• Sony's expensive Vaio laptop struggled through early development issues.Laptop image by Marek Kosmal from Fotolia.com
  
  No laptop is perfect, and Sony found out just how hard attempts at perfection can be when it released the Vaio laptop. Recurring problems plagued the brand in its early years. Although Sony climbed to the top of Consumer Reports' reliability list for laptops (alongside Apple) in 2008, the road to success was paved with a few memorable failures.
  
  

Keyboard

• Sony Vaio laptops were plagued by keyboard contact problems prior to 2006. Models released since have addressed the issue. The two most reported problems are a bad "Fn" key contact and disabled hot keys. Sony addressed the problems through various driver updates, though many laptops had to be returned for hardware replacement.
  
  

Battery

• Sony recalled 9.6 million branded batteries used in their phones and laptops in 2006. The recall included over 460,000 Vaio laptops. The batteries were prone to overheating, which in some extreme cases caused them to melt and set fire to the computer.
  
  

Cooling Fans

• Exacerbating the problem of battery heat was a cooling fan problem on Vaio laptops shipped in 2007. Consumers reported fans that burned out due to a failed sensor. The sensors reported more heat than was actually present, causing the fan to run unnecessarily at full power, which led to unit failure.
  
  

AC Adapters

• Sony issued a recall of AC adapter models VGC-LT, VGC-JS240, VGC-JS250, VGC-JS270, and VGC-JS290. These units were shipped primarily with Sony all-in-one desktops, but laptop owners who used docking stations (models VGP-PRBX1 and VGP-PRFE1) shipped after 2005 were also affected. The units occasionally short circuited, an issue that could lead to electric shock.