Sony VAIO G Announced in Japan

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Sony is making waves again by pushing the envelope on what you can fit into super thin and super small laptops. They've released the VAIO G 1.98lbs, 12.1&quot; screen laptop in Japan that features an optional integrated DVD drive (which boosts the weight to 2.17 lbs) and tough carbon fiber body.

Sony of course has a lot of experience designing carbon fiber notebooks, they offer such an option with the VAIO SZ, VAIO T and the former VAIO X505 (review here) from a couple of years back which was super slim and super light and also used the carbon fiber build. Carbon fiber is lighter, stronger and better at heat dissipation than other typical notebook construction materials. The downside to carbon fiber? It's expensive to use, so you'd think the VAIO G would have an extortionate price tag. However, the reported price of around $2,000 when converted from Japanese Yen means it's not too much more expensive than some competing ultraportables.

Here are the complete specs on the VAIO G:

• Weight: 898-grams / 1.98-pounds
• Screen: 12.1-inch, 1024x768 display
• Choice Celeron or Core Solo 1.06GHz U1300 or 1.2GHz U1400 processors
• Integrated Intel 945GMS Express graphics
• Up to 80GB of disk space
• Up to 1.5GB memory,
• Quoted 6-hour battery life (highly doubtful) with 4-cell battery, 6-cell available
• Fingerprint reader
• 802.11a/b/g WiFi and Bluetooth,
• 2 USB 2.0, a multi-format memory card and PCMCIA slot
• Dimensions: 10.9 × 8.5 × 0.9~1.0-inches

Availability is slated for December 2 in Japan starting at about ¥215,000 (about $1,836) and ¥245,000 (about $2,093) for the higher spec model. No word on U.S. availability, these types of notebooks sell much better in Japan than the U.S., but it's likely at some point Sony will offer it outside of Japan as they did in the past with the super slim VAIO X505 notebook. If you can't wait for it to arrive to where you live, you can always get it imported from Japan via Dynamism.com. You can see the VAIO G Japan product page here.

 

Japan always gets the best electronics.

 

Are the japanese prices generally higher than the US prices? I am in the market for an ultra portable and i was sure i wanted to get a TX untill this.... or may be not ... What it has NO widescreen?????

 

why dont companies make thin but big notebooks for people who have large hands!

 

SAmsung X1 ... You may want to look at this:

http://www.coolbee.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=LP-SAMS-X1-0001&click=39

 

Maybe because it doesn't suit them?

 

alot of other laptops in Japan that I would rather have, all of you guys if you ever go to Japan make sure to go to Yodabashi Camera basically anything you can possibly think of that is electronic is there.

 

This would have been the perfect laptop if it had widescreen. I swear I would sell my Gateway NX100 and buy this in a heartbeat if it came in a widescreen version.

 

wowowo...it's gonna be even lighter than the Dell X1....
and it has a DVD drive....amazing...however not wide screen...

 

Asus makes some thin full-sized systems.

That VAIO looks like a nice option in ultraportable.

 

Excellent traveling notebook. If it magically had descrete graphics, it would be close to ideal.

 

Here's video of the Vaio G.