Solved Removing crapware on new Sony VAIO laptop

Do it when you get around to it. You want to know if the bloatware or it's uninstall has damaged System Files and whether they are reparable. If not you may need to Repair Install or Clean Reinstall Windows 7 Factory OEM.

The steps to Clean up factory bloatware are based on helping thousands of others before you to do this. The one linked tutorial to get a Clean boot via Startup Programs - Change has had over a million views. By not following these steps except when prodded you are missing some of the lessons learned from others.

ok just uninstalled all the sony stuff I could find, lost some functionality of the keys but still working. Still got some things in programs > sony like macafee purchase. Done the scannow and all was good. I'll try to upload a list of the remaining programs in the uninstall wizard. Taking a break for the night, time for a film. Already had a sneak peak, video looks great!

I went through the same procedure last year with the then-new Sony Vaio Laptop. I basically agree with everything Greg wrote, but I took a simpler approach to things.

First thing I did, I created those factory recovery discs - this used to be done by manufacturers, in the past such discs were simply included in the package, but now they just put an image on the hard drive and leave it to us to burn the image on DVDs. Cost cutting, right?

Second, I got hold of a Windows 7 installation disc (well, in my case I already had one, but it's not hard to find either) and completely re-installed Windows 7 and re-formatted the hard drive in the process. As a result, I had the "lightweight instantaneous" Windows, which of course lacked certain Vaio-specific drivers.

Third step was to go to the Sony download page, where all those drivers are available. Here you might start thinking whether you want any of the included software. For example, my laptop has a few "special" buttons on it. If you want to use them, you might want to get the Sony app that allows you to program them. If not (i.e. if you are happy with a few buttons just sitting there doing nothing), then don't do this. There is a Sony app that installs missing packages one by one. You might want to use that, instead of picking them manually from the download page. The end result is the same.

Things that seem to be important to install, are of course the NVidia drivers, the Alps - the touch pad - drivers, and Sony power management app, although here people may disagree with me. Now, the problem with the Sony touch pad is that it's so sensitive, that sometimes I have hard time typing on the laptop. So, I basically use an external mouse and disable the touch pad. But, and here's the catch, the only way I found to disable the touch pad, is by using the Sony "control' app, I can tell you the exact name of it later, when I actually open up the laptop. So this got installed as well.

One thing that I did not manage to install, was the Corel WinDVD that was included with the laptop. I have no idea what else it wants, but I just can't get it working. Not a big deal, there are plenty of other players out there (personally I use VLC), but I mention this just as a warning, that if there is something you want to keep from the original set up, then you might want to be more careful than I was. This however, was the only issue with the whole thing.

Hope this helps.

Thanks unifex that was helpful. I kept Corel WinDVD on there and NVIDIA 3D vision player and all the rest of the NVIDIA stuff even though it's not a £D monitor) just in case I inadvertently removed some of the drivers for the graphics card. I'll probably end up installing VLC as well anyway, a very useful third party app for playing video on the mac anyway.

Glad to hear I can still download the drivers from Sony for some of the features, I was looking for them last night.

I plan to use an ext mouse and keyboard mostly anyway, but that said I really like the feel of in built keyboard, very slick AND it responds to the first key you press after it's been idle for a while, unlike my old Mac:sarc:

Probably should have created the first back up using windows rather than Vaio Care..

What is 'the Alps' btw, did you mean apps?

Clean and order the HD perfectly using free state-of-the-art CCleaner ("Run Cleaner" and Registry tab) then Puran boot-time defrag with Intelligent Optimizer enabled on the Additional Operations tab.
CCleaner - Free software downloads and software reviews - CNET Download.com
http://download.cnet.com/Puran-Defra...-75115626.html

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Why use Puran and not the inbuilt software to defrag the drive? Just trying to install it but it's spamming me with toolbars and software I don't want... ?

It's your choice. I use Puran because it offers a boot time defrag (with Disk check if you want) that gets at System files that are running otherwise.

Almost all 3rd party freeware pays for itself by offering other freeware during install. Most of us have learned by now how to avoid it. Read every pane and choose checkboxes carefully.

