8.9 "SONY subnotebook with integrated video capture card (~ 2001 onwards)

    Hello, Habr!


    Ultra-compact laptops have been made for a very long time, since the 80s. During this time, a long way has been traveled from monochrome typewriters with a full replacement for a desktop PC. Over the years, the concepts of supercompactness and performance have changed, but such devices never lose their charm.
    By the end of the 90s, manufacturers were able to form the image of a universal mobile computer and began their mass production. One of the first, most close in concept to modern counterparts, were laptops series VAIO C1 started in 1998. One of these subnotebooks will be discussed in the article. Under the cut a lot of pictures.



    Before the New Year, at the Savelovsky market in Moscow, I managed to hold a laptop from this series in my hands. The subnotebook was small, lightweight, comfortable and had a pleasant appearance. Japanese characters on the keyboard immediately gave the country of origin. Initially, due to the size (3x15x25 cm), the device was immediately attributed to the mottled "camping-backpack" category of typewriters, but I was mistaken. This VAIO turned out to be unusual and very interesting.



    I immediately liked the complete absence of black gloss in the finish of the case and the large matte screen (8.9 "TFT 1280x600). The viewing angles are average, but for an ultra-compact industry veteran it is excusable.






    1. Web camera "MOTION EYE"
    2. Microphone
    3. Bluetooth switch (not available in US version)
    4. Built-in stereo speakers
    5. Power and Battery Status LEDs
    6. Bluetooth indicator (not available in the US version)
    7. Power switch
    8. Video Capture Utility Button
    9. Joystick JogDual
    10. Ventilation inlets
    11. Memory Stick Card Reader
    12. Port Replicator Connector
    13. Microphone input
    14. Headphone jack
    15. USB 1.1 port
    16. DC OUT (Power output for i.LINK devices)
    17. RJ-11 connector for Dual-Up modem
    18. DC IN (Power Input)
    19. i.LINK (IEEE1394) port
    20. Connector for PC Card CardBus (Type II × 1)
    21. Ventilation outlets




    1. VGA Output (DB-15F)
    2. RJ-45 Network Connector
    3. A / V output (NTSC / PAL video, + stereo line-out)
    4. A / V input (NTSC compatible, stereo line-in)
    5. USB 1.1 port




    The web camera turned out to be rotary with a focus adjustment wheel. To launch the video capture utility, a separate “Capture” button is designed. The first time I saw the JogDial joystick at first seemed unnecessary and inconvenient to me, but later I realized that the lack of space for installing the touchpad justifies its presence, it is simply necessary for such a small and wide screen. The ribbed surface prevents the finger from slipping. The wheel travel is discrete, pressing the joystick button is elastic, you can’t accidentally press it.



    The keys on the laptop turned out to be slanted by 3 mm with an average elastic stroke. optimal size just under the fingertip. Ideal for touch typing. It is immediately felt that this part of the computer was previously worked out wisely. Unfortunately, the modern representatives of the series (VAIO P) in pursuit of design (keyboard ) and gloss ( body and screen ) have lost these qualities.



    From left to right: ASUS A3F, LG C1-P.AP78R Express Dual, SONY Vaio PCG-C1MV / M)
    In the Savelovsky version there was only charging and 384 MB of RAM. Without drives and accessories. I did not find the required amount and the purchase did not take place. But the device was noted and in January it was found on ebay for $ 225 in the maximum configuration.
    The mustachioed American sent the goods only to the USA, because of which he had to connect the capital intermediary ebaytoday.ru. EMS delivery, insurance, margins ... in the end, the cost has grown to $ 337. On February 6, the laptop began its journey from Alabama, 2 days later left the United States and on the 16th ended up in Moscow. The next 10 days, the national postal features made me nervous, but in the end, the infamous EMS Russian Post failed and the package was handed personally to me by a tired courier.

    The machine was in good condition, without noticeable scuffs and scratches. As I understand it, the laptop was either stored for a long time or very carefully handled. because after a short use and a couple of crossings in a backpack with other accessories, scratches appeared on the bottom of the laptop and the licensed sticker from Microsoft was very wiped out.



    Given the age of the device, the build quality and material are not satisfactory. The disadvantages include only a slight backlash of the Web camera. The plastic of the lid is thick, but with a strong press, muddy stains appear on the screen temporarily. Under heavy loads, the case creaks a little. The case is finished in blue-silver colors, which is typical for many devices executed in a practical design of the late 90's. In reality, the machine looks noticeably nicer than in photographs.



    I immediately want to say: “Appearance, reliability and performance were better before!”, But this is not so. In those years, at the time of its appearance, any laptops were positioned as thoughtful and reliable solutions for wealthy customers who were ready to sacrifice speed for mobility. For that price (~ $ 3000), today you can find business models that are in no way inferior to past legends of the past.

    The whole package was severely frozen, and I did not dare to immediately launch the laptop. In addition to the laptop itself, there were many interesting accessories in the box. While the laptop was warming up I had something to see:
    The complete PSU (43W) turned out to be universal at 100 \ 240V. After a brief search, a cord from a cassette recorder was found, which successfully replaced the American plug. At maximum load without cdrom or wifi, the device ate from the outlet no more than



    15 W / h. The Li-ion battery turned out to be 18 W / h. Depreciation of about 5%. Autonomously holds for about an hour.



    The port replicator moves away from the typical stand concept with many connectors. I think this is a necessary measure, because the ports located on it are simply physically impossible to fit on the laptop case.



