Two months ago or so Sony had an awesome sale (presumably back to school) on this. I helped my friend pick out the Vaio Pro 13 with the 4200U, 8GB Ram, and a 256GB SSD for $1200 or so. I thought it was a pretty decent deal at the time, especially given the relative rarity of haswell ultrabooks at the time. The SSD upgrade was only $120 and I think RAM upgrade was about $50. I think we might have added the battery sheet at some point.
Then of course her (rich and trying in every way to spoil her great daughter), against any advice I could muster, found the need to throw in a 512GB SSD (SEVEN HUNDRED dollar upgrade), the i7, and some other obnoxiously useless upgrades for a friend of mine who browses facebook and simply needed a nice laptop for class. End price ended up being about $2500.
But regardless, if this can be had on sale I think it's definitely a great choice. Personally, I think I want the Asus you mentioned as soon as it's out!
It's nice I agree! But it doesn't change the fact that Sony VAIO Pro 13 stands no chance to some of the top laptops on the market. /Kevin from http://www.consumertop.com/best-laptop-guide/
Yeah I bought just a bit ahead of that sale; I was super annoyed when I saw it. With that sale, the Vaio Pros were actually a bit cheaper than a lot of the higher-end Ivy ultrabooks available at the time. It was something like $50 off the RAM/CPU upgrades, $100 off the 256GB SSD upgrade, $50 off the sheet battery, and a $100 rebate to boot.
I don't really know who they're trolling with that $720 512GB SSD upgrade. I'm really glad I can live okay in 256GB. And $2500 sounds about right for the fully-kitted out version--if I had more money than sense, I'd love to tote around the red version they sell (http://store.sony.com/vaio-pro-13-zid27-SVP1321BPX... - $2600!).
Gamin sucks, but it seems to be a great laptop, because it is small. If only you could connect an external graphics card everything would be good. I saw someone modded an Mac book Air to use an external graphics card. Can this be modded too?
"Modding" in that case essentially means they used a Thunderbolt/Lightpeak cable to connect to an externally housed GPU. Technically you could also do that with Firewire or USB but even USB3.0 bandwidth is so limited that you would be better off with the Intel graphics.
In the case of the Macbook, Somebody was guessing the cost of the housing at $200-$250 without a GPU. That would put the cost of a good GPU+case at $350-$500. For some people it would be worth it, for others not so much.
Considering Sony's reputation for making short-life laptops it's hard to justify dishing out a months rent on something that will probably fail right after the warranty expires. Practically every VAIO I've ever come across beginning with the Transmetta Crusoe ultraportable's a decade ago have had chronic overheating problems, failed hard disks (from overheating) and terrible, terrible, terrible driver and warranty support.
Some people think HP and Dell are bad, but man you haven't seen anything until you've owned a Sony. 4 week turnaround time on warranty repairs for something that was likely purchased at a price premium over the competition. They are pretty machines, but if you want something pretty with decent reliability at this price, why would you pass up a MacBook Air 13?
I've owned several Vaios but only needed one warranty experience (in the UK) and it was excellent. The collection and turnaround time was very quick (4 business days from pickup to return) and they checked and replaced a whole lot of stuff that wasn't within the specified scope of the warranty claim. Okay it wasn't major technical stuff - the palmrest cover had unglued on my F series, which they replaced - but they also replaced the fan, the whole keyboard and trackpad because they felt it needed it. Also nice were all the updates so I knew exactly what was going on - even DHL were announcing delivery with automated option to reschedule or re-address.
Funny you mention the fan. Sony had a number of units recalled in 2010 for fan warping. Happy to hear service in the UK is up to par; it is garbage in the USA.
Totally not sharing this experience, had a budget vaio for years and my mom is still using it since 2007 and i had a vaio z13 since 2011 and it never skipped a beat and still work great, replaced it with a samsung ativ book 8 that doest feel as well constructed at all even though its 1kg more heavy than the Z13. The z13 survived all my trips from europe to japan without being even inside a laptop sleeve.
Anand, my dad is looking at buying this laptop, but there has been issues reported about its wifi being bad, dropping signals, not getting them. Did you see this behaviour at all? Also, on all the display models I have seen instore, the trackpad seems to be loose in the corners. Did you notice this on your review sample? Best review I have read on the web yet though, as always!
The touchpad doesn't feel loose, but it's hard to "click" in the bottom and top corners (basically it doesn't depress much). As I note in the review, the touchpad works okay but isn't the best I've used. As for the WiFi, I've noticed on quite a few Intel 7260 adapters (doesn't seem to matter matter if it's AC, dual-band N, or single-band N) that the WiFi will occasionally lose the ability to connect; turn on airplane mode (disable the WiFi) and then turn it back off and that fixes the problem. It seems to happen about once a week, roughly.
I have a Asus Dark Knight, and serious problems. If you look on pictures from inside the pc - or open it up yourself - you will see that the antenna ain't in the monitor - just two cables close to the motherboard.
I used the laptop around the house, but not long-range testing. I will have to look into that later, but at least for general WiFi I didn't have problems at up to 50 feet or so from my router.
Okay, not sure if 50 feet is accurate or not -- it works within my house fine. Leave my house, though, and you're right: WiFi performance goes to basically nothing. I'll update the review with some additional information.
On the gigantic sony vaio pro 13-tread it was mentioned that most people don't have problems with 5Ghz-channels. Are you using 5ghz or 2.4ghz? I have been using the 2.4Ghz 802.11N and have not noticed (after driver upgrade) any slowdowns.. but im only using it for normal surfing.
5GHz range and performance is better than 2.4GHz in my limited testing, but range of 5GHz isn't much better -- maybe 5-10 feet. I've tested other laptops where 2.4GHz band reaches about 50 feet farther than 5GHz, so something is fishy when 2.4GHz has less range. I don't know if it's Intel's drivers or something else, though.
I get better performance on short range with 5 GHz. But the range ain't good on either 2.4 or 5. In the office where there are quite many networks, I'm down to no connection at all after 50 feet with just one light wall between me and the AP. At the same time/place, I can get 30+ Mbps with a another pc with other pc's with Intel wifi.
On battery, wifi is sett to "max performance" in the power options. This can make a impact on some systems.
"The broadband noise emitted from a USB 3.0 device can affect the SNR and limit the sensitivity of any wireless receiver whose antenna is physically located close to the USB 3.0 device. This may result in a drop in throughput on the wireless link."
I hear a lot of people complaining about the bad WiFi on the Vaio Pro. If you're signal is excellent then any crappy WiFi solution will work well but when signal strength get weak, the Vaio Pro struggle a lot. That's definitely very bad for a road warrior where you're going to encounter many places with weak WiFi signals.
If you never leave your house with your notebook then the WiFi issues may not be apparent but then you wouldn't really be looking for a "Pro" notebook anyway.
The sheet battery raises the back about half an inch (1.34" total height at rear -- 34.1mm) and according to my little food scale the laptop with the battery weighs 2.97 pounds (1.348kg).
Thanks so much! It's a great review; I completely agree with your assessment at the end about manufacturers raising the ~$1200 ultrabook spec to 8GB/256GB. It's a little ridiculous so many manufacturers are holding onto 4GB in 2013.
Nice review as always, Jarred. One issue though--my Vaio Pro 13 claims to have Dual-Band Wireless-N 7260 (<3 Intel part naming) and has no apparent issues connecting to my 5GHz AP. Is it possible that this varies between models?
The one other downside of the flex-y chassis you don't mention (maybe didn't encounter?) is that you can actually click the clickpad by pressing down on either side of the touchpad, or by placing a thumb between the touchpad and the edge, and lifting the laptop with your hand underneath it. Practically this is only very rarely an issue (if I'm walking around and holding the laptop by the front, mostly--and the lightness makes this something I do more often than I would have thought), but it bears mentioning.
On the pricing front, I would love to see Sony come down a bit, but it's been four months and there is still pretty sparse competition. There's the Acer S7--on Amazon, $1300 for the i5/128GB SSD/8GB RAM model, or $1580 for i7/256GB SSD upgrade--or the ATIV Book 9 for $1400, but in order to get its beautiful screen, you have to suffer its ridiculous single configuration of 128GB SSD/4GB RAM. Dell's XPS 13 is still Ivy if you buy it today, and the XPS 12 is neither priced much better (especially with upgrades), nor to my mind a directly competing product. Especially now that you can shave $100 off by dropping the touchscreen, Sony's still at or near the front of the Haswell ultrabook pack in value here. It'll be interesting to see how the rMBP 13 compares--and the Zenbook Infinity, if it ever materializes.
Forgot to mention the Surface Pro 2, since you did--if you're comparing to that, you should probably compare the 11" flavor, which starts at $100 less than the 13 and essentially costs the same as Surface Pro 2 when you include a type cover. I do think for roughly the same price, Surface Pro wins that value comparison easily, though again if the tablet-y-ness isn't a factor you save $100 by dumping the touchscreen in the VAIO.
