New Sony A-Series coming at IFA 2014?
Sony will soon be introducing a new Walkman, resurrecting the A-Series name once again. The most surprising aspect may actually be what appears to be a micro-SD card slot on the side. There will be 3 models, with Japan receiving the NW-A16 (32 GB) and A17 (64 GB) and the the rest of the world will have 2 models, NWZ-A15 (16 GB) and NWZ-A17 (64 GB).
The device will feature both Bluetooth and NFC, permitting quick connection to wireless headphones and speakers. Just like earlier with the new WS-Series, confidentiality of the FCC documents ends in early September 2014, so an IFA debut is likely, with possibly press info late August.
It seems not all regions will receive all models, here is the breakdown from the FCC.
Region J – NW-A16, A17
Region EE –Â NWZ-A15, A17
Region E – NWZ-A15, A17
Region CEW – NWZ-A15, A17
Region MX3 – NWZ-A17
Region U/CA – NWZ-A17
Region CN – NWZ-A17
As seen from the image above, the CPU frequency is only 533mhz, more in line with the older A-Series, which had a 500mhz CPU from EMMA mobile by Renesas. Digging into Renesas’ European site, I stumbled onto these details (PDF no longer working). It appears to be a cortex A9, dual core at 533mhz/core.
Nothing major but the previous CPUs were the EMMA Mobile1-S (A860, S760) and MP201 (X-series), so it is logical that Sony would opt for a newer gen of the same product. Even though the new EV2 has SD card support, the old EMMA Mobile1-S also had it so it seems that Sony decided to active the support this time around. I may be wrong but I feel this is the most likely CPU choice for Sony for the new A10. I feel the A10 will not run android but will come with the current Sony mp3 player OS, hopefully updated with new features like on the fly playlists.
I am not sure if there will be Noise cancellation, I would hope so since the device is an A-Series but who knows. I will try to get more information.
