Sony VAIO Pro 13: Exceptionally Portable
by Jarred Walton on October 16, 2013 12:00 AM ESTSony VAIO Pro 13: Performance
In most areas, the performance of the VAIO Pro 13 is more than sufficient. Loading up Windows and common applications, surfing the web, and even video encoding (especially with an application that supports Quick Sync) are all plenty fast. There are faster laptops out there, certainly, but they don't have anywhere near this level of portability. Here's our standard selection of performance metrics, and you can see that the VAIO Pro 13 is basically in line with other Ultrabooks. Note that most of the other Ultrabooks have used Core i7 ULV processors, so here the VAIO Pro 13 is at a disadvantage. The cores specs for the tested laptops are listed in the table below, and additional benchmark results are available in Mobile Bench.
Overview of Laptops in Charts | ||||||
Laptop | CPU | GPU | Storage | RAM | LCD | Battery |
Acer R7-571-6858 | Intel Core i5-3317U | HD 4000 | 500GB HDD + 24GB SSD | 1x4GB + 1x2GB | 15.6” 1080p Glossy AHVA Touchscreen | 4-cell 54Wh |
Acer S7-391-9886 | Intel Core i7-3517U | HD 4000 | 2x128GB RAID 0 SSDs | 2x2GB | 13.3” 1080p Glossy AHVA Touchscreen | 4-cell 35Wh |
Acer V7-482PG-9884 | Intel Core i7-4500U | GT750M DDR3 / HD 4400 | 1TB HDD + 24GB SSD | 1x4GB + 1x8GB | 14” 1080p Glossy AHVA Touchscreen | 4-cell 54Wh |
AMD Kabini Prototype | AMD A4-5000 | HD 8330 | 256GB SSD | 1x4GB | 14” 1080p Matte IPS | 6-cell 45Wh |
Apple MacBook Air 13 (2013) | Intel Core i5-4250U | HD 5000 | 128GB PCIe SSD | 2x2GB | 13.3” 1440x900 Glossy TN | 4-cell 54Wh |
Dell XPS 12 | Intel Core i7-3517U | HD 4000 | 256GB SSD | 2x4GB | 13.3” 1080p Glossy IPS Touchscreen | 4-cell 47Wh |
Dell XPS 13 | Intel Core i5-3337U | HD 4000 | 256GB SSD | 2x4GB | 13.3” 1080p Glossy IPS | 6-cell 47Wh |
Sony VAIO Pro 13 | Intel Core i5-4200U | HD 4400 | 128GB PCIe SSD | 2x2GB | 13.3” 1080p Glossy IPS Touchscreen | 3-cell 37Wh |
In our general performance graphs, here we get another results showing that Haswell isn't really any faster than Ivy Bridge in most tests (unless it has a GT3/GT3e iGPU, or in specific tests that leverage the new instructions). Move to the 3DMark results and the VAIO Pro 13 doesn't really look so hot. It's now clearly slower than the Core i7 Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks, which isn't something I'd expect from 20 EUs. Either Intel actually has slower EUs in Haswell than in Ivy Bridge, or Sony is curbing performance of the iGPU to keep within their desired thermal range. Our gaming results continue this trend:
Other than in StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm and Tomb Raider, the VAIO Pro 13 ends up being slower than every other Intel Ultrabook that we've tested. The Acer V7 isn't technically an Ultrabook, though it's close enough in many respects, but we can see just how much even a moderate dGPU adds in terms of performance. We also have some results for Crystalwell (i7-4750HQ) in Mobile Bench that we're not including here, and GT3e is much faster as well (though the Clevo W740SU doesn't do all that well in the battery life department). Perhaps GT3 would help the VAIO Pro 13, but several games seemed to have issues maintaining higher iGPU clocks – Metro for instance showed cyclic higher/lower performance during the benchmark runs. It's mostly a moot point, though, as outside of light gaming the HD 4400 simply isn't fast enough to handle a lot of games.
106 Comments
View All Comments
broccauley - Wednesday, November 6, 2013 - link
What is it with these laptop manufacturers dropping something as essential as Ethernet? Apple really does start some stupid trends.cm2187 - Monday, November 11, 2013 - link
I cannot agree more with broccauley. Even modern Wifis drop all the time, and one can't seriously copy a large file through wifi (the performance is at best 10-15MB/s in practice, assuming the router is in the same room!) and it adds a significant lag . I am very frustrated that all laptops seem to now drop Ethernet. And a laptop that needs to have ten dongles to be able to do the most basic functions isn't really a laptop. I have been a big fan of Sony's Z Series and own 3 generations. But I won't touch these new model until they offer an Ethernet port.LeeTech - Friday, November 15, 2013 - link
Hello Jarred, Thank you for a great review. I own the Sony Vaio Pro 13. It's great, but the Wifi is very bad unless in the same room with the router. I often have trouble at SBUX even when my iPhone 4s connects flawlessly. Do you still have this laptop and able to do any numerical comparison with other similar laptops at various distances from router? Other forums seem to think the design may be flawed, and only workaround is USB wifi adapter. That's a shame.TinHat - Sunday, December 1, 2013 - link
I've heard a lot of talk before this particular item about interference from USB 3. Poorly shielded components might be at play here?LaMpiR - Wednesday, December 11, 2013 - link
Just ordered a Vaio Pro 13 on sale. 1035€. i7, 8GB, 256GB PCIe and without touchscreen. Here in Austria prices are ridiculous and they had some sail and used a bit of a student discount. This model in stores here is over 1300€. Wanted to go with the MB Air but i7, 8GB, 256GB with a student discount is 1455€ which is just too much...HelgeSverre - Monday, March 10, 2014 - link
I wrote a review of this ultrabook as well, if anyone is looking for a different view on the laptop you can read it on my blog: http://helgesverre.com/blog/sony-vaio-pro-13-revie...