Review: Sony Vaio VGN-SZ3XWP laptop

Sony’s new Vaio is the very same laptop featured (albeit briefly) in the latest James Bond epic, Casino Royale.

Its carbon fibre chassis and lightweight design will attract envious looks, but thankfully it doesn't carry any 007/Bond branding.

The laptop weighs in at under 2kg and certainly feels very slim and light. Despite its diminutive measurements, Sony hasn’t scrimped on the components. A Core 2 Duo T7200 processor, which ticks along at 2.0GHz, is combined with 2GB DDR2 Ram.

This setup achieved a very good score of 241 in Sysmark. A 100GB hard disk that only rotates at 5,400rpm is par for the course, but disappointing in the light of quicker 7,200rpm models.

A switch below the screen lets you chose between stamina and speed modes. The stamina position activates Intel's integrated graphics card (945GM chipset), which pushed out 587 in 3DMark05. By selecting the speed position and rebooting the laptop, you activate the Nvidia GeForce Go 7400.

It has 128MB of video Ram as standard and more can be added via turbocache. The 7400 is based on a crippled 64-bit bus, but it still scored 1,927 in 3DMark05, making casual gaming within reach. The battery life was up for the challenge and the DVD rundown time lasted two hours in tests.

The 13.3in display is a 1280x800 pixel widescreen and uses Sony's X-black technology. It has good contrast, brightness and viewing angles but the backlight bleeds from the bottom of the screen, resulting in a gradient of colours in the bottom portion. This is usually a problem on cheaper laptops and will disappoint those shelling out for such an expensive design.

The keyboard was solid and the large keys were easy to use; its only failing was the function keys which looked disjointed and uneven. The speakers hide behind a thin grill above the keyboard and sounded pretty good considering their size.

The touchpad is of high quality allowing smooth and controlled movements. A  fingerprint reader is included between the right and left mouse buttons.

Sony has, once again, shunned the more popular SD format and instead integrated a Memory Stick slot into the side of the laptop.

It is a good quality laptop but £1,799 is an awful lot to pay especially when you can buy similarly specified laptops for several hundred pounds less.

Also consider:
Asus F3Jv notebook
A bigger laptop with a 15.4in WSXGA+ screen. Fast and elegant, but it falls down on battery life

Dell Latitude D420
Despite only weighing 1.5Kg, it offers a heap of features and a built-in mobile broadband

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