Sony VAIO NS140

Sony’s VAIO series has brought high-end performance oriented laptops to consumers demanding a touch of style. The dinstinctive look of a Sony VAIO laptop brings the toned-down sensibility of the Macbook to the PC market. Happily, not all members of the VAIO family will cost a small fortune to get a hold of. The Sony VAIO NS140 is a budget alternative to more costly VAIO machines. Even with a price tag of $800, the Sony VAIO NS140 manages to provide reliability and some pretty solid multimedia performance.

Standout Features

• 15.4-inch display
• 3GB RAM
• 250GB hard drive
• Budget price tag

Features

The Sony VAIO NS140 forgoes some luxury features in order to bring the quality performance, sleek look and functionality of the high-end VAIO to the frugal user. Unlike most notebooks appearing in the last few months, the Sony VAIO NS140 does not have a row of glowing media buttons. Considering that we often forget to even use the onboard media buttons on our laptops, we don’t consider this to be a deal breaker (especially because there is still the all-important mute button on the chassis). The 4-in-1 media card reader and the built-in 1.3 megapixel webcam on the Sony VAIO NS140 more than make up for the missing volume control, pause and play buttons.

In line with the Sony VAIO NS140’s guiding philosophy of affordable functionality, it offers a mid-to-high-end range of hardware and respectable performance. The latest and greatest laptops boast Intel’s Centrino 2 processors. The Sony VAIO NS140 sticks with the time-tested yet slightly outdated 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5800 processor. This is a great means of reducing the final price tag without and excessive sacrifice in the performance department. 3GB of RAM is slightly below average for up-and-coming laptops, but still provides the steam necessary to run multiple apps without stutters or hiccups.

The Sony VAIO NS140’s 15.4-inch display permits a wide viewing space at a 1280 x 800 resolution. That results in less than true HD quality video, but on a 15-inch screen, who’s counting pixels? Photos and video look clean and crisp—we have no complaints in the display department.

Even with no media bar, the good folks at Sony were good enough to include the battery saving WiFi on/off switch. In terms of connectivity, the Sony VAIO NS140 lacks an HDMI output, but offers standard VGA out and 4 USB ports.

Summary of Reviews from Across the Internet

Laptop speaker systems usually offer lackluster sound quality. The Sony VAIO NS140 manages to produce pretty decent sound—no tinny trebles and muffled basses.

The Sony VAIO NS140’s keys are comparatively loud. Quickly typing in a quiet room can result in quite a distracting racket.

Summary

Users in the market for a laptop under $1000 aren’t going to have much luck finding a machine that will outperform the Sony VAIO NS140. The distinctive look of the VAIO provides a stylish demeanor unusual on similarly priced laptops. There are certainly more powerful laptops out there, but in terms of bang for the buck, the Sony VAIO NS140 excels.

Interested to see how other budget laptops compare to the Sony VAIO NS140? Check out our side-by-side laptop comparisons.

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