Also on that topic, you wrote that Surface Pro 2 comes out in "ten weeks"--doesn't it come out next week? The Anandtech article (admittedly old at this point) says Oct 22.
There is A LOT of Vaio Pro 13 owners that has huge wifi-problems. If you are in the same room as the AP, it can be ok, but some distance a a couple of walls and this pc is one of the worst on the market. No antenna in the screen - just a small cable behind the motherboard.
I use a usb-dongle for wifi. With the internal solution, some of my 802.11g-based old pc's have much better range. My house ain't that large, but all over the house I can get coverage on the iPhone and the iPad - but with the Sony the performance is very low, unstable or completly without a connection.
Sony have for months said there will be an software update for this problem. I doubt it. I belive the antenna is the problem and that it really can't be fixed.
Text on pages 2 and 6 has been updated. It's odd that the WiFi works so well within my home, but the exterior walls just kill throughput (assuming you can connect at all). I had some similar issues with the Acer R7, though oddly only on the 2.4GHz band.
You don't mention an important factor, that this laptop has a problematic wifi. There's no solution for months and probably the problem is in the hardware.
To be more specific, the speed drops drastically when the signal is not good. Some say it's because of a bad antenna location. Anyway, it's a very strong factor to take into account before buying this awesome (besides that one flaw) laptop.
Also, take into account that the back cover is very easily scratchable (way too easy!)
And yes, the extremely light weight is really exceptional!
I bought the Vaio Pro 13 (i7-4500, 8Gb, 256gb toshiba ssd, no touch, 3year warranty) almost 2 months ago for 1200€. I must admit that it had it driver problems on start but every update has actually made a difference and now all problems are solved. It had a bit problems with fan, bluetooth and wifi, but as i said, updates solved those.
I have to totally disagree with the "built quality"-issue, flexibility is by design not because they used sub-par engineering and materials. If you check how big the actual motherboard is, its about half of the depth of the laptop so its not flexing at all. One reviewer also noted that Sony has done these flexible design's before and now few years after those laptops haven't gotten any problems. If you close the lid than vaio 13 isnt bending almost at all. Jarred if you need a crowbar, than use something else than laptop :)
Jarred could you add some benchmarks about the ssd speed? If you get the samsung model.. its should do almost 1Gb/sec sequantials and the 4k read/writes arent that bad either. I got the 256gb toshiba and it still beats a samsung 840pro.
One thing about the display and calibration, Pro13 should use Sony's Tri-luminos tech and that surely could confuse the colormeter?
I don't know about the Tri-luminos tech confusing my colorimeter, but I have verified on a couple laptops that the calibration just looks really off, so I've held off doing any more potentially flawed testing.
As for build quality, I noted that it's by design, but I disagree with the design. Yes, it should hold up reasonably well, but laptops like the ASUS U-series, MacBook Air, heck even the Acer S7 all feel better (though the keyboard on the Acer is not at all good in my book). It's a sacrifice of rigidity in favor of being ultra lightweight, and that's fine -- I can live with it and not complain too much. Still, I wish Sony would reinforce the chassis just a bit more. Carbon fiber is not at all heavy, so another layer or two bonded on there would do wonders.
SSD performance is good, and really maximum transfer rates start to become meaningless past a certain point. I would rather have a somewhat slower 256GB SSD than a faster 128GB SSD, simply because I need more capacity. But the VAIO Pro 13 does boot and load programs very fast (other than Windows 8 Apps, which as usual take far too long to load).
My 256GB unit has a Samsung, and I got 1GB/s sequential read and 825MB/s sequential write just now, if you're curious. Is the Toshiba worse?
As for the build quality, I didn't think Jarred was too harsh on it--he mentioned that he liked a more "solid" feel as a matter of preference and not that there's anything inherently wrong with the flexible chassis. I can get a noticeable amount of flex even when mine is closed though, if I squeeze it--again not problematic necessarily, but I can understand if people would like a more rigid design better. Obviously increasing rigidity isn't going to keep the laptop at 2.3lbs.
When I was ordering, I picked the free 256gb option. I just checked the sony webstore again and now they are offering msata and pci-e options for SSD atleast in Europe. (256gb pci-e upgrade is free btw).
I remember the Toshiba being very similar to 840pro speeds, maybe its the msata version. But anyhow its plenty fast. SSD is just something that people should make note because there are alot of different versions Sony ship with these.
You really need to re-think your benchmark suite. Who gives a crap about how far an ultraportable goes below 20fps in games. We need to know how its SSD performs, how long it takes to elaborate files, zip them, copy them. How fast network transfers are. REAL WORLD USE, not freakin' cinebench.
The PCMark scores more or less encapsulate all of the data points you're after. I noted that the SSD is quite fast, and has very good boot times. The CPU results are there just as reference points, and the gaming tests are there to show that, no, this is not a gaming laptop. You'll notice how much time I spent discussing the benchmarks, and that's because for the most part the benchmarks (outside of battery life) simply aren't important. It's more than fast enough. If you have to know how much faster it is than other laptops, you're probably going to want something with a quad-core CPU and a dGPU. Ultrabooks for the most part target the mainstream user that values mobility over performance, so that's the focus of the review.
Also, I mean the i7-4558U is what I'm interested in. The Asus Zenbook Infinity (UX301) does look good, too. I'd love to see it released properly so I could play with the available configurations. However, pretty much any laptop with this CPU that is 13" is worth reviewing.
Great review, But where is the mention of bloatware? Does this thing come with lots of it? I ask this because specs and presence of Bloatware are the primary factors I base my buying decision on. I know a lot of people who do that as well. Has Bloatware? no buy.
I think win8 has generally reduced bloat, but on this vaio pro 13 Sony has put few modern app's and mcafee virus protection (witch i instantly uninstalled and went with win8 defender) Also i think there was the office365 trial included, have not even started that. But id say very little bloat.
Yes, pretty much what you said. There's some VAIO utilities, but they're not too obtrusive and I like some of the features the VAIO Care Center offers (it gives reasonably detailed control over the various settings like the keyboard backlighting among other things). I also uninstalled the McAfee software (we always test without any Firewall enabled and no anti-virus software running, just for consistency). I personally have been using Microsoft Security Essentials on my PCs since it came out and haven't had any problems, but then I avoid the sort of sites that tend to infect PCs so YMMV.
I did buy this machine three months ago, but with a Sony deal that gave a 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM for about the price listed for your review machine. I must say it has been a truly excellent machine for me, as I favour a top flight display, light weight, long battery life and fast operation.
The Wi-Fi problem you reference was a real pain, but the Intel driver update has (mostly) sorted it out. It does surface in an unusual way, though. If the machine goes to sleep in one location, and then wakes in a location with a different Wi-Fi router, it does not seem to find it without restarting the Wi-Fi adaptor.
Another update for the display driver now seems to cause the display to get stuck on a low brightness level every now and then - not sure what is going on, as this behaviour was not apparent before the update.
I recognise that the use of carbon fibre has made the Vaio feel flexible, but the design's build quality does not strike me as inadequate in any way. One caveat after 3 months of use is that the keys seem to imprint themselves on the screen so that (at certain angles) I can see key marks on the display. I feel that this is a design problem, caused by the search for a thin device. I did discuss this with Sony and the answer from them was that I needed to use the cloth that came with the device - this black cloth seemed to be part of the packaging but it is quite important, and should not be thrown away. It needs to cover on the keyboard every time you shut the lid. I thought this would be remarkably frustrating and that I would lose the cloth immediately. Somehow, I have got used to it and the cloth is still present three months in. Would I prefer that Sony had sorted out the problem in the design work? Yes, yes.
Overall, I am struck how well my personal experience with the machine reflects the findings of the reviewer. This might be the first time I have read an Anandtech review of a product I already know well - rather than reading about a product I might be considering - and its accuracy in laying out my own use case does encourage me to consider your reviews seriously next time I am seeking a new device. Well done.
I'm just a little comfused by the lack of information in the battery graphs. You might as well just remove the numbers entirely. 959 what's? What am i actually looking at? I can make out the graphs lower down as being rated in hours, but what about the former graphs?
I have to get one other finished first (Clevo W740SU), but the preview should tell you much of what you need to know. I just need to test actually gaming performance and battery life, as well as check for any heat issues. It's a shame their keyboard isn't that great though.
I rather get this ultrabook than the compromised Surface Pro. What I found is that Win8 is terrible on a small screen, smaller than 12" is no good. Much better with more real estate.
Surface Pro has a terrible keyboard cover it is so spongy how could anyone type on it. Then the Surface Pro tend to heat up when you watch movies and it has a very poor cooling system, think of it as a hot griddle that you can cook eggs on if it gets hot.
Just like the PS3 vs Xbox 360, the PS3 was a better designed hardware overall. Microsoft is bad with hardware, all those defective RROD 360 is the reason why I wouldn't trust them as a device maker.
You can get the non-touchscreen version (which I have and minimal glare) for around 100$ less; as a bonus: it's 130g lighter; mine weighs in at just 0.93kg.
