Shane McGlaun20 January 2010, 7:00 AM
Sony packs serious hardware into a lightweight ultraportable chassis.
Sony has pulled the wraps off a new and particularly sexy new ultraportable line called the
Vaio Z Series. The new machines look similar to that
Vaio X with its thin profile, but pack in serious hardware. The ultraportable machines use 13.3-inch screens and sport a carbon fiber and aluminum chassis. The machines also use hybrid graphics and can switch between an NVIDIA GT 330M discrete GPU and integrated Intel HD graphics depending on demand.
The series will launch with two models to start with on March 10 in Europe. The high-end version is the Vaio VPCZ11Z9E and it will use an Intel Core i7-620M CPU and run Windows 7 Pro. The machine will have 6GB of RAM and Quad SSD storage with 256GB capacity. The Quad SSD feature writes data simultaneously to four SSDs at once. The 13.1-inch LCD is LED backlit and has a resolution of 1920 x 1080. The notebook weighs 1.43kg with standard battery.
The second model at launch will be the Vaio VPCZ11X9E. The machine will use a slower Core i7-520M CPU, 4GB of RAM, 128GB Quad SSD storage system, and the 13.1-inch LCD will have a lower 1600 x 900 resolution. It will weigh 1.41kg. Both machines will also have a wide range of accessories offered at launch. Pricing is unknown at this time, but expect the notebooks to be expensive.