
Sony sells its VAIO PC business, makes TV arm its own subsidiary - sosuke
http://www.engadget.com/2014/02/06/sony-sells-vaio/
======
PhantomGremlin
I feel sorry for Sony. They're lost. They're so lost that they don't even know
they're lost. And nobody will tell them, or they just won't listen.

E.g. a few years ago they bet big on 3D TV. At the time I said "huh?". It was
destined to fail. Not just because many people dislike the 3D effect, there
were multiple standards, there was a need for special glasses, etc.

No, the real (missing) elephant in the room was _content_. After all, how many
times can you re-watch Avatar? Have there even been 10 "good" 3D movies made
to date?

So what does this article end with? It says that Sony is betting big on 4K
screens. Once again, the key word is "content". Just how do you get 4K content
to people at home? About 10 years ago we were all sold the HDTV story. But
look at what's being delivered to homes today. Extreme bit starving; an HD TV
channel often uses less than 1/2 of what was envisioned. Why? Because most
people don't care and so it's more profitable to deliver two or three mediocre
quality programs instead of one high quality program.

Those uncaring consumers will now start paying for 4K content? I don't think
so! And even if they wanted it, there isn't enough available bandwidth on the
cable systems. So now we need a successor to Blu-ray with even more
resolution? Great, now each movie will be available in DVD, Blu-Ray and 4K
Blu-Ray versions? Don't forget the collectors editions. Don't forget the
inevitable re-releases (e.g. special editions), because the video quality of
the first release was total crap.

And without 4K content, today's TVs are already more than good enough. My TV
set is capable of far better quality than what comes out of my cable. And the
quality of video on demand is no better than what's OTA. Usually worse.

Apparently nobody at Sony has managed to convey to top management the
unexpurgated version of "this is a crock of shit, and it stinks".

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Have there even been 10 "good" 3D movies made to date?_

Yup. But the question is, "have there even been 10 good _movies_ made to
date?". Pretty much every good mainstream movie is made in 3D now, and people
go to see it in 3D _by default_. I've recently been to a 2D movie in a cinema
and then I realized how weird it looks; being accustomed to watching movies in
3D for last few years.

~~~
PhantomGremlin
>Pretty much every good mainstream movie is made in 3D now

Okay, honest question, because I'm not up on the technology.

Are all these movies actually _made_ in 3D, or are they mostly converted to 3D
after the fact? Shooting in 3D has to be a lot more expensive. I can see doing
it for big action movies, but is it needed for a typical RomCom?

~~~
1stop
Really? Don't you just need 2 cameras for every 1. (Like how our eyes work).

~~~
Keyframe
2 cameras, two sets of identical lenses, grip that can carry two cameras
(usually a 3d rig), and the most expensive part - people that know how to work
with 3d. That usually means a stereographer on set, more storage, dedicated 3d
dailies preview (special equipment, monitors), DoP that knows what he's up to
(3d requires slightly different lighting setup).

All combined isn't THAT more expensive on A budgets, but usually they shoot
with parallel setups of two or more cameras (double for 3d). With special
monitoring, extra step (stereographer) and slightly different lighting
techniques you're looking at more time needed for each setup - which then
halts everything and costs even more money.

And that's only for production. Postproduction has to work on everything
twice, including rendering... so it adds up.

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josephlord
The trouble is there is almost no profit at all in TV's these days (and for
most of the last decade too). It is too prestigious and therefore competitive
as there is still the impression that it is the key part of becoming a major
consumer electronics player (I think it is probably wrong these days and
mobile phone/tablets may be more important). Differentiation of TVs is hard
because features appeal to niche's of the total market and basic picture
quality is now good on most products and MOST people can't recognise a good
picture if they see it.

Sony has also suffered badly along with Panasonic from the strength of the
Yen. A great deal of the cost base is still in Japan even when manufacture is
outsourced into local markets which destroys any real possibilities of profit.

I don't know what the effect of making the TV arm it's own subsidiary will be,
(it may be mostly to allow profits to be shown in the rest of electronics),
but I really don't know what the best thing to do with it would be. I'm not
sure it makes commercial sense to make TV's in its own terms but it is
doubtful whether Sony could sustain franchised retail chains without TVs so it
may affect the total business if they withdrew completely. It would also be a
shame as the products are good and there are many good people there but I just
can't see a future of long term profitability.

Ex Sony TV Product Planner/Biz Dev (Europe)

~~~
PhantomGremlin
The real problem is that an LCD TV isn't something that breaks very often. Nor
does it really need adjustment, like the old CRTs frequently did.

