Ultrabook/thin laptop wish list - Buying end of summer

meathman 007

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Thanks for the feedback. Few decent options out there and I will add MBA onto my list, but it would have to have an ivybridge update and a higher res screen for it to be a runner for me.

As a sidenote, has the MBA proven it can run Windows 7 as good as windows based laptops?

As for my wanted list; the removable battery and dual ssd/hdd should have been put down as desirable and not deal breakers...
 
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yer_averagejoe

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It was announced today that the viao s and z series would recieve the updated cpus. It seems the viao z section of the shop is down - maybe for an update?. If the pricing stays the same as sandy bridge, youre looking at 850 for an i5, 4Gb ram, 128GB SSD and a 13.1 inch 1600 x 900 screen, all in a small, light carbon fibre package. *holds breath*
 

yer_averagejoe

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Well, here is the refreshed viao Z. It has the quad core mobile i7 which I suspect is pushing it over £1.1k. Hopefully a lower specced dual core i5 variant in June might bring that down to £900?

Intel®Core(TM)i7-3612QM,2.1GHz
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
128 GB SATA Gen3 Flash SSD
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM
No Power Media Dock
33.2 cm LCD, 1600x900 Premium
No Wireless WAN
No Long-Life Battery
Standard keyboard

£ 1,164.00 (inc. VAT)
 

Amp34

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yer_averagejoe said:
Well, here is the refreshed viao Z. It has the quad core mobile i7 which I suspect is pushing it over £1.1k. Hopefully a lower specced dual core i5 variant in June might bring that down to £900?

Intel®Core(TM)i7-3612QM,2.1GHz
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
128 GB SATA Gen3 Flash SSD
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM
No Power Media Dock
33.2 cm LCD, 1600x900 Premium
No Wireless WAN
No Long-Life Battery
Standard keyboard

£ 1,164.00 (inc. VAT)
Click to expand...

****** hell... Vaio Z prices have reduced massively in recent month. Even in January they started at around £1100 for the base model...:confused:
 

yer_averagejoe

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Amp34 said:
****** hell... Vaio Z prices have reduced massively in recent month. Even in January they started at around £1100 for the base model...:confused:
Click to expand...

Yeah I think they must have decided to bring themselves inline with competition. They weren't really sitting right in the market for no justifiable reason. You can still spec them up to silly prices though.

Last week base spec was 850 as I said. Which is awesome for a 1600*900 13", thin, carbon fibre laptop with i5 sandy bridge and 128GB SSD. I guess they were trying to sell them off before the refresh. They were also offering the extended battery for free.

Hopefully the IB I5 will drop the base spec down a bit more in price too. Then they'll be directly competing with the new macbook pros in June/July and it'll be a tough decision for me tbh.
 

meathman 007

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yer_averagejoe said:
Well, here is the refreshed viao Z. It has the quad core mobile i7 which I suspect is pushing it over £1.1k. Hopefully a lower specced dual core i5 variant in June might bring that down to £900?

Intel®Core(TM)i7-3612QM,2.1GHz
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
128 GB SATA Gen3 Flash SSD
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM
No Power Media Dock
33.2 cm LCD, 1600x900 Premium
No Wireless WAN
No Long-Life Battery
Standard keyboard

£ 1,164.00 (inc. VAT)
Click to expand...

Ridiculous that you have to select that outrageously overpriced upgrade to 256gb SSD to go for the 8gb ram option :mad:

If they would allow you to select 8gb ram without the 256gb SSD, it would seem that laptop could be ideal for my needs (albeit a couple of 100 over - budget). Slim form factor, quality spec, extra long battery options, 1080p screen etc.

Think Ill be waiting for a few more months to see what else comes out...
 

Amp34

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LePhuronn said:
Only on the top-end 13" model it seems, but yup I missed that - extra £100 to take it just shy of £1,500. Ouch
Click to expand...

Yeah, but it is good... ;)

Especially when you pay £1100 new instead of inflated UK prices!:p

yer_averagejoe said:
Yeah I think they must have decided to bring themselves inline with competition. They weren't really sitting right in the market for no justifiable reason. You can still spec them up to silly prices though.

Last week base spec was 850 as I said. Which is awesome for a 1600*900 13", thin, carbon fibre laptop with i5 sandy bridge and 128GB SSD. I guess they were trying to sell them off before the refresh. They were also offering the extended battery for free.

Hopefully the IB I5 will drop the base spec down a bit more in price too. Then they'll be directly competing with the new macbook pros in June/July and it'll be a tough decision for me tbh.
Click to expand...

True, when it first came out it had no equal. Then the (underpowered) MB Air came out at a similar price. The new Air and other ultrabooks kinda destroyed the reason for the price difference as you say, although it certainly has a lot of benefits over the "proper" ultrabooks and Air, for example the dock (switchable from onboard to dedicated GFX and the usual dock abilities) and the Battery pad thing.

