Michael’s Techbox

In this article, I will speak about my experience with Sony and Toshiba.

My Sony Vaio has 3 utility CD’s (That I had to burn) that can be used to restore the Vaio to “Factory State”. What makes me laugh is that whenever you have a problem with a Sony Vaio Laptop and need to contact support, they always ask you “What software does you computer have installed?” followed my their typical response – “Sir, please restore your computer to factory state and see if the problem persists”. To these guys its as if “Factory State” is some magical best possible software configuration where all problems can be simplified to either “Customer is at fault” or “The Vaio might need to go in for technical repairs”.

Its not really that I have a problem with Factory State, a laptop needs an OS right? What I have a problem with is the room full of people who decide what exactly will constitute “Factory State”, clearly these people have no interest in actually using the computer they’re selling. I myself am a computer expert, 10 years in the field and I know that when I buy a computer, the first thing I need to do is “fix it”, because it will arrive “broken” with its factory software configuration. Now you mighy be thinking, yeah yeah, most people are not that clued up on computers, and don’t mind a bit of bloat wear. This statement might have been true a few years ago, but the problem is “Factory State” has become so overbloated that its now noticable even to novice users. I’ve seen this with my friends, who know absolutely nothing about computers, they come to me and say “My computer is taking too long to start up, I think its because when I bought it, it comes with all these programs I don’t need”. Good old me ends up spending 2 hours, tweaking the startup and uninstalling the bloat on the PC.

Below I have documented the steps I need to take to fix a PC from “Factory State”.

1. I removed the start up nag thats showing me about special offers from Symantec and Microsoft Office Home Student.
2. I then needed to purge ALL SYMANTEC PRODUCTS from the system.  These products severly affect system performance. This involves uninstalling 4 products, and so 4 restarts…. but at least no more Norton.
3. Because my laptop is running Windows Vista (and I wish I had an XP option, but I do not) I needed to get rid of UAC – thats right turn it off, do not pass begin or collect 200.
4. Get rid of Microsoft Works – its completely outdated and there is actually no point at all in this product, originally intended to be the poor mans word, now MS Word Home and Student 2007 is affordable to the man on the street, and Open Office better still is FREE!  
5. Have a coffee
6. Install windows updates, “Factory State” does not get updated or patched, so its old, pre Vista SP1 days.
7. Get rid of an installed copy of Microsoft Office Home and Student Edition that is installed, but not activated. Note: this isn’t free software, Sony and Toshiba are not bundling any value in this for you.
8. Change the power setting to performance, and not Vaio Optimised (i.e: slow performance, better battery)
9. reboot
10. Get rid of the google toolbar for IE, I don’t do bloat, full stop!
11. Uninstall Google Earth, its not a bad program, but its now an outdated version, bottom line: if I wanted it on there I would have downloaded it and installed it myself.
12. Uninstall Google Talk, I never use it.
13. Oops just missed an activation assistant for Microsoft Office - better get rid of this too, and
14. reboot
15. uninstall SQL 2005, thats been included despite it having compatibility issues with this version of Vista (This is a Sony only issue)
16. reboot
17. Uninstall Proprietry Video and Photo Viewing Applications – not going to name them all, but there are so many (at least 9).  They’re usually total crap, and not required
18. Uninstall the advertising screen saver
19. Uninstall 1 AC3 Codec I don’t really trust at all
20. EEEEwwww Roxio – this has to go! And now that its on, it could have major issues trying to install Nero after it. Lets hope for the best, this time.
21. Picasso 2 – offically bloat
22. Uninstall SQL Server native Client – getting bored already with this – Yawn!
23. Uninstall Skype, its an older version!
24. Get rid of the damn side bar already!
25. Uninstall the 56k fax modem (not sure why they would include this hardware on such a modern PC, but its completely useless to me)
26. Smoke all SonicStage Products, not sure who these guys are or what they do, but not interested!
27. Reboot
28. Install some more updates, that are coming through on Windows Automatic Updates
29. Turn off most of the Vista Fuzz, that slows the PC down considerably (Core Duo 2 2.2GHz)
30. Set the page file to fixed size
31. Turn off Vista Indexing for the OS drive (another feature that just slows you down)
32. Install some more Vista Updates
33. Reboot
34. Shutdown all unrequired services that are not required by most users (e.g: fax)
35. Remove “buy from Ebay” desktop advertisment icons
36. Clean up general clutter on the desktop from advertising companies
37. Remove duplicate and unneeded items from the start menu
38. Turn off system restore!
39. Get rid of everything relating to tablet PC, I don’t own one, and more than likely never will!
40. Get rid of Vaio AV launcher crap, thats what Media centre is for.

