It looks like Sony will not be offering any migration of VAIO S-series (SZ is ok though) to Vista citing that the S-series doesn’t meet the hardware requirements for Vista (which is an outright lie). Interestingly enough, they are supporting the very last S-series (S6xxx).
Installing Vista on my 1st gen S170P works fine with it find every piece of hardware except the audio hardware. One can simply use the XP audio driver to enable audio and everything works nice.
The big issue is getting the notebook hotkeys and buttons to work and that is where Sony is lagging in the support. One can just assume they didn’t want to go back and update these utilities.
I’ve managed to get some (but not all) of the hardware stuff buttons working and will post instructions for those interested once I have verified it works and can repeat the process. If anyone has info they want to share, please reply to this post.
Though I use TX, I managed to make some buttons work. Like for example the eject button work and AV button on the TX but not the external volume buttons, Stop, Play and forward buttons. Thanks to Vaio Event and Shared Libraries..
I’m currently installing the drivers for my TX as I type this.
I have installed Vista onto my S270p several times throughout the beta process and each time I get a bit further getting a fully funtional install. The only problems I have now are the function keys and the inability to adjust the brightness. Brightness is really the more important of the two, as that plays a big role in battery life. If anyone comes up with a solution to these please let me know.
I was able to get brightness working but not volume which is indeed more useful. I’ll be happy to at least get that…back to testing so I can share my findings.
[quote author=“gr00vy0ne”]I was able to get brightness working but not volume which is indeed more useful. I’ll be happy to at least get that…back to testing so I can share my findings.
Have you guys tried downloading the drivers from here? ftp://ftp.vaio-link.com/PUB/OS/VistaUpgrade/
I can’t test any of them since I don’t have Vista, but they’ve even made the VAIO Event service (the thing that handles the Fn shortcuts) for Vista here: ftp://ftp.vaio-link.com/PUB/OS/VistaUpgrade/Applications/VAIOEventService
As for screen brightness, I think you need special graphics card drivers (not the official ones from nvidia/ati). Even with XP, I have to use drivers from laptopvideo2go.com for my (nVidia) drivers - the official ones dont support screen brightness controls. For Ati users, try using drivers from http://www.omegadrivers.net
Let me know if this helps cos if it does, then I’ll definitely consider getting vista!
[quote author=“da8om8”][quote author=“gr00vy0ne”]I was able to get brightness working but not volume which is indeed more useful. I’ll be happy to at least get that…back to testing so I can share my findings.
Have you guys tried downloading the drivers from here? ftp://ftp.vaio-link.com/PUB/OS/VistaUpgrade/
I can’t test any of them since I don’t have Vista, but they’ve even made the VAIO Event service (the thing that handles the Fn shortcuts) for Vista here: ftp://ftp.vaio-link.com/PUB/OS/VistaUpgrade/Applications/VAIOEventService
As for screen brightness, I think you need special graphics card drivers (not the official ones from nvidia/ati). Even with XP, I have to use drivers from laptopvideo2go.com for my (nVidia) drivers - the official ones dont support screen brightness controls. For Ati users, try using drivers from http://www.omegadrivers.net
Let me know if this helps cos if it does, then I’ll definitely consider getting vista!
Yep, you’re right. The brightness control of my FE590P doesn’t work with general nVidia driver. I have to install OEM driver of Sony to get it works but it’s really good. I also use some EU drivers and utilities and they work fine in my US laptop. They dont put model check in setup files even though I can override the check.
don’t post much here these days but thought i’d share my experience w/ my S260P and see if anyone has had any luck w/ the things I haven’t got working.
installed Vista Bus clean. obviously prog S buttons didn’t work, will get to that…but audio didn’t work (as reported above), video was updated w/ the first windows update I did, radeon WDDM drivers installed and works great…no plans to install Sony provided video drivers.
second priority, get the audio working. tried the sony soundmax drivers from the US support download…nothing, didn’t work, FN keys did nothing either. began searching and found soundmax drivers from soundmax, installed and bingo, got audio, but FN keys to mute/vol do nothing, have to use the soundmax icon in the systray.
next, pulled down the necessary stuff (XP of course) from support and began installing…installed the following items in the order indicated…all from the US Sony Support site. this is the order indicated by the XP clean install directions, thought i’d give this a try.
