Disapointed with my new Sony Laptop VGN-FW21Z and its ATI HD 3650 grapic card

[neiltruscott]

Well after years of buying sony products and computoers ( this lastest one being the forth in 6 years, i am EXTREMELY disapointed in its performance with VISTA and most of all the GRAPHIC CARD (ATI Radeon Mobility HD356.


Operating System: Windows Vista™ Home Premium (6.0, Build 6001) Service Pack 1 (6001.vistasp1_gdr.090302-1506System Model: VGN-FW21Z
BIOS: BIOS Date: 06/04/08 14:30:19 Ver: 08.00.10
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T9400 @ 2.53GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.5GHz
Memory: 2526MB RAM
Page File: 1693MB used, 4542MB available
DirectX Version: DirectX 10
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: ATI Radeon Graphics Processor (0x9591)

For a Laptop of this spec it is extremely slow with VISTA, slow than my pentimum 3 !! With repect to the graphics on some of the basic on line games the FPS and Processor usage is terrible.

After researching and contacting ATI , it seems the drivers provided by SONY are well befind the lastest ATI drivers and catalst versions. But as this chip is only provided to Sony and Dell the only way to get a new driver is to wait for sony to release a new update. Which accoriding to my sony dealer wont be happening.

So my money spent to have a Laptop to play some basic games while sitting on the sofa , was a complete waste 3 - 4 FPS is just not worth tuning on the laptop.

If there is anyone else with a similar issue , please try to voice it hear , so that sony may act and update the Grapgics Drivers.

Thanks for reading and help is appreacited

neil

[WojciechF]

I have similar problem but with GeForce 9600M GT card in my VGN AW31S/B although the problem applies mainly to 2D display performance, especially in Adobe applications. 3D gaming performance is acceptable.

Some Sony driver updates are, put it mildly, a bit outdated. I moved to 64-bit Windows 7 RC1 and had to use modded drivers which in my opinion work better than provided by Sony. I had to do some workarounds to move from Vista to W7 while retaining some basic Sony VAIO software functionality (ie. working shortcut keys etc.). I don't know how much will it take for Sony to fully support W7 users, especially those who own 64-bit version.

I don't understand why Sony filled in for NVIDIA when it comes to drivers. Are these chips special ones? I don't think so. Such deal isn't comfortable for users who have to wait longer for updates and I think, drivers maintenance isn't a high priority task for Sony.

Here's how I deal with the problem:
- I use modded drivers until Sony releases update
- I use "high performance" energy profile, no "balanced" or something like that
- I'm going to build custom cooling system for my VAIO as I see many performance issues are related to overheat