Hands on: Sony Vaio C Series review
Posted by latest handheld | Posted in handheld | Posted on 22-02-2011-05-2008
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The Sony Vaio C Series glows even when the laptop is off. That’s because Sony has used a special material that transfers light through it without power. That makes it look rather odd, but it’s certainly distinctive.
The 14-inch C Series is aimed squarely at family use and is available in a variety of colours. However, only two of them – in green and orange – use the new special material. Everything else has standard non light-emitting plastic.
The key specifications aren’t shabby – there’s an Intel Core i5-241M processor, 320GB of storage and 4GB RAM alongside Windows 7 Home Premium.
If you order the C Series online you’re also able to opt to have switchable graphics so you can toggle between performance and power saving modes. The main dedicated graphics are provided by AMD with the Radeon HD 6470M.
Elsewhere, the C Series is nothing special from a tech perspective – though it does include Sony’s Exmoor image processing tech behind the HD webcam. But this is an unadulterated family notebook and we can see it selling shedloads.
And we genuinely think it’s a fun notebook. When we first used it, we thought it was really spongy and horrible to type on. But it quickly becomes apparent that this is a rubber keyboard overlay to protect the laptop from young fingers. Taking this off reveals the standard new Sony Vaio keyboard which actually seems great to type on.
There’s also HDMI out, a USB 3.0 port and Bluetooth as well as a Linux-based instant on web interface that you can access via a Web button above the keyboard. The keyboard is also automatically backlit for use in a darkened room.
The Sony Vaio C Series UK release date is March 21 and it will be available from John Lewis, Sony Centres and sony.co.uk initially.
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