Quick Overview:
Please note that in the above video I state that the VAIO P will start at $800 and be available June 8th, but Sony’s site has recently listed the price for this model at $899.99 and a shipping date of “on or about 6/25/2010” which is a change since I made the video back in late May.
Since the introduction of the first VAIO P last year, Sony has insisted that the VAIO P is not a netbook. No sir. It’s a “Lifestyle PC.” What’s a “Lifestyle PC,” you ask? I’m not sure but somehow the Sony VAIO P seems to fit perfectly.
For starters, netbooks generally cost under $500, feature 10- to 12-inch screens with relatively low resolutions, and function similarly to standard laptops. The newest VAIO P, on the other hand, starts at $900, features a small screen with a huge resolution, and functions somewhere in between a UMPC and a standard laptop. It doesn’t really function similarly to a phone aside from the built-in accelerometer and the fact that it’s small.
The lifestyle angle, in my opinion, is twofold. First, you need to have a certain lifestyle to pay $900 for a device like this. Second, you need to have the kind of lifestyle that necessitates a device that functions somewhat along the lines of an actual computer while being small enough to fit snugly inside the interior pocket of a blazer. The VAIO P replaces neither cell phone nor laptop but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a fun machine with which to travel.
Fun, yes. Work, not really. I left my laptop at home for a long weekend away and while I was able to get a fair amount of work done with the VAIO P, it’s not an ideal computing experience if you need to actually do anything important. But “lifestyle” and “work” aren’t necessarily supposed to go together that well.
The Hardware
The VAIO P is an impressive feat of engineering. Somehow crammed inside a device measuring 9.6” wide by 4.72” long by 0.78” thick and weighing just 1.3 pounds, you’ve got the innards of a Windows PC.
There’s a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 CPU, 2GB of RAM, 128GB solid state drive, 8-inch 1600×768 screen, webcam, two USB ports, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth connectivity, SD and MemoryStick card slots, and Windows 7 Home Premium.
The thing just doesn’t look like a computer. It looks like a small organizer or one of those old clamshell PDAs that people used to carry. While Steve Jobs has been heard to say that the iPod Nano is impossibly small, the Sony VAIO P is truly impossibly small given what’s inside.
Overall performance is decent but not spectacular. Sony’s made a valiant attempt to stuff as much power into as small a package as possible but there’s a reason that in this day and age, devices like the iPad don’t run a full-blown operating system–interface fluidity and battery life take a huge hit.
The overall feeling of using the VAIO P is like, “Cool, I’m surfing the full web. It’s a little slow and this screen is tiny, but I’m surfing the full web. I’m watching a movie. It’s a little jittery and the battery’s about to die but this thing fits in my jacket pocket and I didn’t have to download the movie through some weird store.” You have to make peace with the fact that everything is pretty scaled back; the tradeoff being that you’re carrying around a machine that’s about as easy to pocket as a DVD case and runs Windows 7 Home Premium.
The Screen
Note to self: Be careful what you wish for. I’ve personally been cursing the 1024×600 netbook screens since the very beginning, so to see that Sony somehow managed to cram 1600×768 pixels into an 8-inch LED backlit screen is truly a sight to behold. Unfortunately, trying to actually behold text on websites is another story. Unless the screen is about six inches from your face, forget about reading most of the web without zooming.
Web page at 1600×768 resolution:
Thankfully, Sony’s not only included zoom-in and zoom-out function keys, but a handy quick-resolution toggle button that kicks the 1600×900 display down to a much more legible 1280×600 in a matter of seconds. However, you run into that godforsaken 600 lines of vertical resolution that plagues cheap netbooks. It cuts off information windows and makes web page scrolling an almost non-stop activity. In the end, I found myself using the VAIO P most often at the full 1600×768 resolution with a liberal amount of zooming.
Web page at 1280×600 resolution:
But wait, there’s more! Sony’s added an accelerometer to the VAIO P. Turn it on its side and you can read long articles, books, and documents with 1600 vertical lines of resolution and a nice width of 768 pixels. It’s a weird yet strangely comfortable way to read lots of text but the actual switching doesn’t happen quickly enough to make it practical to flip back and forth between horizontal and vertical alignments. Pick one or the other and go with it.
The accelerometer also functions as a forward and back button for web surfing. Tilt the VAIO P to the left and you’ll go back. Tilt it to the right and you’ll go forward. Tilt it one too many times by accident like I did and you’ll disable the feature altogether. It doesn’t bring a whole lot to the party.
