I have a valid license for Vista Ultimate 64bit. If I order a Z series with Vista Home 64 (cheapest option), will I have any problems updating it with my Ultimate 64?
In particular.. will I have all the necessary disks to install any Sony software that would normally come with the laptop? (stuff particular to the laptop.. like making everything work.. I don't care about 3rd party junk software like antivirus, works, etc).
With all the hand wringing folks have been doing about the lack of drivers for a clean install of Win7 I thought I'd jump in to the deep end of the pool with my FZ190 and investigate an alternative. My good friends Rajesh and Dr. Pratik have done clean installs of Win7 on FZ models, but I decided to take a different approach... the "dreaded" OS in place upgrade. Partly out of curiosity, I wanted to see if it would work, but mainly because I have a ton of software that would need to be reinstalled, if I did a clean install. That would mean days or weeks of inventorying every thing I have installed, digging up installation media and then installing all the stuff. I just don't have the spare time. So...
This past weekend I imaged my C: drive (all my data and I mean ALL my data is on D:, I am a fanatic about that). MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A BACKUP OF YOUR C: DRIVE BEFORE YOU TRY AN UPGRADE! I ran the Windows 7 Update adviser and it said I had some issues:
Quote:
NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GT - NVIDIA Not compatible The driver installed for this device is not compatible with Windows 7....................
I have an Upgrade dvd Vista business to Win 7 that I received for my z790. Finally got around to install Win 7 and seems like I will need to install Vista first to be able to use the upgrade DVD. Any workaround?
My secondary objective is to install new SSD.The way I see it now:
1. Ghost XP on SSD
2. Install Vista on SSD
3. Install Win 7 on SSD
Is there an easier way to do it? Any more pitfalls to avaoid? Thanks!
the only Win 7 key that I have is the upgrade Vista to Win 7. Am I correct that retail/all versions install Win 7 disk will not let me use this key?
I'm thinking about purchasing windows 7, do i need a clean install of windows vista to upgrade? and also do i need to get all the drivers ect like in the clean install of vista if i wish to upgrade? i have a vaio vgn-fw21L
If I buy the windows 7 upgrade (only $49!) do I have to upgrade my vista or can i keep vista and have windows 7 at the same time in a dual-boot situation? Does anyone know if this is allowed?
I have a vaio Z 598u and I want to have both windows vista and seven on it. But I have heard that it is not possible to have two operating systems on Z series.
Firstly I apologize if this has been asked earlier, but I couldn't find an answer to my question. I have a 1530 on order. The OS will be Vista Premium x86. There are 2 things I need to do-
1. Upgrade the HD from a 5400 to a 7200, I have the HD.
2. Install Windows Vista Business - I have an original retail version, and I absolutely need this.
I have the Vista Business Retail DVD. What I want to do is have Windows and the dell partitions configured exactly as they came with the original computer, only with Vista Business, and on the new hard disk. I don't want to alter Media Direct, or delete the restoration partition. Everything should be the same except the Windows Versio
I have the new Win7 disks from MSDN (pro and ultimate). Tried multiple times yesterday to upgrade my Z690 from Vista. Uninstalled all of the conflicting drivers/programs, it goes all the way through the install process, gets to the point where it copies over the old files, but then abruptly restarts and uses the Rollback program to get me into Vista again.
I tried 4 times, same result each time. Anyone have an idea if there's something I can do get this machine upgraded?
A clean install is not an option, too many programs I can't find the disks to...
have a TZ340 on order. At the time I thought it would be nice having an ultralight with an optical drive and really long battery life, but ten looking at the specs ULV U7600 1.2ghz cput and 100gb PATA 4200 rpm, 1gb ram, i'm starting to get buyers remorse cause it seems like the hardware is kind of dated already. Anyone with some of the older TZ models have any relatively cheap modification suggestions to speed up the laptop when I get it. I have some 2gb so dimms laying around so I'll just swap that in for the 1gb, but anyone have any suggestions on some smaller ssd drives available now? I believe the 100gb pata drive in the tz is a 1.8" drive, do they make 1.8" pata ssd drives?
I bought my sony Z series in Oct 08, havent got the full spec infront of me. But it was the 4GB, 320GB model The past 18 months its been faultless apart from a problem with the left clicker under the touch pad which sony fixed very quickly.
