Hasta La Gadget!

Been getting the feeling that your laptop was missing that certain something, that little detail, the perfect touch… crocodile skin, perhaps? Well check yourself, homeboys and homegirls — Sony has just launched a line dubbed the “Signature Collection” which should suit all of your fashion / money havin’ needs. Besides offering a handful of its laptops like the CS390 in new skins (the aforementioned fake animal flesh in multiple colors, “kaleidoscope,” and all kinds of high gloss varieties), Sony is also introducing a snappier version of the VAIO P (the P699E/Q) — a glitzy black iteration that will only be available to 1,000 customers. Sure, you’ll have to shell out a totally barbaric $1,999 to get one, but it’ll come equipped with a 1.86GHz CPU and a freaking radical 256GB SSD. A glorified netbook is worth $2k in our awesome economy, right? Ponder that and other philosophical conundrums as you peruse the new selections located in the vicinity of an area adjacent to the location of that read link.

[Via Sony Insider]

Filed under: Laptops

Sony launches VAIO Signature Collection, $2,000 VAIO P originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 26 Jun 2009 21:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony announced today a new entry into its VAIO series, the NW, complete with a Blu-ray drive and what they’re hoping is an aggressive pricing point. It’s packing a 15.5-inch WXGA display with XBRITE, 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo P7350, ATI Mobility Radeon HD4570 with 512MB VRAM, a 4x BD-ROM drive, 4GB of DDR2 RAM, webcam, 802.11a/b/g/n, a 400GB HDD, and a Li-ion battery that’s at best 5.5 hours in large capacity and at worst 1.5 hours with the standard-sized version. Port-wise, we’ve got VGA and HDMI output and Memory Stick Pro, ExpressCard, and SD card slots.

We got a chance to get some hands-on time with the portable, and we gotta say, it’s a pretty impressive little number. It’s not the most slender 15-incher, but at six pounds, it’s lighter than we expected. The chiclet keys — dubbed “isolated keyboard” by Sony PR — are comfortable to use, as is the textured trackpad. Body and hinge felt sturdy, with an intentionally rugged and stylistic feel to it, and as one rep was excited to show, the metallic “Vaio” logo on the back makes a great reflection in the sun. From what we saw, Blu-ray playback was smooth, but we did notice horizontal viewing angles weren’t the best. We’ll reserve judgment when we get some play time with the unit and see how hard we can push the software, but for now we’re pretty happy with what we’ve seen. Starting price isn’t too shabby, at $880 equipped with the BD-ROM and $800 without, and it comes in three colors: white, grey, and dark brown. Striking your fancy? Look for it to ship out pretty quickly, as in some time next month.

Filed under: Laptops

Sony unveils 15.5-inch VAIO NW with BD-ROM and $880 price tag, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ah, Spring. The season of vacations, beach attire and VAIO updates. We already heard that Sony was giving its VAIO P netbook a dose of Windows XP and an optional 256GB SSD, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. Indeed, the Type T, Type Z, Type F and Type A are all getting makeovers, so we’ll do our best to break ’em down right. The beastly A series will continue to be menacing, boasting an 18.4-inch 1080p panel, WiFi, a HDD / SSD hybrid system, 4GB of RAM, a Blu-ray drive and a GeForce 9600M GT. The F series rolls in with a 16.4-inch display, 4GB of memory, ATI’s 256MB Mobility Radeon HD 3470, WiFi, a battery good for three hours and a Core 2 Duo P8700. The other guys are seeing far lighter touchups, but you can feel free to have a look at all of these Japan-bound units in the links below.

Read – VAIO updates I
Read – VAIO updates II

Filed under: Laptops

Sony updates plethora of VAIO laptops in Japan originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 May 2009 15:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The third of the laptop hunter ads shows a mom and a kid, shopping for a computer under $1500. And yes, the clip takes yet another dump on Macs.

Not to repeat everything on the ad, but the kid picks a Sony Vaio because it has Blu-ray and because Macs are “a little small”, even though his mom says “they are pretty” before making the most disgusting face ever caught on video.

The mom seems to be happy to be getting a couple hundred bucks in cash, and the kid seems to be happy because hey, free computer. But in the end, does it really matter which OS you choose? Does it? You give me a $1500 blank check and I’ll pick a $200 Eee and buy $1300 worth of ice cream. That’s right, I haven’t had ice cream in a while. [Thanks Ravi!]

According to the folks over at Sony Insider, Sony might have something more than just color changes up its sleeve when it comes to forthcoming variations on the VAIO P. Supposedly, the company has a new series of the diminutive laptop in the pipeline numbered 700 (as opposed to the current 500 line), which SI says looks just like a typical Sony scheme for spec refreshes. Inside the new digits there’s a designation for upcoming colors, but the existence of a fresh starting point as well as an additional “Q” in the mix might also mean that there are legitimate hardware changes happening as well. At this point this is just speculation, and it certainly wouldn’t surprise anyone if Sony were to bump some of the internals of the netbook… er, ultraportable, but it would likely be a welcome change. For a more detailed analysis, hit the read link.

VAIO P spec bumps coming? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Mar 2009 10:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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