Disappointed with my Vaio AR71ZU - Vista SP1 update killed my wireless

[alekoo8]

Hi everyone,

I wish i'd been able to view this forum before buying my AR71ZU. I'd searched high and low for a review and there wasn't a single one. Maybe it was a sign. It's an ok machine. Very buggy and runs so slowly despite it's T9300 processor(s) and i'm close to junking Vista and getting XP like some of you guys have. My old Acer Travelmate 8104 ran for 4.5hrs and was gutsy enough for AutoCAD/Outlook and listening to Internet Radio. With all the Vaio power saving features enabled and the processor throttled back i might get 2hrs without Wireless enabled - Sony should have done better than that.

I've already hijacked a thread where machines with nVidia G84m/G86m GPU's are having problems - namely where it couldn't detect wireless networks despite being in the same room as my Draytek. I had to do a full restore and it seemed to be working ok. Until the weekend when i'd installed the Vista SP1 update and it went and disabled my Wireless Radio.

Any of you guys/girls had problems with your Wireless dying over the weekend and having to go back a step with System Restore?

Arrrgh! Everytime i use Disk Cleanup it disables the Hibernate Feature. Useful when i'm working from site and better on batteries. So i have to enable it in DOS each and everytime (is it still DOS - Run, CMD as Administrator, etc).

Oooh! It also won't detect my 2.5" Seagate Momentus 100Gb in a USB2 caddy. It's powered via 2 USB connections and has all my data on it. I need to get the data off so i can do some work! How can i transfer my data over? Get another 2.5" caddy maybe?

AND! Can any of you tell me how to change the Resolution for recording Live TV in Windows Media Centre? I've been trawling the web and only found 1 other post from a guy with a HP that was asking the same thing. All the other step by step processes say it should be in Settings. It isn't and is driving me crazy as i'd like to record in High Def. And can any of you tell me where the Windows Media Center High Def video is for setting up your screen? I'd just like to watch it and not have to setup Media Centre everytime.

Apart from that it's not a bad machine. The screen is nice, along with RAID, Blue Ray, the nVidia 8600m GPU and Windows Ultimate 32bit (ahem, why not 64bit - Vista can only see 3 of the 4Gb RAM). I just don't like all the proprietory Sony Drivers, etc.

Rant over. Many thanks in-advance for your help.

Alex

[alekoo8]

Hmmm... i don't really know what to say right now. I've done the Vista Service Pack 1 update expecting the wireless to have been disabled and had already downloaded the Intel Wireless drivers as per Ruu's instructions. And what do you know? It's updated and the Wireless still works.

I doubt Service Pack 1 will fix my Media Center flickering recording and playback and i've just discovered another problem. Whilst extending my desktop to our LCD telly and dragging Media Center onto it - as soon as i close the lid Media Centers loses the plot, complains and closes down. No other laptop i've ever had has done that. I've gone into the nVidia Control Panel expecting to see a whole bunch of settings, but the control panel is perhaps too limited in what it can do.

It's late and i need to go to bed now. Night all.