What is the expected real benefit of a faster processor on playback and image quality?
The 8657 is 20% faster + it has a L2 cache so there will be some increase in performance.
Internal testing reveals the Gigabit USB port can transfer data at around 24~30MB(ytes) sec which is like a PC's transfer rates when copying from internal SATA to a external USB drive.
NMJ version 2 is already installed and boasts of better performance in terms of scraping capability as well as allowing flash based list views using coverart (like Realtek players).
The biggest change is the totally new firmware front end (UI) that has dropped HTML and uses Adobe Flashlite.
It's actually a big deal because dropping HTML (called Gaya browser) that was in use since the A-100, YAMJ HTML and pretty much a lot of the existing CSI user developed apps will not work anymore.
There's actually a poll going on in the main forum for the PCH asking owners if they want to move to the same UI as the A-300. If Syabas pushes forward with this, expect the 200 series to be a bit faster but not as fast as the A300.