Well, X series fading out would only have had negative implication if the sony thing was planned to be some kind of break through attempt.
In that case they would have put much energy into a dead horse because the target audience needed for such endevour would yawn about outdated HW again and move on. correct?

But as Sony is a step stone on the way to juicey (paying) customers, it is a good thing that the device will fall in price soon so we as community can also profit by having the most fleshed out sfos device for rather cheap.

I do not think we (as end customers) are even primarily targeted by this device.
Making the community happy is a welcome by-product at this point.
Looks like the main plan is to finally show sfos on decent hardware because it is one thing to tell a client "Sure, it will behave much better on your high spec device than on this Aquafish i can show you here" than to actually demonstrate what you can do or already did.

And i can see another positive incentive.
As James wrote during meeting, it might raise Jollas interest to target even newer Sony modells.