Sony VAIO VGX-XL2 Digital Living System (Intel Pentium D Processor 920, 1 GB RAM, 320 GB Hard Drive,

Follow your imagination without leaving your sofa. The VAIO XL2 Digital Living System fits perfectly into your home theater, bringing desktop performance and IT intelligence to your living room. Combining DVD recording /playback, media storage, webbrowsing, Windows XP MCE 2005, and built-in NTSC/ATSC TV tuners,its all the entertainment you can handle and allthe PC you need.
Features:
* Consolidate your media library: The VAIO XL2 Digital Living System merges Sony's industry-leading home theater expertise with the powerful computing performance ofa VAIO PC. Now you can manage your digital content - from personal photos and high definition camcorder video, to downloaded movies and music, to recorded TV shows, to your CD and DVD collection - from the comfort of your sofa.
* CD/DVD/Media Changer/Recorder: With its 200-disc Media Changer/Recorder, the VAIO XL2 Digital Living System allows you to keep your favorite music and movies in one convenient location.
The XL2 has the ability to access meta data, genre information, track listings and cover art for your DVD collection. Enjoy the convenience of managing and playing your CD and DVDcollections from the comfort of your sofa with the touch of the wireless keyboard or remote control.
* Traditional PC Functionality: The VAIO XL2 Digital Living System is the ultimate A/V entertainment center, but its also an incredibly powerful PC with Intel Viiv technology, delivering robust performance for running multiple demanding applications simultaneously. With its Intel Pentium D dual-core processor, ample DDR2 memory, PCI-E graphics, and room for up to three SATA hard drives (RAID 0 ready), the VAIO XL2 is well-equipped to power through your most demanding tasks.
* Sleek Design: With its sleek and flush design, the VAIO XL2 Digital Living System is designed to fit beautifullyinto your home theater. The innovative liquid-cooling system and advanced noise-reduction technology enable screaming-fast performance in

Bring together your computing and entertainment worlds in one package and control it all with one remote with the Sony VAIO VGX-XL2 Digital Living System, which combines a high-end multimedia desktop PC and a 200-disc DVD/CD changer/recorder. Both are designed to fit into a home entertainment rack and the elegant silver and black casings will nicely complement the rest of your home entertainment system. With the VGX-XL2, you can manage all your downloaded digital content--such as music online stores, home movies from your camcorder, and photos from your digital camera--but it offers the added ability to easily organize, sort, and access packaged content from the CDs and DVDs that are sitting on your bookshelves.

The desktop PC portion of the VGX-XL2 is powered by Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (Update Rollup 2), which provides support for Media Center Extender technology built into XBox 360 game consoles, and a robust 2.8 GHz Intel Pentium D 920 dual-core processor for powering through multiple applications simultaneously and without stress. Other PC features include 1 GB of installed DDR-2 RAM (2 GB maximum), 320 GB hard drive (with room for up to three SATA hard drives (RAID 0 ready), an NVidia GeForce 6600 video processor with 128 MB of dedicated video RAM, multi-format/dual layer DVD burner, 54g Wi-Fi LAN, built-in TV tuner, multi-format memory card reader compatible with the most popular digital camera formats, and a wide assortment of pre-loaded Sony multimedia software titles. The 200-disc changer/recorder features multiformat DVD and CD burning capability with dual-layer DVD+R support.

Multimedia Features
With the XL1 Digital Living system, you can consolidate your music library by backing up your music CDs to your hard drive to be stored along with all of your downloaded music. With the touch of a few buttons, you can automatically and sequentially record up to 200 audio CDs from the media changer to the hard drive along with available album covers and track information. You can also record a series of television show episodes to the hard drive and easily transfer them to blank DVDs stored in the changer. The system alerts you to how many discs are needed and you can burn a whole season of your favorite TV program to DVDs to take on your next road trip.

Discs inserted into the 200-disc changer/recorder are automatically detected by the PC which downloads (over a wired or wireless network) available metadata on each one, including jewel case covers and artist information. For movies, an in-depth synopsis is also downloaded in addition to the star, director, producer details and more. All of this information is easily sorted and accessed using the included wireless keyboard or remote control.

