The computer of the future…
… from 2007!

A few years ago, I’ve obtained and restored a VAIO UX VGN-UX380N Micro PC. On this website, I tell about the computer itself, how I restored it to the factory software, how i updated it and give a brief experience with some programs and games on it.

Take a seat and grab a coffee before you read it; it’s quite a long story but well worth to read!

Good to know: This article was written in July of 2020. Some things software-related have been changed since. But the overall steps required to get your computer working should be roughly the same today.

The basics

The Vaio UX computer usually comes with some accessories that make it useful. If you plan on getting one, you’ll likely want to get:

• The charger
• A protective case
• A docking station or a port replicator. These offer video output, Ethernet port and add more USB ports
• An external CD/DVD drive (for restoring and installing software)

I purchased mine on eBay. It was described as being in good condition and came with some accessories. The person who had sold me it had packed it really well. Almost everything was present, except the carrying case and the translucent plastic sheet of the port replicator.

The computer itself is in really good condition. Only a few scratches on the outside and it still has a screen protector on it. Hell, even the battery still holds a charge and lasts about 70% compared to a new one! This is really cool, as a lot of the units up on sale are either broken, noticably worn or just ridiculously overpriced. My unit is perfectly fine and went for sale for a reasonable price, considering how rare these are ($230).

Getting the important accessories

When using the VAIO UX, you’ll likely want to get some kind of dock or port replicator. This allows you to connect the computer to an external monitor, keyboard and mouse, making it a lot easier to work on. You’ll also likely want to get an external CD/DVD drive and a USB flash drive to install software and games on it.

With my purchase, there were some missing parts. Those were:

• The carrying case
• The plastic sheet (stand) of the port replicator

I could live without a carrying case, as I’ll almost never take mine outside. But the plastic sheet of the port replicator is something I really wanted. It’s needed for the PC to be used in the port replicator. Without one, it will not stand and you’ll risk damaging the connector on the replicator.

This piece of plastic was too complex to cut or 3D-print, so I decided to buy another dock that did come with it. Luckily, a dock went up for sale on eBay in the UK. With me being in the Netherlands, this meant shipping wasn’t that expensive.

Having a complete port replicator, the computer could now also be connected to an external monitor, keyboard and mouse.

A few months later, I also found a carrying case on eBay. It was sold from France and for a good price. Having received that, I now have a complete system.

Restoring the Sony software

Sony UX computers of the mid-2000s heavily relied on custom programs in order to access all features. There were many applications included, for example to use the touch screen, the cameras and mobile connectivity (cellular)

Restoring the software can be quite a challenge, because a lot of older software and drivers have been removed from the internet.

When received, my computer was running Windows XP, whilst it should ship with Vista. My fear was, that the previous owner had downgraded to XP and had removed all (or at least some) of the original Sony applications. That would be problematic, as it’s almost impossible to find these online and some of the programs are needed in order to use the handheld features.

Wanting to restore the computer to original condition, i had to remove the XP installation and reinstall the original operating system.

In order to reinstall the original operating system, you’ll either need to use the recovery program (from a special partition on the hard drive, available by pressing F10 on startup), or a set of DVD recovery disks.

The DVD recovery disks were not included with my computer. Not strange, considering the computer did not come with them when new; you had to create them yourself using the VAIO Recovery Recenter program. So, with the machine running a customized version of Windows XP, I thought i would be out of luck.

But I wasn’t.

While the previous owner had downgraded to XP, he had left the original recovery partition intact. This meant, that just by pressing the F10 key at startup, I could launch the built-in recovery mode and reinstall the original Vista OS from scratch. Bingo!

Reinstalling the operating system on a device this old is not something you’ll do quickly. The recovery itself took slightly more than 2 hours, but proceeds automatically. Then, you’ll need to update it (see below).

My first impressions were that this computer was slow. Everything took long, from booting up, to opening files and even launching simple programs such as Paint or Notepad. Was it the tiny hard drive that is on its last legs? Maybe. But upon opening Task Manager, there was something else slowing it down: The bundled trial of Norton antivirus 2007. Ugh, shame you Sony, to put this crapware on a $1700 device!

After removing Norton, things got a lot better. I could actually explore it and saw lots of other programs installed as well. Most of these are trials, some of them are not. Microsoft Streets & Trips 2006 was probably the best non-trial program installed, but in 2020, it’s gotten useless.

Updating Windows

After restoring the OS, you’ll end up with an unpatched Vista installation from around March 2007. This meant: 10 years of updates and 2 service packs to go!

Installing the first updates and SP1

A while after the computer was set up, the Windows Update icon popped up. Ah, it found out that it was missing some updates!

So I opened Windows Update and saw 95 updates ready to install. I let the computer install these (taking an hour to complete) and checked again afterwards. No updates available?!? That doesn’t seem right. We need at least Service Pack 1 installed!

