The newest grist on the smartphone rumor mill is Sony's Xperia J handset, whose leaked images have surfaced online ahead of its expected IFA debut.

Earlier in July this year, rumors of a new Sony smartphone offering - codenamed the ST26i - did the rounds thanks to XperiaBlog, who spotted the smartphone's certifications on an Indonesian POSTEL Regulatory site. Barely a month later, the Sony smartphone has reappeared (with more details and pictures in tow) courtesy of Russian blog Mobile-Review. The blog gives a detailed preview of the Sony Xperia J, including its design, screen size, camera, battery, platform, etc.

"This product is similar to the old model of the company, but is very similar to LT30p Mint and copies it looks, although it uses cheaper materials, dissolves some of the functions as a low-cost model. It is sad that the unit is using the old iron, we have seen it in previous generations of phones," read (translated) the blog post.

Sony's Xperia J is being touted as a mid-range budget Android smartphone. Expected to be priced attractively near the £120 mark, the smartphone adopts the sleek design of other phones like the Xperia S, Xperia U, and Xperia P in Sony's Xperia line up.

The 4-inch Xperia J sports a LCD display with a 480x854 pixel resolution. However, the screen settings reportedly have several drawbacks, including small viewing angles and bad picture quality.

"Unfortunately, the other display settings do not impress, or they at other models of this level or even worse. Viewing angles are small, the picture quality is not perfect, it is not too bright, I would like more. Also there is a glare, which arise from the fact that between the protective plastic and the screen has a layer of air, because of this, and low angles, and poor color reproduction," reads the Mobile-Review blog post.

A single-core 1 GHz processor with 512MB of RAM powers the smartphones. The smartphone also features a 5- megapixel rear-facing camera and will offer 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and microSD card support. The Xperia J is also expected to have a front-facing camera whose specifications are not yet known. A 1,700mAh battery will power the phone.

The Xperia J will run on Android ICS, which adds to its consumer appeal as most competing models are still on the older Gingerbread and are expected to be upgraded to ICS in the future.

Sony is expected to unveil the Xperia J at the IFA 2012 event next week.