It’s been a long time coming, but someone finally managed to throw some 3G into their Sony VAIO UX ultra mobile PC [Portal page]. It is simple to use a USB dongle, but when you have the know-how, why not make it a challenge to fit everything inside the UX’s tiny case? I’m really impressed that there is even room to add anything inside the UX as the device is already so small and packed full of hardware.

User Oginger1 of MicroPCTalk has managed to put a Huawei E169G USB 3G Modem inside of his UX for internal 3G goodness. The US versions of the VAIO UX come with a built in EDGE modem, but Sony never refreshed the line with a 3G capable model. Oginger1 wasn’t even able to use the slow EDGE connection as he owns an international model (UX50) that comes with a CF slot instead of an EDGE module. He documented the process and gave a rough guide of how to do the mod (definitely not for newbies). To understand just how small the modable space inside the UX is, you should note that he had to cut out one of the back hand grips and raise it up 2mm, then epoxy it back into place to be able to squeeze the unit inside. Head over to his thread to see the whole process.

Not long ago, I theorized about the idea that the VAIO P could be a potential successor to the UX series. Both devices crammed premium hardware into a tiny space to make a true UMPC. It has been some time since Sony has updated the UX series, and they have yet to bring it into the Atom era; the release of the VAIO P seemed like it could be the re-embodiment of the UX series.

I recently had the please of chatting with two very nice guys from Sony US: Jon Piazza, Sr. Public Relations Strategist, and Eric Treski,Product Manager of the VAIO line, and specifically for the VAIO P series. Both were kind enough to answer some questions for me regarding the VAIO P and VAIO UX.

One of the first questions I proposed was the idea that the VAIO P is a sort of reincarnation of the VAIO UX line. Eric explained a bit about where the P and the UX came from.

The VAIO UX, which is a handheld ultra mobile PC was designed by Sony several years back, looked to put a tiny, but fully functional PC in someone’s hands. Eric told me however that Sony didn’t know exactly who would pick up the UX, but they knew they had something special. As for the VAIO P, Eric said that they put all of the history of the Sony ultra portables into the P, but this time they had a designated target customer. That customer is someone who wants to be connected all the time and is, as Sony calls it, “a style-conscious consumer”; that is to say: people who want to be seen with a sleek, expensive computer.

I asked about the unique aspect ratio of the screen, which is a somewhat odd 2.07:1 shape. Eric confirmed for me what I thought about the circumstances of the screen’s creation: I assumed that they created the smallest usable keyboard they could, and used that as the main footprint of the device. From that shape, the screen was designed to fit, which accounts for its uncommon aspect ratio. I asked for thoughts on the font being too small because of the high resolution and Eric said that the high resolution of the screen is somewhat a product of trying to stay away from netbook hardware. He explained that there were many netbook returns citing a lower resolution 1024×600 screen and Sony wanted to provide people with enough width to not have to scroll horizontally on web pages. The width is also just about wide enough to fit two windows side by side, which is why there is a hardware button dedicated to rearranging windows for the user. He also mentioned that many people might be unaware that they can adjust the DPI for a more favorable font size. 

If you’ll recall in my first post about the VAIO P and the VAIO UX, I mentioned that there were two ways to ask the question in the title of the post (“Is the VAIO P supposed to be the successor of the UX series?“) The first of which was to ask Sony if the P was supposed to be a kind of UX successor and the second way was asking if the P replaced the UX in terms of actual usage. From my chat with Jon and Eric, it sounded like the P was not necessarily meant to succeed the UX. It sounds more like a new ultra portable, in a different form factor, and for a different demographic. As for the second way the question could be asked; I’m still evaluating the VAIO P and should have an answer soon.

I was also interested in the health of the VAIO UX line. Sony hasn’t done anything with it in quite some time, and it isn’t currently featured on their website. Eric conceded that it was hard to answer the question involving the continuation of the VAIO UX series because Sony is always looking at a lot of different things, but not all of it gets through. From my interpretation of the answer, it sounds like the UX series isn’t discontinued, but they aren’t actively developing anything new for it right this moment. Here is to hoping that Sony’s next look into the UX line leads to an all new Atom based device. I feel like Sony has some untapped potential in the UX series, and a more consumer oriented device would be a huge hit. If we start to see smartphones turning into MIDs, I think Sony will realize that they could make a great device in this field that would be a sort of combination of the UX, Mylo, and old Clie UX series.

Eric also talked quite a bit about the ‘Instant Mode’ capability of the VAIO P. He noted that they have had similar sub-OS software on several other lines of their computers, but they may not have been targeted just right. It isn’t always in the interest of a business laptop user to be able to quickly boot the computer into a mode capable of playing back media. This time around, the VAIO P had the right target user to have a media based sub-OS, and they expanded on their previous concepts by adding online connectivity which they haven’t had in the sub-OS before the VAIO P. I haven’t been using it for too long, but I think that the Instant Mode idea is quite promising and Eric seems to think so to. He tells me that they are definitely getting good feedback from users and will continue to expand on the Instant Mode concept and hopefully make it available on other products in the future.