Done and done, several times because I didn't do it properly the first time. Just about ready to use this machine for something interesting. Just wiping free space, would have been finished by now if my computer hadn't gone to sleep while I was out :-(

Still some read only files in programs > sony anything I can do about them?

gregrocker said:

Take Ownership Shortcut

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OK but...

WARNING, DO NOT TAKE OWNERSHIP of the C: (Windows 7) drive!!

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OK just realised what that means... don't select the whole drive, only parts you wish to block.. cheers.

TL;DR

Backup certificate and royal license with ABR, and backup the drivers folder too, then perform a clean install with a regular windows 7 dvd, restore cert/lic/drivers and you're golden.

OK all systems go, everything running smoothly so far upon installation of winamp and virtual DJ.

Accidentally installed this app called SweetIM which was on advert banner placed at the top of one of these links explaining how to install Take Ownership.. Not sure if it uninstalled correctly but checked the registry by doing an sfc /scannow in an elevated command prompt after anyway. Got some folder still in the programs folder which is annoying.

Oh and 7 disks for the recovery? cf. four using VAIO care.

Once I get everything I want installed then I will do a proper back-up to an ext drive and see how it goes from there. Thanks to all for the assistance, couldn't have done it without you!

7 disks using what recovery? Use external for WIn7 backup image: Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup

gregrocker said:

7 disks using what recovery? Use external for WIn7 backup image: Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup

Click to expand...

Those are the steps I followed. 6 recovry and 1 repair boot discs.

Is that not right? It said I might need up to 42GB for it!

That would be for the Vaio Factory Recovery, correct? Did it give you a DVD option to use less disks? The reason I ask is that with more disks it becomes less likely it will complete.

The only method I would use for Win7 backup imaging is to save it to an external HD, after you have it set up and running best.

I thought I'd got rid of the vaio factory recovery settings, are you saying I've not done it it right? I'm going to install a few basic apps like chrome and that then do a recovery back up whatever to an ext drive. Do I need to create a new partition or can I just save the file somewhere- I want to rearrange some of my ext drive and reformat them so might want to move the file.

EDIT- trying to delete this but don't have the privelege... yet? Anyway- ignore.

I can create a recovery back up on an ext drive now, got plenty of space only it was formatted to MS-DOS (FAT32) using Disk Utility on Mac OSX. Not sure if it makes a difference but was going to reformat another drive using Win 7 which would be NTFS I think, not sure what the difference is and what difference it would make to an ext backup...

EDIT- apparently it does have to be formatted to NTFS for this to work, so I need to juggle some data around and reformat my portable drive before I can do this.

OK I've got a 750GB partitioned drive that I want to convert from Mac OS Extended to NTFS. It's partitioned, the question is can I reformat one partition at a time because that would be really dandy if I could. Already got on 420Gb sized partition wwhich pretty much matches the HDD capacity on my Vaio so that would be really hand to just keep it that way.

I'm going to test this theory out on a USB stick to see if it works.

EDIT OK I tried this on a 4GB stick, partitioned into two Mac OS Extended drives. Win 7 only recognised one half and prompted me to reformat it. Tried reformatting the second partition to MS-DOS (FAT) but Win 7 still doesn't see it.

And now it can't see my 750GB partitioned drive which I think was formatted to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)

EDIT EDIT OK partitions are showing up in diskmgmt so looking into playing around with that, will report back.... went back to Mac and reformatted one partition to MS-DOS (FAT) then came back into diskmgmt and now reformatting it to NTFS... which is taking forever..

OK so just created a recovery back-up onto my newly formatted partition on my portable samsung 750GB drive, took about 40GB of space again. Backed up System Reserve (System), (C (System) and Recovery (System) Doesn't show up in explorer but I assume all the stuff I need is there..

Now let's see if my MAC recognises the other Mac OS formatted drive when I plug it in..

This is a WIn7 Backup image? Did it force you to include Recovery partition? It's fine if you really want it in the image, but I wonder why if it required including it.