Most slim and lightweight laptops sacrifice connectivity for portability? Most of the big brands would say yes, as they drop every port but for USB-C and the trusty headphone jack.
But Vaio's newly-released SX12 insists that travellers – and travel-friendly notebooks – shouldn't have to compromise.
Instead, this skinny 12.5-inch 890 gram (!) machine almost relishes in its roll-call of nine ports. The complete roster: one USB-C port (which is also the power socket), three of the infinitely more common USB-A ports, HDMI video, a full-size SD card slot, an Ethernet socket for networking, a headphone/mic jack – and, yes, even a VGA socket.
VGA might seem like an unwelcome blast from the past, but any road warrior will attest that it's still incredibly common in conference rooms and is almost a 'port of last resort'.
And for some wireless icing atop that delicious connectivity cake, the SX12 also offers optional 4G LTE mobile broadband.
There's no stinting on the tech inside, either, with Intel's latest 8th Gen quad-core Core i5 and i7 processors providing the mobile muscle.
Vaio claims the SX12's battery lasts up to 14.5 hours, with almost a full tank after just one hour of fast-charging.
Even if the battery life is overly optimistic, we doubt many would argue against a solid eight or nine hours when the SX12 has so much else to offer, and leaves plenty of room in your bag for the AC adaptor.
So how do you snare a Vaio SX12? It'd help to be in Japan, where this every-port-in-a-storm laptop is now on sale from ¥119,800 yen (A$1,600) to ¥216,800 yen (A$2,900) depending on the processor, SSD storage capacity and chassis colour (classic bento-box inspired black to silver, bronze and pink).
The SX12 may also land in the US, but we're unlikely to see it reach Australian shores, as Vaio – created as Sony's premium PC brand, then sold to investment firm Japan Industrial Partners in early 2014 – has no local importer.
David Flynn is the Editor-in-Chief of Executive Traveller and a bit of a travel tragic with a weakness for good coffee, shopping and lychee martinis.
13 Feb 2015
Total posts 70
So the only USB-C port is next to useless because it's also the power socket? Who on earth would come up with that nonsense?!?
09 Jul 2016
Total posts 30
USB-C dock should be included then
24 Jun 2016
Total posts 7
It actually has a dedicated DC jack on the left hand side and the included AC adapter uses it, so the PC is capable of taking power from either that or the USB-C port.
01 Nov 2018
Total posts 81
Why a VGA port, thought these ports died off years ago. Seriously who uses VGA these days.
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
13 Nov 2018
Total posts 117
How about a comparison to the recently dropped MacBook 12”?
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