deleting Vaio from Sony computer

[Broadback]

Can I simply delete Viao from my Sony computer and then load a fresh
Windows 10?

[Martin Brown]

On 04/04/2017 10:03, Broadback wrote:

> Can I simply delete Viao from my Sony computer and then load a fresh
> Windows 10?

Sony (and Toshiba) portable kit has a bad tendency to have customised
hardware drivers that can result in problems/loss of some bespoke
functionality if you do a generic reinstall with a bog standard Windows.

Sleep, suspend and battery saver features are one area of concern.

Whether these matter to you is another matter. Portable PCs it is
usually better to stick with the manufacturers approved OS installer and
their own drivers intended for the model that you have.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

[The Natural Philosopher]

I can confirm that my Toshiba C55 at least happily takes linux with no
need for any other software.



--
There’s a mighty big difference between good, sound reasons and reasons
that sound good.

Burton Hillis (William Vaughn, American columnist)

[Martin Brown]

On 04/04/2017 10:48, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 04/04/17 10:45, Martin Brown wrote:
>> On 04/04/2017 10:03, Broadback wrote:
>>
>>> Can I simply delete Viao from my Sony computer and then load a fresh
>>> Windows 10?
>>
>> Sony (and Toshiba) portable kit has a bad tendency to have customised
>> hardware drivers that can result in problems/loss of some bespoke
>> functionality if you do a generic reinstall with a bog standard Windows.
>>
>> Sleep, suspend and battery saver features are one area of concern.
>>
>> Whether these matter to you is another matter. Portable PCs it is
>> usually better to stick with the manufacturers approved OS installer and
>> their own drivers intended for the model that you have.
>>
> I can confirm that my Toshiba C55 at least happily takes linux with no
> need for any other software.

I have never found Linux on Toshiba portables to be a problem (apart
from one where there was a physical hardware problem with the keyboard
which was what I wanted to test) - it loads reasonably sensible default
generic drivers. The same cannot always be said for Windoze.

Latent faults might not show up if you never use sleep, hibernate
timeout or suspend modes. Portable makers do some pretty odd driver
tweaks to maximise battery life - it is these features that you tend to
lose. (and or unreliable USB devices after the machine has been asleep)

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

[The Natural Philosopher]

My tosh does go a bit weird under whichever mode it is that saves the
state to disk and shuts down.

In particular a USB attached DTV dongle jams up and needs to be
disconnected and reconnected and the receiving program shut down and
restarted.

Previously an acer laptop would suffer video failure on resume when
using Nvidia drivers rather than nouveau. Screen states were not saved
by the proprietary drivers.

In practice these have not been hugely serious issues.

Power saving under the battery power seems well enough handled by latest
releases on Mint/Ubuntu - I confess I have not explored all the possible
combinations of shut down suspend, sleep and hibernate offered to test
every one. Indeed I am not actually sure of the difference ;-)

Wifi comes back up as it should.

As far as keyboard mappings and mouse pad handling goes, the C55 laptop
behaves better than expected, with every function key and te mouse pad
doing the expected thing.

My general impressions that whilst not as rock solid as a desktop most
reasonably modern generic laptops will run Linux perfectly well.

I kept a windows partition on mine, but in 18 months have never used it.

PS. something I discovered when replacing the charge cable socket, is
that if you cant get into the BIOS any other way, to get it to boot
Linux, removing the battery causes it to throw you in on next power up
to set the system date and time. This can be exploited to access the
rather limited set of BIOS options - IIRC there as a need to ensure the
correct boot mode to boot linux via GRUB etc.

I hope this helps someone.


--
Karl Marx said religion is the opium of the people.
But Marxism is the crack cocaine.

[Brian Gaff]

Depends on whether there are drivers for the hardware available in Windows
10.
Brian

--
----- -
This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...
bri...@blueyonder.co.uk
Blind user, so no pictures please!
"Broadback" <messag...@j-towill.co.uk> wrote in message
news:obvnbp$9ba$1...@dont-email.me...

