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Rating: 
Summary: Definitely one of the best laptops i've used
Review: Awesome machine. It has a huge, clear, bright display, good resolution, a comfortable keyboard, decent sound output, a powerful processor, plenty of RAM and HD space, one of the best ethernet cards around. Definitely recommend it.I have yet to try to install Linux on it. Seems like there's not much information about it's compatibility, and some devices are unlikely to work, like the modem and power management, but driver support for Sony is coming along nicely. Weight and battery life are issues to consider: if you're looking for a laptop you can use comfortably on a long flight, forget it unless you buy a power port adapter - on mine, batteries last for around an hour and a half with normal use.
Rating:
Summary: Sony VAIO PCG-GRV670 Notebook(2.6 P4,512 RAM,40GB)
Review: I must apologize,I gave the 'Sony VAIO PCG-GRV670 Notebook' a bad review. I just got a replacement,and guess what? It can play hard core games like 'Medieval: Total War','Shogun: Total War'. I really feel bad about the review,but please,buy this 'Laptop',you'll never need a 'desktop' again. All I can say is the 'Sony VAIO PCG-GRV670 Notebook'(Windows XP Home Edition),'Intel P4 2.6GHz Processor w/400MHz,512MB DDR RAM Memory,40GB Harddrive,ATI Radeon 9000(64MB of dedicated video memory),8X DVD ROM Drive,will get you 'in' and 'out' of the 'Total War' game series with a smile on your face,I guarantee you that! On 'Medieval:Total War',I've played battles,campaigns,and etc.,no crashing and no freeze-ups,no problems period. With an SXGA 16' screen,you get superior screen resolution for those demanding 3-D games. Some helpful advise,don't upgrade your '512MB DDR RAM Memory',because these games can't handle that much memory,anything like '1024MB DDR RAM Memory' or higher will 'crash' the game,its just too much memory for those games. P.S., this 'Sony VAIO PCG-GRV670 Notebook' has an 'AV Output',means you can hook-up booming speakers (I-Trigue 2.1 3300-Creative) that will shake your house roof off,great 'laptop',ready for 'Rome:Total War'.....
Rating: 
Summary: NEVER BUY A SONY LAPTOP
Review: I own this laptop and after 13 months, it now is a $2,400 paperweight! One month after my warrenty expired, this model kept over-heating and crashing. I called Sony and received the worst customer service ever. They wanted me to pay $800 for a new motherboard! I refused. Since then, I've researched this model and other Sony models on the net and found that lots of people have the same issue and Sony expects them to pay $800 for new motherboards. Someone needs to get a group lawsuit against them. I'll never buy another Sony laptop again.
Rating:
Summary: Very provincial product for a "supposedly" global brand
Review: I wish I had bought a Toshiba instead of the Vaio. That's what I was planning to do. But at the last minute I was lured by Sony's DVD burner. As it turns out, I bought the Vaio in the USA, but many features are rendered useless in Europe, where I live most of the year. Plug and play drivers don't work for simple accesories like a USB mouse !?! The Vaio can't find the drivers even for a SONY digital camcorder. So I'm not using the DVD burner. Nor can it find the drivers for my HP printer. The Sony technical support tried to help, but couldn't resolve my problems. They told me that the machine was designed to work in the USA, but not in Europe. How bogus an excuse is that? Also, the warranty is only good in the USA. Pretty lame for a supposedly global brand. Lack of Wi-Fi is a major drawback, and Sony recognized that and apparently tried to remedy this by offering free PCMCIA Wi-Fi cards for a limited time. Unfortunately, I bought my Vaio ONE DAY after this offer expired. I sent Sony a note asking them to send me the card even though I missed the date by one day. Did they? No. Hard to understand why you would recognize that you have a major design flaw... but recognize it for only a limited time... The Vaio is fast and works very well for other basic applications. Also, I did get a Bluetooth USB adapter to work (after having to return a PCMCIA Bluetooth adapter which did NOT work) almost to my surprise. However, the people at Sony really blew it with this customer. Don't expect me to buy another Vaio. I think I'll go with Toshiba.
Rating: 
Summary: Power Packed
Review: Power packed little PC - but bear in mind: The bad:
XP HOME edition (not Pro)
Only 1 RAM slot.
Battery life not real long. The good:
DVD burner included.
It's fast for a laptop.
It's real fast. :)
Rating:
Summary: An excellent compact, desktop, you can take with you.