    The dimensions of the case did not allow cdrom to fit there, but, as you can see, the Japanese engineers really wanted to solve this problem. So the external PCMCIA cdrom was born. The design is well thought out, has a hardware button. Only reads discs and only CD-R \ RW



    On the bottom of the drive in a special groove was found a small removable rod (blue triangle in the photo). It turned out that it is designed to manually open the drive tray.



    USB floppy is the most common



    PCMCIA WiFi G network card. Unfortunately, Windows doesn’t make friends with WPA2 8 (there



    are 6 copies of the original disks.



    After checking the working capacity, the RAM compartment was opened on the bottom.



    The memory module turned out to be very small, rare and expensive.



    Then there was another 1 unscrewed the screw on the bottom and I was able to look under the hood.



    I did not dare to completely remove the loop, so peaceful. Offhand more than 50% of the internal space occupied by the PCMCIA slot and a basket on hard disks.
    Due to the lack of Memory Stick cards, I could not check the built-in card reader. But even theoretically, it can not do more than 1 MB \ s - the system-wide USB 1.1 will not allow to accelerate faster.



    The original Windows XP Home SP0 Gold English was immediately restored from the "native" disks using the proprietary console utility. Unfortunately, I immediately had to face indestructible despotismmanufacturer’s desire to make the world a better place. During recovery, the partition sizes were fixed by the utility, the image was restored only on FAT32, and the system was clogged with a lot of programs and advertising applications that I did not need. The Corporation considered the utilities of the Web camera, power profile management and joystick to be very valuable for JogDial and therefore did not post them with the rest of the wood on the support site in the USA. Complete disks came in handy here. Then the utilities began to refuse to install on another OEM, too, but already clean Windows XP Home SP3 English.



    Nevertheless, thanks to Sony for leaving at least firewood to devices available, many brands generally close support for older devices. All these problems were resolved, but an unpleasant aftertaste remained.



    The sound quality is average, 2 built-in speakers are in front of the keyboard. The built-in microphone has excellent sensitivity. The stereo effect is observed when located strictly in the center of the laptop. The sound is quite juicy, but it lacks volume. You can unscrew it to the maximum and then rattling and distortion will be well earthly.



    To execute x86 commands, software emulation in the form of a virtual machine is used. This technology simplifies the hardware of the processor, which, in turn, reduces power consumption. But there is a downside - even by the standards of the early 2000s, the processor noticeably lagged behind competitors in performance. According to my observations, it is somewhere at the level of the first generation Pentium III. The hard drive and memory are trying to balance the situation, but the forces are clearly not equal.

    [MEM]
    Read
    298.22 MB / s
    Write
    196.26 MB / s
    Read / Write
    195.62 MB / s
    Cache
    3355.04 MB / s

    [HDD]
    Read
    34.17 MB / s
    Write
    34.01 MB / s
    RandomRead 64K
    5.07 MB / s
    RandomWrite 64K
    7.73 MB / s

    Nevertheless, you can watch the video. Media Player Classic v. 1.5.2.3236 digested the avi video file at 267 MB without problems (DivX 5 704x400 25.00fps MPEG Audio Layer 3 48000Hz stereo 128kbps) The

    responsiveness of browsers leaves much to be desired. You can read the news, but we are not talking about comfortable work. The speed in their work is the same, the difference is only in the amount of memory eaten.
    As an alternative system to the machine without Xs, Debian 6 was installed with the kernel compiled exclusively under Crusoe. Perhaps this will help solve the problem with speed, but so far there is only a lot of file work ahead.



    During operation, the laptop case is heated slightly and the cooler noise is almost imperceptible.



    The most unusual feature of the laptop is the presence of a built-in video capture card with hardware support for MPEG2. There is an RCA video input on the port replicator. The proprietary video capture utility works in 3 modes: photo, video 640x480 and video for the 176x144 network. Photos from the Web camera are clear, contrasting, of good quality, but not more than 0.3Mpix. I did not have the necessary cables to connect an external signal source, so I limited myself to a brief recording from a Web camera. The result was a .mpg MPEG2 video file with a resolution of 640x480 30fps with stereo sound for 27 seconds. Such a miracle weighs 20MB. The most amazing thing is that it works and works without brakes. But why is it needed on such a device?
    The only thing I could come up with was checking and adjusting the position of analog cameras in security systems.



    The interface of a proprietary utility switched to receiving a signal from an external source

    Conclusion.

    A laptop cannot be judged by the usual categories; it is the first one. And even now, ten years later, this Vaio remains unique. And that is +. Design, screen, keyboard, mobility. + More. The laptop is about 10 years old and it works well, without freezes. Another argument is Pro. At the same time, the model has many weaknesses - the processor, the amount of memory, USB 1.1., Ethernet on the replicator ... But this is an inevitable property of many technologies a decade ago.
    The device was bought as a mobile device for typing and working on the Internet. But, unfortunately, VAIO subjectively did not cope with the second task. Because of this, the laptop turned for me into an exotic toy for collecting dust in the closet.

    PS Preparation of the article made me think and make a decision. Therefore, if someone believes that the subnotebook is worthy of better use, I’m ready to part with it fully loaded for the spent $ 337

    UPD: Any questions about the purchase - just for habrahpost, do not clog the comment block.

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