March 10, 2009, 9:27 AM — Sony has provided some detailed specifications for its promised and anticipated X-series Walkman that was teased at January's CES but the launch date remains the biggest unanswered question.
The specifications were posted on Sony Hong Kong's Web site.
The device has a 3-inch touchscreen OLED (organic light emitting diode) display that, like other OLEDs, is sure to look crisp and bright. The use of a touchscreen means most buttons are gone from the small device but a few, such as the basic start, pause and volume controls remain. It also means the display takes up most of the front panel of the device, which is just under 10 centimeters tall, 5 cms wide and a centimeter thick.
It will play MP3, Windows Media WMA, AAC and Linear PCM format audio songs, which just about covers all of the most common formats but it won't play DRM-protected AAC songs bought from the iTunes Music Store. Video support includes MPEG4 AVC/H.264 and Windows Media WMV9.
There's also a podcast player and it will run YouTube video, both of which are loaded into the player via a computer.
The 3-inch screen is revealed as having 432 pixel by 240 pixel resolution, which is widescreen QVGA resolution.
Memory capacity is a generous 32GBs on the version detailed so you're unlikely to run out of space in a hurry unless you load up a lot of video or have a very large music collection.
The Sony Web site didn't give away any pricing details or an exact launch date in Hong Kong or any other country but via Amazon U.K. we know the device will launch in two configurations, 16GB and 32GB, in Great Britain for £214 and £283 (US$295 and $390) with shipping in "one to two months."