Keyboard and Mouse
Despite its diminutive stature, the VAIO P’s keyboard is amazingly usable. As someone who cobbles words together for a living, I’d absolutely use the VAIO P for just about any task that required creating text. My job calls for a fair amount of image editing and video work, though, which is where everything starts to either slow to a crawl or become hindered by the super high screen resolution. For straight-up text, though, the VAIO P is wonderfully capable. Bold statement: You could probably use it to write a book. Yes, I said it.
Mousing is a different story. While Sony gets points for providing two mousing options—an old-school pointing stick and a tiny trackpad mounted to the right of the screen—neither works well enough that you’ll put up with it for long if you don’t have to. The pointing stick works better than the trackpad but it still takes long enough to get from point A to point B that you’ll want to plug in a USB mouse or use a Bluetooth mouse when space permits. Remember, though, that this is a so-called “Lifestyle PC” so if you’re using it on the go, the mousing options work okay in a pinch for quick tasks.
Other Notables
The VAIO P’s battery is good for about three hours, give or take an hour depending on what you’re doing. If you’re surfing the web constantly you’ll see a little over two hours but with Wi-Fi off and the screen brightness set at medium, I was able to grab about 3:45 of time between charges. Needless to say, you won’t be able to go too far without the charger but it’s not a very large brick so it’s easy to transport.
Video playback is a mixed bag. If you’ve got it in your mind that you’d use the VAIO P for watching videos all the time, you’d be better off looking elsewhere. While standard-definition YouTube videos, for instance, play pretty well inside the browser, the HD versions tend to be jerky, and full screen is basically a no-go. Even downloaded 720p WMV files were either choppy, had lagging sound, or both. There are various hacks, tweaks, and software you can use to improve video quality on these Z-series Atom computers but if you’re not willing to put a little elbow grease into it, you won’t find the VAIO P gives you a great video experience. Downloaded standard definition content works okay but everything else is a crapshoot.
There’s a quick-boot Splashtop operating system that launches directly into a Linux-based desktop environment consisting of a modified Firefox browser. It actually works quite well although the boot process isn’t exactly instantaneous. The browser is nice and you’ll see a bit of a boost in battery life, so if you need to check something quickly, it’s a decent option. Again, though, it’s not exactly an instant-on deal. The computer will have to be shut all the way down and then it takes about 30 seconds from boot to browser.
After a few weeks of testing, my favorite use for the VAIO P ended up being using it to play old school games. SimCity 3000, SimGolf, Civ 4, old Sierra games, and similar blasts from the past turned out to be a great way to have some ultraportable fun. Sure, it does a bunch of other stuff but the thing almost seems to be built for retro gaming–whether that was Sony’s intention or not. Hey, maybe that’s my lifestyle. Retro gaming. Huh.
Conclusion
Much like the Fig Newton isn’t a cookie (it’s fruit and cake!), the VAIO PC isn’t a netbook (it’s a Lifestyle PC!). You’d be forgiven for mistaking the two in both cases, though, except that the VAIO P carries a pretty high price tag. And while some/most reviewers will blast the $900 price tag, it’s important to keep in mind that Sony has its own conventional netbook line in the VAIO W series. The VAIO P truly fits the vague “Lifestyle PC” category somehow.
You’ll know instantly if you want it, provided you have $900 of disposable income and can think of situations where having a device that runs Windows 7 Home Premium in a package a bit larger than a cell phone and a bit smaller than a netbook would benefit you.
I personally found it to be the ultimate retro gaming machine and the most portable word processor with a decent keyboard around. If I want to quickly surf the web, I have a smartphone. If I want to get a bit of work done, I have a netbook. Both devices fare better at each respective task than the VAIO P. College kids with plenty of money to burn come to mind as ideal candidates for this machine. It’d be great for taking notes and playing games when you don’t feel like taking notes. Remember the “money to burn” part, though.
I hate, hate, hate giving numeric scores for reviews since gadgets are so subjective but let’s compromise and look at a few scores depending on what you want to do with this thing.
If you’re looking for a netbook, the VAIO P is a 3 out of 10 thanks to its high price, short battery life, and (I can’t believe I’m about to say this) it’s too-high resolution screen. If you’re looking for a machine to play old games, it’s an 8 out of 10. Just bring the AC adapter and a mouse. If you’re looking for a typing machine, it’s a 7 out of 10—super portable, yes, but the battery life isn’t spectacular, the price is high, and you can find better keyboards on actual netbooks. And if you have a lifestyle where you need a tiny-but-full-featured computer with you at all times, the VAIO P is an excellent choice.
Product Page: Sony VAIO P Series Lifestyle PC
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