Apparently, it did not find SP1 in Windows Update. Also not after turning on Microsoft Update, which should find updates for more products. This meant, that I had to manually install SP1. After having it downloaded from Microsoft, it took multiple hours to install. How long exactly, I dont know. But I left it instaling overnight and the next morning it was done.

SP2, here we go!

After SP1 was installed I immediatley downloaded and installed SP2 from Microsoft as well. Knowing how slow the device was and that installing it manually would probably be the quickest way, I waited no longer and installed it directly. This took about 2 hours, which was probably shorter than SP1.

Installing the rest of updates (Fixing “Searching for updates…”)

After SP2 was installed, it was time to install the remainder of updates (from 2009-2017). My first attempt was to let Windows Update search for these. But it kept searching, and searching, and searching… it did not complete the search after a whole night. Bummer!

However, I googled this problem and it seems to be a common issue for Vista as well as older installations of Windows 7. Apparently, there have been so many updates released over time, that the algorithm that decides which updates you need to install needs to make such a complex calculation that it will never finish (or stops with an error).

But: the internet has a solution: Install a few crucial updates first, then the calculation becomes less complex and Windows will find the rest of updates to install! The page at http://wu.krelay.de/en/vista.htm exactly shows which updates you need to install, and in which order. Just download them, and eh, see the installation program search for updates forever, as well?!?

Apparently, installing downloaded update files (.msu) also triggers an (impossible) search for updates. To get around this, you need to turn off the wi-fi, restart the computer and immediately install one of the manual updates from krelay. Then it’ll work …

After having done a few of these updates, the rest went easier and did not hang on “searching for updates” anymore. Rebooting afterwards allowed searching for the remainder of 184 updates.

These updates could be installed in about 4-5 hours. That meant, after a few days of work, Vista was fully up to date and ready to be used. Yaaay!

Creating recovery disks

The last thing I wanted to do is creating a set of DVD recovery disks. Like I said, these were not included and you really need them in case the hard disk breaks down or you want to upgrade it to an SSD.

So, I thought, well, let’s create some! Plug in a USB DVD burner, grab some blank disks and here you go.

But nope, like with most things with this old computer, it’s not that simple. The VAIO Recovery tool showed “The disk could not be created”. Yep, very clear error message here…

Fixing the problem

It turns out, the problem comes due to the low amount of free space available on the C: drive. With all updates of Windows installed, only 5.5 GB was left free. And that’s not enough, as the recovery disk program copies portions of the recovery partition to C: and needs to create an image out of it. In total, about 8.5GB of free disk space is required. Except that it’s impossible to free that up – all space is taken up by Windows and the bundled programs.

However, after thinking for a while, I came up with a clever solution. With a small program, called Link Shell Extension, It is possible to redirect directories to an external drive, which has enough free space, but allowing the program to think as if it was on the C: drive. This is something I’ve done a few times on Linux servers, and is called creating symbolic links.

After having installed Link Shell Extension, I plugged in an USB thumb drive, made a link using “Pick link source” on the external D: drive, and used “Drop as: symbolic link” on the folder C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\temp (which is a folder created and used only by the recovery disk tool, not by Windows itself).

Creating the disks then proceeded without errors and after having them burnt, I imaged them for safekeeping and creating the Recovery Disks Page – in case you want to restore your own VAIO-UX.

Now that we have the recovery disks, all updates installed and a fresh image made of the entire disk (with Macrium Reflect), it’s time to start using it!

Restoration complete! But is it still usable today?

I’ve tried to use a few programs and play a few older games on it. To keep it short: the performance is usually not adequate to perform any current-day tasks on it. Browsing the web is painfully slow, Youtube playback stutters and forget about watching Netflix or Amazon Prime on it. And why would you, as more modern devices can do this much better. This is a computer you get for the fun of having it, and occasionally showing it to others.

As for games, there are some interesting things to see. First of all, this is not a gaming machine. It was oriented at business users and therefore only had integrated graphics.
While you shouldn’t expect any modern games to work on it, some open source remakes of older games can actually be played. These open source games seem to work quite well! They shine on single-core systems and get a decent FPS to be playable. The controls aren’t that great though, as the mouse pointer is not responsive enough for smooth gameplay and the keyboard is, well just, tiny…

Nevertheless, it’s cool to see some modern programs run on it. I’ve created a video of it in action:

Wrapping it up

This was a long story, and I really appreciate if you’ve read all of it. But in the end, I’ve got a perfectly fine UMPC running all of its original software in full glory. It was well worth it and I still think it is one of the most forthstriving devices of the late 2000s. I only wish that devices like this were more user-friendly, as you could have done so much more with it if it included a faster processor and an SSD. But still, Sony showed us a glimpse in the future of an always-connected world in which we seamlessly switch between devices and screen sizes. Thanks for reading!