Problems with FE41 utils.

[Xternal]

Good day to everybody.

I've just bought Sony Vaio FE41ZR and downgrading from Vista to XP.
Video, wireless and most are working, but:

- No camera driver installed
- No Sony Vaio utilities at all. Vista software doesnt work of course, Utilities package from FE31 doesnt work either.

I want to have a nice Vaio battery monitor, hardware buttons and camera driver+soft.
Oh, and also Vaio energy profiles for perfomance, battery saving and so on..

Does anyone got an idea?

Thanks in advance,
Pavel.

[Blencogo]

Hi Pavel and welcome to Club Vaio.

The Camera Driver is the same for Vista and XP - you need your original driver. This should be on your Recovery Disc in the Drivers folder.

The Utilities for the FE31ZR should install but you need to do these in the correct order manually.

Download FE3_Utilities.zip
Right-click on the .zip file and choose "Extract All" and extract to a new folder C:\Utils
Go to each of the 14 Utilities Installer Folders IN ORDER, look inside and run the "Setup.exe" file in each folder.

Don't try to be clever - INSTALL THEM ALL if you want the features to work properly.

Whatever you do, you MUST install Folder 1 and Folder 2 first.
The battery checker is in Folder 3
The Power Management is in Folder 12
The Camera Utility is in Folder 9

[Xternal]

Hi Blencogo and thanks for welcoming

No reason to explain in the way 'right click -> extract all'

Anyway, very thanks for the fast reply.

So as I see it's better to Install everything instead of choosing some, right? It's ok for me

When i so the dir sctuct i understood that install 1 && 2 folders should be first. But next folders lay down in alphabet order and in this order i should intall them? It's 2 a.m. now in Moscow, so i go to sleep and next evening i'll try to do my best

One more time thanks.

Pavel.


btw, pretty avatar, isn't it from HoM&M?

--

p.s. I forgot! Sound also doesnt work. I have already SP2 installed. Installing some sigmatel driver from Drivers folder doesnt make any sense. Is there a need to install some KB from ms to get it working? Where to get best drivers for XP?

[Xternal]

Anyone?

[Blencogo]

Yes, after you install Utilities Folders 1 and then 2, it doesn't matter which order but I would follow the order in the download.

Yes install them all - things like the FN keys need THREE of the Utility Folders to be installed!

To get the sound to work, you need to install Microsoft Hotfix KB835221 and then install the Sigmatel driver from the Original XP Driver download for FE31ZR . This is the best place for all your drivers. You will find the hotfix in \\Drivers\Hotfix or you can download it.

[Xternal]

Ok, now i'm at home.
Installed FE31 Utils all in the order.
I got hardware buttons working, but still not enough good with power managment.

I got a tab "Vaio Power Managment" in Power Options, but when i get out the power adapter and notebook is working on batteries there are no changes with brightness and other.

And when i run SPMgr.exe - i have no GUI, just a process. In Vista there was a very usable GUI on rightclicking the battery in try. Can i get it anywhere?

When i run VCUSet.exe (camera utility) - it giver a error:
"An unknown error occured. VAIO Camera Utility will now close"

--
Ok. I'll check the sound fix, Thank You.
--

Any ideas?

Thanks again.
Pavel.

[Xternal]

Just one more thing.

When i push Fn + Brithness Minus (there are 8 rounds - full white colored) one round makes not colored with white and that's all. Can't make display brightness lower 😞

May be there is a way to push the buttons in other way/speed or what? Is this a known bug or a feature? ;]

Thank you again, Blencogo.

[Xternal]

And... one more time thanks because almost everything works allright.

Just a little problem with Fn + Brightness buttons...
I'm repeating: after pushing these buttons, 8 rounds appear and i can make brightness only like 7 white colored rounds. 7/8. I can minus brightness just for 1 point. It doesnt go any more.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

[lapenass]

Had the same trouble with downgrading FE41M to XP Pro. I think you should install an original FE31XX Video driver, as it must be somehow responsible for brightness control. At least helped for me.

[Geoff_33]

I have exactly the same problem as you Xternal. BUt I used the pack for the serie FE31... I can't fix this problem yet