Digital Trends

Sony Vaio UX50

June 9th, 2006 | by Brandon King

Introduction

The recent announcement of the combined Microsoft/Intel venture to support a new breed of ultra mobile PCs was more the subject of many questions regarding the usefulness of such a device rather than excitement over a new class of PCs. Who were these designed for? How powerful would these tiny PCs be? What it even feasible to run Windows XP on a PC with such limited size, power and battery life? These questions were mostly asked out of ignorance, as ultra-portable PCs have been around for more than 5 years; they just were not recognized like they should have by Microsoft or Intel.

The Sony VAIO U line of PCs, first introduced in 2002, has gone through many revisions. From the early U1 through the U70/U50, the ultra-portable U series has had its fair share of innovation and drawbacks. The early models, including the U1, U3 and U101 used the classic clamshell/laptop design. They were largely seen as simply tiny, underpowered laptops for niche vertical markets. But even then, the roots of the modern ultra-portable could be seen. A dedicated zoom button, standing-use pointer layout (with mouse pad on the right of the screen, and buttons on the left) were first seen in the U1. The U3 and U101 provided better performance, but kept the same general design. The U70 was the first major redesign by Sony, with the most marked change the lack of a built in keyboard. Even without a keyboard, Sony stuck with the tried and true non-Tablet version of Windows XP, instead opting for an in house application for text input and quick access to an on screen keyboard. The U70 remains one of the most impressive PCs we have seen in terms of size, power and design.

In March 2006 Microsoft took the wraps off its top secret initiative, developed in part with Intel, which had been referred to under the code name Origami. Now officially dubbed the UMPC, vendors started lining up to fill the niche created by the push for more power and features at the cost of portability. But Sony, who had only released one version of the U series outside of Japan, took the UMPC buzz as the heralding of a mass interest in the ultra-portable PC. The result was the UX50, UX90S, and UX180P. You can compare the three at Dynamism.com.

Sony UX50