Sony Xperia Mint with Qualcomm S4 power leaked online

A new Sony premium-level handset has leaked online, dubbed the Xperia Mint.

Mobile-review appears to have been lucky enough to go hands-on with the previously unheard of device, meaning there’s a pretty clear picture of what its features and capabilities are.

The Xperia Mint follows on in Sony’s new style recently seen on the budget-end Xperia Go, which means it’s very blocky but nonetheless reasonably good-looking.

Side-by-side images show it’s about the same size as Samsung’s Galaxy S3.

Interestingly, despite the fact that Sony has clung to Android Gingerbread even with its more recent models, the Xperia Mint is said to be running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and the lack of physical or capacitive buttons on the front would support this assertion.

The handset runs a Qualcomm S4 Snapdragon MSM8960 dual core ARM Cortex-A9 processor clocked at 1.5GHz with 1GB of RAM. There’s 16GB of internal memory and microSD capability too.

Displays and cameras are two areas where Sony handsets typically excel and the Xperia Mint appears to be no exception with a 4.3-inch 1280x720 pixel Bravia-powered LCD and a 13-megapixel Exmor R-powered primary shooter.

Sony's Xperia S still currently has the highest pixel density display on the mobile market and it seems determined to keep that record with the Xperia Mint.

On the software side of things, Sony’s Timescape interface appears to have had a revamp and is now much cleaner and generally more in-keeping with Android’s own aesthetic.

Traditionally Sony has managed to optimise Android very well to its hardware and interface so we’re reasonably confident it can do the same here.

Early benchmarks indicate the Mint is a little slower than HTC’s One S and the Samsung Galaxy S3 but as this is a pre-release model. A bit more tweaking before the launch could make all the difference.

Sony is hosting a press event on August 29 in Berlin and is expected to unveil multiple new handsets. We think it’s quite likely the Xperia Mint will be in attendance.

We've approached Sony for details - we'll bring you more as we hear it.