Sony RC210G: Very quiet & fast, but too much software crud ...
Written: May 25 '06 (Updated Nov 07 '06)
Product Rating:
Ease of Use:
Quality of Tech Support:
Pros: Very quiet, mega-diskspace, dual-core, expandable.
Cons: Pre-installed software crud (such as AOL), DVD recording problem, somewhat frequent "hangs".
The Bottom Line: This is a fast, quiet, capable machine. Seriously consider whether you're going to utilize the "Media Center" (TV tuner & Tivo) stuff though.
graphics_guy's Full Review: Sony VAIO® RC210G (027242690530) PC Desktop
The Scenario (the computer I'm replacing):
------------------------------------------
I previously had a Toshiba laptop that was about 5 years old.
I used the Toshiba to 'rip' songs from my cd collection and
make custom "greatest hits" cds (I'm very into my music).
The toshiba is kinda slow, and the external cd recorder is
connected via slow USB-1.0 (4x max speed), it only has 10Gb
disk space (which gets filled up quickly by music stored at
maximum cd quality), The operating system is Windows ME
(which sucks), I had bought several pieces of software over
the years that wouldn't run well on it (because of the
operating system and/or the puny cpu & memory).
I also used it to process pictures from my digital camera,
reading them in via an external card reader and burning
them onto cdr (reading 3 megapixel+ pictures is slow via
the USB-1.0 external connection, and even viewing pictures
via the internal cd drive is excruciatingly slow).
And this laptop is not on the internet (I occasionally use
a prepaid dialup internet service by AT&T).
Things I was looking for in my new computer:
--------------------------------------------
Big hard drive (to store lots of pictures and audio).
Fast read-speed (picture cdr's and camera memory sticks).
Built-in cd recorder drive.
Built-in camera memory stick reader.
Quiet (I hate when the loud fans turn on in my computer at work).
Built-in dvd recorder (to archive things from my Tivo).
Very good audio & video capabilities (not for maximum gaming,
but just regular stuff).
Lots of built-in software for pictures/audio/video media stuff.
RCA plugs on the front of the unit (hate crawling behind unit).
Ability to run my software I had bought for my Toshiba laptop
(both the software that ran ok on the Toshiba, and also the
software that didn't run so well on it).
Be able to make backup copies of DVD's that I had recorded
from my Tivo, using a standalone DVD recorder.
High-speed internet capable.
Also, I liked the promise of the dual-core cpu -- I thought
that would help keep my audio/video stuff running smoothly
(such as burning cd's) while I was doing something else
(multi-tasking).
The decision:
------------
After reading a *lot* on the internet & pc magazines, I decided
that I didn't really need a high-end "gamer" pc with the super
fast 3d graphics and such. The high-end graphics really bump
up the price, and I think these graphics cards often have their
own cooling fan (which makes noise, and requires a larger card
and more slot-space than a 'regular' graphics card).
But also I didn't think I'd be happy with whimpy graphics
that are built-in to the cpu board.
So, as a happy in-between, I thought one of these new
"Media Center" pc's would be just about right.
One deciding factor was that there were very few models
with the RCA plug on the front (a high-end HP, and the
high-end Sony).
Also at the time (several months ago) very few models had
the dual-core cpu.
The "clincher" is probably that this Sony is "water cooled"
and is therefore very quiet. Also the sony comes with a
lot of software.
This Sony RC-210G:
-----------------
So I decided to get this Sony - here are the important things
that influenced my decision:
320Gb Hard Drive (that's a *lot* of disk space)
This disk space is spread across 2 fast 7200 rpm drives, on a
fast ATA controller, and configured in RAID-0. These drives
should be *very* fast configured like this.
DVD Burner & CD Burner (plus an extra DVD/CD read-only drive)
1GB RAM (memory)
Memory stick reader (reads all kinds - I use Sony memory stick)
ATI Radeon X300 graphics card, with 128Mb dedicated RAM
Wireless Keyboard and Mouse
Room for additional disk drives & ram/memory.
Built-in network card.
Water-cooled, and *very* quiet.
