Commitments and Contingencies - Additional Information (Detail) In Millions, unless otherwise specified	1 Months Ended	3 Months Ended		9 Months Ended					9 Months Ended
	Sep. 30, 2011 USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 USD ($)	Jul. 01, 2011 USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 USD ($)	Jul. 01, 2011 USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 EUR (€)	May 25, 2012 USD ($)	Apr. 25, 2012 USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 CERCLA Sites And One Past Facility USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 CERCLA Sites And One Past Facility Minimum Year	Jun. 29, 2012 CERCLA Sites And One Past Facility Maximum Year	Jun. 29, 2012 Other Sites USD ($)	Jun. 29, 2012 Other Sites Minimum Year	Jun. 29, 2012 Other Sites Maximum Year
Commitments and Contingencies [Line Items]
Loan facility to CPTC	$ 165.3
Varian's participation under the CPTC loan facility	115
Guaranteed prepayments to a third party	67
Guaranteed prepayment obligations to a third party in fiscal year 2012				7
Guaranteed prepayments to a third party in fiscal year 2013				21
Environmental cleanup costs, third-party claim costs, project management costs and legal costs		0.7	0.5	1.2	0.9
Estimated environmental remediation costs, minimum									2.1			6.6
Estimated environmental remediation costs, maximum									9.5			36.0
Amount accrued for environmental remediation expense									2.1			10.1
Estimated time frames to resolve contingency related to environmental remediation contingencies, years										1	30		5	30
Estimated environmental remediation costs, best estimate, undiscounted												13.4
Discount rate for environmental remediation costs, net of inflation												4.00%
Recorded receivables of past and future environmental-related expenditures	3.0	2.7		2.7
Loss accrual						0.9
Actual damages found by jury		37		37
Enhanced damages								74
Prejudgment interest to the damages award								13
Damages from sales information was updated until judgement							3
Double damages from sales information was updated until judgement							6
Attorneys' fee added to the judgement							9
Aggregate accrual for ongoing proceedings		$ 6		$ 6