Sony PlayStation PULSE Explore (CFI-ZWE1) FCC Teardown

I say mics because Sony in their support for the earbuds, mentions microphones, so I guess there are 2, with both of these being MEMS mics on the flex PCB. This flex PCB is connected to the main board with a board to board connector.

We can see the coin cell battery here, along with its details. We already knew the capacity from previous certifications though, which revealed the battery to be from Springpower. The 1454 size is the same as Sony uses on the WF-1000XM5, which begs the question, why not just use this larger battery in the WF-1000XM5 as well? I think it might be a weight issue. If I had unlimited funds, I would try and transfer this larger capacity battery to the WF-1000XM5 to see what kind of improvements in battery life it would provide.

The main PCB has the main Bluetooth chip, along with some other connections like for the flex PCB, Bluetooth antenna, and the flex PCB antenna. Unlike other Sony earbuds, the Pulse explore use a black PCB rather than blue. Not sure why, but I do not think it makes a difference.

Finally we have a shot of the Bluetooth chip, Airoha AB1565M. In my original post, I had 4 options for the Bluetooth chip, and it appears it was the first one. I am wondering why Sony opted for an Airoha chip, rather than the Mediatek chips they use or their own CXD3277 found in the INZONE buds. There is a reason but no idea what it could be.

The AB1565 is LE Audio certified, but the earbuds do not have LC3 codec support, only SBC and AAC. Perhaps a firmware update will add LC3 in the future. The wireless connection for gaming uses some proprietary codec, I suspect similar to what the INZONE headsets use.

And with that, this concludes the FCC teardown analysis. If anyone spots anything in the photos, drop it in the comments.

If you wish to support the blog, grab a pair with the Amazon affiliate link below.