Sony unveils Vaio Z1 to compete with Apple MacBook Air

Sony has announced a high-end competitor to the MacBook Air, which is more powerful and even lighter than Apple's ultra-portable device. But, as you might expect, such advanced technology comes with an advanced price tag.

The top-spec Vaio Z1 model, with a Core i7 processor running at 2.7GHz (with Turbo Boost to 3.4GHz) and 8GB of 1333MHz DDR3 RAM, is currently listed at £2,700 on Sony's web site.

This model also includes 256MB of solid state storage in a Raid0 configuration, and a 13.1in screen with a maximum resolution of 1,600x900.

For more modest budgets, an i5 model is available starting at £1,434. It has Windows Home Premium, 4GB of RAM and a 128GB SSD.

Also available is an ultra-thin battery wedge for £60 which fits to the bottom of the machine and doubles the battery life from a quoted seven hours to 14.

There is a media dock option available too, which connects to the laptop via Intel's Light Peak optical system. This will provide a more beefy AMD Radeon HD 6650M graphics card with 1GB of VRAM and a DVD or Blu-ray drive.

The dock also has HDMI and VGA outputs, can support up to four monitors in total, including the laptop's own display, and will provide USB 2.0 and 3.0 sockets. Sony claims that this makes it ideal for everyone from executives to CAD specialists.

Prices for the dock start at £400 for the DVD version, £450 for the Blu-ray player edition and £525 for one with a Blu-ray writer.

All of this comes in a machine that weighs 1.2kg and has a depth of just 16.65mm. Its weight is possible, at least in part, because the chassis is made out of carbon fibre, more commonly found on racing cars than laptops.

When we asked James Sproston, product specialist for Sony, who the machine would suit, he told us: "It's perfect for the typical businessman who needs massive battery life, amazing portability as well as power, especially when sat at a desk."

But even Sproston understands that this is not a budget solution, telling V3.co.uk that it would not suit everyone "at that price".