My Experiences So Far:
---------------------
I set it up with no problems (there were scantily any printed
directions, but I am fairly adept at setting up computers).
It's standard now-a-days that they don't give you a backup/restore
dvd, so I immediately first-thing made one (this is pretty easy
once you find the right menu to do this - I got some tips via
the online help).
As with most pre-configured systems, I found a *lot* of cr*p
pre-installed on my computer. I guess these companies pay sony
to ship this stuff on their computers - lots of things I didn't
want (even some AOL junk was on there??) I thought there was
going to be more useful pre-installed software, but I was
pretty disappointed in general (although I haven't tried it
all out yet).
I used the Norton Firewall & anti-spyware software
that came with the Sony - it's only a 60-day trial, so
I'm not sure what I'll do afterwards (Windows has it's
own firewall which is supposed to be pretty good, and I
got a copy of SpySweeper with some other software I bought,
so maybe I'll go with them. Also my Earthlink/Roadrunner
ISP will provide some, so maybe I'll go with them ...
decisions, decisions.)
I noticed that my monitor didn't work well with the Sony - it
either stretched the stuff out of proportion, or left black
bars at the edges. I wanted to fully utilize my 1440x900
monitor to it's fullest, at "native" resolution, so I did
some checking and finally fixed the problem by downloading
some newer drivers, which allowed me to select 1440x900
resolution (why didn't Sony already have this?, why didn't
the driver disk that came with my monitor have this?)
This took quite a bit of investigating, and was kinda
frustrating.
Of course, I couldn't download those new drivers until
I got connected to the internet, which took a few days.
I went with Earthlink (they use TimeWarner's cables).
The guy that came out and connected it was pretty nice,
and the speed seems pretty good.
Next I tried installing some of the software I had originally
bought for my Toshiba laptop. I was very disappointed to find
that most of these softwares would not run (I guess this is not
in particular Sony's fault, but rather the fault of Microsoft
operating system inconsistencies between versions, and also
short-sightedness of the particular softwares I bought).
My $99 Easy CD & DVD Creator v6 would just "hang" while
writing the table of contents when I tried to create a cd.
I tried downloading all available updates, and tried creating
several different music cd's in several different ways, and
it always hung at about the same place. Very disappointing.
It says it will run on Windows 98SE, ME, 2000, and XP.
I assumed since it would run on XP that it would work on
Windows XP Media Center 2005 Edition - I guess I assumed wrong :\
Rather than spend $99 for the full version of Creator 7 (or 8),
I bought the "basic VCD edition v7" (it doesn't support the
DVD stuff). At least I can make my custom music cd's with it.
I also tried installing my Cakewalk "Club Tracks" music mixing
software. It would not even let me *try* to install it.
It's system requirements are Windows 95, 98, or ME (and it
seems to strictly enforce that). Cakewalk doesn't sell this
software anymore, nor do they have any updates for it on their
website. I guess I'm out the $50-$100 I paid for it, and also
whatever I pay for some new software to replace it with.
After approx 1 week, the DVD/CD recorder drive stopped working.
I went ahead and restored my system to factory-original config
using the restore disk (just to make sure I hadn't clobbered
the drivers or something). It was still broken. I called
Sony's tech support (it was 11pm Saturday night, and I was
very impressed that someone answered :) They took my info
and said I'd done the correct trouble-shooting, and said a
technician would call Monday to schedule a time to come to
my house and replace the drive. He was a generic/independent
repair guy - he wasn't too familiar with this new model Sony,
but he figured it out and did a good job replacing the drive
without breaking anything. No hardware problems other than
that one.
The original/Sony batteries for the wireless mouse only lasted
about 2 weeks. I replaced them with some higher-quality Energizer
batteries, and they have lasted several weeks now.
I tried using the Sony software to make a backup copy of a
DVD I had recoreded with my Lite-On standalone DVD recorder.
It would get about 40 minutes into it, and then just hang.
No error, no message, nothing graceful - it just hangs.
I confirmed this several times, with several different DVD's.