Sony's high end laptops are usually pretty impressive. I own a VPC-Z11 laptop that's about 3 years old now and amazingly few laptops can compare to this ultraportable even today. Sony often uses completely custom designs and their high end laptops are often assembled in the US or in Japan.
The biggest downside with Sony is because it's all custom you're going to need to pray if you break it. At least in Canada where their repair service is dismal and expensive. Even the parts cost a fortune due to custom design.
Good review, seems like too many compromises. Then you factor in the price and I agree with your conclusion entirely. Really looking forward to that Gigabyte review, barely bulkier than this to carry around with significantly better hardware for the same price. Seems like the laptop to beat in this generation.
My bad, it's $150 more. Given what you're getting though it's EASILY worth that extra $150. I'd prefer the P35K, 15" instead of 14". You doing a review on that as well or just the 14"? I assume they're pretty comparable.
- For web browsing, do you do any scrolling? I'd imagine that would drain the battery a bit as well. - "minutes per Wh" has no real meaning. Why don't you simply show "watts" instead? It would be the same (invert the graphs and multiply by 60), and we would see numbers that actually mean something.
The battery life testing is all done automatically, so no scrolling. While that's not a perfect representation of how people use laptops, coming up with a way to simulate interaction with a laptop that's repeatable and consistent is far outside of our abilities. (No, I'm not going to sit in front of a laptop using the touchpad every minute or so for the duration of the battery tests -- especially not on laptops like this where it takes 15 hours to run down the battery in the Light test!)
As for Min/Wh, of course it has meaning: it's how many minutes of battery life you'll get for every Watt-hour of battery capacity. Yes, we could convert that to simply "watts" if we wanted, but considering we're normalizing to battery capacity it makes more sense to me to keep that fact in the numbers. If we simply put "watts", someone is going to take that to mean we're actually measuring power draw in some fashion, when in reality I'm merely taking the battery life and dividing it by the capacity.
Put another way, you're smart enough to post the above comment asking about scrolling, so please don't pretend to be incapable of understanding the meaning behind "minutes per watt-hour". Saying it has "no meaning" would be like saying 1 Joule per second has no meaning... except that's what we now call a Watt (after James Watt). And of course Joule is named after James Prescott Joule, and it stands for the energy expended in applying a force of one Newton through a distance of one meter (or kg*m^2/s^2). Oh, and a Newton is named after Sir Isaac Newton, and represents kg * m / s^2. Whee! Maybe someday someone will come up with a name for Min/Wh -- I propose we call it a Walton. </sarcasm>
Great review Jarred... I have some questions regarding battery life/testing.
1. Which browsers are you using for Windows/OSX testing ? Native for each, IE/Safari, or crossplatform Chrome for both ? I trust that using the native solution for each platform is the most battery efficient option.
2. And at your normalization charts... specifically under full load... do you reckon that 1080p and the 1.6GHz might be the culprit behind lower efficiency compared to the MBA in the chart(with the lower CPU and the lower res)?
Yes, Safari and IE (now IE10 with Win8) are used. I also use Windows Media Player for the music (which is more power friendly than the Windows Music App), but I switch to Media Player Classic - Home Cinema for the video. I don't know what Anand uses on OS X for the movies or music -- probably iTunes for music, and some standard video player?
Regarding normalization, I think resolution may have a very small impact in some tests, possibly a larger impact for the 1080p video playback. I actually did some testing last year and found that Windows 8 seems to have leveled the playing field for 1080p video decoding though -- like, running a display at 1366x768 vs. 1080p had virtually no effect on battery life. That wasn't the case with Windows 7, so the new display driver model may have optimized some stuff in relation to video playback.
Anyway, it's difficult to say what the exact reason for the drop is at higher loads (the Heavy test), but since we're doing 8Mbps network stream + 1080p 12Mbps H.264 + fast web browsing there are a lot of parts in the system that will be active. My bet is that Apple just manages to keep things at lower power states better than Windows.
I understand you don't want to manually scroll. I was just asking if you had some automatic scrolling figured out. No big deal though.
As for units having meaning... what you just listed are standard units, and they all have their uses. A useless unit would be for example "furlongs per fortnight". It's a unit of speed, and you can make charts with it, showing you nicely how things compare relative to each other, but the numbers themselves would be meaningless and you might as well skip them altogether. My point was that while your graph shows the relative power efficiency of the computers, which in itself is kind of interesting, the number "10" in "min/Wh" doesn't really say anything meaningful. It would be more interesting to know that the computer uses 6W. How reliable that number is is another matter of course. Like you said, you're not measuring power, and so have to trust the battery capacity numbers, but I think it's still a better way to represent the same thing.
A note to the scrolling: I have the reviewed laptop, and I've noticed surprisingly high CPU usage in SynTPEnh.exe (I.e. the touchpad driver). I'd expect that to mean that any touchpad usage - even accidental contact which the touchpad driver (as mentioned in the review) filters out - will cause the CPU to burn power, reducing battery life.
And in practice, I don't think I've achieved 8 hours of life (even just when web-browsing); sony's estimate of 6.5 hours seems more realistic.
In short: I think the comment about scrolling and touchpad usage is something that matters.
seems i'm about on the same page as you, jarred, when it comes to ultrabooks. i too find 13" to be the sweet spot, but i'm still using my 2010 13-inch mpb, which already gets a bit old in the tooth, if i'm honest.
i also like the zenbooks very much and am eagerly waiting for the upgraded version/s to arrive. i like some of sony's offerings, but their pricing and flexible, if not flimsy feeling hardware is just too much of a turn-off for me. the metal finish of the zenbooks on the other hand is right up my alley and i'm hoping to get my hands on the new gorilla glass covered units as soon as possible, so i can form an opinion.
Just saw Lenovo's updated Yoga 2--13.3" 3200x1800. Best Buy sells a i5-4200U/128GB SSD/4GB RAM version for $1000 and Lenovo's site currently has the i5/256GB/8GB version for $1150. That's how pricing should be!
Dang, that's actually really impressive pricing from Lenovo. Sure, the Yoga 2 is a bit heavier than the VAIO Pro 13, and they currently have a sale going on, but when you can get 3200x1800 and 8GB RAM/256GB SSD for less than this Sony, I have to think that's the way to go.
I am surprised that there wasn't any discussion on SSD types that could be found within the unit, especially since some configured systems contained much slower SATA M.2 SSDs, vice the Samsing native M.2 PCIe. We learned first hand and, whereas our first system contained a SSD capable of 500MB/s, the one we received yesterday (and posted on) reached 1GB/s with a 256GB Samsung. Would love to have seen some SSD results here as they are far and few in between and this is the most powerful storage performance ultra in the world right now, when received with the PCIe M.2. LOTS of unhappy customers who have received the SATA M.2 as well. Other than that nice system and nice review except for the continuous fan (always) and heat emmitted from the fan. I hope you dont mind but I think the storage performance differentiation is significant:
While I understand the importance some users will place on the SSD speed, the reality is that we often have component lotteries on laptops. I can run a few SSD performance numbers, but keep in mind that the time to review a laptop is already rather long, so adding more low level tests just bloats that. We're one of the few sites that continues to focus on long-form content these days, and even then we still have to draw the line somewhere. My feeling is that I can leave low-level SSD benchmarks to Anand and Kristian, where they can fully characterize the performance in a specific test bed, and I can mostly focus on the overall laptop experience.
A lot of users and reviewers have complained about the loud fan noise on the Vaio Pro 13 but you didn't seem to have any such issues.
Did you use the Silent fan settings in your review? Can you tell whether the lack of loud fan noise in your review is due to CPU throttling (i.e. loss of performance) or has Sony resolved previous issues in this area?
Would you know whether there would be a noticeable difference in this regard between the i5 and i7 config?
The CPU and Fan setting (in the VAIO Control Center) is set to "Performance" -- so apparently fan noise has been addressed with an updated BIOS/firmware, and perhaps resulted in more throttling.
Awesome review Jarred, thank you! I had fallen in love with this laptop at BestBuy in Canada last week where it was on sale for $1199 with 8GBs of RAM, touchscreen and 128GB SSD, however upon looking into it more, maybe I should wait...Problem is I am stuck with a Samsung Series 5 with an AMD A10 4655M and although the CPU isn't the best, I don't want to spend $1200+tax for a slightly lower GPU....decisions decisions...lol
On battery life: why does this review assign 559, 414 and 327 minutes to the MBA13 on light/medium/heavy web browsing, whereas Anand's original review: http://anandtech.com/show/7085/the-2013-macbook-ai... shows 11.03 hours, 8.93 and 5.53 hours (662 minutes, 536 and 332 minutes respectively)? Are they different benchmarks? Is the MBA running windows in this test?
Interesting. I grabbed the numbers for the MBA13 from Mobile Bench, but I honestly don't know where those figures came from. I will have to ask Anand -- it's possible he ran the tests under Windows, or maybe he retested and got better battery life the second time. It's also possible there was an error in putting scores into Bench, but really I don't see any relation to what's there and what's in the MBA13 article.
