- Conclusion Get the lowdown
- Features How it compares
- Performance Real world benchmarks
- Differences Technical showdown
- Reviews Word on the street
- Competition Others to consider
- Discussion Answers and opinions
Sony VAIO S Series
- 13.3"
- Core i5 2.4 GHz Dual core
- 8 GB DDR3-1333
- 128 GB SSD
#2 in Sony laptops
Released October, 2011
Rated 78% by by c|net (Jul, 2011)The 15.5-inch display has a native resolution of 1,920x1,080 pixels, which is perfectly suited for Blu-ray and 1080p HD video.
Conclusion Check out the Sony VAIO S Series
First reviewed December, 2011
Features Key features of the Sony VAIO S Series
2.4 GHz
Intel Core i5 2430M
by LaptopMag (Jul, 2012)Click to EnlargeAlthough the 1366 x 768-pixel resolution is standard fare for a 13-inch laptop, the VAIO S Series 13 plenty bright.
screen size
13.3"
15.6"
15.6"
VAIO S Series by Shawn-Corrill (Apr, 2012)Otherwise I love the backlight on the keyboard, the large screen.
VAIO S Series by M.-FUSCO--yawnmower (Mar, 2012)It is streamlined with an extraordinarily thin profile, and incredibly light weight - a truly portable laptop with a large screen.
screen resolution
VAIO S Series by c|net (Jul, 2011)Tew/CNET). The 13.3-inch matte display does a good job of keeping glare away in an office; the screen's 1,600x900-pixel resolution is a step up from the average 1,366x768-pixel resolution of most 13-inch laptops, and colors and text alike pop vividly.
VAIO S Series by Mike (Dec, 2011)The 15.5" screen may not be huge, but there is so much workspace because the resolution is so impressive.
cpu speed
| 0 GHz | 1.65 GHz   | 3 GHz |
VAIO S Series by LaptopMag (Jul, 2012)In addition to the $919 configuration we reviewed, which includes a 2.5-GHz Core i5-3210M CPU, 6GB of RAM and 640GB HDD, the S13 can be customized to include up to a 2.9-GHz Core i7-3520 CPU, an Nvidia GeForce GT 640M LE GPU with 1GB of VRAM, a 1TB 5,400-rpm hard drive, 12GB of RAM and a 4,400-mAh sheet battery.
VAIO S Series by J.-Watson (Apr, 2010)As far as the specs go, they look great on paper, but aren't any faster than a Core 2 Duo 2.1 GHz.
processor
VAIO S Series by c|net (Jul, 2011)It's not quite in the ultrabook category, but this is still a reasonably thin and light 15-inch laptop, especially considering the powerful components inside, such as the quad-core CPU and Nvidia GPU.
VAIO S Series by c|net (Jul, 2011)With a quad-core Intel Core i7-3612QM CPU, the Vaio S is pretty much ready for anything, from HD video editing to heavy-duty multitasking.
memory
| 0 GB | 4 GB  | 8 GB |
VAIO S Series by M.-F.-Makala (Mar, 2011)I have owned a Vaio laptop before even though the RAM was only 2GB, and 6 years older its performance was a lot much better than this one.
VAIO S Series by J.-White (Aug, 2011)The unit comes with 4GB of RAM soldered onto the motherboard, so you can upgrade to 8GB with just one 4GB chip.
Performance Real world tests of Sony VAIO S Series
3DMark06 CPU
VAIO S Series by LaptopMag (Mar, 2010)Armed with a 2.26-GHz Intel Core i5 i5-430M CPU, 4GB of RAM, Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit), and a 5,400-rpm 500GB hard drive, the S series notched a score of 4,950 on PCMark Vantage, which measures overall performance.
VAIO S Series by D.-Lao--Domin8r (Dec, 2011)This is the first time I've experienced the performance of an i7 and SSD together, and everything is just incredibly smooth and snappy.
battery life
7 hour
4.5 hour
5 hour
VAIO S Series by c|net (Jul, 2011)Sony has added a slot-loading drive and a larger touch pad; more RAM is included, and the hard drive is larger; there are a new, faster Intel CPU, better Nvidia graphics, and an integrated battery, which gives much improved battery life over the previous generation's $150 slice battery add-on, sold separately and practically a requirement for good battery life the last go-around.
VAIO S Series by Khalil-Al-Hayek (Feb, 2012)I love the battery life in STAMINA, it is up to 4 hours.
cinebench r10 32Bit
VAIO S Series by thor3 (Nov, 2011)I like this configuration because it's a good mix of features vs. nice price, in that I've read that the performance difference with the i7 isn't worth the extra cost, plus you get 6GB RAM and the Blu-ray drive.