I know its a bit of a long post, but I have to tell you after all the work, the notebook is finally ready, and in my opinion now “Factory State”.

Recently I wanted to run some USB2.0 vs Firewire Tests, I was amazed to see USB2.0 seriously outperforming the Firewire drive on my Dell D630. I was about to conclude that USB 2.0 might be quicker than Firewire and all the hype about it being faster, was just that – hype.

Luckily I work for a large corporate, where just about everyone in the company has a Dell D630 at the moment. So a few of my colleagues enrolled their D630s, and we tested some results.

I also decided to enlist Microsoft Support in our quest to find the solution to the crummy Firewire performance, andI have to tell you, Microsoft Gold Support is not 1/2 bad, expensive, but they go the extra mile.

I have concluded that the Dell D630 has a manufacturing defect that is present in 50% of the Dell D630s we were able to test on.These tests were carried out in Czech Republic.

Here are some sample graphs. The very last one is taken from my Sony, and btw thats what it should look like.

Notice how the lines of that graph are not at all straight and average as they should be, in fact just by looking at it, it seems like the drive is suffering from some kind of heart attack, or might be broken, actually its not! It’s just a hardware defect, the drive works, but not according to Firewire specifiction.

Good case graph

Q: Why does my 1TB drive only seem to have 930GB free space? Even after an NTFS format

A: The drive manufacturers use a standard metric system to determine the drive size.

According to the packaging(marketing hype)

1TB = 1000,000,000,000 bytes

This might seem correct, but the real way bytes should be calculated is like this

1TB = 1000bytes x 1024 (kb) x 1024 (mb) x 1024 (gb)

This accounts for the 7% space exageration by the drive manufacturers. So next time you’re out buying storage, expect to loose 7% of the capacity advertised on the box.

Recently I purchased a Sony Vaio VGN-AR41S running windows vista 32bit home premium. To my surprise I discovered that the display nVidia driver was out of date, so I quickly logged onto the nVidia website and downloaded the 30MB package, once downloaded however it refused to install, the error message: Only OEM drivers can install on this notebook. Wow – in other words – only drivers provided by the laptop manufacturer, but hold on for a sec, didn’t nVidia make the individual display adapter, is this all wrong?

Months passed before Sony released a driver that was up to date, unfortunately by the time Sony released the up to date driver, it was already surpassed with yet another update, since then Sony have not released the updated version and I suspect it will be another few months before Sony catch on.

As more and more people decide to use laptops over clunky desktops, this issue will become more and more apparent when the Suppliers do not provide partner updates in an efficient manner.

If you would like to get around this however – you can help yourself and simply go to this website – http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/ and download a driver that is more up to date than the one supplied by your Supplier.

Seriously beats dealing with helpdesk support staff who will just end up frustrating you even more.

update – since the purchase of this laptop – nVidia have released 16 driver updates, and Sony have managed to incorporate 2 of these…. someone pass me a pillow to scream into….

So as per my last post, I decided to buy a new Sony Vaio VGN-AR41S….
Is this computer stylish? yes absolutely.
Does it feel good to use? Yes
Does it work? Well yes and no…. and this is why I am now not recommending Sony Vaios to anyone who wants a high performance gaming desktop replacement…

These are the problems I have faced with the Sony in the week I have had it.

1. The remote control that comes with it… used to work… Until I cleaned out the windows installation, and put on a fresh copy of windows… Now the remote does not work… and I have spent 2 days researching why it does not work… there is not a scrap of documentation on the subject on the internet (including support forums) and the 188 page manual only states the obvious like replace the batteries….

