For Sale: High end Sony laptop model VPCEC 490X. This computer works and will boot from an external USB hard drive or the DVD rom BUT will shut down randomly.
Features a dual core i5 580M CPU running at 2.67ghz, 3.3ghz turbo mode. 3mb L3 cache. The graphics are ATI Radeon- most likely HD-5470 or 5650 with 512mb video RAM. Shows up in Ubuntu as Gallium 0.4 on AMD Cedar. The screen is a very nice 17.3" LED backlight model and it's working perfectly- no apparent bad pixels or any issues at all. Laptop has an HDMI port, VGA port, eSATA port, SD card slot, Sony card slot, pcie express card slot, etc. The DVD burner works fine, all keys on keyboard tested good, etc. Windows 7 COA sticker in good shape. Will play You Tube videos at 1080p HD flawlessly. As far as I know besides the shutdown issue this laptop is working perfectly.
I have had it running for up to a few hours no problem. After it randomly shuts down you can press the power button again but usually what will happen is that the power button will light up for a few seconds then turn right off. After a little while you can try again and it will boot right back up and stay on for a while- maybe a couple hours, maybe 15 minutes. It's random.
Missing the hard drive, hard drive cable, hard drive caddy, hard drive cover, and battery. Everything else is still in the laptop as far as I know working correctly including the N Wifi card (tested) and bluetooth card. 4 gig memory RAM stick is included, can take 8gb or more. My guess is the problem is related to the video chip or the voltage regulator. Might be as simple a fix as adding a little heat sink compound or replacing the voltage thing. I installed Ubuntu 13 to an external hard drive in order to test this (not included). The install went very smoothly and it did not shut down during the process.
Sold as is for parts or repair.
Email for additional/higher resolution photos.
Send your zip code for ship cost - should be between $7.99 and $15.99 if you are in the continental USA (listed Jan. 2014).