Sony marketing made 3D a big thing in 2010:
[http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB126281921528818651](http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB126281921528818651)
Sony Pins Future on a 3-D Revival Jan. 7, 2010

But I had just bought a big screen Sony XBR6 the year before. That TV is still
my primary TV, still working fine. I might replace it in another 5 years,
"just because". But until then, there had better be a really compelling
"breakthrough" for me to justify buying another TV. And, IMO, 3D wasn't it.
And 4K isn't it, either, for reasons I already outlined.

Most households got rid of their CRTs a long time ago. So the long-time
scenario of moving the old TV to the basement doesn't work anymore, because
the basement already has an LCD, and that LCD still works great.

I agree with you, there's just no future of long term profitability in TVs
anymore.

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goldfeld
It had been north of 5 years since I had last bought a laptop. It was a VAIO.
I loved that computer as a man can love his bread-winner. Nowadays I work on
an old trusty Acer (which feels close to a VAIO in finish, build quality and
even style) and an old MacBook Pro (also top notch.)

Well, I just got a Samsung Ativ Book 9. What crap. I'm deep in buyer's
remorse. For a computer supposedly with high finish, the keyboard is
completely cheap and crappy and scratchy, the screen is meh, it's oversized
(despite being super thin) and just overall feels cheap, cheap, crap. Don't
buy it. I could only get Fedora 19 working (not latest Ubuntu, not latest
Mint, all graphic driver issues) and it was laggy as hell, my keystrokes took
a half-second to materialize. Presumably the graphics driver. Gonna try Fedora
20 right now, or I'll go after driver updates or something. Don't buy this
sucker. I know I won't buy Samsung again over this. Wish I would have bought a
VAIO. But then they sell out.

~~~
nly
If it sucks so much, why not return it?

~~~
goldfeld
Unfortunately, not every place in the world allows no-questions-asked returns
like in the US. Even at an intl' chain store like Walmart (where I bought it.)

~~~
nly
We're kind of blessed here in the UK, consumer rights is one area where we
haven't yet been thrown under the bus. Distance selling regulations for stuff
bought online mean companies are obliged to take products back within 7 days
of customer receipt no questions asked. This law exists solely to alleviate
the "buyers remorse" problem. This doesn't apply to brick and mortar though.

Did you not play with it in shop?

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higherpurpose
As the PC market declines, I expect further selling of PC divisions and
mergers in the PC market over the next few years.

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gesman
High end Sony Vaio are the best laptops the money can buy.

When I custom ordered one from them - they notified me about every step from
the beginning of manufacturing to the movements between facilities to detailed
cross ocean shipping.

It is Made in Japan.

Every time I use this Laptop (one of Z-models, gold colored) it's a joy.

I think instead of trying to compete for made-in-china junk buyer's attention
- they should of elevate their Z-line to fashion statement for very high end,
demanding users.

~~~
gesman
Oh, and when ordering - they also allows you to select (at no charge) the
"fresh start" option.

Fresh start means - absolutely no preload with bloatware crap. Just bare OS
with couple Sony utils.

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omnibrain
I hope the TV subsidiary can stand on it's own feet. Losing it would be a
shame because they build damn fine TVs. The only problem they have is that
others advertise their features more aggresivly and customers prefer to buy
some 50" candy-colour "Smart TV" for 800€ instead of a feature rich awesome
display 46" Bravia for 900€.

~~~
csmithuk
I thought that when I bought my Bravia EX but it's a pain in the ass. iPlayer
is poorly maintained and it barely plays anything on a good day, the thing is
impossibly slow for the first minute when you turn it on and it's the fussiest
thing I've ever seen when it comes to media playback. The TV bit is pretty
good but I didn't really buy it for that as there is literally nothing on TV
in the UK. Oh and it randomly decides to inform the watchers that it's going
to turns itself off even though every option in it is set to not automatically
turn off.

It's no Triniton to make a comparison.

I've had zero experience with other smart TVs so this might be the best user
experience out there -- please feel free to confirm this or not as I was
thinking about getting rid of it.

