SonyVaioVGN-SZ650N
Contact: MichaelDoube
- Make: Sony
- Brand: Vaio
- Model: VGN-SZ650N
- Website:
Current Issues
- Testing Hardy Heron 8.04
Screen brightness control not working on nVidia card; Intel card requires xbacklight 173652.
Webcam works after installing this driver
LiveCD doesn't detect nVidia display adapter (GeForce 8400M GS) so you have to choose screen res and driver
WLAN LED not working bug 176090
- Suspend to RAM is improving (but has been good lately... better on Gutsy at the moment)
- Battery life very short (2-3h instead of 4-6h)
- Fingerprint sensor not working
- Double-tap-to-middle-button-click not working
- Tap-and-drag annoyingly difficult to initiate (but sometimes possible)
- Vertical and horizontal scroll not working from side and bottom of touchpad
Mic not working, nor is headphone jack 175652
Hibernate is improving 179101
No support for hybrid hard drive NVCache feature 178654
No support for hard disk head parking based on internal accelerometer (G-sensor shock protection) 116045
No kernel support for MagicGate MemoryStick card reader. (Card is detected by tifm_core, but not mounted.) Looks like preliminary kernel support is slated for 2.6.25 linux.kernel mailing list
Sierra Wireless 595 (EVDO modem) PCMCIA card fails to load with "ohci_hcd 0000:0a:00.1: USB HC takeover failed! (BIOS/SMM bug)" in dmesg. 201158
Kismet freezes the laptop requiring a removal of the battery (combination of iwl4965 driver and a 64 bit environment?) 216544
System Info
Sony Corporation VGN-SZ650N J002UR2M
Hardware details
Screen & Monitors |
||||
Device |
Works? |
Bug # |
||
in Ubuntu 7.10 |
in Hardy Heron (current development) |
|||
Intel GM965 / GMA3100 |
||||
Screen |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
Correct resolution? |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
Correct refresh rate? |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
3D Acceleration |
No |
Yes |
|
|
External monitor works? |
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
External monitor - mirrors |
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
External monitor - extend desktop |
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
nVidia GeForce 8400M GS |
||||
Screen |
Yes |
Yes |
||
Correct resolution? |
Yes |
No |
|
|
Correct refresh rate? |
No ( and strange random black flicker) |
Yes (53 Hz!) |
|
|
3D Acceleration |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
External monitor works? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
|
External monitor - mirrors |
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
External monitor - extend desktop |
Yes |
Untested |
|
|
Notes on dual display adapters |
||||
SZ series notebooks have 2 display adapters - an integrated Intel adapter for low power consumption and an nVidia adapater for higher 3D performance. The adapters cannot be used concurrently. The special switch, labelled STAMINA SPEED, selects between the adapters, and must be changed while the notebook is powered down or just before a reboot. So far the intel adapter works fine, except that it is blacklisted by Compiz so 3D desktop eyecandy does not work. This is a known and high-priority issue that should be fixed in Hardy. Eyecandy works with the nVidia card. A script that switches between 2 xorg.conf files depending on the output of lspci must be in rc2.d, as described here, though X is getting better at autoconfiguring. |
Power Management |
|||
Battery detected? |
Yes |
Yes but GPM is giving weird information |
|
Hibernates? |
I think so |
Sometimes |
|
Suspend |
Improving |
Unreliable |
|
Dim monitor on battery |
No |
No |
|
Blank monitor on inactivity |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Lid Close |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Cpu frequency scaling |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Sound |
|||
Sound works? |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Correct volume? |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Hardware volume switch |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Internal mic |
No |
No |
|
Headphone jack |
Yes with alsa 1.0.15 installation instructions |
No |
|
Mic jack |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Networking |
|||
Wired NIC |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Wireless NIC |
Yes (LED doesn't go) |
Yes (LED doesn't go) |
|
PCMCIA NIC |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Firewire |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Bluetooth |
Yes but connecting to devices fails with error: "obex://[00:05:c9:ea:68:ee]" is not a valid location. |
|
|
Modem |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Infrared |
Not present |
Not Present |
|
Touchpad & Mice |
|||
Touchpad |
Yes with annoyances |
Yes with annoyances |
|
Touchpad - Doubletap = double click |
No |
No |
|
Touchpad - Scroll down side |
Had to customise my xorg.conf |
No |
|
External mouse - USB |
Yes |
Untested |
|
External mouse - Serial |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Docking Station/Port Replicator |
|||
AC through replicator |
Untested |
Untested |
|
USB |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Serial |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Parallel |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External Monitor - VGA |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External Monitor - DVI |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Modem |
Untested |
Untested |
|
NIC |
Untested |
Untested |
|
PS/2 |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Additional Hardware |
|||
Fingerprint reader |
No (partial under virtualbox WinXP guest) |
No |
|
CD/DVD drive |
Yes |
Yes |
|
PCMCIA cards |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Express card |
Detected |
Detected |
|
Parallel Ports |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Card reader(s) |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Webcam |
Yes with this driver |
|
Function and other keys |
|||||
Fn key |
Operation |
Keycode |
Works? |
Bug # |
|
in Ubuntu 7.10? |
in Heron (current development)? |
||||
+ F2 |
Mute |
0xa0 |
Yes |
Yes |
|
+ F3 |
Volume down |
0xae |
Yes |
Yes |
|
+ F4 |
Volume up |
0xb0 |
Yes |
Yes |
|
+ F5 |
Brightness down |
0xd6 acpi event sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000010 |
No |
No |
|
+ F6 |
Brightness up |
0xd7 acpi event sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000011 |
No |
No |
|
+ F7 |
External monitor |
acpi event sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000012 |
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F10 |
Zoom in |
acpi event sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000015 |
Untested |
No |
|
+ F12 |
Hibernate (to HD) |
|
Yes but hibernate unreliable |
Untested |
|
+ E |
eject optical disk |
0xcc |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Other Keys / Switches |
|||||
Wireless switch |
Enable / disable all radio communication |
event "sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000026" = enable, event "sony/hotkey SPIC 00000001 00000027" = disable |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Notes
Sony have crippled the BIOS so that hardware virtualisation (IVT, VT-x) and AHCI are disabled and there is nowhere in the BIOS setup to enable it. You can enable these features by manually hacking the BIOS registers provided that you have installed the latest BIOS from Sony.
- Suspend-to-RAM sometimes works. Applying all updates and linux-backports-modules seems to help.
- I have only tried 64-bit desktop Ubuntu so far.
Attachments
Other Resources
LaptopTestingTeam/Old/SonyVaioVGN-SZ650N (last edited 2010-03-02 11:38:34 by host226-241-dynamic)