I'll give the update a shot today. As for the MBA13 numbers that Durandal7 asked about, they are indeed from Windows 8 on the MBA, so I need to edit the text. As usual, running OSX delivers much better battery life than under Windows for the Apple hardware.
You mention in the article that avoiding the touch-screen saves a few bucks which may be an interesting option therefore. There are a few other advantages to that choice: it also saves 130g on an already very light laptop and gives you a screen with less glare. (Subjectively, it feels about as heavy as an iPad with the magnetic cover, which is quite something - although at 931g it's still slightly heavier). Finally, I've seen several glass touchscreens in ipads+MBA's crack, and given the flex in the casing I'd be even more worried here. However, if you don't have the touchscreen then there's nothing to crack.
In other words, if you want a road warrior (which this laptop indeed is quite good for), I'd definitely recommend avoiding the touch screen. The laptop's quite a bit better without it.
It is a somewhat good review. But why is it 3 month late? I had this computer in June. Yes, I got it soon after its launch. I was excited but soon let down. I hate the fan/electricity noise, tricky touchpad, and the wifi connect issues. I am a consumer, not a repairer. I hate been told again and again about updating Wifi firmware when it doesn't really help. The computer comes with tons of useless/trial software. Why does PC companies want to deteriorate their image like this? If you have a budget like $1300, go with macbook pro. Somebody told me. I hated it. I tried and now I know why.
We've got this laptop for a sales staff in my company - I've had it 3 weeks now and I haven't deployed it due to constant wireless issues. With no Wired option, its a dealbreaker - It WILL NOT connect after coming out of hibernate. I have to disable and enable to wireless card. Not acceptable for an end user to have to do. Odd thing is, it says its connected to the SSID, shows great signal strength, has an IP address... but I can't ping anything but loopback. 5 hours on the phone with sony invested. About to return the bloody thing.
I would like to see this against Yoga 2 pro which was recently selling for $1299 for haswell i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD. Plus it also has a 2nd slot under keyboard for extra msata. For $1599 yoga 2 pro comes with 512. I am seriously considering it Also because it has that tablet mode. Also it would be nice if all ultra books come with microsd slots like the surface 2. But I know that's wishful thinking.
I have been looking for a good 11.6" or 12-13" w/ backlit keyboard and decent battery life for awhile now. still using an old Atom netbook w 2GB RAM and an M4 SSD. These are pricier that what I wanted to spend but I am ready to finally get something soon. Are the RAM or hard drive user upgradeable? I see the HD is PCIe, is that mSATA? Is the RAM soldered to the MB? Thanks-
I got the Sony Vaio Pro 13 but ended up returning it (-%15) Mine ended up having a wifi issue of low wifi speed When there is a direct line of sight between router and laptop I don't think there is any issue Where I use the laptop i'm on a different floor than the router My smartphone, old laptop & desktop all get good speeds browsing and in internet speed tests But the Sony Vaio pro Never could get decent speed - Icouldn't watch youtube videos (buffering) and sometimes couldn't even load gmail properly
I took the Sony on a trip and had the same problem where ever I went - ipads, my old laptop, etc all worked normally while theSony Vaio Pro 13 was slow slow I gave up trying to browse websites or check email on it
I tried fixing it for a month because overall its a pretty slick laptop but in the end returning it was my best option
Other thoughts about the laptop: When the fan kicks in it is a little too loud - louder than you would expect - not a deal breaker but not a high class touch The multitouch trackpad was not as responsive as I would've liked - I tried the apple laptops in an apple store and I could scroll webpages up and down with a lot of speed, responsiveness and no glitches - with the Sony Vaio Pro I had to coax the trackpad to work by tapping a few times and then starting slowly to get things rolling and then ramp up to my speed and then it would start hiccuping and I would switch to using the touchscreen. I think you will find you need to use both the touchscreen and the touchpad because one alone is not very reliable/responsive as it should be Screen was beautiful - as good if not better than any i've seen (glossy not so great for getting work done outdoors but beautiful in the right conditions) The Macbook air has a TN panel and the TN panel is no comparison to this IPS panel (i don't see much difference between retina and non-retina but TN vs IPS makes a big difference for me)
Have owned several Sony Z ultraportable computers with great success. Primarily used for SolidWorks 3D modeling and assemblies. I want to upgrade and have considered the Pro Red 13 ($2600) for the configuration and addition support. Any opinions? What other high end 13" small lap tops should I consider?
Just noticed the perf and power comparisons are to an Acer S7 391 (the year-old model), not this summer's S7 392 (the Haswell system, shipping a roughly the same time as the Haswell MBA). Would be great to see the Haswell-to-Haswell comparisons across these vendors - I suspect the 2013 MBA has met its match in every dimension ('cept brand).
I cannot agree more with broccauley. Even modern Wifis drop all the time, and one can't seriously copy a large file through wifi (the performance is at best 10-15MB/s in practice, assuming the router is in the same room!) and it adds a significant lag . I am very frustrated that all laptops seem to now drop Ethernet. And a laptop that needs to have ten dongles to be able to do the most basic functions isn't really a laptop. I have been a big fan of Sony's Z Series and own 3 generations. But I won't touch these new model until they offer an Ethernet port.
Hello Jarred, Thank you for a great review. I own the Sony Vaio Pro 13. It's great, but the Wifi is very bad unless in the same room with the router. I often have trouble at SBUX even when my iPhone 4s connects flawlessly. Do you still have this laptop and able to do any numerical comparison with other similar laptops at various distances from router? Other forums seem to think the design may be flawed, and only workaround is USB wifi adapter. That's a shame.
Just ordered a Vaio Pro 13 on sale. 1035€. i7, 8GB, 256GB PCIe and without touchscreen. Here in Austria prices are ridiculous and they had some sail and used a bit of a student discount. This model in stores here is over 1300€. Wanted to go with the MB Air but i7, 8GB, 256GB with a student discount is 1455€ which is just too much...
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Drumsticks - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Two months ago or so Sony had an awesome sale (presumably back to school) on this. I helped my friend pick out the Vaio Pro 13 with the 4200U, 8GB Ram, and a 256GB SSD for $1200 or so. I thought it was a pretty decent deal at the time, especially given the relative rarity of haswell ultrabooks at the time. The SSD upgrade was only $120 and I think RAM upgrade was about $50. I think we might have added the battery sheet at some point.Then of course her (rich and trying in every way to spoil her great daughter), against any advice I could muster, found the need to throw in a 512GB SSD (SEVEN HUNDRED dollar upgrade), the i7, and some other obnoxiously useless upgrades for a friend of mine who browses facebook and simply needed a nice laptop for class. End price ended up being about $2500.
But regardless, if this can be had on sale I think it's definitely a great choice. Personally, I think I want the Asus you mentioned as soon as it's out!
Drumsticks - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Oh yeah, great review, thanks!kevin_newell - Thursday, October 9, 2014 - link
It's nice I agree! But it doesn't change the fact that Sony VAIO Pro 13 stands no chance to some of the top laptops on the market. /Kevin from http://www.consumertop.com/best-laptop-guide/teiglin - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Yeah I bought just a bit ahead of that sale; I was super annoyed when I saw it. With that sale, the Vaio Pros were actually a bit cheaper than a lot of the higher-end Ivy ultrabooks available at the time. It was something like $50 off the RAM/CPU upgrades, $100 off the 256GB SSD upgrade, $50 off the sheet battery, and a $100 rebate to boot.I don't really know who they're trolling with that $720 512GB SSD upgrade. I'm really glad I can live okay in 256GB. And $2500 sounds about right for the fully-kitted out version--if I had more money than sense, I'd love to tote around the red version they sell (http://store.sony.com/vaio-pro-13-zid27-SVP1321BPX... - $2600!).
