a little embarrassed if anyone finds out I paid $2,199.

Revised Sep 28: Yesterday morning after six or seven hours of work over two days with the unit, I sent it back to Amazon for credit (15% restocking charge possible). The 1.2GHz processor just is not fast enough to handle Vista. Working with Office is fine; but with the wireless connection on and with downloads in the background or while installing updates in the background, response was annoyingly slow. Just getting into and out of Control Panel applications was tedious. The case was uncomfortably hot in the area where the fan discharges when plugged into AC power. Perhaps the next revision of this model will get the engine into the same class as the chassis.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For now, the perfect sub notebook with looks in my opinion, February 2, 2008

By 

Gamearts (Fairfax, VA USA) - See all my reviews

What an outstanding sub notebook computer from Sony! The TZ is a continuation of their current classic sub notebook line called the T series, which has evolved now to the TZ. From its gorgeous looks, such as its piano black keyboard frame and the emerald green led power button making it stand out from the rest of the pack, to its terrific battery life (potentially 7-9 hours), to all the features it has (dvd drive, web camera, built in microphone, vga), there is just so much to like. I've used most of the features this computer has and I still can't say "WOW" when I look at how small and portable this is.

I'll segment my review into the different aspects of the TZ150 and grade them individually.

PERFORMANCE(MY RATING: A-)
===========================
Out of the box the TZ150 scores low. 1GB RAM + Sony Bloated Vista Business OS = slow as molasses computing performance. That's the bad news.

The good news is that it's possible to improve the performance dramatically.

If you do a clean installation of the operating system (albeit not a trivial task for the average person), tweak Vista so that it is optimized for performance (for example, using the Classic Theme instead of Aero), and switch the 1GB RAM with a 2GB stick (about $40 or so these days), you can expect powerful performance for a computer in this class. I'd also recommend removing the hidden partition (done easily by using the VAIO Recovery Disks) to free up an additional 8GB of space.

Performance times are the following:
Cold boot up: 38 - 55 seconds, depending on how optimized the system is. Time measured from pressing power button until desktop appears on screen (includes bios start-up, et cetera).

Shut down time: 12 - 15 seconds.

Adobe Photoshop CS3 Start-up time (includes splash credits): 5 seconds. MS Office programs (Word/Excel/OneNote): 1-2 seconds, first time opening them. 1 second afterward.

KEYBOARD (MY RATING: B)
========================
The TZ's keyboard is 10% smaller than that of a full sized one, so the keys may feel cramped to some. However, the keyboard features flat keys that feature gaps between them. Besides making the keyboard look better aesthetically, this helps make sure you don't press the wrong key next to the one you were trying to press.

The keyboard frame is a glossy piano black, which can get scuffed and show oil very easily. I recommend a keyboard protector for this reason. The only real drawback to the keyboard is that there are no dedicated page up/down and home and end keys -- instead, they are mapped onto the arrow keys, which require you to hold the Fn key first.

PORTABILITY AND FORM FACTOR (MY RATING: A-)
============================================
The TZ's dimensions are smaller to that of a standard looseleaf piece of paper--not counting thickness of course, which is only 1" anyway. The TZ is very portable, but it does require care as it's fragile, and this is the only reason for me to grade it with an A- here instead of an A.

For example, in the instructions, Sony asks that you put a keyboard protector cover whenever the unit is closed (possibly to avoid the keyboard coming into contact with the screen). Having to remember to keep that protective cloth with you all the time is going to be annoying for some people. Also, the top lid itself requires you to be gentle with it whenever you're lifting it up to open the computer.

But probably the biggest factor for portability should be the battery life. Under normal use, with everything turned on, this is giving me 4-5 hours.

However, with optimized settings using VAIO Power Saver mode, brightness and volume on low, the DVD drive and wifi turned off, you can get 7-9 hours, no questions. So really, when Sony says you have all day computing power with the TZ, they mean it. And if those times still aren't good enough you can always buy the extended battery, granted at $200-300, it's not cheap.

