Sony Vaio P Review – Build and Design

Despite the use of an Intel Atom processor, the design of the Sony VAIO P is quite unlike any netbook we’ve seen. The exterior is covered in glossy plastics with smooth lines, rounded edges, and a style that looks like it’s trying to strike a balance between luxury and utility. The best way to describe the design is that the VAIO P looks like it’s equal parts computer and fashion accessory. The look is pretty neat; something like a cross between a glossy smart phone and a netbook. Glossy plastic is found on the top of the screen cover as well as around the bottom of the laptop. Matte silver plastic is used around the keyboard and the internal frame uses magnesium alloy for extra support. Overall, the look is quite nice, but the glossy LCD lid is a magnet for fingerprints and makes the new netbook look a little tarnished after just a few minutes of use.

The build quality of the VAIO P is amazingly solid for a subnotebook of this size and weight. The construction is mostly plastic but all of the plastics feel strong enough to handle being tossed around inside a backpack or purse. Even the glossy plastic surfaces resist minor scratches. While we certainly don’t recommend it over a padded laptop bag, the VAIO P is small enough to slide into your back pocket … something you certainly can’t do with any $500 netbook currently on the market.

In terms of upgradeability, the VAIO P is pretty limited. The chassis isn’t designed to be opened and serviced by the owner. A qualified technician can open the VAIO P and repair it, but it won’t be easy for you to open the chassis yourself. Honestly, there isn’t much need to. The 2GB of system RAM is soldered to the motherboard so you cannot replace or upgrade it. Many of the netbooks we’ve seen to date require complex disassembly in order for you to get to the storage drive, system RAM, or wireless cards … so this isn’t anything new.

While it would have been nice for Sony engineers to include socketed RAM inside the VAIO P so you can upgrade it yourself, the reality is that a RAM socket won’t fit inside a laptop this thin along with everything else that’s packed inside. Bottom line, the Sony VAIO P is a marvel of modern engineering.

Sony Vaio P Review – Performance and Benchmarks

Regardless of how cool the Sony VAIO P looks there are many potential buyers who only care about one thing: performance. This is one area where the VAIO P might be a tough sell for some. In order to keep temperatures and power consumption as low as possible in this little notebook, Sony decided to use a 1.33GHz Intel Atom processor rather than the 1.6GHz Atom processor used in larger netbooks. While this helps keep the VAIO P from overheating and promotes better battery life, the bottom line is the VAIO P has a pretty weak processor.

Like most Atom-based netbooks, the VAIO P has enough processor performance for basic tasks like web browsing or working in Microsoft Office, but don’t expect to use this as a multimedia entertainment notebook. Since Sony includes Windows Vista with the VAIO P we also decided to test the new Windows 7 beta during our benchmark tests. Thankfully, Windows 7 seems to improve the overall performance of the VAIO P and makes this mobile computer a much more useful laptop. Windows Vista is okay, but Windows 7 makes the VAIO P much, much better.

Speakers and Audio

The speakers on the VAIO P are painfully weak. The built-in speakers on the VAIO P produce sound similar to what you hear coming from a cell phone set to the speaker phone option. The speakers are perfectly capable of playing short video clips or system sounds, but don’t bother trying to use the built-in speakers for listening to your music library.

The headphone jack on the VAIO P works well with the two different brands of earphones I used during the test. External speakers or headphones are obviously the way to go if you plan to use your VAIO P as a media player.

Battery

Under normal use, backlight at 80 percent and using wireless for web browsing and typing documents in Microsoft Word without allowing the computer to go into sleep mode, the VAIO P managed to deliver two hours and 39 minutes of battery life with the standard 4-cell battery. The extended life 6-cell battery delivered 4 hours and 8 minutes of battery life using the same settings. Lowering the screen brightness and turning off the wireless card should provide even more time away from a power outlet.

The 6-cell battery is a little larger than the 4-cell battery, but the VAIO P is still amazingly compact even with the larger battery inside.

Conclusion

Sony wants you to believe the VAIO P is a “Lifestyle PC” and not a netbook. Whether or not consumers will see it that way remains to be seen. As we said in our first look review, “the Sony VAIO P is not your average netbook.” In fact, the VAIO P probably comes as close as possible to being a “luxury netbook.”

Is it worth $900 when you can get a similar laptop for less money? That depends on what matters to you. The VAIO P has a revolutionary design, an extremely high-resolution display, and a few features you won’t find in a $500 netbook. That said, it still uses a relatively weak processor and isn’t designed to be a primary computer. If you plan to use the VAIO P as your primary family PC and multimedia center then you will probably be disappointed. If you plan to purchase the VAIO P as a lightweight travel laptop it might just be the perfect laptop on the market.

Pros:

• Smallest and lightest in class
• Excellent build quality
• Fantastic keyboard despite the small size
• Responsive, business-grade touchpoint
• Available with built-in 3G WWAN
• No noisy cooling fan

Cons:

• Expensive for an Atom-based laptop
• Gets a little hot
• Glossy plastic lid is a magnet for fingerprints
• Weak speakers, even for something this small
• Not user-upgradeable