Sony's SonicStage Mastering Studio software allows you to record music off of vinyl or tapes by utilizing the Studio's 24bit/96kHz processing technology, producing crisp digital quality sound. Also included are four different effects that allow you to enhance the sounds in the original recordings or to add new effects for remixing. Sony's DVgate Plus software allows you to import video footage from several sources and edit it, giving you the freedom to create your own video masterpiece.

Desktop Basics

Hard Drive:: This entertainment-centric desktop is loaded with a gigantic 320 GB (7200 RPM) hard drive--which is about as large as you'll find in any multimedia desktop PC.
Processor:: The 2.8 GHz Intel Pentium D 920 dual-core processor is near the top of the speed spectrum for this processor class (as of March 2006). An Intel dual-core processor delivers additional computing resources and help expand the PC's capabilities by providing higher throughput and simultaneous computing. You'll be able to perform multiple tasks such as digital rendering and gaming all while running virus scan or other background tasks seamlessly. Each core has 2 MB of L2 cache onboard (for a whopping 4 MB total), and the two cores share an 800MHz front-side bus.
A hyperthreading processor helps a PC run several demanding applications at the same time. This technology enables the processor to execute two threads (parts of a program) in parallel, boosting performance during key high-drain procedures. This results in more efficient software performance, such as faster reaction times in gaming applications, and enhanced multitasking.
Memory:: The VGX-XL2 comes with 1 GB of installed PC-4200 DDR RAM, with a very fast 533 MHz speed. This is a good start, but seems small in comparison to the capabilities of this machine. You'll want to max out the 2 GB capacity (which is a bit small for such a multimedia powerhouse) for your 3D gaming and video-editing needs.
CD/DVD Drive:: Offering the latest in DVD writing technology, the VGX-XL2's changer/recorder has a multi-format DVD/CD drive that's compatible with both DVD+ and DVD- disc formats as well as dual-layer DVD+R discs, which can store up to 8.5 GB of data. For DVD-RW discs, it has a 16x write/6x rewrite speed, while for DVD+RW discs it has a 16x write/8x rewrite speed. For dual-layer DVD+R, it has a 4x write speed. For CDs, it has a 40x write/24x rewrite speed.
The PC portion of the VGX-XL2 also includes a multi-format, dual layer DVD burner. For DVD-RW discs, it has an 8x write/6x rewrite speed, while for DVD+RW discs it has an 8x write/rewrite speed. For dual-layer DVD+R, it has a 4x write speed. For CDs, it has a 24x write/24x rewrite speed.
Keyboard, Mouse, and Accessories:: It comes with a wireless Vaio keyboard and remote control (but no mouse). It also comes with an IR blaster for controlling a cable or satellite TV box and a wireless antenna.

Video and Audio
This desktop comes installed with NVidia GeForce 6600 video/graphics card, which offers 128 MB of dedicated video RAM, which is a bit small for such a video and multimedia PC. The GeForce 6600 features Nvidia's TurboCache technology, which is designed to increase notebook performance without increasing the size or draining the battery. NVIDIA PureVideo technology delivers smooth HD video in all formats for superb picture clarity.

The integrated TV tuner features Sony's Giga Pocket MPEG2 Realtime Encoder Board with composite video/audio, S-Video, and RF coaxial (VHF/UHF) inputs. It offers a very good range of video connections, including HDMI, DVI-D (via HDMI to DVI-D adapter), and component video outputs and gold-plated composite and S-Video inputs on the front (for connecting to a digital video camcorder).

Connectivity and Expansion Slots
For expansion, the VGX-XL2 has three half-height 3.5-inch bays (two occupied), two PCI slots (one occupied), and one x16 PCI Express slot (occupied by graphics card). It also has an integrated 54g wireless LAN that's compatible with 802.11b and 802.11g networks (requires 802.11b or 802.11g compatible access point). It comes with the following external connectors:

4 USB 2.0 ports (2 front, 2 back) for connecting a wide range of peripherals--from digital cameras to MP3 players
3 FireWire (also known as IEEE 1394 or i.Link) ports for connecting digital video camcorders and other peripherals (2 6-pin in rear, 1 4-pin in front)
1 microphone, 1 headphone
2 infrared transmitter out
Multi-format memory card reader on the front, compatible with Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro/Duo, CompactFlash (Type I and II), MicroDrive, SmartMedia, MultiMedia Card, Secure Digital, and XD Picture Card

It also has an integrated 56K modem (V.90) and an RJ-45 LAN network port for a 10/100 Ethernet connection to networks and DSL/cable modems. The changer/recorder offers two FireWire (i.Link) ports.