Review: The key to this machine is understanding what it is. It is a compact footprint desktop with a built in UPS. If you think of it that way you will be very happy with it. If you're out to buy a kick butt gaming laptop so that you can frag your way from Los Angeles to New York, don't get this machine. This machine has a lot going for it, very nice 3D performance, very nice ergonomics, clear bright screen, zippy P4 performance, and you can burn your own DVDs on it. All very nice. Ports are somewhat limited (3 USB + ethernet + firewire + parallel and VGA) but you get back your serial port of you buy the port replicator. For a limited time Sony is giving away WiFi cards if you send them a copy of your reciept and serial #. Sony now offers this notebook with WinXP pro (the GRV680P) and you should get that as its the same price ... and XP Pro gives you some nice server like features. The not so nice part is that clearly this machine will be orphaned quickly. I say this because soon the only laptops worth buying will have WiFi built in, systems without it will become like laptops without Ethernet two years ago. The software was somewhat thrown together as well. The built in CD-burning application (drag & drop CD) works, but if you try to use the "built in" XP software for dealing with writable CD's it doesn't work. Other issues arise when you try to use it as a portable machine. First, the machine draws 100 watts. That means you can't really power it from an airplane power socket without blowing the circuit breaker. Second, the second battery (needed if you want to have long run time) requires that you remove the DVD drive. That means no games while you are "mobile." However, if you get a piece of code that "emulates" a CDROM drive using a disk image on the hard drive you can get by, and the generous hard drive makes that practical. It also weighs a ton with two batteries in it so if you're going to do this get the Sony VAIO back pack to carry the thing. Holding it over your shoulder will give you back pains. There is a slot for a memory stick. That's great if you're into memory sticks but of little use to those who have cameras with CF slots or USB disk drives. All that being said, if you are someone who has a small home office, or a desk that you use for both writing and email. Or you are a student who wants to be able to use their computer in the library or the dorm without all the cabling hassle. This is the machine for you. It is completely capable of running all of todays applications (from games, to spreadsheets, to databases) and it offers excellent data storage capacity and connectivity. Like many (most?) portables today it does not come with a floppy but it will read/write CDR's and CD-RWs, as well as DVDs (send a video this year a christmas rather than a letter!) and the fact that everything was designed to work together means no annoying driver/motherboard/OS compatability issues to deal with.
Rating:
Summary: Power Hungry - Power House - Built For The Power Hungry
Review: The Sony VAIO PCG-GRV680 is an excellent notebook for the power hungry users. The screen resolution is excellent with vivid graphics and sharp readable text. Sony also includes color management profile to help keep the displays color output accurate. ATI Mobility RADEON 9000 does a respectable job of pumping pixels to the display for video and DVD playback. However, the 3D gaming performance is not a good as a desktop with a state of the art AGP card. That being said, the 3D performance is still very useable if you want to play the occasional game and is certainly better than most laptop displays. The CPU performance is fantastic, and the PCG-GRV680 has plenty of DDR RAM to multitask with ease. The CPU cooling fan is slightly louder than some notebooks, but it is not annoying. The hard drive speed and performance is very respectable for a laptop, but it is not as fast as a desktop hard drive. There is more storage on this notebook than most people will use. Sony has partitioned the drive into two logical drives, the C: drive is about 14 Gig and the D: drive is about 41 Gig respectively. The hard drive is quiet, which is a nice plus. The keyboard has a very useable layout, but the keys are a bit too touchy for my liking. The pointing device is very acceptable and I was able to adapt to it with ease. The DVD burner is a great plus, but it is a bit slower than I had hoped for, but still it is very useable. The dual DVD format is fantastic. The CD burning speed is very useable at about 16X MAX. The bundled software is good, and includes Adobe Photo Elements, Quicken, etc. I would have preferred to see Roxio's Easy CD & DVD Creator to the bundled burning software that Sony included. Consider a 3rd party CD burning application upgrade a must have. The biggest let down is the fact that this unit ships with Windows XP Home Edition instead of XP Professional. Sony also includes system and software restore CD ROMs that can reload your system to factory defaults in about an hour. The built in NIC on my laptop is an Intel N100, which is about as good as it gets for 100 Mbps Ethernet performance. There are three USB ports built in to the PCG-GRV680. However, on a machine with this much power the addition of a USB 2.0 port would be greatly appreciated. There is one 1394 Firewire port providing a high-speed peripheral connectivity option. Another disappointment is that Sony did not include a built-in microphone on this unit; however, there is a jack for a MIC on the right side of the unit. The built-in audio is provided by Yamaha and is very acceptable to me. The built in stereo speakers are ok, but as expected for built-ins, not fantastic. The battery life is not that great, but that is to be expected when your machine has a 16 inch display 512 Mb RAM, and a full blown Pentium 4 running at 2.6 GHz. Add a wireless card and you looking at 2 -3 hours of runtime. If you require more battery life, Sony does offer the option of adding as second battery that fits into the DVD drive bay. If battery life is of key importance, then this is probably not the notebook for you. I would look at a Centrino notebook. Oddly, Sony does not appear to make a car or airplane adapter for this notebook, so you will have to look at 3rd party solutions if you require either. The worst part of the Sony VAIO ownership experience for me is the Sony VAIO website. The vaio.net site is one of the worst website designs I have seen in quite a while. Navigation is terrible! I hope that Sony will find a new web designer soon! Overall, if you are power user looking for a loaded system this is a fantastic notebook with only a few minor faults that are quite forgivable. If you are looking for great battery life, or featherweight, look elsewhere.
Rating:
Summary: Fast Pig, Great for the uncertain Desktop Convert
Review: This thing is fast, its Gigantic, its Hot, its a desktop processor with a laptop fan, Its loudish, and its not super portable.
Why is this good? Because it acts like a desktop too. If you have it plugged in and want all of the performance, youll have it. If you want to bring it somewhere, and plug it in, youll have it. If you want to roam in the park, unfettered by worldly concerns, specifically wifi and plugs, you dont got it.
The software package is interesting, but weird, all sony all the time, but you can change that, from all that software left on your desktop.
If you have any question about the desktop replacement computer, see this machine, it defines the genre.
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