The new Vaio Z is significantly thinner and lighter than the old Vaio Z: It weighs in just 2.6lbs and has height of 0.66” compared to its 3.04lbs and 1.3” predecessor. It’s actually slightly thinner than the MacBook Air (0.66” vs 0.68”). MacBook Air’s design is slanted though so at its thinnest point, it’s much thinner than the new Vaio Z. Vaio Z is also quite noticeably lighter than 13” MacBook Air or Samsung 9 Series, which weigh 2.9lbs and 2.88lbs respectively. 

The main reason why the new Vaio Z is so much lighter and thinner than its predecessor is the lack of a discrete GPU. It comes with Intel HD 3000 which is integrated into the CPU die, whereas the old Vaio Z came with a discrete NVIDIA GT 330M. However, Sony has provided an interesting solution to this. They have announced a Power Media Dock (PMD) which is basically a souped up external optical drive. The external dock has an AMD Radeon HD 6650M with 1GB of DDR3 in it as well. The AMD 6650M allows you to connect up to two displays to the PMD so you can have a total four displays: two attached to the PMD, one attached to the laptop’s HDMI port and obviously the laptop’s integrated LCD. 

To make this worthwhile, Sony uses Intel’s Light Peak technology (yes, Sony calls it Light Peak, not Thunderbolt) which provides up to 10Gb/s of bandwidth in each direction. A GPU requires lots of bandwidth which is why USB, especially 2.0, is not suitable for powerful external GPUs. There are plenty of USB video adapters which are fundamentally external GPUs but they are not suitable for gaming or other GPU heavy tasks by any means. What makes Sony’s implementation different from Apple’s is the fact that Sony uses a combo-port that combines USB and Light Peak into one, instead of Mini DisplayPort connector like Apple. Sony actually calls the port a docking station/USB port. It can function as a regular USB 3.0 port as well. 

The Power Media Dock comes in three flavors. The cheapest one is a normal DVD drive. The second option is a Blu-Ray player. The most expensive option is a Blu-Ray writer as you might have guessed. PMDs with Blu-Ray are only available from Sony’s online store whereas the DVD PMD will be available through resellers as well. The PMD supports up to two external monitors: one via HDMI and one via VGA. There is also a Gigabit Ethernet port, two USB 2.0 ports and one USB 3.0 port. 

One issue with the PMD is its price. The cheapest one is £400 which translates to $640. Take away UK’s VAT which is 20% and we get $512, so the cheapest PMD will most likely retail for $500. That sounds pretty expensive, considering that AMD 6650M is an underclocked AMD 6570 (our review) which goes for around $70. Combine that with $20 DVD drive and you get what Sony calls Power Media Dock. 

Then there's the concern about performance. Sony must be running PCIe over Light Peak, but you only get a maximum of 1.25GB/s of bandwidth to/from the GPU - assuming no additional overhead. While the 6650M is likely much faster than Sandy Bridge's intergrated GPU, it's potentially slower than an on-board 6650M would have been because of the Light Peak bottleneck.

Conclusions

Vaio Z is definitely the most portable of the current 13" ultraportables and it packs in a nice amount of power. However, its pricing makes it too expensive compared to most of its competitiors. 13" MacBook Air starts at $1199 so the cheapest Vaio Z will be at least $700 more expensive if UK's pricing is comparable to US's. Even the Lenovo X1 starts at $1199 nowadays and it features exactly the same CPUs. The biggest market for Vaio Z seems to be in the high-end ultraportable market. No other brand offers 512GB SSD or 1080p screen at the moment for example. 

Power Media Dock sounds interesting but the price tag is everything else but attractive. For the same amount of money, you could grab for instance NVIDIA GTX 580, which is the fastest single chip GPU as of today. With PMD, you will be limited to AMD 6650M which isn't exactly a great GPU for gaming in the first place. At $500, you would hope for something much, much better than a DVD+GPU combo that struggles to play games at decent quality. We have seen external GPUs before but they have always failed miserably. Sony's attempt doesn't seem too promising either but at least we now have a port that is capable of external GPUs: Thunderbolt/Light Peak. There is hope that third parties will release cheaper and faster solutions, the most promising being Sonnet's Echo Express, which supports full size PCIe cards (though no word on GPU support). 