Brutalizer - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Gamin sucks, but it seems to be a great laptop, because it is small. If only you could connect an external graphics card everything would be good. I saw someone modded an Mac book Air to use an external graphics card. Can this be modded too?purerice - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
"Modding" in that case essentially means they used a Thunderbolt/Lightpeak cable to connect to an externally housed GPU. Technically you could also do that with Firewire or USB but even USB3.0 bandwidth is so limited that you would be better off with the Intel graphics.In the case of the Macbook, Somebody was guessing the cost of the housing at $200-$250 without a GPU. That would put the cost of a good GPU+case at $350-$500. For some people it would be worth it, for others not so much.
hodakaracer96 - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
"The keyboard gets a pass, but I’d rate it a B rather than an A" I think you mean touchpad.JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Thanks, corrected. :-)Samus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Considering Sony's reputation for making short-life laptops it's hard to justify dishing out a months rent on something that will probably fail right after the warranty expires. Practically every VAIO I've ever come across beginning with the Transmetta Crusoe ultraportable's a decade ago have had chronic overheating problems, failed hard disks (from overheating) and terrible, terrible, terrible driver and warranty support.Some people think HP and Dell are bad, but man you haven't seen anything until you've owned a Sony. 4 week turnaround time on warranty repairs for something that was likely purchased at a price premium over the competition. They are pretty machines, but if you want something pretty with decent reliability at this price, why would you pass up a MacBook Air 13?
br1an - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
I've owned several Vaios but only needed one warranty experience (in the UK) and it was excellent. The collection and turnaround time was very quick (4 business days from pickup to return) and they checked and replaced a whole lot of stuff that wasn't within the specified scope of the warranty claim. Okay it wasn't major technical stuff - the palmrest cover had unglued on my F series, which they replaced - but they also replaced the fan, the whole keyboard and trackpad because they felt it needed it. Also nice were all the updates so I knew exactly what was going on - even DHL were announcing delivery with automated option to reschedule or re-address.Samus - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Funny you mention the fan. Sony had a number of units recalled in 2010 for fan warping. Happy to hear service in the UK is up to par; it is garbage in the USA.br1an - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Always been a bit disappointed by Vaio cooling. Shame that over in the USA you only get 1 year warranty - two is standard in the UK.rinneh - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Totally not sharing this experience, had a budget vaio for years and my mom is still using it since 2007 and i had a vaio z13 since 2011 and it never skipped a beat and still work great, replaced it with a samsung ativ book 8 that doest feel as well constructed at all even though its 1kg more heavy than the Z13. The z13 survived all my trips from europe to japan without being even inside a laptop sleeve.tomascivinod - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Anand, my dad is looking at buying this laptop, but there has been issues reported about its wifi being bad, dropping signals, not getting them. Did you see this behaviour at all?Also, on all the display models I have seen instore, the trackpad seems to be loose in the corners. Did you notice this on your review sample?
Best review I have read on the web yet though, as always!
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
The touchpad doesn't feel loose, but it's hard to "click" in the bottom and top corners (basically it doesn't depress much). As I note in the review, the touchpad works okay but isn't the best I've used. As for the WiFi, I've noticed on quite a few Intel 7260 adapters (doesn't seem to matter matter if it's AC, dual-band N, or single-band N) that the WiFi will occasionally lose the ability to connect; turn on airplane mode (disable the WiFi) and then turn it back off and that fixes the problem. It seems to happen about once a week, roughly.juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
A driver update from intel fixed the WiFi problems for me.Intel® PROSet/Wireless Software and Drivers for Windows 8* version 16.1.5
7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
fixed connection-drop problem. Not the range problem on the Vaio Pro 13.7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Did you only use the pc quite close to a good APLook here: http://community.sony.com/t5/VAIO-Hardware-Network...
I have a Asus Dark Knight, and serious problems. If you look on pictures from inside the pc - or open it up yourself - you will see that the antenna ain't in the monitor - just two cables close to the motherboard.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I used the laptop around the house, but not long-range testing. I will have to look into that later, but at least for general WiFi I didn't have problems at up to 50 feet or so from my router.7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Did you do performance testing of the wifi and compared to others, or only used it for web surfing? HD-streaming and large file tranfers?can be work a second look - or a feedback from Sony if they have new revision of the pc with a new antenna design.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Okay, not sure if 50 feet is accurate or not -- it works within my house fine. Leave my house, though, and you're right: WiFi performance goes to basically nothing. I'll update the review with some additional information.juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
On the gigantic sony vaio pro 13-tread it was mentioned that most people don't have problems with 5Ghz-channels. Are you using 5ghz or 2.4ghz? I have been using the 2.4Ghz 802.11N and have not noticed (after driver upgrade) any slowdowns.. but im only using it for normal surfing.http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony-owners-lounge...
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
5GHz range and performance is better than 2.4GHz in my limited testing, but range of 5GHz isn't much better -- maybe 5-10 feet. I've tested other laptops where 2.4GHz band reaches about 50 feet farther than 5GHz, so something is fishy when 2.4GHz has less range. I don't know if it's Intel's drivers or something else, though.TinHat - Sunday, December 1, 2013 - link
I've heard a lot of talk about interference from USB 3. Do you think poorly shielded components might be at play here?7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I get better performance on short range with 5 GHz. But the range ain't good on either 2.4 or 5. In the office where there are quite many networks, I'm down to no connection at all after 50 feet with just one light wall between me and the AP. At the same time/place, I can get 30+ Mbps with a another pc with other pc's with Intel wifi.On battery, wifi is sett to "max performance" in the power options. This can make a impact on some systems.
juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I just read about this on http://www.trustedreviews.com/asus-rt-ac68u-802-11... on the comments:"The broadband noise emitted from a USB 3.0 device can affect the SNR and limit the sensitivity of any wireless receiver whose antenna is physically located close to the USB 3.0 device. This may result in a drop in throughput on the wireless link."
http://www.usb.org/developers/whitepapers/327216.p...
Are you people using the usb 3.0 ports on either end? (at the router or laptop)
7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
No.jaff32 - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I hear a lot of people complaining about the bad WiFi on the Vaio Pro. If you're signal is excellent then any crappy WiFi solution will work well but when signal strength get weak, the Vaio Pro struggle a lot. That's definitely very bad for a road warrior where you're going to encounter many places with weak WiFi signals.If you never leave your house with your notebook then the WiFi issues may not be apparent but then you wouldn't really be looking for a "Pro" notebook anyway.
meacupla - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
While the MSRP is $1250, I have seen this on sale for $1150, which hurts less and puts it closer to surface pro 2, in terms of a complete package.And these new vaio pros are extremely light for their size compared to SP2.
Amkitsaw - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I apologize if you already said this, but what is the total weight (and dimensions) with the sheet battery?JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
The sheet battery raises the back about half an inch (1.34" total height at rear -- 34.1mm) and according to my little food scale the laptop with the battery weighs 2.97 pounds (1.348kg).Amkitsaw - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Thanks so much! It's a great review; I completely agree with your assessment at the end about manufacturers raising the ~$1200 ultrabook spec to 8GB/256GB. It's a little ridiculous so many manufacturers are holding onto 4GB in 2013.teiglin - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Nice review as always, Jarred. One issue though--my Vaio Pro 13 claims to have Dual-Band Wireless-N 7260 (<3 Intel part naming) and has no apparent issues connecting to my 5GHz AP. Is it possible that this varies between models?The one other downside of the flex-y chassis you don't mention (maybe didn't encounter?) is that you can actually click the clickpad by pressing down on either side of the touchpad, or by placing a thumb between the touchpad and the edge, and lifting the laptop with your hand underneath it. Practically this is only very rarely an issue (if I'm walking around and holding the laptop by the front, mostly--and the lightness makes this something I do more often than I would have thought), but it bears mentioning.
On the pricing front, I would love to see Sony come down a bit, but it's been four months and there is still pretty sparse competition. There's the Acer S7--on Amazon, $1300 for the i5/128GB SSD/8GB RAM model, or $1580 for i7/256GB SSD upgrade--or the ATIV Book 9 for $1400, but in order to get its beautiful screen, you have to suffer its ridiculous single configuration of 128GB SSD/4GB RAM. Dell's XPS 13 is still Ivy if you buy it today, and the XPS 12 is neither priced much better (especially with upgrades), nor to my mind a directly competing product. Especially now that you can shave $100 off by dropping the touchscreen, Sony's still at or near the front of the Haswell ultrabook pack in value here. It'll be interesting to see how the rMBP 13 compares--and the Zenbook Infinity, if it ever materializes.
teiglin - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Forgot to mention the Surface Pro 2, since you did--if you're comparing to that, you should probably compare the 11" flavor, which starts at $100 less than the 13 and essentially costs the same as Surface Pro 2 when you include a type cover. I do think for roughly the same price, Surface Pro wins that value comparison easily, though again if the tablet-y-ness isn't a factor you save $100 by dumping the touchscreen in the VAIO.Also on that topic, you wrote that Surface Pro 2 comes out in "ten weeks"--doesn't it come out next week? The Anandtech article (admittedly old at this point) says Oct 22.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Should have said 10 days. Heh. Wrote that earlier so now I need to edit it....7heF - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
There is A LOT of Vaio Pro 13 owners that has huge wifi-problems. If you are in the same room as the AP, it can be ok, but some distance a a couple of walls and this pc is one of the worst on the market. No antenna in the screen - just a small cable behind the motherboard.I use a usb-dongle for wifi. With the internal solution, some of my 802.11g-based old pc's have much better range. My house ain't that large, but all over the house I can get coverage on the iPhone and the iPad - but with the Sony the performance is very low, unstable or completly without a connection.
Sony have for months said there will be an software update for this problem. I doubt it. I belive the antenna is the problem and that it really can't be fixed.
There is a huge thread at the Sony forums about the issue: http://community.sony.com/t5/VAIO-Hardware-Network...
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Text on pages 2 and 6 has been updated. It's odd that the WiFi works so well within my home, but the exterior walls just kill throughput (assuming you can connect at all). I had some similar issues with the Acer R7, though oddly only on the 2.4GHz band.whatever61 - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
You don't mention an important factor, that this laptop has a problematic wifi.There's no solution for months and probably the problem is in the hardware.
