Sony Xperia SL is a speeded-up Xperia S sequel

The sequel to the Sony Xperia S is set to be one 'ell of a phone -- well, they've tacked an L on the end and beefed up the processor, anyway.

According to Chinese site ePrice, the Xperia SL will have a 1.7GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, a slight speed bump on the current model's 1.5GHz dual-core chip.

It seems the changes are almost entirely under the bonnet: if leaked photos are correct, the SL will come in brighter colours, including a deep purple and a soft pink, but will otherwise look the same.

The Xperia SL will share the Xperia S styling, including the transparent strip through the bottom of the phone that lights up to get your attention when you have a new message.

And it'll have the same 12-megapixel camera and 4.3-inch high definition screen. It's still not a quad-core behemoth like the current crop of flagship phones including the Samsung Galaxy S3 or the HTC One X. But that crystal-clear screen gives every other phone a run for its money in the display department -- even beating the vaunted retina display on the iPhone 4S.

Here's hoping the Xperia SL will have Jelly Bean, the latest version of the Android software that powers the Xperia range. But the current Xperia S has had issues updating to the last version of Android, Ice Cream Sandwich, so we don't expect big things. That said, Sony has at least committed to bring Jelly Bean to recent Xperia phones, so fingers crossed.

Does the Xperia SL keep Sony in the smart phone game, or does the Japanese giant need to buck up its ideas to compete with the S3 and One X, let alone the forthcoming iPhone 5? Tell me your thoughts in the comments or on our Facebook page.