Sony VAIO VGC-RA830G Desktop PC (Intel Pentium 4 Processor 550 (H-T), 1 GB RAM, 2x160 GB Hard Drives, Dual Layer DVD+/-RW, DVD-ROM Drives)

by Sony

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 15.6 x 15.3 x 7.4 inches ; 26.5 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 32 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B00079F7P2
• Item model number: VGC-RA830G
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: January 30, 2005

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

The VAIO RA Digital Studio PC provides the multimedia muscle for your next-generation A/V demands. Edit high-definition camcorder video. Master your own music recordings. Turn your home movies into high-quality DVDs. You have the power with Serial ATA hard drives in RAID 0 configuration, a DVD+R Double Layer/DVD±RW drive, PCI Express 16x graphics and Intel Hyper-Threading processor technology. Plus, there's room to expand with capacity for multiple drives. And no matter how demanding the tasks, the VAIO RA Desktop remains cool and quiet with Sony's innovative liquid-cooling system and advanced noise-reduction technology. Powerful. Empowering. The ultimate in multimedia desktop computing.

The power you need for the most demanding A/V applications. Serial ATA hard drive in RAID 0 configuration for incredible hard-drive speeds. DVD+R Double Layer/ DVD±RW drive for data storage of up to 8.5 GB on one Double Layer DVD disc3. PCI Express 16x Video graphics capabilities for cinematic-quality effects and color. Intel Pentium 4 processor with Hyper-Threading technology for robust multi-tasking.

Ultimate A/V Entertainment. Bringing Sony's professional audio, video and broadcast expertise directly to your PC, so you can create, manage, edit and archive video, music and photos like a Pro. Capture and edit high-definition camcorder video. Turn your old VHS and 8mm videos into professional-quality DVDs. Watch and record high-quality TV. The VAIO RA Digital Studio PC empowers your creativity and entertainment.

Enjoy the high-quality TV viewing experience that you've come to expect from Sony. Watch and record all of your favorite shows with Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 enhanced by Sony's Giga Pocket engine. It's convenient and easy with on-screen program listings and navigation. Create a Digital library for personal viewing at your convenience. It's TV on your schedule.

Innovative Industrial Design. Sony's revolutionary liquid-cooling system and advanced noise-reduction technology ensures premier performance without the heat or noise of traditional PC designs and cooling fans. A unique liquid-flow heat pipe draws heat away from the processor, while air-intake from the desktop tower's mid-section maximizes air flow and optimizes Acoustics. The result: cool, quiet and reliable performance from an incredibly powerful desktop computer.

Product Description

Includes: wireless keyboard, wireless mouse, Logitech X530 5.1 channel speakers, & Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 Sony VAIO(R) VGC-RA830G Desktop PC - This desktop computer features Sony's Giga Pocket. The Giga Pocket let's you watch and record TV on your computer, as well as capture video. Coupled with the included DVD writer, you can capture old VHS tapes to make your own DVD movie! And with the 3.4GHz Intel processor, 1GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM, and two 160GB hard drives, you have plenty of power and room for capturing video and much more! 2 RAM Slots (occupied) 320GB (2 x 160GB) 7200RPM SATA HDD in a RAID 0 configuration Double Layer DVD Writer - supports Double Layer DVD+R, DVD+R/RW, DVD-R/RW, & CD-R/RW media DVD-ROM Drive NVIDIA GeForce 6600 256MB Video Memory Giga Pocket MPEG2 Encoder/Decoder board with TV Tuner and Motion Reality Technology Multimedia Card Reader Unit Weight - 34.172 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nice package, May 25, 2005

By 

--chris (New Jersey) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sony VAIO VGC-RA830G Desktop PC (Intel Pentium 4 Processor 550 (H-T), 1 GB RAM, 2x160 GB Hard Drives, Dual Layer DVD+/-RW, DVD-ROM Drives) (Personal Computers)

The RA8xxx Series from Sony is very nice. Big plus is the cooling system. The machine is super quiet. The integrated Home Media support is a nice bonus. I don't think I'd want to use one of these as a TiVo replacement but for a home machine it's tough to beat from a combination of style, power, features and performance.

Negatives are the crappy mouse and keyboard and having to burn your own Recovery software.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 4 years and still going, January 17, 2008

By 

E. Neff "Longbow" (Northern Wisconsin) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sony VAIO VGC-RA830G Desktop PC (Intel Pentium 4 Processor 550 (H-T), 1 GB RAM, 2x160 GB Hard Drives, Dual Layer DVD+/-RW, DVD-ROM Drives) (Personal Computers)

Nice to see reviews where someone keeps it for a day. This thing is great. Quiet, dependable. Easy to upgrade. It has new Ram and I upped the HD after 3 years to a new larger one. I finally upped the Video card as well. The main thing is it still works beautifully. 5 stars for a quiet long lasting and dependable machine.

15 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars buyer beware!!, May 16, 2005

By 

joey1989 (Dallas,TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sony VAIO VGC-RA830G Desktop PC (Intel Pentium 4 Processor 550 (H-T), 1 GB RAM, 2x160 GB Hard Drives, Dual Layer DVD+/-RW, DVD-ROM Drives) (Personal Computers)

Just bought this yesterday at compusa. Will be taking it back tomorrow morning. This is the 5th computer I have owned and the worse I have ever seen. Sony has allot of wonderful software on this system and impressive 5.1 speakers that come with it. But you are screwed if you have to do a system recovery. Followed the directions and spent 2 hours making recovery disks before putting any of my software on it, only to find out that when it tries to recover your system it prompts you to insert disk #1 and press ok. Guess what? You can't press ok because your wireless mouse and keyboard are no longer functional. And turning off the computer wiped out ALL my system restore checkpoints. So I couldn't even restore to a earlier time. When I tried it again I then got a message that it couldn't locate the recovery partion. And forget about any type of help from the website or the non-existant user manual. The only help they had was to change the batteries in the mouse and keyboard (they already had brand new batteries).