To be more specific, the speed drops drastically when the signal is not good. Some say it's because of a bad antenna location. Anyway, it's a very strong factor to take into account before buying this awesome (besides that one flaw) laptop.
Also, take into account that the back cover is very easily scratchable (way too easy!)
And yes, the extremely light weight is really exceptional!
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
As noted above, the text on pages 2 and 6 has been updated. Thanks!juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I bought the Vaio Pro 13 (i7-4500, 8Gb, 256gb toshiba ssd, no touch, 3year warranty) almost 2 months ago for 1200€. I must admit that it had it driver problems on start but every update has actually made a difference and now all problems are solved. It had a bit problems with fan, bluetooth and wifi, but as i said, updates solved those.I have to totally disagree with the "built quality"-issue, flexibility is by design not because they used sub-par engineering and materials. If you check how big the actual motherboard is, its about half of the depth of the laptop so its not flexing at all. One reviewer also noted that Sony has done these flexible design's before and now few years after those laptops haven't gotten any problems. If you close the lid than vaio 13 isnt bending almost at all. Jarred if you need a crowbar, than use something else than laptop :)
Jarred could you add some benchmarks about the ssd speed? If you get the samsung model.. its should do almost 1Gb/sec sequantials and the 4k read/writes arent that bad either. I got the 256gb toshiba and it still beats a samsung 840pro.
One thing about the display and calibration, Pro13 should use Sony's Tri-luminos tech and that surely could confuse the colormeter?
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I don't know about the Tri-luminos tech confusing my colorimeter, but I have verified on a couple laptops that the calibration just looks really off, so I've held off doing any more potentially flawed testing.As for build quality, I noted that it's by design, but I disagree with the design. Yes, it should hold up reasonably well, but laptops like the ASUS U-series, MacBook Air, heck even the Acer S7 all feel better (though the keyboard on the Acer is not at all good in my book). It's a sacrifice of rigidity in favor of being ultra lightweight, and that's fine -- I can live with it and not complain too much. Still, I wish Sony would reinforce the chassis just a bit more. Carbon fiber is not at all heavy, so another layer or two bonded on there would do wonders.
SSD performance is good, and really maximum transfer rates start to become meaningless past a certain point. I would rather have a somewhat slower 256GB SSD than a faster 128GB SSD, simply because I need more capacity. But the VAIO Pro 13 does boot and load programs very fast (other than Windows 8 Apps, which as usual take far too long to load).
teiglin - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
My 256GB unit has a Samsung, and I got 1GB/s sequential read and 825MB/s sequential write just now, if you're curious. Is the Toshiba worse?As for the build quality, I didn't think Jarred was too harsh on it--he mentioned that he liked a more "solid" feel as a matter of preference and not that there's anything inherently wrong with the flexible chassis. I can get a noticeable amount of flex even when mine is closed though, if I squeeze it--again not problematic necessarily, but I can understand if people would like a more rigid design better. Obviously increasing rigidity isn't going to keep the laptop at 2.3lbs.
juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
When I was ordering, I picked the free 256gb option. I just checked the sony webstore again and now they are offering msata and pci-e options for SSD atleast in Europe. (256gb pci-e upgrade is free btw).I remember the Toshiba being very similar to 840pro speeds, maybe its the msata version. But anyhow its plenty fast. SSD is just something that people should make note because there are alot of different versions Sony ship with these.
SetiroN - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
You really need to re-think your benchmark suite.Who gives a crap about how far an ultraportable goes below 20fps in games.
We need to know how its SSD performs, how long it takes to elaborate files, zip them, copy them. How fast network transfers are. REAL WORLD USE, not freakin' cinebench.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
The PCMark scores more or less encapsulate all of the data points you're after. I noted that the SSD is quite fast, and has very good boot times. The CPU results are there just as reference points, and the gaming tests are there to show that, no, this is not a gaming laptop. You'll notice how much time I spent discussing the benchmarks, and that's because for the most part the benchmarks (outside of battery life) simply aren't important. It's more than fast enough. If you have to know how much faster it is than other laptops, you're probably going to want something with a quad-core CPU and a dGPU. Ultrabooks for the most part target the mainstream user that values mobility over performance, so that's the focus of the review.piroroadkill - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
ASUS UX301: with the desired i7-4558U (which is also what I'm interested in) is available in Germany.http://www.amazon.de/Zenbook-UX301LA-Ultrabook-Int...
Since it's publicly available, there's no NDA. I say buy one from Germany and get it shipped. You know people want an indepth review on it.
piroroadkill - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Also, I mean the i7-4558U is what I'm interested in. The Asus Zenbook Infinity (UX301) does look good, too. I'd love to see it released properly so I could play with the available configurations.However, pretty much any laptop with this CPU that is 13" is worth reviewing.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Now if only I had the money to buy things and have them shipped to me for review....Fatality - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Great review, But where is the mention of bloatware? Does this thing come with lots of it? I ask this because specs and presence of Bloatware are the primary factors I base my buying decision on. I know a lot of people who do that as well. Has Bloatware? no buy.juhatus - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I think win8 has generally reduced bloat, but on this vaio pro 13 Sony has put few modern app's and mcafee virus protection (witch i instantly uninstalled and went with win8 defender) Also i think there was the office365 trial included, have not even started that. But id say very little bloat.JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Yes, pretty much what you said. There's some VAIO utilities, but they're not too obtrusive and I like some of the features the VAIO Care Center offers (it gives reasonably detailed control over the various settings like the keyboard backlighting among other things). I also uninstalled the McAfee software (we always test without any Firewall enabled and no anti-virus software running, just for consistency). I personally have been using Microsoft Security Essentials on my PCs since it came out and haven't had any problems, but then I avoid the sort of sites that tend to infect PCs so YMMV.jyotib - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I did buy this machine three months ago, but with a Sony deal that gave a 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM for about the price listed for your review machine. I must say it has been a truly excellent machine for me, as I favour a top flight display, light weight, long battery life and fast operation.The Wi-Fi problem you reference was a real pain, but the Intel driver update has (mostly) sorted it out. It does surface in an unusual way, though. If the machine goes to sleep in one location, and then wakes in a location with a different Wi-Fi router, it does not seem to find it without restarting the Wi-Fi adaptor.
Another update for the display driver now seems to cause the display to get stuck on a low brightness level every now and then - not sure what is going on, as this behaviour was not apparent before the update.
I recognise that the use of carbon fibre has made the Vaio feel flexible, but the design's build quality does not strike me as inadequate in any way. One caveat after 3 months of use is that the keys seem to imprint themselves on the screen so that (at certain angles) I can see key marks on the display. I feel that this is a design problem, caused by the search for a thin device. I did discuss this with Sony and the answer from them was that I needed to use the cloth that came with the device - this black cloth seemed to be part of the packaging but it is quite important, and should not be thrown away. It needs to cover on the keyboard every time you shut the lid. I thought this would be remarkably frustrating and that I would lose the cloth immediately. Somehow, I have got used to it and the cloth is still present three months in. Would I prefer that Sony had sorted out the problem in the design work? Yes, yes.
Overall, I am struck how well my personal experience with the machine reflects the findings of the reviewer. This might be the first time I have read an Anandtech review of a product I already know well - rather than reading about a product I might be considering - and its accuracy in laying out my own use case does encourage me to consider your reviews seriously next time I am seeking a new device. Well done.
monstercameron - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Jarred why not compare it to a6-5200? the a4-5000 only makes the AMD competition look terrible in comparison.JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Because we never had one for testing.hughlle - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I'm just a little comfused by the lack of information in the battery graphs. You might as well just remove the numbers entirely. 959 what's? What am i actually looking at? I can make out the graphs lower down as being rated in hours, but what about the former graphs?JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
They're in minutes... not sure why the subtext no longer says that as I swear it used to be there. I'll fix that....Chrispy_ - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Mind-boggling expensive for a Dual-core with only 4GB of RAM, a small SSD and the entry-level IGP, portable or not.Is it worth it?
NO. Not even close.
hfm - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Stop messing around with these other devices and post the p34g review. :)JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I have to get one other finished first (Clevo W740SU), but the preview should tell you much of what you need to know. I just need to test actually gaming performance and battery life, as well as check for any heat issues. It's a shame their keyboard isn't that great though.hfm - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
How's the cooling system noise under gaming load?vision33r - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I rather get this ultrabook than the compromised Surface Pro. What I found is that Win8 is terrible on a small screen, smaller than 12" is no good. Much better with more real estate.Surface Pro has a terrible keyboard cover it is so spongy how could anyone type on it. Then the Surface Pro tend to heat up when you watch movies and it has a very poor cooling system, think of it as a hot griddle that you can cook eggs on if it gets hot.
Just like the PS3 vs Xbox 360, the PS3 was a better designed hardware overall. Microsoft is bad with hardware, all those defective RROD 360 is the reason why I wouldn't trust them as a device maker.