Ive had a couple of problems recently with it overheating. Fans running at when seems like warp speed then the laptop turning off. The laptop seems to run really warm when I have the wireless on and using the internet etc. Ive done plenty of virus scans, defrags, disk clean up and cant seem to find anything un toward.
So my next port of call is to do a full system freash install. My questions are
With the speed that technology changes is it possible to upgrade any of my current Z series?
Or
would I be better off buying on of the latest Z series models?
The laptop is used alot for internet and some gaming.
I know that many of us have been seeking an inexpensive third-party RAM upgrade for our new Vaio Zs. Fortunately, I've found a great solution. Not only does this module use precisely the same RAM ICs as the currently shipping Vaio Z11 8GB machines, those RAMs just happen to be manufactured by the world's largest DRAM manufacturer (by far), Samsung. This module has been tested for over a week, and it has truly been a completely stable solution. Plus, I don't suppose that it'll hurt to point out that this is the least expensive 4GB DDR3-1066 SO-DIMM module that I can find in the United States right now! Moreover, it's sold by a very reputable vendor, whom I trust - EWiz.com (they're still making the transition from their old name, SuperBiiz). They've got great prices, ship fast, and stand behind what they sell - no, I have nothing whatsoever to do with them, other than being a customer.
Rock-solid RAM that's the cheapest, too! For details behind all the testing that allowed me to finally post this, see this thread (which started off as a look into RAM speeds on the new Vaio Zs). To pick these up, check out the Super Talent 4GB DDR3-1066 Samsung Chip Notebook Module at EWiz.com - literally priced below any other 4GB DDR3-1066 SO-DIMM on Pricewatch, as of 3/30/2010!
There are already a couple of "guides" floating around that describe how to install a clean copy of Windows on Sony laptops.
The process is fairly simple and involves installing certain Sony software and drivers in particular order (according to Sony).
For FW series, the guide is here: Official Vaio FW Clean Vista Install Guide
When I first installed Windows Vista Ultimate, I had no problems getting everything to work EXCEPT for the following:
1) CompactFlash (JMicron JMB368 ExpressCard CF) driver is not available on Sony's web site. When inserting the card, it does not show up as a drive in Windows Explorer. After some time playing around, I figured the following 2 ways to make it work:
a. Insert your card, go to device manager and click on "scan for hardware changes" b. Boot Windows while the card is inserted
2) SD card slot works but is not mapped to any drive. While Ricoh MS driver automatically creates a drive, there is no driver on Sony's web site that would do the same for SD slot.
Sony's support is useless to a point where they told me that the reason why my CF cards do not show up and there is no drive mapped to the slot is because the laptop does not support cards larger than 4GB (and I have only 8GB Sandisk cards) What a joke. I finally managed to get a 2nd tier technical guy on the phone who said that Sony does not provide CF drivers and that there is nothing they can do about it..........
I was browsing at an online store today and I see that Intel has released 1.8" 160GB drives! These are 5mm thick.
Now I have upgraded my Z to a single 160G (2.5") but these should slip right in! Does anyone know where I can get the required cable and the tray for the z-series notebooks
I have a a vaio nw series with a blu-ray player and i want to upgrade a couple of things on my computer. I would like to upgrade the memory on my laptop to 8Gb and the processor to a t9900. On the sony website it says the laptop can max at 2.2ghz and 4gb but the chipset in the laptop can support the processor i want and the 8gb.
I would like to request your opinion on upgrading my current Sony Vaio VGN-Z590 P9500 2.53ghz processor into a X9100 3.06ghz one. I would like to know if it would still be possible to upgrade my cooling system by just applying a thermal compound on the existing copper wire cooling system. I also plan to add more thermal compound on the cpu and heatsink.
Alright so i have been trying to upgrade from home premium 64bit vista to W7 with my upgrade disc and i am out of idea. Every time i try to run the upgrade i get an error saying
"Windows cannot copy files required for installation. The files may be corrupt or missing. Make sure all files required for installation are available and restart the installation. Error code: 0x80070017"
I just have a question regarding aftermarket upgrade of blue ray for Vaio Z series, did any one try upgrading with any aftermarket blue ray drive for Z series? If so what is the compatibility criteria and did anyone find one for Z series
I found a notebook blue ray rom for $79
[url]
but it is IDE interface I am not sure what interface is for Z series.