Preloaded System and Software
The pre-installed Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (Update Rollup 2) is essentially Windows XP Professional Edition with a variety of tools to help you to create, organize, and enjoy digital media ranging from music to home movies to photo slide shows. The Update Rollup 2 upgrade offers support for the Windows Media Center Extender technology built into XBox 360 game consoles, which lets you access entertainment from your Media Center PC--whether it's live and recorded TV and movies, music, photos or Online Spotlight--on any TV in the house

It also comes loaded with a bevy of Sony multimedia software: Click to DVD (DVD creation), SonicStage (digital music), Vaio Media (network file sharing), DVgate Plus (digital video), and Image Converter (for PSP transfer). Other pre-loaded software includes Adobe Photoshop Album Starter Edition, Quicken 2005 New User Edition, Microsoft Works 8.0 (with word processing, spreadsheet, and calendar), Norton Internet Security (with 90-day subscription), Intervideo WinDVD, Roxio DigitalMedia SE, and SpySubtract.

Dimensions and Weight
Combined, the desktop PC and 200-disc changer/recorder measure 17 x 13.8 x 19.5 inches (WxHxD) and weigh approximately 86 pounds.

What's in the Box
This VGX-XL2 package contains the desktop PC and 200-disc changer recorder components, IR remote control (with batteries), IR blaster, wireless keyboard, HDMI cable, FireWire cable, S/PDIF optical cable, HDMI/DVD-D adapter, Mini-DVD disc adapter, wireless antenna, power cords, and printed operating instructions. It is backed by a 1-year limited hardware warranty.

Customer Reviews:

Another 1/2 decent job from Sony
Beyond its looks and novel levels of (at times, needless-)functionality, I would like to bring to your attention what seems to have become an industry norm, which Sony brings to an art-form: purposefully incomplete functionality in conjunction with nigh-impossibility of hardware/firmware upgrades.

In this case, the unit doesn't support HD-DVD, despite supporting HDTV screens. How about an up-converter for those who want to make decent use of their existing DVDs with this configuration? Up-converting is done by a micro-chip whose cost is well under $100.

Kudos for the processors (main and graphics), too bad it sports only 1G of RAM. We are nowhere told about the ease (cost and mechanics) of adding memory.

Then, to add insult to the injury, what's one's representation of this product's customer when it comes with so much pre-installed software junk (read: up-sell Sony channels)? After the many failures at, say, AOL, one could think tech companies stopped underestimating customers.

I have to confess, I have contemplated buying this product for a while. I'll call Sony to see if/how they address any of my concerns. If the answer is positive, on balance, I'll update here. Otherwise, either wait for the next version OR for the price on this one to drop.

Addendum: Sony states that some of these systems ship with Intel Viiv. IF you can make sure you get one of those, some of the above concerns, to the extent Viiv is for real, go away.
--2006-12-09

Great Media PC
I did a lot of research before I purchased this unit. I wanted a Media PC that would fit in my stereo rack that would actually look like my other components. My final two choices were this sony and the HP. I chose the Sony because it has HDMI (I like having the sound transfered over Digital) output, which none of the other Media PCs have out there and the processor was a dual core, which means it's more up to date than other units I looked at.

The setup was real easy, although when I connected it to my TV it didn't like it. I had to update the video driver before it worked correctly, I started by using the component cable. My TV supports 1080P natively, so the picture looks great. The 200 Disk changer works flawlessly and pretty easily. The keyboard that comes with it is allright, I wish it were a bluetooth keyboard, but I guess we can't have it all. The Remote is okay as well, It's not very ergonomic, it's a standard Media PC remote with some minor Sony Tweaks, it's not a sony remote by any means. Since I don't have an ethernet port near my TV, I have to use the wireless G that's built into the unit; This sony has one of the strongest receivers I've seen in a wireless network card.

The only think I don't like about this unit is that it doesn't really have room for expantion. It seems that all the PCI slots are being used by the two tunner cars that are in the unit. I haven't dared to open it to see if maybe one of them can be removed. Also it's kind of pricy, but my experience with the new VAIO PCs has been that they are very reliable. I also think that they could have used a higher end graphics card like a 7600 series or above nVidia.

Overall, I'd recommend it.
--2006-08-09

- Sony IT