I wouldn’t be here right now if I didn’t pick up a VAIO UX180P [Portal page] a few years back. I’ve been a big fan of the UX series of ultra mobile PC from Sony for a long time. You’ve probably read on our site that the UX180 was my primary PC for nearly 4 years. I’ve built up a lot of respect for the unit since I’ve been using it for such a long time.

As great as the UX series might be, it definitely isn’t main stream. Since the initial release of the UX180, Sony has released incremental updates over the last few years (280, 380, 390) finally landing on the current top-of-the-line UX490. The UX490 [Portal page] is almost identical to the original UX180 in terms of aesthetics, but the insides have had some nice bumps in power and performance. The UX490 has a 32GB SSD, 1.2GHz Core 2 Solo, 1GB of RAM, and as far as I know, still claims the title of most powerful ultra mobile PC to date.

Though the UX490 might still be one of the highest performing UMPCs, it was released back in November… of 2007. It isn’t inconceivable for Sony to have some big gaps in model refreshes, but it has been quite a while now. That, and the fact that the VAIO UX series is pretty much gone from Sony’s site, make it seem like the VAIO UX line is done.

Enter the VAIO P [Portal page]. This ‘pocketable‘ computer has a pretty similar usability concept. Both the UX and the P are supposed to be relatively powerful, highly portable computers (that’s why we call them Ultra Mobile PCs), but their form-factors are inherently different. The UX is designed to be hand-held and thumb-typed. The P is supposed to be small and portable, but still retain its touch-typability, and probably won’t function very well as a hand-held device in the way that the UX does.

Regardless of the fact that the P is Atom based, both the P and the UX carry a premium price, so it is hard to say that Sony is really following the netbook trend instead of releasing a new UMPC. It almost seems as though the P is a successor of the UX, but simply with a different form-factor. The change in form factor would be a reason to switch the series denotation as well.

I think there are two ways to ask the question that is proposed in the title of this article. First of which, is asking if Sony intends for the P to succeed the UX. Second, is looking at whether the P replaces the UX in terms of usage. I’ve contacted someone at Sony and I’m hoping to get an answer to the first version of the question. As for the second… I should be able to answer that for you over the next few weeks.

MicroPCTalk forum member Anh did some serious surgery on his UX280. Taking the unit apart, he de-soldered the factory U1200 Core Solo (1.2GHz), and soldered in a U7600 Core 2 Duo (1.2GHz) CPU. An impressive instillation in a machine that has so much hardware stuck in such a tiny footprint. Was it worth it? Take a look at the graph belo; the benchmark performance almost doubled in certain areas. The graph compares the modded UX280 to a UX380, I compared to the 380 because both machines were running Vista and I wanted the graph to be as accurate as possible. ALU and FPU are the primary CPU benchmarks and as you can see, the 1.2GHz U7600 Core 2 Duo crushes the 1.33GHz U1500 Core Solo. Ahn is most likely the first person in the world to be running a UX280 with a Core 2 Duo, and might even be the first to successfully swap the UX’s CPU for any other CPU in general.

[MicroPCTalk] via [Pocketables]

Jenn from Pocketables.net notes that the Sony VAIO UX490 has gone missing from SonyStyle.com. This isn’t abnormal for Sony. It’s been seen before, however this time it seems a bit different as Sony has completely removed the UX section from their website. This is the first time that there hasn’t been at least one UX model for sale on SonyStyle. Without the UX490 there is nothing under that category, so the whole section has been removed from the site.

I think the big question is whether this is an indicator of Sony moving away from the UX line and instead replacing it with the netbook. Sony is rumored to be taking advantage of VIA’s OpenBook design which would help them bring a low-cost netbook to market in a relatively short period of time. Does that conflict with the UX line? I would say no. The two are in completely different categories. The netbook is a low-power, low-cost device targeted toward first time PC users or users who don’t need a lot of power. The UX line, on the other hand, is a high-power premium device targeted toward mobile professionals. Sony managed to pack enough power into the UX490 to make it one of, if not the most powerful ultra mobile PC to date, and in one of the smallest packages.

So what could explain the removal of the UX490 from SonyStyle.com? Sony is often very mechanical about the way it does things when it comes to pricing and online sales. When the UX180 was first released it was only on shelves for a few months before it disappeared entirely and was replaced with the UX280. The UX280 sold for the same price as the UX180 but had double the RAM and a larger HDD. Then of course came the UX380/90 models which were slightly upgraded versions of the UX280 for the same price. Consequently the UX280 faded off into the background. The same thing happened with the UX380 before the UX490 came out. If anything, I would say that removal of the UX490 from SonyStyle.com has more to do with marketing and sales than telling us whether or not the line is going to be discontinued in favor of a netbook. It’s quite possible that Sony stopped producing the UX490 because they new a new model would be coming to market soon, but something has prevented them from bringing the new model on board at the right time.

So the way I see it, the two are not going to interfere with each other. Sony will probably continue its incremental updates of the UX line. Sony is large enough that it can experiment with a netbook while continuing to manufacture the UX series of computers. Its anyone’s guess as to when they will update the platform that the UX runs on. They have been using the same powerful Intel hardware since the series started with the UX180. There has been some fishy activity on Sony’s support website which may hint at new models. I’ll be keeping an eye on that and keep everyone posted.