Sony VAIO PCG-SR31K Subnotebook

[JEWilson]

My bro wants me to look at one of these he has rec'd.

Comes with Windows 2000 Pro CoA on the base of the case.
The base spec. is;
1 x 128MB miroDIMM
1 x low voltage PIII 750MHz with speedstep
1 x 15GB Toshiba HDD
1 x proprietary SONY Bluetooth
1 x SONY Memory stick adapter
1 x PCMCIA adapter
1 x 1394 adapter

Rec'd this with no recovery media and a broken OS (some components
missing). However, there was an i386 installation source on the HDD.

I reinstalled Win2K Pro from this and got the OS back to normal.
However, drivers for the sound IC (Yamaha YMF754-R),
the bluetooth adapter, the memory stick adapter and the modem
all failed to install from this installation source.
The OS asked for the licence key and the one supplied with CoA worked.

After a belated amount of time searching for drivers, I obtained a
some the Sony website. However, these appear to be
updates only. I require the original installed drivers in the first instance!

No luck finding these - pain in the arse (if you ask me).

I did find a driver for the modem which installed ok.
I got the correct driver from the Yamaha website but this failed to install.
I suspect Sony have rebranded (using the subsystem device driver ID)
this such that the notebook requires their version.

Looking at the driver inf for the Yamaha and referencing vendor ID etc., there is no entry for Sony albeit a number exist for several OEMs.

I suspect further, those adapters not installed from the installation
source require further proprietary SONY software (drivers included)
which will come (probably) with the recovery media set.
Something I don't have.

Any thoughts on this matter?

Next, this notebook is based on the veneralbe Intel 440BX chipset
As it presently only has 128MB it takes forever to install the OS from
scratch (as undertaken above).
So...
SONY state max. RAM is 256MB SDRAM (PC100/133) 2 x 128MB microDIMMs.
SONY state installed CPU is a special low voltage version of PIII - 750MHz

Q - 256MB is useless even with Win2K. Will the notebook accept
DIMMs greater than 128MB? As I believe typical BX chipset accept
low density 256MB per slot, do any members have experience
upgrading this class of notebook?

Q - Would it be the case the CPU is upgradeable subject (of course)
to an assessment of the CPU thermal solution in situ?

Any suggestions, insight and help, as usual appreciated.

[jpdoe]

Re: Sony VAIO PCG-SR31K Subnotebook

I've dealt with rebranded / broken PCI IDs a couple of times. It involved editing the driver .ini files to include the PCI ID of the device in question. If you upload the .ini and provide me with the PCI ID, I'll do it for you. It simply consists of adding a line to the .ini
The hard part is figuring out which device it actually is the one installed.

[JEWilson]

Re: Sony VAIO PCG-SR31K Subnotebook

Thanks

Y - I have done this before myself
Sought to get a reaction on the issue of proprietary drivers and to what
extent I could upgrade this thing

Thanks again

[jpdoe]

Re: Sony VAIO PCG-SR31K Subnotebook

You're welcome.

The easy way to deal with drivers to try to backup the ones present on the broken install. This is something I don't do (I like to use up to date versions), but I know several techies that do it. There's several programs available. Driver Genius is one of them. If the OS is broken, I've seen BartPE boot cds that include this kind of application.

What's the PCI ID of the devices?