As the world becomes increasingly more mobile, external GPUs may be a solution to the problem of balancing portability with performance. Light Peak is a great way to get data out of a system however we may need to see a next-generation version of the interface, with higher bandwidth to really make sense for high performance external GPU solutions.

Update: Head over to the Sony UK site to configure one yourself — pricing starts at £1,434 ($2,294) with a Core i5 CPU, 4GB of RAM and no PMD. The dock is a £400 ($640) option with no optical drive included, while upgrading to a 1080p 13.1-inch LCD is a mere £40 extra.

PRESS RELEASE

Ultimate performance and design: ultra-mobile new VAIO Z Series from Sony weighs under 1.2kg
28 June 2011

Specifications and features vary by model. Please check VAIO laptops for more information.
For more information please contact
Sony Europe Press Centre

Sony expands its groundbreaking 3D home projector range with the affordable VPL-HW30ES

9th June 2011

Basingstoke, UK, 9th June 2011: Sony has today announced it has expanded its range of market leading 3D home projectors with the new, more affordable, VPL-HW30ES. Incorporating Sony’s latest lamp technology, dynamic lamp control system, movie fans have the opportunity to enjoy an unrivalled 3D cinematic experience, with stunning images that are three times as bright as Sony’s first 3D home projector, the VPL-VW90ES.

In order to achieve an optimal movie experience which feels natural on the eye, the VPL-HW30ES is equipped with Sony’s High Frame Rate SXRD Panel (1920ｘ1080), which helps to reproduce dramatically sharp and smooth motion and reduces the image motion blur for a crisper image (Motionflow) and deliver a dynamic contrast ratio of 70,000:1 and brightness of 1,300lm. In addition, “3D crosstalk” is significantly reduced thanks to the 240Hz SXRD panel drive system. The VPL-HW30ES is also capable of taking 2D video and simulating 3D images, bringing new life to classic movies from the past and allowing a wide variety of video content, such as live sports, to be enjoyed.

The VPL-HW30ES also enhances the customer viewing experience by enabling them to enjoy 3D and 2D pictures more comfortably. It has independent 2D/3D picture mode, which helps when you watch 2D and move on to watch 3D contents and you can watch the contents optimum picture image setting automatically. And the VPL-HW30ES runs very quietly with an advanced air discharge system by “22 db” which doesn’t disturb the overall cinematic experience.

“The launch of the VPL-HW30ES demonstrates Sony’s commitment to developing truly innovative products which allow more people than ever to experience 3D in their own living room,” said Tak Nakane, product specialist at Sony Professional, Sony Europe. “Built using Sony’s extensive 3D expertise, the VPL-HW30ES sets down a new benchmark for demanding movie-goers who want a high-end home cinema system at an affordable price.”

The VPL-HW30ES is compatible with Sony’s new active shutter glasses, the TDG-PJ1, which are 18 grams lighter than the previous model (59g compared to 77g). The TDG-PJ1 can be charged in 30 minutes to provide 30 hours of continuous watching. In conjunction with the new glasses, Sony has announced a new transmitter, the TMR-PJ1, which synchronises 3D content effortlessly to generate a high-quality natural 3D effect.

The VPL-HW30ES will be available across Europe in July 2011. The TDG-PJ1 and TMR-PJ1 are sold separately.

The peculiar thing is, you can’t actually buy it yet. F2F lists staggering prices ranging from €1,809 ($2,642) to €2,839 ($4,146), though it’s not, in fact, available. Meanwhile, search results turn up mentions on staticICE UK and Belgium’s Execute, but they’ve been scrubbed from the actual pages. So, it looks like it’s up to Sony to announce this already — and dish up some pictures while it’s at it.