Sony comes clean on faulty 8XXX series Nvidia Chips!

[Freiberg75]

I guess I should thank you for making my point... Gaming intel score at 3.1 and nvidia score at 5.8 - maybe you don't do much real gaming so that hearts plays fine for you on either card... But I notice night and day differences in games that I ran on this laptop. It was thebest ultra portable card I could find at the time. It performed great for many a madden game on the road and any real dx games. With 800 posts hopefully you have a little more insight then intel is as good as dedicated... Even though the dedicated card has nearly 2x the performance numbers. I was running win7 ultimate 64bit so was not using the 32 bit drivers. Feel performance difference was maybe even a little better in that setup.

Originally Posted by leslieann

Trolling with 800+ posts? Okay.

Are you honestly going to try and tell me that the 8400GS is a good gaming card? The day the SZ was released, reviewers kind of chuckled at including it for "gaming". Read up on 8400 reviews, it's more of a video card than a gaming card. It was something companies could throw in as a (very) cheap step up from embedded.

Run the Windows User Experience test and look at the scores. Better yet, I can post them.
I ran these on 10-26-2009 in Win7)
Stamina mode: (relatively new Intel drivers)
32bit graphics 3.5 / gaming 3.1

Speed mode:
32bit graphics 2.8 / gaming 3.4 (older driver, 185 or 186 maybe)
32bit graphics 2.8 / gaming 5.8 (190.4)

While Intel has improved, and so has Nvidia, it doesn't change that the fact that the card just plain stinks for gaming. It was a pathetic gaming card when released, just as it is today. More often than not, the 8400 does nothing for speed except suck down your battery and make a bunch of fan noise. Especially with older drivers. Another driver, released between these fell in between, and the original Sony supplied Nvidia driver was even worse than these numbers. I could only go so far back with Intel, but it varied only a little.

As for not playable for games, I play Supreme Commander, Red Alert 2 and 3 and Second Life on mine in Stamina Mode. I admit the Nvidia is slightly better on Second Life, but only marginally because it has some lighting abilities the Intel lacks, but in terms of refresh rate, the difference is negligible.

[leslieann]

Originally Posted by Freiberg75

I guess I should thank you for making my point... Gaming intel score at 3.1 and nvidia score at 5.8 - maybe you don't do much real gaming so that hearts plays fine for you on either card... But I notice night and day differences in games that I ran on this laptop. It was thebest ultra portable card I could find at the time. It performed great for many a madden game on the road and any real dx games. With 800 posts hopefully you have a little more insight then intel is as good as dedicated... Even though the dedicated card has nearly 2x the performance numbers. I was running win7 ultimate 64bit so was not using the 32 bit drivers. Feel performance difference was maybe even a little better in that setup.

Somehow, I knew you were going to do that.
Look at the OLD driver score, which are actually BETTER than what the card did when it was released. Also look at the "graphics" score, where Intel won both times.

I suspect the reason the Nvidia does better on gaming is because it offers some enhancements the Intel does not, which is why some games run on the Nvidia and not the Intel. There is also the fact that, again, the 8400 (not an 8600), is a junk graphics card, it always has been.

Lets look at a different test, maybe this will get my point across. We will ignore the Intel, since I have no results and my point is to show that the 8400 is a joke.

3dMark06 test scores:
Nvidia 8400 GS - 701
Nvidia 7900 GS - 2109


If you think that is bad... lets look at some desktop cards.
Nvidia 6800 Ultra - 1158 (Note that this is an 6800, not an 8600)
Nvida 8800 GTS - 4385



Oh, and I have the 64bit numbers for the Windows Experience.
In gaming, it's even worse than 32bit, though I admit, 64bit feels better on the SZ than 32bit.
Stamina mode:
32bit graphics 3.5 / gaming 3.1
64bit graphics 3.5 / gaming 3.1

Speed mode
32bit graphics 2.8 / gaming 5.8 (190.4)
32bit graphics 2.8 / gaming 3.4 (2 year old driver)
64bit graphics 2.9 / gaming 5.3 (190.4)
64bit graphics 3.5 / gaming 4.1 (2 year old driver)

Stats taken from here:
Sony SZ750 Win7 64bit clean install (should help on other SZ's)

[babart3]

I can't belive it.

I had my Vaio FZ31Z motherboard replaced in November 2009.

The laptop worked absolutely fine, until 2 days ago.

I started the laptop from sleep mode, suddenly distorted lines came on screen then screen turned white n then black..

I restarted the laptop, it logged in etc fine and then after 2 minutes the same thing again.. weird lines n then black screen.

I thought its the same nvidia problem again, however now my laptop doesn't even Post (It doesn't boot).

The fan, hard disk , wireless switch work fine. However I can't even turn Caps lock on.

I have searched online and it seems there are a few other people who have developed the exact problem who have replaced motherboards.

It seems like Sony really messed it up and installed refurbished old motherboards which are inherently defective.

[18000rpm]

Does your laptop work correctly when you switch to stamina mode?

[ScuderiaConchiglia]

Originally Posted by 18000rpm

Does your laptop work correctly when you switch to stamina mode?

There is no stamina mode on FZ models.

Gary

[babart3]

there is no stamina mode.

There is an AV mode. however the laptop doesn't work in it.

After trying multiple times in a couple of days, the laptop starts on rare occasiosn but weird lines appear on the display and then screen goes to blank

[Rengsey R. H. Jr.]

I'm going to call sony to get my lappy fix. This is the second lappy of the same model that needs the mobo replaced because of the 8400M GT. The first one worked fine and sold off.. now to get this fix and sell it too.. lol

[Jeremy86]

I found this thread today searching Google.

I have a sz780 and my nVidia failed a week ago while playing Starcraft2. It would show cracked images when I boot on speed mode.

I'm in Korea currently and the Sony service demands $400 for a motherboard change...

Really surprised that there's a lot of sz users out there with the same problem...

[leslieann]

Considering the number of SZ's sold, the number is relatively low actually. I have only heard of a handful, systems with only the 8400, the failure rate is MUCH higher. Where we are seeing a low percentage, some systems are seeing 80% failure.

Check Ebay, you can probably get a motherboard for a bit over half that, though it takes a bit of work to change it.

[softarno]

Hi all,
Am using Vaio VGN-FZ25M, was having the same problem 4months ago, and was running vista Home premium, sent the computer to repair center they replaced the card with a new one, then it works fine till yesterday, i upgraded to win 7 ultimate, then i installed the vista driver for Nvidia, shortly after and while starting to watch a movie got this message again ((( display DRIVER NVIDI compatible windows vista kernel mode driver, version 167.60 stopped responding and has successfully recovered ))) and it came many time and the screen turns to black then it come back to normal again.

Went online to check for solution, found a Thread
Display driver stopped responding and has successfully recovered - MajorGeeks Support Forums

and it’s like they saying remove the driver for the Nvidia and go step back to older driver, anyway i did that but with my new fresh win 7 its showing that my display adapter is a standard VGA graphics adapter.
Ok, i did that and went to try watching movies or viewing pics and the problem disappeared.

Is that a final solution? or it’s a software driver problem or i just stay like that, yet for sure i think the resolution was much better while the nvidia was installed..

Pliz Any help or suggestion