Sony Vaio Dilemma

College student here hi there, I’m looking for a small second hand laptop (I’m using a 16’’ monster right now) and found a Sony Vaio SB3 - a 13,3 inch ultrabook in my area. It’s really nice:nice build, backlit keyboard, usb 3, hdmi, vga, ethernet, intel i3 2330, amd 6470m, well the screen could be better ;), ~3h battery. I could get it for a good price (225€ ) but the owner has a history with it. He bought the thing in 2012. At the end of the year he had a problem with sound/sound card so he took it back for repair. In Jan 2013 they’ve sent him a whole new laptop with 2 year warranty. At the end of 2014 (1 month before the warranty would expire) the laptop just wouldn’t start up. He again sent it back and they’ve changed the motherboard. He got it back again in Jan 2015. I’ve tested it this week and everything works as it should.
My other options are an Asus s46c or lenovo x220/x230 for a bit more money.
Any advice? Thanks :slight_smile:

I had a vaio SVE11135CXB, and it didn't work out for me.

The screen cracked under the pressure of my own backpack, and I was forced to take it apart and install a new 50 dollar screen. I went to go and get it replaced under warranty because I hadn't dropped it but they tried to charge me 600 dollars - More than twice for what I originally paid for it to get it fixed.

In addition, the AMD apu's graphics drivers did NOT work under Linux and I had serious problems. With the drivers installed, it sometimes would not wake from suspend, and sometimes it just dropped me to the login screen for no reason. The logs showed nothing.

I dropped that laptop for a T420 within one year, as the vaio was the WORST laptop I have ever used. My T420 is amazing and I would recommend the X220 because it is basically a smaller T420.

Amazing build quality, great keyboard, and can handle anything I throw at it with the i5 (except gaming). Get the X220/230. Especially if you are using Linux.

TLDR - I had a REALLY bad experience with a sony Vaio laptop.

I bought a Sony VAIO VGN-FW170J - That's right, a 17" monster, purchased in 2008.
I still use it today. It's white, intel core 2 duo, and at 3.1Kg, HEAVY.

It's been rained on, left on in my backpack for hours where it overheated and shutdown due to thermal protection
kicking in... really thought I fried it that time. The dog pulled it off the table by the headphones plugged in... It still works. I just installed Gentoo on it a few days ago. Replaced the disk with an SSD so now my wrist doesn't catch fire every time I turn it on. Half the screws are missing from the bottom because after 6 years I couldn't be bothered.

Would I like a new laptop? Perhaps one of those W-series Thinkpads? YES! Do I want to pay for a new laptop? No.

I have had nothing but excellent success out of my Sony products. If I could stick 8Gb of ram in this thing, I would.
If I could upgrade the processor to one of those 125W Quad Cores and water cool it, I would - but I doubt it would fit in my backpack after that!

I have basically the same exactly story with my old Vaio - abused the hell out of it for about 5 years now and it's still kicking.

Though, considering all the trouble the OP's saying the laptop in question had, I might steer clear of it.