DukeN - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Ugh, glossy screen = deal breaker.Will stick to my Thinkpad.
juhatus - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Actually the touch-enabled is glossy and non-touch is matta.eamon - Saturday, October 19, 2013 - link
You can get the non-touchscreen version (which I have and minimal glare) for around 100$ less; as a bonus: it's 130g lighter; mine weighs in at just 0.93kg.juhatus - Sunday, October 20, 2013 - link
Jared: might want to add its 0.932kg withouth touch. I weighted it and yes thats how much it weights.foxalopex - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Sony's high end laptops are usually pretty impressive. I own a VPC-Z11 laptop that's about 3 years old now and amazingly few laptops can compare to this ultraportable even today. Sony often uses completely custom designs and their high end laptops are often assembled in the US or in Japan.The biggest downside with Sony is because it's all custom you're going to need to pray if you break it. At least in Canada where their repair service is dismal and expensive. Even the parts cost a fortune due to custom design.
Hrel - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Good review, seems like too many compromises. Then you factor in the price and I agree with your conclusion entirely. Really looking forward to that Gigabyte review, barely bulkier than this to carry around with significantly better hardware for the same price. Seems like the laptop to beat in this generation.Hrel - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
My bad, it's $150 more. Given what you're getting though it's EASILY worth that extra $150. I'd prefer the P35K, 15" instead of 14". You doing a review on that as well or just the 14"? I assume they're pretty comparable.JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I'll see if Gigabyte wants to send the P35K once I wrap up the P34G... stay tuned!ajp_anton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
I'd like to comment on your battery life tests.- For web browsing, do you do any scrolling? I'd imagine that would drain the battery a bit as well.
- "minutes per Wh" has no real meaning. Why don't you simply show "watts" instead? It would be the same (invert the graphs and multiply by 60), and we would see numbers that actually mean something.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
The battery life testing is all done automatically, so no scrolling. While that's not a perfect representation of how people use laptops, coming up with a way to simulate interaction with a laptop that's repeatable and consistent is far outside of our abilities. (No, I'm not going to sit in front of a laptop using the touchpad every minute or so for the duration of the battery tests -- especially not on laptops like this where it takes 15 hours to run down the battery in the Light test!)As for Min/Wh, of course it has meaning: it's how many minutes of battery life you'll get for every Watt-hour of battery capacity. Yes, we could convert that to simply "watts" if we wanted, but considering we're normalizing to battery capacity it makes more sense to me to keep that fact in the numbers. If we simply put "watts", someone is going to take that to mean we're actually measuring power draw in some fashion, when in reality I'm merely taking the battery life and dividing it by the capacity.
Put another way, you're smart enough to post the above comment asking about scrolling, so please don't pretend to be incapable of understanding the meaning behind "minutes per watt-hour". Saying it has "no meaning" would be like saying 1 Joule per second has no meaning... except that's what we now call a Watt (after James Watt). And of course Joule is named after James Prescott Joule, and it stands for the energy expended in applying a force of one Newton through a distance of one meter (or kg*m^2/s^2). Oh, and a Newton is named after Sir Isaac Newton, and represents kg * m / s^2. Whee! Maybe someday someone will come up with a name for Min/Wh -- I propose we call it a Walton. </sarcasm>
ananduser - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Great review Jarred... I have some questions regarding battery life/testing.1. Which browsers are you using for Windows/OSX testing ? Native for each, IE/Safari, or crossplatform Chrome for both ? I trust that using the native solution for each platform is the most battery efficient option.
2. And at your normalization charts... specifically under full load... do you reckon that 1080p and the 1.6GHz might be the culprit behind lower efficiency compared to the MBA in the chart(with the lower CPU and the lower res)?
Thanks.
JarredWalton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Yes, Safari and IE (now IE10 with Win8) are used. I also use Windows Media Player for the music (which is more power friendly than the Windows Music App), but I switch to Media Player Classic - Home Cinema for the video. I don't know what Anand uses on OS X for the movies or music -- probably iTunes for music, and some standard video player?Regarding normalization, I think resolution may have a very small impact in some tests, possibly a larger impact for the 1080p video playback. I actually did some testing last year and found that Windows 8 seems to have leveled the playing field for 1080p video decoding though -- like, running a display at 1366x768 vs. 1080p had virtually no effect on battery life. That wasn't the case with Windows 7, so the new display driver model may have optimized some stuff in relation to video playback.
Anyway, it's difficult to say what the exact reason for the drop is at higher loads (the Heavy test), but since we're doing 8Mbps network stream + 1080p 12Mbps H.264 + fast web browsing there are a lot of parts in the system that will be active. My bet is that Apple just manages to keep things at lower power states better than Windows.
ajp_anton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
I understand you don't want to manually scroll. I was just asking if you had some automatic scrolling figured out. No big deal though.As for units having meaning... what you just listed are standard units, and they all have their uses. A useless unit would be for example "furlongs per fortnight". It's a unit of speed, and you can make charts with it, showing you nicely how things compare relative to each other, but the numbers themselves would be meaningless and you might as well skip them altogether.
My point was that while your graph shows the relative power efficiency of the computers, which in itself is kind of interesting, the number "10" in "min/Wh" doesn't really say anything meaningful. It would be more interesting to know that the computer uses 6W.
How reliable that number is is another matter of course. Like you said, you're not measuring power, and so have to trust the battery capacity numbers, but I think it's still a better way to represent the same thing.
eamon - Saturday, October 19, 2013 - link
A note to the scrolling: I have the reviewed laptop, and I've noticed surprisingly high CPU usage in SynTPEnh.exe (I.e. the touchpad driver). I'd expect that to mean that any touchpad usage - even accidental contact which the touchpad driver (as mentioned in the review) filters out - will cause the CPU to burn power, reducing battery life.And in practice, I don't think I've achieved 8 hours of life (even just when web-browsing); sony's estimate of 6.5 hours seems more realistic.
In short: I think the comment about scrolling and touchpad usage is something that matters.
fokka - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
seems i'm about on the same page as you, jarred, when it comes to ultrabooks. i too find 13" to be the sweet spot, but i'm still using my 2010 13-inch mpb, which already gets a bit old in the tooth, if i'm honest.i also like the zenbooks very much and am eagerly waiting for the upgraded version/s to arrive. i like some of sony's offerings, but their pricing and flexible, if not flimsy feeling hardware is just too much of a turn-off for me.
the metal finish of the zenbooks on the other hand is right up my alley and i'm hoping to get my hands on the new gorilla glass covered units as soon as possible, so i can form an opinion.
i'm looking forward to reading a review here!
Einy0 - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Looks a lot thicker than the Lenovo X1 Carbon...teiglin - Wednesday, October 16, 2013 - link
Just saw Lenovo's updated Yoga 2--13.3" 3200x1800. Best Buy sells a i5-4200U/128GB SSD/4GB RAM version for $1000 and Lenovo's site currently has the i5/256GB/8GB version for $1150. That's how pricing should be!JarredWalton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Dang, that's actually really impressive pricing from Lenovo. Sure, the Yoga 2 is a bit heavier than the VAIO Pro 13, and they currently have a sale going on, but when you can get 3200x1800 and 8GB RAM/256GB SSD for less than this Sony, I have to think that's the way to go.TheSSDReview - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
I am surprised that there wasn't any discussion on SSD types that could be found within the unit, especially since some configured systems contained much slower SATA M.2 SSDs, vice the Samsing native M.2 PCIe. We learned first hand and, whereas our first system contained a SSD capable of 500MB/s, the one we received yesterday (and posted on) reached 1GB/s with a 256GB Samsung. Would love to have seen some SSD results here as they are far and few in between and this is the most powerful storage performance ultra in the world right now, when received with the PCIe M.2. LOTS of unhappy customers who have received the SATA M.2 as well. Other than that nice system and nice review except for the continuous fan (always) and heat emmitted from the fan. I hope you dont mind but I think the storage performance differentiation is significant:SATA M.2 SSD: http://www.thessdreview.com/featured/sony-vaio-pro...
PCIe M.2 SSD: http://www.thessdreview.com/Forums/showthread.php?...
JarredWalton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
While I understand the importance some users will place on the SSD speed, the reality is that we often have component lotteries on laptops. I can run a few SSD performance numbers, but keep in mind that the time to review a laptop is already rather long, so adding more low level tests just bloats that. We're one of the few sites that continues to focus on long-form content these days, and even then we still have to draw the line somewhere. My feeling is that I can leave low-level SSD benchmarks to Anand and Kristian, where they can fully characterize the performance in a specific test bed, and I can mostly focus on the overall laptop experience.fr33h33l - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Jarred,A lot of users and reviewers have complained about the loud fan noise on the Vaio Pro 13 but you didn't seem to have any such issues.
Did you use the Silent fan settings in your review? Can you tell whether the lack of loud fan noise in your review is due to CPU throttling (i.e. loss of performance) or has Sony resolved previous issues in this area?
Would you know whether there would be a noticeable difference in this regard between the i5 and i7 config?
