How (and why) Sony designed the new VAIO P Series

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Contrary to the beliefs of the rest of the PC Pro team, I didn’t spend all my time while stuck in Japan drinking sake and impersonating Elvis in debauched karaoke bars. Along with going behind the scenes to see the VAIO testing setup, I had the good fortune to hear directly from the chief project manager behind the Sony VAIO P Series – both the original and its successor – on how exactly this innovative laptop came into being.

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Behind the scenes of Sony’s VAIO testing lab

Monday, April 19th, 2010

We were made to sign non-disclosure agreements, told to remove our cameras and phones, and forced to stand in an air chamber whilst air was blown into our every extremity. But then we were in. This is Sony’s top-secret area: the testing lab at its VAIO headquarters, based in Nagano Prefecture in the Japanese mountains, where all the company’s designs for new laptops are put to the test.

Fortunately, not all cameras were banned: as you can already tell, we were accompanied by a camera-toting Sony employee who I persistently annoyed by asking to “take a picture of this”. “Oh, and that”. “And could you take one of those too, please?” I think she may have said something rude about me in Japanese at one point.

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First look: Sony VAIO X-Series

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

We got our hands on an early sample of the all-new Sony VAIO X-Series at Sony’s pre-IFA show, and to say it looks an impressive feat of engineering completely understates matters.

Let’s get the facts out of the way first. This is the world’s lightest ever laptop, weighing less even than the Sony VAIO P-Series – and that weighed in at 640g.

Hold the X-Series in your hands and it feels breathtakingly light. Once you pick it up, you don’t want to put it down. (more…)