Design
Sony's Vaio TP2 is a media centre designed for the living room. You couldn't actually miss this fact; it's adorned with "TV side PC" on the exterior packaging. Once you unpack it, you're met with something that looks rather like the illicit offspring of a Roomba vacuum cleaner and an Apple TV. It's not an overwhelmingly bad design, but it is exceptionally white, and as such, it may not match up with many of the other parts of your home AV setup. As one passer-by put it while we were testing, it looks like something you'd have in a design home to show off -- but not necessarily your own home.
While it initially appears a little barren aside from the rather obvious Blu-ray drive tray, that's because most of the TP-2's most accessible ports are hidden. The front panel of the TP2 slides inwards to reveal memory card readers, two USB 2.0 ports and an i.link style Firewire port. The back of the TP2 is nowhere near as neat, however, and it much more betrays the TP2's PC heritage. There's a pair of USB ports, HDMI, ethernet and the screw for the supplied WiFi antenna -- which is naturally enough white. Surprisingly for a Media Center PC, the TP2 doesn't ship with an integrated TV tuner, opting instead for a rather large external USB unit. You'll need to use the supplied USB extension cable with this, as directly plugging it in at the back will entirely obscure the secondary USB port. Either way it's annoying, and with the USB extender cable, somewhat unsightly.
The remote control and keyboard that come with the TP2 are once again white, and it's pretty clear that the design aesthetic for the keyboard has come from Sony's VAIO notebook line. The keyboard keys are flat and there's a touchpad at the base to cover basic mousing functions. Both work off IR and the keyboard requires 4 AA batteries.
Features
On the PC side of things, the TP2 runs off a 2.1Ghz T8100 Core 2 Duo Processor, 500GB hard drive, combo Blu-ray drive and 256MB NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GT GPU. Networking is provided via either Ethernet or WiFi, although we struggled for some time to get the supplied antenna to screw in properly for WiFi usage, before giving up and going to the ethernet port.
Aside from the basic Windows Media Center offerings that you get with Vista Home Premium, Sony also provides some Vaio-specific utilities with the TP2. The most pertinent of these is the "living browser", which can be accessed directly from the Media Center menu and gives you a web browsing experience direct from the remote control.
Performance
There are two basic aspects to consider when assessing the TP2's performance. First of all, on a pure PC grunt basis, the TP2 performed quite adequately for a lounge room PC, scoring 5407 PC Marks in PCMark05, and 2427 in 3DMark06. That's not going to hugely satisfy cutting edge gamers -- and given the TP2's modular design, you're not going to easily be able to upgrade the graphics card -- if at all. Still, for less ambitious gamers, it's fine.
The real taste test of the TP2, however, is in how good it is in a lounge room setting, and it's here that the news isn't so good. The basic Windows Media Center interface is still solid as ever and that part works quite well. It is worth noting that the TP2 ships with a standard Windows Media Center remote, and if, like us, you've got an Xbox 360 in the vicinity, you'll have to do some delicate aiming to avoid switching both on at the same time. That's a minor concern, however, next to the aspects that just don't work as smoothly as they should.
The Living Browser concept is a fair one -- letting you control Web browsing just with a remote -- but in operation it's way too fiddly to bother with. When there's a keyboard supplied with the unit with a trackpad, you'll quickly go back to using your regular web browser.
The keyboard is nicely light, but it also feels rather flimsy, and the flat notebook-style keyboard can be uncomfortable and a bit unresponsive at times. We'd advise getting a good wireless keyboard from Microsoft or Logitech to replace it.
Ultimately, the factor that makes the TP2 far less interesting than it really should be is that it feels like a product that should have been available at least two years ago. In the intervening period, we've seen no end of home A/V devices that cover the TP2's main "fun" applications just as well, if not better than the TP2 actually does. This list includes Sony's own Playstation 3, which also gives you the same Blu-ray playback opportunities, web browsing and even image, music and video playback. Strip those out, and you're left with a lounge room PC that you can't easily upgrade and most likely won't match your existing home décor.
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Hamish
18/04/2008, 05:39 PM
rating
4/10
I would have not bought this product if it were not classed as a laptop, this giving me the ability to salary sacrafice, therefore saving me 40 % off retail. However there is no other product on the market which seriously attemps to to merege all media requirements and be used in the living environment. performance wise it meets all of my basic requirements (I gave up gaming years ago) ashtetically it is appauling, its really WHITE! This is against its very purpose(I thought), which is to de-clutter and streamline my living space, not to stand out and say "I have a really WHITE!! computer in my living room!!" Ten years ago I might have wanted a big "look at me" computer, but now I want function, refinement, minimalism and thoughtfullness to fill my life.The keyboard is tacky, cheap the touchpads action and feel is poor The external tuner is just one more "techy" thing that needs to be overcome. The average Joe just wants to plug the thing in and go. It feels like the product was made to a budget by tech heads who do not represent the wants and wishes of the consumer who ultimately pay their wages. But Sony have had a crack (allbeit a poor one) at making a product which is ultimetly the future in home media entertainment, which hopefully will evolve into a product which the consumer has long been waiting for.
Pros: Does the job
Has pioneered future home entertainment
Cons: Gawdy asthetics
Tacky and cheap feel
External tuner
More USB ports please
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