~~~
omnibrain
To be honest, I can only compare it to Samsung because that's all my parents
and my friends have. My GF's parents have a Sony.

I found Samsungs menus and control scheme to be unbearable and the owners
often struggle with it too.

I usually play media directly from my PC via UPNP and that works. The built-in
Youtube app is okay for the occasional video, too. Other than that I only play
DVDs and Blurays and the media libraries of german TV channels (they are
usually not available via built-in apps to the same extend) via a connected
Rapsberry Pi.

A big plus is that my TV is able to put out DD 5.1 it receives via HDMI on
it's optical output.

The picture qualities beats every other (LED) TV I have seen. It even came
with halfway decent factory settings. Don't ask me how much time I spent
trying to adjust the colours on my parents TV. But they grew to like the candy
colours...

~~~
PhantomGremlin
>I found Samsungs menus and control scheme to be unbearable and the owners
often struggle with it too.

I have my doubts about Apple succeeding in the TV business. But maybe they
will, just like in phones. Not necessarily because they're so good, but
because everyone else is so bad.

I still remember the remote control of my last Sony VCR. It let you record up
to 8 different programs, you put them into "slots". Horrible. Quite the
opposite of how TiVo does it.

But the real absurdity of the Sony remote came when entering start/stop times
for recording. The remote had a number pad (most remotes did, to allow
changing channels). But the number pad couldn't be used to enter start/stop
times. Instead you had to push up/down arrows, and IIRC separately for each
"digit" of time. An utter fuster-cluck when it came to usability.

So maybe Apple is the future?

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be5invis
I wish that Sony publish all the Vaio engineering diagrams before its death. I
don't want this spirit disappear.

------
pedalpete
I thought the Tap 11 showed a ton of potential. I hope somebody else can
capitalise on that. The rest of the line I found fairly ho-hum.

------
sdfjkl
What does that leave Sony with? Game consoles, cameras, incompatible flash
memory and some audio kit?

~~~
obtino
There's a hell of a lot more to Sony than electronics:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony#Business_units](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony#Business_units)

~~~
sdfjkl
Interesting, had no idea they were in banking.

As for the electronics sector I was referring to, it seems I missed
semiconductors, medical and the remnants of Ericsson.

~~~
TorKlingberg
Sony bought Ericsson's phone business. They make nice Androids, but are not
very high profile in the U.S. Certainly nowhere near the market share Ericsson
had in the 90's. Much of the R&D is actually in Sweden.

Ericssons network business is alive and well, actually no. 1 by market share.
I worked there until recently.

------
spullara
No one can make laptops as great as Apples. It isn't because of skill though,
no one else can expect to sell as many of the same model. The current MacBook
Air is magic and the Retina Pros are amazing performance wise. All while
retaining a great look and build quality. Hard to do that when you sell dozens
of skus the way sony, dell, hp, Lenovo, etc do.

~~~
72deluxe
Very true, mainly because nobody can expect to sell as many as the same model.

What always strikes me is that when you go to a PC laptop, the keyboard flexes
in the middle. This is rubbish. The MacBook does not.

EDIT: Why downvotes? Does your laptop flex in the middle when you press the H
or G key? PC manufacturers seem to not bother with much bracing there.

~~~
sz4kerto
> Why downvotes?

Because the basis of your opinion is anecdotal and seemingly you haven't used
business category PC laptops. They have disadvantages compared to Macbooks
(heavier, clunkier, and usually more expensive than a Macbook Pro), but many
advantages as well (much-much better cooling -- I hate my rMBP because of it's
constant cooling issues; much-much better warranty -- if it breaks, you can
get a replacement in a few hours).

~~~
72deluxe
Ah ok. I have used HPs in business when I was in charge of of the IT
department and you did get a lot for your money but they flexed. I had some
turn up bust or with duff batteries. Some also had poor fittings on the
keyboards, particularly around the edges where they met the body casing. For
~£750 laptop this was poor. This was the ProBook line, in addition to other
lines. And the screens were dreadful, with washed out colours. The Sonys we
had in were better but I had some blow up. The Toshibas were alright but
again, flexing.

~~~
sz4kerto
ProBooks are low/mid category laptops. You want to compare Macbooks with
EliteBooks.

~~~
jotm
Elitebooks are now Zbooks for some reason and the new Elitebooks are midrange
hardware - why would they do that to a successful brand name...