Our analysis How does it stack up against its top 10 competitors
pros
-
0.1 ms (SSD) -
8 GB -
138 ppi -
MMC -
1,655 g -
DDR3-1333 -
23 mm -
2.4 GHz -
1600 x 900 -
572 MB/s (USB 3.0)
cons
-
128 GB -
13.3" -
1 Mbit/s (Bluetooth v2.0)
Reviews Word on the street
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 |  Rated by 108 users at amazon.com Rated 80% by by Real-Name™-╦⌠≥---æ¢ç╡ (Aug, 2012) Rated 80% by by rkent78 (Aug, 2012) Rated 80% by by Real-Name™-╦⌠≥---æ¢ç╡ (Aug, 2012) |
Screen
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 78% by by c|net (Jul, 2011)The 13.3-inch matte screen is better than most we've seen, with strong viewing angles and crisp, bright color.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by Mark-J.-Tierney--coastie-1980 (Dec, 2011)I really like the 1600 resolution option on this particular model, if your wondering about text size, my philosophy is that you can always turn up the zoom of the page to 125% and most web pages still fit on the screen.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 80% by by Gordon-S.-Marlowe (Nov, 2011)The 1600x900 matte screen is bright and very clear, but lacks color depth and contrast for any kind of high quality, color accurate display.
Harddrive
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by D.-Lao--Domin8r (Dec, 2011)I am not looking to replace the existing hard drive with a faster sata 3 SSD since it is already blazingly fast.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 78% by by c|net (Jul, 2011)Upgrade options are plentiful: you can pick from a trio of Core i5 or i7 processors, Nvidia 1GB or 2GB graphics, up to 12GB of RAM, up to 1TB of hard drive storage or 512GB SSD, and even an optional Blu-ray player or burner.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by Joe (Jun, 2012)128G SSD is a little small but I adpat an additional 500GD harddisk, now it's perfect.
Storage
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 78% by by c|net (Jul, 2011)Our $1,299 Vaio SA configuration included a 2.3GHz Core i5-2410M CPU, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB 5,400rpm hard drive, a 1,600x900-pixel screen, and AMD Radeon HD 6630M graphics, but no Blu-ray drive; we had a standard CD/DVD burner instead.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by M.-FUSCO--yawnmower (Mar, 2012)The blu-ray player/software gives the smoothest and most flawless video playback I have ever seen in a blu-ray laptop.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 80% by by Asiriusbee (Jul, 2011)Sony also does a disservice to their customers by including a 5400rpm HDD!!! Are they for real!?!? In order to get a SSD, you'll have to pay another hundred or so and the price of this laptop is already way too high as is.
Ssd
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | by LaptopMag (Jul, 2012)If you don't mind opting for a bigger screen, the Dell Inspiron 14z packs discrete graphics and an SSD cache and 8GB of RAM for the same price as this Sony.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by zenmaster43 (Mar, 2013)Maximum SSD capacity is still far less than maximum IHD capacity in the equivalent model.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 80% by by RbstrThe positives:If you're doing basic office stuff the notebook is blazing fast thanks to the SSD.
Connection
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by D.-Lao--Domin8r (Dec, 2011)In regards to the sata 3 compatibility, I honestly have no idea if this is still a problem.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by D.-Lao--Domin8r (Dec, 2011)Some are complaining that the new bios is not SATA 3 compatible or that the screen is not up to par.
Sony VAIO S Series 13.3", 2.4 GHz, 8 GB, 128 GB SSD | Rated 100% by by D.-Lao--Domin8r (Jul, 2012)Considering that the laptop I purchased and the SA33GX comes with a sata 2 SSD installed, I and anyone purchasing this laptop shouldn't worry if these compatibility issues exist.
Competition What else you should consider
 | 2 | SAMSUNG Series 7 Chronos Largest amount of storage capacity SAMSUNG Series 7 Chronos vs Sony VAIO S Series |
 | 3 | Apple MacBook Air 4th Gen Has a light sensor Apple MacBook Air 4th Gen vs Sony VAIO S Series |
 | 4 | ASUS ZENBOOK UX32VD OK CPU benchmark score ASUS ZENBOOK UX32VD vs Sony VAIO S Series |
 | 5 | ASUS Zenbook UX31E 3-way tie: Longest battery life ASUS Zenbook UX31E vs Sony VAIO S Series |
 | 8 | HP ProBook 4530s More USB ports HP ProBook 4530s vs Sony VAIO S Series |
New duel?
Let the battle continue or dare to compare.
Editions Editions of the Sony VAIO S Series
| Price | Edition | Battery life | Internal storage random access time | Supported card formats | Manufacturer code | Compare | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | | 4 hour | 10 ms | None | VPC-S111FM/S | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCS135FX/B | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPC-S137GX/B | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCS134GX/B | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCS132FX/S | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCS132GX/B | | ||||
 | | 5 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCS137GX/S | | ||||
 | | 5.75 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSE13FX/S | | ||||
 | | 5.75 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSE13FX/B | | ||||
 | | 5.75 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSE16FX/S | | ||||
 | | 5.75 hour | 10 ms | MMC, Memory Stick Duo, SD | VPCSE17FX/B | | ||||
 | | 5.75 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSE16FX/B | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA3AFX/SI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA33GX/SI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA3AFX/BI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA33GX/BI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA31FX/BI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 10 ms | MMC | VPCSA31FX/SI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 0.1 ms | MMC | VPCSA35GX/SI | | ||||
 | | 7 hour | 0.1 ms | MMC | VPCSA35GX/BI | | ||||
 | | 15 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCSA21GX/SI | | ||||
 | | 15 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCSA2FGX/BI | | ||||
 | | 15 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCSA21GX/BI | | ||||
 | | 15 hour | 10 ms | None | VPCSA25GX/SI | | ||||
