Sony says I can't upgrade from 7 Premium to Ultimate

sushiman · 10 Nov 2009

Greets from an American in Japan and new to the forum .

I am very interested in purchasing a new Sony L series ( all in one ) computer that comes with Windows 7 Home Premium installed . I had my wife call Sony the other day to find out if it could be upgraded to Ultimate and they said no because the lower end model does not come installed with Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium . Now I should mention that some of their laptops in the same price range as the L I am looking at can be ordered on-line with Ultimate installed and don't have Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium, so it makes no sense to me that the model I am interested in cannot be upgraded .

Anybody know or have ideas/suggestions/advice/whatever ?

Barman58 · 10 Nov 2009

Buy the model that you want with whichever version you can get then use the windows any-time upgrade to go to ultimate - has a cost penalty of course.

or chose a model from Sony or someone else that ships with ultimate.

this type of package deal is unfortunately the norm with the larger OEM suppliers, it not the best for a lot of people but the package does tend to be cheaper

sushiman · 10 Nov 2009

Thanks for the prompt reply !

To clarify , Sony said 7 Ultimate cannot be installed in the L series model I want for the reason I mentioned earlier . The model with Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium and Ultimate costs twice as much as the one I am looking at , so that is out . After reading info on MS's site I assumed that anybody with Home Premium installed in their computer could upgrade to Ultimate on-line or purchase the software for a price . Don't see why this Sony model should be an exception .

Barman58 · 10 Nov 2009

The way I see things there is no technical reason for the model you are looking at running the Ultimate SKU, as the system requirements for the Home premium and Ultimate are the same.

There may well be a Commercial reason for Sony not to supply the combination you want. This is as I said above often a decision that is made inside a company like Sony for their own internal reasons - one of the main ones is that the cost of ultimate will increase the low or mid range systems into a higher price band. Another reason is that Sony offer a set number of packages rather that a customised service.

One other thing to consider is of course - do you need Ultimate - unless you need the enterprise level tools such as bitlocker and the things such as branch cache ETC - the Professional SKU is possibly more akin to the Vista Ultimate level

sushiman · 10 Nov 2009

Thanks again for the prompt reply .

From what I gather after talking with my Japanese wife , Sony said Ultimate would not work on the L series computer I'd like to purchase because it hasn't got Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium installed . I can understand if they don't want to pre-install Ultimate . A lot of companies don't offer it as an option . But I cannot understand why it would not work .

The main reason I want it is so that I can use the computer in English and my wife can use it in Japanese .

sushiman · 10 Nov 2009

BTW - In Japan one can customize any model on line on the Sony site . I see that on the US site they offer a set number of packages like you mentioned .

Barman58 · 10 Nov 2009

I cannot think of any reason why the Adobe software would not work with the Ultimate, (the language option an understandable reason you would need ultimate :) ), ultimate has everything in it that is in home premium so there is no reason I can think of to prevent it running.

It may be interesting to check the Adobe site for requirements for the suite and see if Windows 7 Ultimate is a valid OS. It may be that Sony are being inventive or pedantic with their reasoning in an attempt to persuade you to upgrade to a more expensive model.

I would personally try to discuss this with a customer service representative rather than someone in sales - the sales staff are often constrained in their available options, whereas Customer service can often be persuaded especially when you have researched the issue

As an interesting experiment you may want to start a thread in the software section in the form of "Will adobe creative suite premium work with Ultimate", we have a wide set of members hers and it may well be that someone will have a definitive answer for you :)

sushiman · 10 Nov 2009

You said :

" I cannot think of any reason why the Adobe software would not work with the Ultimate "

The Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium ( whatever that is

) comes installed on the expensive model along with Ultimate . One can downgrade to Windows Pro or Premium .

The model I want comes installed with Windows 7 Home and no Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium . Otherwise the specs are identical as far as I can see .

And my wife did call Customer Support and not sales .

I am teaching at an elementary school today , and the principal here is a computer geek . He is out now , but when he returns I am going to ask him if he will do me a favor and call Sony for me via their toll-free number and see what he can find out .

I really appreciate all your replies , and I'll be sure to let you know what we find out .

Barman58 · 10 Nov 2009

I will await your reply with interest. Sony's reasoning does seem flawed from what I can see :)

sushiman · 11 Nov 2009

Well , the mystery continues . Got the same answer from Sony and they would not elaborate on WHY we couldn't upgrade to Ultimate . Just said we could not . This was Customer Service by the way .

I have discovered that the two " L " models that Sony offers on their website ( where one has CPU , HDD and other options to choose from and Ultimate comes with the high end model only ) differ from the two models sold at shops ( one with touch screen and one without ...different specs as well ...1 TB of HDD and 12 GB of RAM ! ) , and that the shops will do the upgrade to Ultimate , however for the outrageous cost of $ 300 US !

Despite the all the confusion and lack of info coming from Sony Customer Service , I am still considering a purchase ,. It'll cost me more money as the shop models come with 1 TB HDD and 12 GB Ram which add to the base cost + I still have to purchase Ultimate . Don't need 1 TB HDD ...nor do I need 12 GB of RAM ...but that's the choice if I want to upgrade to Ultimate . Wild ...