The Xperia Z1s passed through China’s TENAA, the country’s telecoms regulatory authority, revealing it will come with the L39t model number in China (as opposed to L39h for the Xperia Z1) as well as a number of images. This particular SKU is the TD-LTE version for China, most likely heading for China Mobile. The Sony Xperia Z1s will be a refreshed version of the Xperia Z1 from all that we’ve seen so far. The device is likely to be announced at CES 2014 and shares the same design as the Xperia Z1, although there are a few differences.
This includes the placement of 3.5mm headphone jack that sits slightly off-centre, compared to sitting on the very left side of the Xperia Z1. The front-facing camera also sits on the left side of the SONY logo as opposed to the right when looking at the Xperia Z1. The right side of the Xperia Z1s is laid out exactly the same as the Xperia Z1, however the left side is slightly different only having one port flap as opposed to the two on the Z1. If this is correct, then it either means they managed to squeeze both the micro USB port and microSD card slot under one flap, or that they have removed the latter altogether. Could the Xperia Z1s end up with 32GB of internal storage as opposed to 16GB in the Xperia Z1?
It is interesting why there are no pictures of the rear of the Xperia Z1s, so we can’t confirm at this stage confirm whether the handset will use the exact same 20.7MP CMOS imaging sensor found in the Xperia Z1. Another image, shows the L39t model number on the phone itself along with the manufacturing date of “13W42” this would peg it at week commencing Monday 14 October 2013. Therefore, it is highly likely that we will see an announcement early in the new year. We’ll keep you posted with further developments.
Thanks Ben!