I finally got way into the properties of the DVD, and it appears
that "copy allowed"='no', so maybe this Lite-On copy-protects
it's DVD's?? Looks like the Sony and Easy Creator could
detect that and warn me more gracefully instead of just
hanging. So I got some more serious DVD copy software
(DVD Cloner III) - it also had trouble making a "copy" of
these Lite-on DVD's, but it would let me select the
individual tracks, and make a new DVD containing them
(minus the menu/thumbnail/title stuff). Oh well, I guess
that's as good as I'm gonna get. This was a real bummer,
because this was one of the main things I wanted to be able
to do.
It reads my camera memory sticks *real* fast.
Also, the Photoshop Elements that came with the Sony has
turned out to be *real* useful. It's got pretty good
image editing capabilities, and will let me batch-process
whole directories (and do stuff like reduce the size,
or red-eye reduction, etc in batch). And it also lets
me make html thumbnail galleries. These are all things
that I am very happy to be able to do.
One major annoyance - when I'm running Easy Media Creator 7,
and in the "Creator Classic" mode 'ripping' songs from my
cds to make my "greatest hits" cds, every time I put in a
music cd, the pc's whole screen turns blue, and it says
"Please Wait While Your Media is Detected" - it hangs like
this for 15-20 seconds, and I can't do anything while I'm
waiting on it. It sometimes even hangs, such that I have
to use the TaskManager and kill it. What a pain! (I think
this blue screen & big writing looks like "Media Center"
stuff, rather than Easy CD Creator stuff).
Since I have DirecTV satellite TV, with built-in Tivo,
I have not really used the main feature of this media
center pc. It has the capability of being a TV tuner,
and recording TV shows onto the hard drive (ala, Tivo).
But I think that would make my computer a rather expensive
Tivo unit, and I don't really want to leave my expensive
computer powered up all the time (it could wear things out,
and also makes it more susceptible to power spikes and
lightning). Since I'm not really using the Sony's Tivo
capability, and also not using much of the built-in
Media Center software, in hindsight I wish I had bought
the bare-bones machine, with a standalone copy of
Windows XP Pro that I could install myself (and not have
all this AOL and everybody else's demo software pre-
installed).
This computer sometimes "hangs" when I'm trying to shut it
down, even when I'm not (as far as I know) running any
significant software that didn't come with it. I don't
think I'm running any competing Firewall or Antivirus
stuff, but I guess that's a possibility. Whatever the
case, it "hangs" solid, not even responding to task manager,
and I have to hold in the power button and hard-shutdown
(which is not good for the computer, and I hate to do).
In a nutshell:
--------------
This machine is plenty of hardware for almost anyone's needs
(except maybe hardcore gamers).
It is *very* quiet.
Most of this pre-installed software is annoying (such as AOL),
and for most of it you have to "register" before using it.
The Media Center "Tivo" capabilities were a waste for me,
since I already have DirecTV with built-in Tivo.
If I had it to do over, I'd probalby buy similar hardware,
and buy Windows XP Pro (and not be hindered by all this
automated Media Center stuff and pre-installed software
that I don't need.)
----------------------------------------------
Update!
Although this Sony Vaio is supposed to support both
DVD+R and DVD-R, I was trying to use DVD-R and running
into all these troubles copying these DVD's created with
my Lite-on standalone dvd recorder. (They would just
"hang" towards the end).
A friend of mine was able to copy the DVD's with no problem on her very similar computer -- I noticed that she
was using DVD+R's. So, I bought a pack of DVD+R's and my
pc is able to copy the Lite-on-created DVD's just fine.
(Gee - now what to do with these ~100 DVD-R's I had
already bought...)
So, all the trouble/headache I was having seems to be
with the Sony Vaio (or more likely the Windows XP Media
Center Edition operating system), rather than the
Lite-on. (After knowing what to look for, I did some
web searches and found that others were having similar
problems with DVD-R's on Windows XP MCE).
Here's an example where others seem to be having the
same problem as me with Windows XP MCE "hanging" when
trying to burn DVD-R's (even using different software
than what I'm using)...
http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=139198
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1299 Operating System: Windows Processor: Other Processor speed: over 1000 RAM: More than 256 Internal Storage: CD-RW and DVD Hard Drive (GB): Over 50
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