1. intel chipset drivers
2. notebook control drivers
3. sony prog i/o
4. sony shared lib
5. notebook control
6. audio drivers
still no audio, plus, when i fire sony notebook setup (SNSetup.exe) from program menu, it errors out…HOWEVER, if I fire the other exe (PBMsg.exe) in the Sony program files folders, bingo, it comes up on the prog key tab…I can click anywhere and change any settings but the ‘About This Computer’ tab, that tab errors out w the same error i get when firing sony notebook setup (SNSetup.exe).
anyway, that’s where i stand…anybody have any ideas or know if i’ve got my order above goofed up?
I own SONY VAIO S4HP, I have installed Windows Vita 2 weeks ago and till that, I have everything running except the brightness control which is shame because it’s very important for battery life. I have tried modified SONY OEM driver, modified nVidia driver from http://www.laptopvideo2go.com, original Microsoft WDDM driver, but none of them works. Has anyone managed to run the brightness control on the VAIO S-Serie?
Has anybody a vista install on the S1xx/S2xx line without allowing Windows Update to install the MS version of the Sony Prog IO and Sony Shared Lib.
What I’m wondering is whether or not those files are different/newer than the last stuff from Sony on the Sxx esupport website and if that’s causing some of the non-functioning pieces/parts.
After my install, I just let Vista update everything, including these two things…they show up now in my Update History, but they are not typical KB updates that can be removed…
Anyway, rather than go thru another install and skip those, trying then the files from esupport…thought I’d ask first and see if anybody had any thoughts on that, or if anybody has already considered it and tried it.
The fact that my S260P works perfectly accept for the one tab in SNS and the vol FN keys not working, makes me wonder if it’s not just a conflict w/ a file that Vista pulled down from MS.
Has anybody a vista install on the S1xx/S2xx line without allowing Windows Update to install the MS version of the Sony Prog IO and Sony Shared Lib.
What I’m wondering is whether or not those files are different/newer than the last stuff from Sony on the Sxx esupport website and if that’s causing some of the non-functioning pieces/parts.
After my install, I just let Vista update everything, including these two things…they show up now in my Update History, but they are not typical KB updates that can be removed…
Anyway, rather than go thru another install and skip those, trying then the files from esupport…thought I’d ask first and see if anybody had any thoughts on that, or if anybody has already considered it and tried it.
The fact that my S260P works perfectly accept for the one tab in SNS and the vol FN keys not working, makes me wonder if it’s not just a conflict w/ a file that Vista pulled down from MS.
Thoughts?
Chris
Do you have brightness control working? Which graphic driver are you using? :o
Yes, brightness controls work on my S260P. I am using the drivers that Vista installed and then I believe (but don’t quote me on it) that it updated the video drivers during a Windows update at some point right after Vista came up for the first time.
I did install, in the indicated order, all the XP stuff from the Sony eSupport site, related to Sony Prog IO, shared libraries, chipset, notebook setup, etc…but I didn’t not install any video, audio, etc from there.
The only think I didn’t have working, was the audio, which I tried the XP drivers from Sony, don’t work or I couldn’t get them to work, after installing and rebooting, nothing happened.
I finally downloaded a SoundMax package from somewhere, that indicated Vista support, and that works, but my FN keys don’t do anything.
esupport seems to have a tool that recommends an upgrade path for this model, what i’m guessing is the the 32mb S360 would generate a message saying that it’s not capable of running vista, the 64mb model might check out OK and then the tool might offer a way to get at drivers for the S360/360P. if that’s the case, given that everything else but audio works on the S260, it’s possible that any updated drivers would work as well.
anybody that can give that a shot and let me know what you find?
I’m going to upgrade to Vista soon as well. Has any of you found the solution for the brightness and the volume issue? I do have to say it isn’t essential for me since I use my laptop more like a desktop most of the time, but it would be nice to have it working still.
What are your opinions so far with Vista on the S model?
What is the best way to install Vista? I’ve already decided to do the work-around clean install. But Is there an order in which I should install the VAIO drivers?
cos if it does, then I’ll definitely consider getting vista!
