Tuesday, September 3, 2013

And I had such high hopes

Dashed upon the rocks of "Must be user error".

Quick recap: bought a Sony Vaio laptop with Windows 7 on it, but Windows 8 ready. Could purchase upgrade for $14.99.

First time, around, using the Sony Vaio update utility, I had problem after problem after problem (copy/paste not working, Windows Explorer crashing, video/graphics drivers issues, then the black blank screen) so I restored the Windows 7 system image I had.

A few months roll by, and after yet again getting intermittent BSODs during Windows 7 start ups, of which no specific reason could be found, I decided to update to Windows 8 again.

Once again, rolled out the Sony Viao update utility, updated to Windows 8. Knew about the graphics driver issue, the fix for the copy paste issue, and what to do about the black screen.

Ok, well and good. Let's go back to the Sony site and get the most up to date drivers. Therein lies the problem. Once again, when I tried to update the video drivers, I keep getting "You don't have the right hardware for this update". So, I head on over to the AMD site. Yes, they have the newer drivers, but it specifically says NOT COMPATIBLE WITH SONY LAPTOPS.

I emailed Sony. I had thought I was actually getting somewhere with them. How so silly of me. Want to know what their final response was? An hours long version of "Have you tried turning it off then back on?" Yes, their brilliant decision was to restore Windows 7 (again) and update to Windows 8 (again) using the Sony Viao update utility (again)

Isn't the definition of insanity doing the same exact thing over and over and expecting a different result?

Clue up: First attempt to update fails, could very well be user or software problem. 2nd attempt, there's something wrong with the hardware.

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