Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI

By PCMag Staff

July 22, 2011

The Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI ($1,799 direct) remixes the VAIO family of with top-of-the-line features that create an engaging visual experience for both games and movies—even when they're in 3D. From its handsome angular design elements to all the media-friendly components packed inside, the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI has a distinctive style that's hard to pass up.

Design
The VPC-F215FX/BI impresses before you even open its lid. Whereas many laptops utilize a clamshell design, the new VAIO line's frame has a beveled edge, as opposed to usual the flat front seen on other systems. These sharp angles are dressed up in a beautiful glossy piano-black finish, which you'll probably need to wipe down regularly to remove fingerprints. As is common for a desktop replacement media laptop, the Sony VAIO is fairly big, measuring 1.79 by 15.69 by 10.69 inches (HWD) and weighing a backache-inducing seven pounds.

The 16-inch, 1,920-by-1,080 widescreen display serves up bright colors and extremely fine detail. In addition to its high resolution, it also has a 240Hz refresh rate, so it can display more frames per second and a smoother picture in 3D. A built-in emitter syncs the active shutter 3D glasses; these come installed with two batteries rated to last 100 hours, but you will have to pay $4.99 to replace each one once it drains. The display is matched with Sony's S-Force Front Surround 3D sound, which provides impressive simulated five-channel surround sound as paired with the Dolby Home Theater audio system.

The Sony VAIO also features a backlit chiclet-style keyboard, with square matte-finish keys that look nice against the glossy black chassis. The layout is nothing out of the ordinary, but the keys are well spaced and the typing experience is comfortable. The palm rest is raised slightly and features the same matte finish as the keys, which is unusual but prevents a lot of unsightly handprints. Integrated into the palm rest is a multitouch touchpad which, like past models in the VAIO line, sports a textured pattern consisting of raised dots. These can sometimes be obtrusive, but the VPC-F215FX/BI keeps them very low-profile. The touchpad registered multitouch gestures without any false negatives, though not all of my gestures were understood as I intended them. The right and left buttons click softly, and the unified button bar is one of the few I've used that didn't leave me wishing for separate right and left buttons.

Features
The Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI is stocked with a full assortment of features, with one USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports, VGA and HDMI outputs, an Ethernet port, 802.11n Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 3.0. A spacious 640GB 7,200rpm hard drive matches the one found in the ($1,599.99 direct, 3.5 stars). Along the front edge of the laptop you'll find a multiformat card reader (SD, MMC, MS/MSPro), a physical switch for turning on or off the Wi-Fi, and a small FireWire 400 port.

The real draw for this system is the assortment of entertainment options it allows. The Blu-ray optical drive lets you play both standard and 3D Blu-ray movies, as well as DVDs and CDs. The included active shutter 3D glasses are a bit bulky, but they aren't heavy, weighing only 2.5 ounces. But they are expensive if you want to order replacements or an additional pair: They cost roughly $100 each.

Performance
The Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI isn't just a pretty display with lots of entertainment features. At its heart is a 2GHz Intel Core i7-2630QM quad-core processor which, paired with 6GB of RAM, provides a lot of horsepower for any program you want to throw at it. When we ran our full-system benchmark test, PCMark Vantage, the Sony VAIO scored 8,701, easily beating out the 8,211 of the Editors' Choice ($1,499.99 street, 4 stars) and the 6,276 of the HP Envy 17 3D. We saw this same level of performance in our CineBench R11.5 rendering test, in which the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI scored 5.07, edging past the Aspire AS8950G-9839 (4.96) and blasting past the HP Envy 17 3D (2.95) with its first-generation Core i7.

Sony also adds to the mix an Nvidia GeForce GT 540M graphics processor, with a full 1GB memory cache. It also features Nvidia's Optimus technology, which automatically switches between Intel's integrated graphics and the discrete GPU when you need more power. In our 3DMark 06 DirectX 9 test, the Sony VAIO scored 5,673 at 1,024-by-768 resolution, and when we ratcheted up the resolution settings to a full 1,920 by 1,080, the score dropped to 2,257. We saw similar results in actual games, like Crysis, on which the Sony produced 28 frames per second (fps) at 1,024 by 768 and 3fps with the resolution maxed; and Lost Planet 2, we saw frame rates of 16.6fps at the lower resolution and 5.2fps at the higher one. The Acer Aspire AS8950G-9839 put up higher frame rates in both Crysis (48.4fps) and Lost Planet 2 (47.7fps), and the HP Envy 17 3D did even better (68.3fps in Crysis, 71.2fps in Lost Planet 2). We tested the Sony with 3D enabled; turn it off and you'll experience even better frame rates, though the Acer and HP will still be faster.

The Sony VAIO offers even more raw power than competing systems, however, particularly when it comes to multimedia. In our Photoshop CS5 tests, the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI completed 12 photo manipulation tasks in 4 minutes 11 seconds, beating every similar system except the Acer Aspire AS8950G-9839 (3:52). In our Handbrake video encoding test, the Sony cranked through in 1 minute 40 seconds, beating all competitors, including the Acer Aspire AS8950G-9839 (2:08) and ($1,039.98 direct, 4 stars) (2:39).

These components provide solid performance, but they're battery hungry as well, and in our MobileMark 2007 battery test, the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI lasted 2 hours 36 minutes with its six-cell 54Wh battery. That's not quite enough juice to get you through a long movie, but it's a full hour longer than the paltry 1:39 of the HP Envy 17 3D. Systems with longer battery life managed with much larger batteries, like the Dell Inspiron 17R (90Wh, 7:51) or the Acer Aspire AS8950G-9839 (87Wh, 5:22). Regardless of battery size, you'll still want to keep the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI near a power outlet.

If you're looking for a strong media center laptop and want some of the best 3D implementation on the market today, take a good look at the Sony VAIO VPC-F215FX/BI. It packs some impressive components, like a Quad-core Intel Core i7-2630QM processor and an Nvidia GeForce GT 540M graphics card, and wraps it all up in an attractive package. If you don't mind forgoing the 3D, try our Editors' Choice Acer Aspire AS8950G-9839.

BENCHMARK TEST RESULTS:

COMPARISON TABLE

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