Sony takes over the Xperia S AOSP project, previews it

Sony announced that it has taken the lead on the Android Open Source Project for its popular Xperia S smartphone. The exercise began back in August when Jean Baptiste Queru, Google’s Technical Lead of the AOSP announced it. The current progress on the Sony Xperia S has been demonstrated in a video, which appeared in the Sony developer’s blog.
Sony has taken the lead because from Android 4.2 Jelly Bean on, the Xperia S will not remain as the target handset of the main AOSP branch. However, the current progress on the Xperia S will not go to naught – Sony will maintain the AOSP for the device at GitHub, where developers are encouraged to step in and help.
Stock Android 4.1 Jelly Bean has worked out quite well for the Sony Xperia S with most of the hardware functioning properly, including the SD card, Wi-Fi, and all sensors. The audio and modem are also working, but Sony won’t release its binaries right now for proprietary reasons. The next planned step is to bring Android 4.2 to the smartphone.

Sony Xperia S granted access to the PlayStation store

The Sony Xperia S is a fully PlayStation certified device, though at launch it lacked access to the PlayStation Store - not any more though. Sony just opened the doors and let the Xperia S and Xperia Acro HD (the Japanese version of the S), but the others of the NXT lineup will have to wait.

There should be a placeholder app called "Let's start PS Store" available on your phone, which will download the needed apps. Before you launch it, make sure to enable installation from unknown sources.

The placeholder app will download two new apps to your Xperia S (or Acro HD) - PlayStation Store, where you get games, and the PS Pocket, which serves as a launcher for games.

After that's done, head over to the Store and check out the 14 PS1 titles available. Note that they'll run you £3.99.

The rest of the NXT line, including the Sony Xperia ion, will get the same access as the Xperia S later on this year.

Sony Xperia S delayed in the UK until February

If you're a UK resident and on the lookout for Sony's Xperia S flagship, today isn't your lucky day, that goes for the people who've pre-ordered the device from online retailer Play and were expecting shipment starting today.

Play has delayed the device, which was previously on track for a release on January 30 - today, and says the new expected date to be February 13, although that is subject to change too.

Clove, another online retailer, went on record saying that the device will be available SIM-free from their website in the first week of March, with stock arriving on March 6 or 7, placing the arrival of the Xperia S in the UK shortly after the Mobile World Congress.

The Sony Xperia S sports an HD (720 x 1280) display measuring 4.3 inches, a 12 MP camera on the back capable of 1080p video recording, a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor and will come out with Android Gingerbread 2.3 with an eventual ICS update at some point.

The EU approves Sony's bid for Ericsson

The European Commission has approved Sony's decision to buy Ericsson's stake of the Sony Ericsson joint venture.

The ten year long alliance is coming to an end and the EU approval is a huge step for Sony. Back in October the ladder announced it will be buying Ericsson's stake in the joint venture for €1.05 billion. Two weeks ago Sony Ericsson posted a quarterly net loss of €207 million, selling a total of only 34.4 million handsets for the entire year, that's around 3 million less than Apple did in just last quarter alone.

Sony LT22i Nypon to be marketed as Xperia P

ust a week ago the Indonesian equivalent for the American FCC posted the retail name of the Sony's ST25i Kumquat a.k.a. Xperia U. Today we find another retail name in there - the LT22i Nypon's.

Sony LT22i Nypon should be called Xperia P when it is launched. It looks just like the Xperia S, but is based on NovaThor U8500 chipset and its screen and camera are less impressive than the Xperia S ones.

According to this leak, the Xperia P will be launched this April and will cost about €370. It should be announced on the MWC in Barcelona in a few weeks along with the Xperia U and the codenamed Pepper.

Xperia S to feature a fast-charge battery and anti-stain coating

The first Xperia to have stripped itself of the Ericsson brand, the upcoming Sony Xperia S, is rumored to feature a sunlight-activated coating which should help repel dirt and other stain-forming materials, as well as a quick-charge battery.

Dirt and chocolate stains on the cover are said to come off easily after the UV coating is exposed to sunlight for several seconds, and the battery charge times are expected to be reduced by half when compared to previous Xperia models. A ten minute charge should provide an hours worth of standby.

We first got a look at the Xperia S a few weeks ago at CES, and were really impressed with its BRAVIA-powered display image quality.

Expect the Sony Xperia S this March for around €462.

Sony announces new 8 and 13MP sensors with HDR video support

Yesterday,

Sony announced that it's working on a couple of new image sensors for use in smartphones and other portable devices.

The sensors use a new RGBW matrix, which adds a white pixel to the usual RGB layout, aiming to improve light sensitivity and, in turn, low-light performance. Sony says that while the addition of white pixel normally has a degrading effect on image quality, here they have found a workaround with their new processing algorithms.

Sony plans to release three mobile sensors, utilizing this new technology this year. An 8 megapixel one, measuring 1/4" in diagonal is planned to start sampling in March, but that one won't have the HDR movie support.

The first proper RGBW Sony sensor should measure 1/3.06" and should come in June. Its effective resolution will be 13 megapixels.

Finally, an 8 megapixel 1/4" sensor with the HDR movie support will be developed by August this year.

So, we probably won't see actual smartphones with the new sensors by the end of the year, but here's hoping that the waiting will be worth it.

Upcoming Sony smartphones to support the Russian GLONASS

Sony has announced that their newly announced Xperia smartphones, the Xperia S and Xperia Ion, will come equipped with the GLONASS satellite navigation system built-in.

What's more, they have also revealed that some of their previous smartphones on sale right now have had GLONASS support built-in since launch. These other handsets include the Xperia arc, Xperia arc S, Xperia ray, Xperia neo, Xperia pro, Xperia PLAY, Xperia active and Live with Walkman.