Sony VAIO P Upgrades to Atom 1.6GHz

Yes, I understand that the Sony VAIO P is probably a lot more svelte and stylish than the rest of the netbook arena. It’s meant to be a higher end device in terms of fashion, but it’s been a little short on performance up until now. It was running on a 1.33GHz chip, but now Sony has bumped that up to the 1.6GHz Atom that you see just about everywhere else.

On the outside, the Sony VAIO P “Lifestyle PC” looks much the same as it did before with its ultra-wide 8-inch display and not-quite-in-your-pocket form factor, but the speed bump should certainly help. We think that Sony is using the Intel Atom Z530 here, but it could very well be the N270. That’d be a pain, eh?

In addition to the above features, the Sony VAIO P will also get 2GB of RAM, a 128GB SSD, Verizon Mobile Broadband, GPS, Bluetooth and a webcam. The North American version will only ship with Vista, rather than the XP option in Japan.

At $1,499, the Sony VAIO P Lifestyle PC is far from a bargain. At that price, you could afford to buy three or four netbooks with comparable specs, but you wouldn’t have that cool VAIO name emblazoned on the top cover. That’s worth the premium, right?

Source: Engadget