VAIO, for those who have always wondered but never dared to ask, is actually an acronym and stands for Video Audio Integrated Operation. Thus, both Sony’s VAIO desktops and notebooks are geared towards multimedia use. The pre-installed software bundle that comes with the FZ21M only emphasizes this point even more. The notebook comes with an impressive range of applications. Aside from the almost obligatory trial versions (MS Office 2007 60-day, Norton 360 60-day), there are also some full versions such as Adobe Acrobat 8.0, Photoshop Elements 5.0, Microsoft Works 8.5, Norton Save & Restore, Roxio Easy Media Creator 9, WinDVD for Blu-ray, and quite a lot more. Additionally, Sony also includes a number of its own utilities for various purposes, ranging from media playback and disc creation to system utilities.

As with many such tools, the downside is that they install themselves in the startup folder or the registry, so that it takes a while for the system to actually finish loading. They will also continue to bug you, asking to be configured. Thus, starting up often ends with several product configuration screens overlapping, vying for your attention. Lastly, they also remain resident in RAM, taking up space. Luckily, this isn’t really much of an issue, thanks to the 2 GB of DDR2-667 (PC2-5300) memory.

The built-in speakers are sadly not quite in line with the VAIO theme. While we can’t expect miracles from a portable device that obviously can’t integrate real speakers, we would have thought that a notebook sold as an HD video playback device would come with speakers a little more befitting of this purpose. In short – if you want to listen to more than Windows’ system sounds, we recommend you break out your headphones or set up some speakers.

The VAIO is a cool unit, both with regard to looks and actual temperature. It never gets too hot to use it as a laptop in the actual sense of the word. The warm air expelled from the case does get a bit warm, though certainly not hot.