FEATURES (MY RATING: A+ NOTHING IS MISSING!)
=============================================
There are a slew of features that come with the TZ150, but I'll only limit my discussion to the few that I use. The MotionEye web cam is pretty good but it's rated as a 1.3 (or 0.3 depending on what source you're looking at) Megapixel camera, so don't expect the best of quality.

The built-in microphone is also pretty good though doesn't seem to record sounds coming from a distance (it barely detects the sounds coming from my TV in the same room only about 10 feet away).

The VGA port and microphone input is really handy; I connected a 1080p Sony KDL-40XBR3 LCD TV with it and the picture and sound are terrific. No compatibility problems. The only issue is that I can't get 1080p, so the best I can do is 720P as the computer's max resolution output to the external display is 1366 x 768.

The DVD drive is good; I have had zero problems burning the recovery disks and all my disks I put into it work. 2 USB ports work as they should as does the ethernet plug (for wired connectivity), though the ethernet plug is hidden inside a compartment, which I found a little cumbersome to remove the first few times.

OTHER NOTES
===========
I should say the computer does generate some heat; not much though. On the left side the computer gets noticeably warm, but I wouldn't use the word hot to describe it. Your sensations may vary though. Also the emerald green LED power button may bother the person sitting to the right of you, but I have yet to hear anyone complain about it.

Obviously, you can't compare this computer's performance power with that of a recently configured desktop or other notebooks that are bigger than it. You won't be able to play Crysis on this thing, no doubt, but it will play older games with reasonable performance. This is mainly due to it not having a discrete Graphics Processing Unit, which is usually the case for computers of this size. They are not meant to be gaming grade or powerful video editing computers, but they can play older games reasonably OK.

Also, I should add that for those who just can't let go of windows XP, Sony DOES provide Windows XP Downgrade Disks. You can order them for free and only pay for shipping. Personally, though, Vista is just super-fast enough, and with SP1 officially around the corner to further improve its performance and value, I see no reason why to downgrade.

CONCLUSION
==========
I cannot recommend this computer to those who are not very comfortable using the Windows operating system, as it requires a lot of tweaking and registry editing to get it to perform the way I have described. A lot of people complain the computer is slow--this is due to them not tweaking the computer for best performance and using the Sony bloated OS version of Vista. Hence, if you are the type of person who buys a computer and you don't make backup recovery disks and don't plan for a clean isntallation, don't defrag your hard drive on a regular basis, don't get this computer. This requires effort to get it working for optimum performance, but the effort pays off in the end.

But beyond that, do go with this computer most importantly, if you want a good traveling companion. This computer is a blast to use. I haven't taken it with me on any flights, but I have used it outside the house and it's just been nothing but fun. I can just stick this into my tiny backpack instead of having to carry around a big "laptop backpack" for average sized notebooks. You can definitely use this for flights (crowded coach is no problem), relaxing at home in bed, just working on a traditional desk, taking it with you for business or school purposes, or just using it with an external display with a computer output. Also this is one of the few notebook computers out there that are still Made in Japan. I just love this computer!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Amazingly compact and portable, December 17, 2007

By 

Alan Kin "buakin" (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

I've been using this notebook pc for about 2 weeks. I'm very satisfied with the hardware, its design, construction.. it is incredibly light and thin, and has all the necessary technologies and more - wireless, bluetooth, fingerprint reader, mem. stick slot and SD slot..

I admit the software is a bit weak - Vista is a little under-powered, given only a 1.06GHz processor and 1GB memory, and the amount of trial software installed and included in the Windows startup. It took a little over 2 days to remove much of the programs and configure Vista for performance. I'm also taking advantage of Vista's ReadyBoost technology (using flash memory for pre-loading software, to speed up loading common applications), by using a mem. stick. I'm happy with the performance.

This is the ultimate business notebook pc.

Here's a list of major pro's and con's:

Pro's
-----
Extrememly light, thin, portable
Very bright, clear screen (few typical laptops have LED backlighting)
Decent battery life
Good Sony online support

Con's
-----
Smallish keyboard
Trial software bloat
Expensive
A minor issue - it does get a bit warm on the bottom, so don't use it on your lap too long!

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