2. The enter key skips a beat every now and again… and gets stuck when you press it while typing fast…. This is one annoying factor about having a notebook PC… the keyboard is not replaceable, instead its serviceable… This means that should anything go wrong with your keyboard, like mine, on a brand new pc… then you literally have to take your notebook back… this means being without your notebook for I would guess up to a month… to have it serviced… depending on where you are in the world… for example in Czech Republic, Eastern Europe, things tend to happen here at a snail pace…

3. The SD Card reader stopped working after a clean install of windows… Which is a pitty, cause I really liked having this card reader for use with my Digital Camera… Ok so you might think I am some idiot unable to install drivers… actually not the case… the correct drivers are installed, the works…. but…. nada, not a bloody thing…

4. This is a huge concern… Its not possible to install Windows XP on the Sony Vaio VGN-AR41S. Now I want you to think about that one for a second… Not possible? What do I mean, not possible? Everything is possible right? Well… here is the thing – the Notebook was designed for use only with Vista, but I am guessing Linux would install… The problem is XP just can’t see the HDD (hard disk drive), so it simply will not install… Also even if it could install… guess what there are not enough windows XP drivers out there…. because most of the components… including the graphics card… were only meant to be used on windows vista… This is most frustrating…

5. The nVidia GeForce 8600M GT that is installed, only operatates with Sony Provided Drivers… and this means that its at the liberty of Sony to provide drivers… Not nVidia.. basically off the shelf nVidia drivers simply do not work even though the card installed is nVidia…
So already Sony is not providing the most recent driver thats available on the nVidia site.. meaning that you are limitied to the fresh off the shelf driver, that was basically the first driver written for windows Vista…

6. A fresh clean re-install did not fix all the problems… they still persisted….

7. The overal gaming experience is seriously not impressive… I think its because of the windows vista thats installed…. but I can’t be sure… infact no one could be since you can’t get XP installed on one of these babies…. Anyways… this is not a gaming PC… and if you don’t believe me… You are going to get really pissed off if you rush out and buy one… But thats your choice… I was also warned against buying one, and I bought one anyways… Main thing is that the games will run… just not as sweet as you would think…

Anyways – hope this tip helps

I would like to thank Acer for the terrible service I have recieved from them. I really want to thank them because they prevented me from making a huge mistake, and that would be buying one of their products. After 1 month of patience with dealing with Acer, I have decided that their service really leaves a lot to be desired, thank fully I will not have to re-encounter such crap service from them again.

Am I knocking the product? No absolutely not, I did not get to recieve the product, even though I tried to purchase it many times. A laptop not in hand is a laptop I can’t comment on or review.

Despite my best efforts to purchase the Acer Aspire 9920, I found it an impossible mission for the following reasons. I only stuck it out so long because I was interested in this particular model of notebook. But I am since relieved having not purchased this oversized piece of trash.

1. Acer do not deal directly with the public, and there staff are seriously lacking in the PR department. For example – the only number listed for Acer in the country where I was trying to purchase is in fact a service division of which no one there knew the contact details for PC purchases or dispatch.
2. Acer Suppliers have an equally difficult time in getting any info out of Acer. Acer Suppliers simply can’t get it right to provide the correct info back to the client, instead they attempt to cover up the mistakes of Acer….

At one point in time I very nearly had my hands on an Acer Aspire 9920, however… it arrived to the computer shop where I ordered it… and guess what… it was broken… it did not even turn on… so now here comes the lovely suprise… it went to the service center… where it lay there for a week…. once I found out they were going to try and sell me this already broken laptop (bearing in mind its not a cheap deal) I decided to cancel the whole dealing with Acer and Co… and move on….

I am now very excited to recieve a new Sony VGN-AR51SU. I have decided to go for this PC cause…

1. Its actually a laptop… and it can go places… not just live its life at home as a desktop replacement.
2. It can fit in laptop bags not suitcases…
3. It has a proper fully compliant 1080p HD Ready LCD, not like the Aspire with a XSVGA+ which is not full HD.
4. It has a blue ray RAM. unlike the Acer… that is falsely marketed as having an HD DVD drive… but actually does not when you order it , in your country…
5. I CAN ACTUALLY GET IT…. not like the Acer which was really a waste of 1 months worth of waiting…

Please post your thoughts.