Thanks
JarredWalton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
The CPU and Fan setting (in the VAIO Control Center) is set to "Performance" -- so apparently fan noise has been addressed with an updated BIOS/firmware, and perhaps resulted in more throttling.BMNify - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
It is not that expensive if you consider the very expensive Vaio Z series which was replaced by this vaio pro.JarredWalton - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Which had a dGPU and thus better graphics performance (by far!)ketacdx - Thursday, October 17, 2013 - link
Awesome review Jarred, thank you! I had fallen in love with this laptop at BestBuy in Canada last week where it was on sale for $1199 with 8GBs of RAM, touchscreen and 128GB SSD, however upon looking into it more, maybe I should wait...Problem is I am stuck with a Samsung Series 5 with an AMD A10 4655M and although the CPU isn't the best, I don't want to spend $1200+tax for a slightly lower GPU....decisions decisions...lolDurandal7 - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
On battery life: why does this review assign 559, 414 and 327 minutes to the MBA13 on light/medium/heavy web browsing, whereas Anand's original review:http://anandtech.com/show/7085/the-2013-macbook-ai...
shows 11.03 hours, 8.93 and 5.53 hours (662 minutes, 536 and 332 minutes respectively)? Are they different benchmarks? Is the MBA running windows in this test?
JarredWalton - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Interesting. I grabbed the numbers for the MBA13 from Mobile Bench, but I honestly don't know where those figures came from. I will have to ask Anand -- it's possible he ran the tests under Windows, or maybe he retested and got better battery life the second time. It's also possible there was an error in putting scores into Bench, but really I don't see any relation to what's there and what's in the MBA13 article.I'll update when I have more information....
juhatus - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
And now that the windows 8.1 is available maybe you could run more thest to see it those S0ix-states really matter on haswell?Btw anyone updated to 8.1 already on SVP13? Any problems? Im a bit hesitant to upgrade still..
JarredWalton - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
I'll give the update a shot today. As for the MBA13 numbers that Durandal7 asked about, they are indeed from Windows 8 on the MBA, so I need to edit the text. As usual, running OSX delivers much better battery life than under Windows for the Apple hardware.eamon - Saturday, October 19, 2013 - link
You mention in the article that avoiding the touch-screen saves a few bucks which may be an interesting option therefore. There are a few other advantages to that choice: it also saves 130g on an already very light laptop and gives you a screen with less glare. (Subjectively, it feels about as heavy as an iPad with the magnetic cover, which is quite something - although at 931g it's still slightly heavier). Finally, I've seen several glass touchscreens in ipads+MBA's crack, and given the flex in the casing I'd be even more worried here. However, if you don't have the touchscreen then there's nothing to crack.In other words, if you want a road warrior (which this laptop indeed is quite good for), I'd definitely recommend avoiding the touch screen. The laptop's quite a bit better without it.
aliase - Saturday, October 19, 2013 - link
a little expensive for 128 gb ssd version.wdfmph - Sunday, October 20, 2013 - link
It is a somewhat good review. But why is it 3 month late? I had this computer in June. Yes, I got it soon after its launch. I was excited but soon let down. I hate the fan/electricity noise, tricky touchpad, and the wifi connect issues. I am a consumer, not a repairer. I hate been told again and again about updating Wifi firmware when it doesn't really help. The computer comes with tons of useless/trial software. Why does PC companies want to deteriorate their image like this?If you have a budget like $1300, go with macbook pro. Somebody told me. I hated it. I tried and now I know why.
JarredWalton - Monday, October 21, 2013 - link
It's three months late because Sony didn't want to ship us one earlier. Sorry!sudz - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
We've got this laptop for a sales staff in my company - I've had it 3 weeks now and I haven't deployed it due to constant wireless issues. With no Wired option, its a dealbreaker - It WILL NOT connect after coming out of hibernate. I have to disable and enable to wireless card. Not acceptable for an end user to have to do. Odd thing is, it says its connected to the SSID, shows great signal strength, has an IP address... but I can't ping anything but loopback. 5 hours on the phone with sony invested. About to return the bloody thing.Geronemo3 - Thursday, October 24, 2013 - link
I would like to see this against Yoga 2 pro which was recently selling for $1299 for haswell i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD. Plus it also has a 2nd slot under keyboard for extra msata. For $1599 yoga 2 pro comes with 512. I am seriously considering it Also because it has that tablet mode. Also it would be nice if all ultra books come with microsd slots like the surface 2. But I know that's wishful thinking.omaudio - Friday, October 25, 2013 - link
I have been looking for a good 11.6" or 12-13" w/ backlit keyboard and decent battery life for awhile now. still using an old Atom netbook w 2GB RAM and an M4 SSD. These are pricier that what I wanted to spend but I am ready to finally get something soon. Are the RAM or hard drive user upgradeable? I see the HD is PCIe, is that mSATA? Is the RAM soldered to the MB?Thanks-
strafejumper - Monday, October 28, 2013 - link
I got the Sony Vaio Pro 13 but ended up returning it (-%15)Mine ended up having a wifi issue of low wifi speed
When there is a direct line of sight between router and laptop I don't think there is any issue
Where I use the laptop i'm on a different floor than the router
My smartphone, old laptop & desktop all get good speeds browsing and in internet speed tests
But the Sony Vaio pro Never could get decent speed - Icouldn't watch youtube videos (buffering) and sometimes couldn't even load gmail properly
I took the Sony on a trip and had the same problem where ever I went - ipads, my old laptop, etc all worked normally while theSony Vaio Pro 13 was slow slow I gave up trying to browse websites or check email on it
I tried fixing it for a month because overall its a pretty slick laptop but in the end returning it was my best option
I'm not the only one who had this issue with the laptop - 117 pages on the Sony community forums about this issue:
http://community.sony.com/t5/VAIO-Hardware-Network...
Other thoughts about the laptop:
When the fan kicks in it is a little too loud - louder than you would expect - not a deal breaker but not a high class touch
The multitouch trackpad was not as responsive as I would've liked - I tried the apple laptops in an apple store and I could scroll webpages up and down with a lot of speed, responsiveness and no glitches - with the Sony Vaio Pro I had to coax the trackpad to work by tapping a few times and then starting slowly to get things rolling and then ramp up to my speed and then it would start hiccuping and I would switch to using the touchscreen.
I think you will find you need to use both the touchscreen and the touchpad because one alone is not very reliable/responsive as it should be
Screen was beautiful - as good if not better than any i've seen (glossy not so great for getting work done outdoors but beautiful in the right conditions)
The Macbook air has a TN panel and the TN panel is no comparison to this IPS panel
(i don't see much difference between retina and non-retina but TN vs IPS makes a big difference for me)
alphadean - Thursday, October 31, 2013 - link
Have owned several Sony Z ultraportable computers with great success. Primarily used for SolidWorks 3D modeling and assemblies. I want to upgrade and have considered the Pro Red 13 ($2600) for the configuration and addition support. Any opinions? What other high end 13" small lap tops should I consider?aritai - Saturday, November 2, 2013 - link
Just noticed the perf and power comparisons are to an Acer S7 391 (the year-old model), not this summer's S7 392 (the Haswell system, shipping a roughly the same time as the Haswell MBA). Would be great to see the Haswell-to-Haswell comparisons across these vendors - I suspect the 2013 MBA has met its match in every dimension ('cept brand).broccauley - Wednesday, November 6, 2013 - link
What is it with these laptop manufacturers dropping something as essential as Ethernet? Apple really does start some stupid trends.cm2187 - Monday, November 11, 2013 - link
I cannot agree more with broccauley. Even modern Wifis drop all the time, and one can't seriously copy a large file through wifi (the performance is at best 10-15MB/s in practice, assuming the router is in the same room!) and it adds a significant lag . I am very frustrated that all laptops seem to now drop Ethernet. And a laptop that needs to have ten dongles to be able to do the most basic functions isn't really a laptop. I have been a big fan of Sony's Z Series and own 3 generations. But I won't touch these new model until they offer an Ethernet port.LeeTech - Friday, November 15, 2013 - link
Hello Jarred, Thank you for a great review. I own the Sony Vaio Pro 13. It's great, but the Wifi is very bad unless in the same room with the router. I often have trouble at SBUX even when my iPhone 4s connects flawlessly. Do you still have this laptop and able to do any numerical comparison with other similar laptops at various distances from router? Other forums seem to think the design may be flawed, and only workaround is USB wifi adapter. That's a shame.TinHat - Sunday, December 1, 2013 - link
I've heard a lot of talk before this particular item about interference from USB 3. Poorly shielded components might be at play here?LaMpiR - Wednesday, December 11, 2013 - link
Just ordered a Vaio Pro 13 on sale. 1035€. i7, 8GB, 256GB PCIe and without touchscreen. Here in Austria prices are ridiculous and they had some sail and used a bit of a student discount. This model in stores here is over 1300€. Wanted to go with the MB Air but i7, 8GB, 256GB with a student discount is 1455€ which is just too much...HelgeSverre - Monday, March 10, 2014 - link
I wrote a review of this ultrabook as well, if anyone is looking for a different view on the laptop you can read it on my blog: http://helgesverre.com/blog/sony-vaio-pro-13-revie...