The C2's 13.3-inch widescreen display is its strongest asset. It runs at a native resolution of 1,280x800 pixels and is of a very good standard. It's laced in Sony's X-Black screen coating so it benefits from better perceived contrast and colour reproduction is accurate. Its glossy finish makes it a little too reflective when used in direct light, but on the whole we think it's excellent.
The C2 is a fully fledged Centrino laptop so it's capable of connecting to Wi-Fi networks. This should come in handy for surfing the Web in your local Starbucks while showing off the laptop's flamboyant blue finish to fellow coffee drinkers. It also has Bluetooth so you can synchronise data with your mobile phone. As is usual, there's a hardware wireless switch on the front edge of the laptop that will come in handy when an air steward tells you to switch off devices that could interfere with a plane's navigation systems.
There's a ghastly shortage of ports on the C2. The right side of the laptop is host to a paltry two USB ports and one four-pin FireWire port, which are joined by S-Video and D-Sub graphics outputs. The left side has modem, LAN, mic and headphone jacks, plus an SD memory card reader. A separate MagicGate Memory Stick reader sits at the front edge of the laptop.
The software package is slightly more impressive than the hardware specification. The C2 ships with Windows Vista Home Premium Edition, which has a range of applications that lets you exercise your creativity. Windows Movie Maker, Windows Media Center and Windows DVD Maker are three of the highlights. You also get Microsoft Office.
Performance
The C2's U1500 CPU and 1GB of RAM aren't exactly awe-inspiring, and neither were its PCMark 2005 results. It clocked up a meagre 2,855, which indicates it's really only intended for everyday tasks such as surfing the Web, organising and viewing your media collection, and possibly light video editing. Its 3DMark 2006 score wasn't much cop either -- it racked up 234, which means its not capable of running modern games.
Battery life wasn't bad, though -- it lasted 3 hours 12 minutes in our tests, which is long enough to watch a couple of movies on a long car or plane journey. It's enough to keep the kids quiet if nothing else.
Conclusion
In a world of grey, plastic boxes, Sony is to be applauded for trying something different with this blue Vaio. Unfortunately, the colourful tinge comes at a hefty price -- specs-wise, you could pick up something similar on the high street for less. You could even try Sony's Vaio VGN-FE31H, which has a similar spec but is £200 cheaper.
This is a perfectly adequate portable, but we're not sure that the blue paint is worth the cash.
Edited by Jason Jenkins
Additional editing by Kate Macefield
Android App 
RSS Feeds 
iPhone App 
Newsletters