Sony will stop designing all of its VAIO PCs itself, the company's business deputy president Ryosuke Akahane revealed in an interview today. The Japanese PC house will split its line into two tiers, with a top tier being its usual self-designed computers and a new, second tier being designed by a contractor that would simply attach the VAIO name to the design. They would include Sony-specific features like a help button, PCPro was told, but would have Sony only approve the design rather than shape it from the outset.