[Capitol]

I have never had a problem with Ubuntu 10,4 on my Dell Mini as the only
operating system.

[Brian Gaff]

One thing to try then is get a cheap hard drive, and swap them and try an
install on that. At least then you have not burned your bridges as you still
have the drive.

Brian

--
----- -
This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...
bri...@blueyonder.co.uk
Blind user, so no pictures please!
"Broadback" <messag...@j-towill.co.uk> wrote in message
news:obvnbp$9ba$1...@dont-email.me...

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 04/04/17 12:05, Brian Gaff wrote:
> One thing to try then is get a cheap hard drive, and swap them and try an
> install on that. At least then you have not burned your bridges as you still
> have the drive.
> Brian
>

The first thing to do is try a live DVD. If the hardware all seems to
respond correctly you are 90% there.


--
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as
foolish, and by the rulers as useful.

(Seneca the Younger, 65 AD)

[Bill]

In message <obvnbp$9ba$1...@dont-email.me>, Broadback
<messag...@j-towill.co.uk> writes

>Can I simply delete Viao from my Sony computer and then load a fresh
>Windows 10?

I suspect the answer is: Probably, if it was previously running a Vaio'd
version of Windows 10. Especially if there are drivers out there.

I believe that Sony are no longer in the laptop market, which may be
relevant.

I once had a Sony laptop. A nice man in Ireland said "Yes, the one here
does it, too". He gave me a phone number to raise the issue with Sony
HQ. That number led to another number, and another. Then I was back with
the man in Ireland again. I gave up and sold it. Never again.

Why does anyone think that saying Linux works on a Toshiba laptop
answers the question?
--
Bill

[The Natural Philosopher]

If you read back in the thread the first responder said that Sony and
Toshiba Laptops were somewhat of a laws unto themselves. My response was
the first that said 'but Toshiba laptops are not a law unto themselves:
they actually work very well with a standard distro'

I don't think mine has any special drivers at all.

I know it didn't help the OP with his Sony, but it at least might help
someone who is considering buying a Tosh for linux use, as I did.

--
“It is hard to imagine a more stupid decision or more dangerous way of
making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people
who pay no price for being wrong.”

Thomas Sowell

[Alan Dawes]

In article <obvnbp$9ba$1...@dont-email.me>,

Broadback <messag...@j-towill.co.uk> wrote:
> Can I simply delete Viao from my Sony computer and then load a fresh
> Windows 10?

As others have said your problem will be drivers. You have not said which
Sony Viao you have as between 1996 and when Sony sold the Viao devision in
Feb 2014 there wer 100s of versions many changes to hardware requiring new
drivers. Although Sony no longer own Viao they still have support pages
and a quick browse suggests that if it was one that came with win 8.1 then
drivers are available but earlier ones are less clear cut. Use the model
number to check with support eg:

https://www.sony-asia.com/microsite/support/win10/en/windows10_81_upgrade_steps.html

https://esupport.sony.com/US/p/os10upgrade.pl

http://www.sony-asia.com/microsite/support/win10/en/

Even then you may have to do upgrades to the present windows version
rather than remove the old and instal win 10 to ensure compatability.

It also seems others have problems with older versions of Vaio. If you
google ther are quite a lot of hits eg:

http://www.windowscentral.com/sony-dont-update-your-vaio-windows-pcs-windows-10-yet

Alan

--
alan....@argonet.co.uk
alan....@riscos.org
Using an ARMX6

[mechanic]

On Tue, 4 Apr 2017 12:04:38 +0100, Capitol wrote:

> I have never had a problem with Ubuntu 10,4 on my Dell Mini as the only
> operating system.

Yes, that'll help the OP no end.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Well it might as it might actually be that a Linux install instead of
Win10 would be a more successful use of an old sony laptop.



--
"The great thing about Glasgow is that if there's a nuclear attack it'll
look exactly the same afterwards."

Billy Connolly

[dennis@home]

On 04/04/2017 12:21, Bill wrote:

> Why does anyone think that saying Linux works on a Toshiba laptop
> answers the question?

They are running linux on a desktop and feel lonely.