Since MWC 2016 is getting closer, we are hearing all sorts of rumors about upcoming phones. From Sony, we don’t expect to see new flagship phones at that event, given that the Xperia Z5 lineup is still becoming available in some markets. However, since the company didn’t introduce any smartphones or smartwatches at this year’s CES, we could see some new devices at the Barcelona event, including a few mid-range smartphones. Now, the model numbers for two Xperia models have been spotted in the Indonesian Posel Regulatory site.
The model numbers are F5122 and F3166, which follow the nomenclature that Sony uses in their mobile products. The first letter is an indicator for the year these devices got released and these letters are set in alphabetical order, for example, last year’s models began with the letter E, 2014 models began with the letter D and the ones that were released in 2013 started with the letter C, where the new naming scheme began. Then, the first number following the letter indicates the category of the phone, flagship phones usually carry the number 6. The second number usually indicates the series that the phone belongs to and subsequent numbers indicate variants of the phone.
With this premise, the F5122 could be a mid-range phone, the latest phone that had a “51” following a letter was the Xperia T3 with model number D51XX, it was released in 2014 and it integrated a 5.3-inch HD display and a Snapdragon 400 processor. The F3166 is more intriguing as there hasn’t been a model that starts with a “3” following the letter, for example, the budget Xperia E models usually start with a “2” following the letter, so the new phone could fit into a new budget series. There was a report about an Xperia phone with model number F3215, it would launch with Android 6.0 out of the box and a MediaTek Helio P10 (MT6755) chipset, but since it started with a “3”, the report was a little hard to believe. Today, we realize that the phone might as well exist and it might launch quite soon along the other one. It was reported that Sony would launch only two phones along the year, but it would be quite strange if the two phones turned out to be a mid-range phone and a budget phone.