Let me first start by asking your forgiveness if I have stuffed this quick little guide in the wrong spot. I spent a rather brief 10 minutes searching this forum, and I don't believe I am repeating a write-up someone has already done that follows this simple method. If I am incorrect, I ask a moderator to please place this post in its proper home. As you can see, I am not an avid poster here, and I really don't want to be slammed for not searching with enough gusto, etc.
Alright, on to the quick 'n easy...
I have a new VGN-AW235J, so proceed with courage and fortitude if our letters don't match. I found this as I was trying various ways to cleanse this beautiful machine of it's bloatware. It worked for me, and that is all I will claim.
This method requires that you create the restore DVDs.
If you don't have a handful of restore DVDs, go do that now and come back...and while you're up, bring a snack.
One more disclaimer: I didn't take the greatest notes while doing this, so my instructions may be sufficiently vague to cause minor trepidation on the part of the reader. With that being said, each step should be fairly obvious while in front of your machine...DVDs in hand..........................
I had replaced mobo on my dead SZ 4 series (don't ask why) and couldn't stop there since I was in the move thus consequently contemplated about possible upgrades. For now I settled for fan, WLAN card and CPU upgrade. If it works well, I might install SSD also.
1.Fan Modification
As you all proud SZ owners know, fan is very noisy on this machines so it made me think if there is any possible modification to reduce the noise. Since the BIOS is controlling it there is not much to do on the RPM part (in win at least, but more on that later) I settled for a fan and fan casing swap from SZ 4 to SZ 7 series.
In the photos you can see that fans, fan casings and heat-sinks are of different design. Besides design differences, voltage and the amperage are the same, 5V-300mA.
Only way was to install the fan and the casing of the SZ 7 heat-sink to my old one as one of the heat-sinks bolt bushings is off for a few millimeters.
There has to be some care exercised when prying off the fan casing, some heating was required from the aluminium side on three pins were casing is attached.
Not to be simple, the difference is also in the inlet hole. One on the SZ 7 heat-sink is bigger and off centre compared to SZ 4s. Had to do some filing there, to match it to the size of the new fan. Fan of SZ7 is not bigger, it is due to different design of the fan eye and its volutes...................
How would we go about upgrading the Vista OS to 64 bit? Apparently had no choice of ordering 64 bit when I took advantage of the free vista upgrade from xp professional.
Now I want the 64 bit instead of the 32 bit, but I have the 32 bit CD. Anyway to obtain the 64 Bit CD and use the 32 Bit serial I received with the Vista upgrade CD?
I just got a nicely loaded E6500 from the Dell Outlet. It has XP installed but came with a Vista Business licence and I am just not sure whether to or if vista is an "upgrade" or not. I've read a bunch of reviews comparing the two systems but they were all done on Vista's release and did not account for the SP1 and other fixes, those reviews seemed to give Vista a slight edge but by no means was it overwhelming. So I was wondering what peoples opinion of Vista was now that its been on the market for a while and has had some fixes applied.
Brief specs on the laptop: 2.5ghz, 3m L2C, 1066FSB 2gb ram (1 dimm) have a second 2gb dimm on order. 250gb 7200rpm HD Nvidia Quadro 256mb vid card.
my usage: I am not a gamer. I do some limited video, Photoshop and audio arranging. For the most part it will be a general usage computer mainly using MS Office apps, web apps and multimedia playback.
I've place my order with HP for the Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit upgrade, but I was wondering if I can perform the upgrade from Vista Ultimate SP1?
As an aside, I've completely given up on trying to install SP2 - it has never shown up in WU. When I first got my HDX18, I performed all necessary updates expecting that eventually SP2 would be an option. After many struggles with the Readiness app, installing and uninstalling various updates that may or may not be in conflict with SP2, seeking advice from HP tech support and forums then finally restoring the system to factory state and directly downloading SP2 and attempting an installation that way,
I am planing on getting this machine for my home office use. Couple of questions about RAM upgrade.
1. It comes with 2G RAM 1x2048MB stick; I wan to get this up to 4G; Has Vista-32 preinstalled. Will I be able to USE all 4G or less than that (I know Vista reports all 4G as installed), but does it it really use all 4G. Specs say max RAM is 4G. Is it worth getting this upgrade now, or
2. Should I just get the upgrade and when Windows 7 comes out, will it be able to USE the full 4G, even if 32-bit