weird port

okay, I jsut got a new laptop for school, a sony vaio with a GeForce FX G05600 and its pretty sweet. I wanted to connect it to my TV and see how it would work but the video port on the back is the same type of port as a headphone jack. I tried e-mailing tech support but the link the sent me was useless. does anyone else have a vaio with thes port? thnaks for the help.

also, i didn't get any recovery cds with it. they told me i could burn my own set or get a dvd of it all for 18 bucks. does anyone else find this odd?

burn your own set? where exactly did you buy this laptop from?

the video out might be an RCA connection, otherwise ive never seen a video out port like that

I got it a new egg, and i;ve bought a lot of stuff there, so i think the recovery stuff is a sony issue and thew port it def not a RCA jack, because a mini headphone jack fits in it.

video out is a small hole and not a svideo slot? if that is the case you should have gotten some thing like this

it splits off for audio and vid (i think) because my brother got it with his lappy but we never used it we only used tv

So this laptop did not come with any disks that contain the OS and the other software and drivers that came with the system?

AND it didn't come with an adapter that will allow you to actually use the video output?

Sounds pretty lame to me.


Can't really call BS on them though. There is no mention of a recovery cd or of the video output jack that requires an adapter.

I am not really mad they didn't give me the video cord or whatever, I jsut wish they told me what it was so I could get one. And with the recovery cds I jsut assumed that that sort of thing would come with a new PC, but you know what they say about assuming.

the cable is 1/4" to rca. i helped my buddy pickout a toshiba laptop with video out that used the same style plug a few years ago.




btw did you buy it as a refurb? if not it should have came with all the cables, manaul, cds etc..

my digicams got the same "headphone" plug, it came with a cable that had the stereo plug on one and an a video RCA plug on the other end
i would get a pic but i only have 10 minutes before my dad disconnects the dsl modem.... (dont ask.... )

Thanks for all the help, hopefully radio shack will ahve what I need. I didn't get the laptop refrub, and it was sealed in the VAIO box when new egg shipped it too me. However, before I ordered it I called new egg to see if the 256 mb of ram was one or two chips and they told me to call sony. After about 45 minutes on hold when I gave the tech rep the model number was confused by it and asked if i was sure thats what it was, as if they didn't have a record of my model. he told me it was two 128 chips but when i got it it was one 256 chip, so its *** if no one at sony knows about this model. the laptop is great and plays games very well, just as well as my geforce 3 in my desktop plus direct x 9 support, so I am not complaining even thoguh the customer service and suport leaves something to be desired.

travioli said:

even thoguh the customer service and suport leaves something to be desired.

Click to expand...

That's why I like my Dell.

Krusty said:

That's why I like my Dell.

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No comment.... It's quite common for the PCs NOT to come with recovery disks. The drive image is stored on a partition of the hard drive that you can't see and then if you want CDs you have to run software that's on the machine to create them. All the new HPs, Sonys, and Compaqs are comming this way and I don't doubt others will be far behind. Be warned that if you want to create a set it'll take at least 5. Every system that customers have made me create a set for them has required 5 discs or more. A few HPs have taken 7!!! It's all that damn preloaded software they give you!!! blah. Toshiba gives you CDs btw.

First thing I did when I got my laptop was format the thing. Recovery cds serve me no purpose at all. I formatted the thing (and re partitioned), put on WinXP pro, downloaded all the recent drivers, defragged, then created an image and stored it on a network drive.

Laptops come with way too much crap clogging up all of my precious hard drive space and memory and cpu resources. I like to be a minimalist.

What I like about the Dells is that they have great service if something happens to go wrong with the system. All hardware issues are resolved by making a phone call and waiting for a courier to come pick up my laptop. Fortunately, I have not had to use this service yet. I'm hoping the whole thing dies just before the warranty expires so I can get all new stuff then.