Then again I almost bought it, even at the inflated price, but even with £200 knocked off it in store the base model still came out more expensive than the MBA (so maybe it wasn't £1100 for the base model then).:confused:
 

Amp34

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meathman 007 said:
Ridiculous that you have to select that outrageously overpriced upgrade to 256gb SSD to go for the 8gb ram option :mad:

If they would allow you to select 8gb ram without the 256gb SSD, it would seem that laptop could be ideal for my needs (albeit a couple of 100 over - budget). Slim form factor, quality spec, extra long battery options, 1080p screen etc.

Think Ill be waiting for a few more months to see what else comes out...
Click to expand...

Part of the reason it's so expensive for the upgrade used to be the SSD was a weird RAID hybrid to make it significantly faster, not sure if it's the same now though.
 

yer_averagejoe

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For anyone interested, the i7-3612QM is being offered as a "free upgrade" until the 11th, which gives you these specs for £1,069.01

Intel®Core(TM)i7-3612QM,2.1GHz
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
128 GB SATA Gen3 Flash SSD
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM
No Power Media Dock
33.2 cm LCD, 1920x1080 Premium
No Wireless WAN
No Long-Life Battery
Backlight keyboard
Intel® HD Graphics 4000
1 AC Adapter
Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11abgn)
Security features
HDMI(TM) output
Bluetooth® 4.0

(I've added carbon black finish, backlit keyboard and the higher res screen for £40)

Base spec (with quad i5) is £984

Intel®Core(TM)i7-3612QM,2.1GHz
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
128 GB SATA Gen3 Flash SSD
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3-SDRAM
No Power Media Dock
33.2 cm LCD, 1600x900 Premium
No Wireless WAN
No Long-Life Battery
Standard keyboard
Intel® HD Graphics 4000
1 AC Adapter
Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11abgn)
Security features
HDMI(TM) output
Bluetooth® 4.0

This is kind of annoying because the free upgrade runs out just in time for apple's announcement of their macbook pros. Don't know what to do!
 

Amp34

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The VAIO Z ;)

I forgot the one big difference between the ultrabooks and the Z actually. The CPU, somehow Sony seem to be able to fit a full on mobile processor in instead of the ULV ones?!

I say that, still not sure if I should have gone for the VAIO over the Air... The VAIO wouldn't have dented so easily I bet!
 

meathman 007

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Update on my search:

Not going to be buying until the end of August when hopefully a few more options are out there, but at the minute, top of my list is the following:

ASUS ZENBOOK UX32VD - Amazon US Link

I would then get the Crucial M4 128gb 7mm SSD to replace its stock HDD and also a 8gb RAM module. Both very easy to install.

After upgrades you would be looking at a 13 inch Ultrabook with great form factor, Ivy Bridge i7 dual core processor, switch-able dedicated graphics card, 10gb RAM, 128gb Sata 3 SSD and a 1080p matte screen. I am guessing it will come to around £1100 when all is said and done.

That would tick pretty much all of my boxes. The issues with the above Ultrabook that have been highlighted by some owners are backlight bleed, loud fan and some keyboard flex. Hopefully they are issues with the early production models, but it may put me off getting it if they remain (especially bad backlight bleed).

I was thinking of holding off and waiting for Windows 8 ultrabooks/hydrid tablets to come out, but I dont think its worth it:
  • Windows 8 desktop does not seem to be much of an improvement on Windows 7 and many people are saying it is in fact worse for non-touchscreen systems.
  • If I want to use the new Windows 8 touchscreen optimised functionality, I can just buy a dedicated tablet down the line.
  • I could be waiting until after Christmas before I get the ideal system and that is too long for me.
 

meathman 007

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I also have been looking into the new Sony Vaio Z laptop. You can put together a great spec with it:

Ivy Bridge i7 QUAD-Core (full mobile processor, not low power), 1080p screen, 8gb RAM, 128gb x 2 SSD in raid. However the price is very very high, coming in at around £1800. It is also not possible to get 8gb RAM with the 128gb (64gb x2 in RAID) option, only 4gb is possible. It seems impossible to do any after-market upgrades as well as everything is soldered to the motherboard. Form factor is great, just a pity about the price.

After a little more digging, it looks like there is a decent alternative to the Sony Z; The recently released Sony S: Link

For about £940 you get a decent full power Ivybridge i7 dual core processor, DVD drive, Nvdia GeForce GT 640m 2gb graphics card and a 1600 x 900 screen. In addition you get 4gb ram and a 320 HDD. However, it appears that it is easy to after-market upgrade this laptop, so I would look to add the Crucial M4 SSD and a 8gb Ram Module.

So after upgrades you are looking at the above spec, including a new 128gb SSD and 12gb ram in total for about £1050.

Pretty interesting and definitely something I will consider. There is a 15 inch version of the Sony S and it comes with a great IPS 1080p screen and a quad core ivybridge full power i7 processor. The weight on it is decent, but the dimensions are a little big for me and ideally I want to stick with the 13 inch size considering I will be carrying it around a lot...
 
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