Sony Vaio VGN-TZ11MN

Launch price £1,500.00

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Stuff says

If you're after a tiny laptop with considerable talent, the TZ11MN is a very fine buy

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The TZ11MN is the starting model in Sony’s latest and, hopefully, greatest line of ultraportable laptops, aimed squarely at the business user with plenty of money to spend on ultra-miniaturised technology, but no compulsion for building biceps. It’s not supposed to be a media or games machine but it needs to work seamlessly with office and communications tasks, so those aesthetics won’t mean a thing if performance is weak. Thankfully, it's anything but.

Out of the box
The first thing you notice when you remove the TZ11MN from its packaging is just how ridiculously small and light it is. As you paw its slightly coarse carbon composite construction you’ll note the many ports and connections Sony has managed to squeeze into it.

Before opening the hair's-width screen, you'll rub your finger along the chromed media buttons adorning its front. Next you'll be confronted by the ZX Spectrum-esque keyboard – very cool and surprisingly ergonomic in use.

Finally, you'll press the green, glowing power button on the right-hand end of the hinge and be blown away by the quality of the 11.1in screen: its LED backlighting and X-Black coating make for one of the crispest, brightest and colourful displays we've ever seen.

The light fantastic?
In the grand scheme of things this is not a powerful laptop computer, especially at the price: it packs a low-voltage processor, memory is a perfunctory 1GB (expandable to 2GB) and graphics are of the built-in, memory-sharing Intel type. Vista rates the TZ11 as a two out of ten in the performance stakes and none of the stats top 4.5.