Sony's Vaio S laptop readable in sunlight?

One overlooked consideration when choosing a laptop is the screen type - glossy or matte.

This week, Sony showed off a new Vaio S series laptop, a 13.3in machine for business users that has an anti-reflective screen which product reps say will mean a better picture under bright lights. A "diffusion coating" on the screen means the display is not quite as diffuse as regular matte screens and has softer reflections than a glossy screen.

To our eyes, the display looks more akin to the matte screen than glossy; held up to a nearby window, the screen was definitely very readable. We'll reserve a final verdict once we have the opportunity to do a review.

It's fair to say that some people really don't like glossy - back in 2009, Apple's gloss screens even triggered a university health warning. If this is you, then anti-reflective screens are worth investigating.

So how does the Vaio S stack up on paper? Prices range from $1,399 for a 2.3GHz Core i5 machine with 4GB RAM and 320GB HDD, up to $2,599 for 2.7GHz Core i7 with 256 SSD and a 1GB Radeon HD 6630M.

The starting price point is lower than the brightly coloured consumer Vaio C series, though you can easily spend more for a top of the line S machine. The alternative for Vaio fans is to get one of the AMD Fusion powered Y Series machines, which are more akin to a netbook and cost around the $750 mark.

The Vaio S range will arrive in April.