We'd just assumed that T-Mobile would've written off the myTouch 3G and moved on to other Android-powered endeavors before outright re-engineering the thing, so color us shocked to find out that the carrier has gone back and added a desperately-desired feature -- a genuine 3.5mm headphone jack -- for a new version of the phone later this year. That's just the beginning, though: the new myTouch is actually being released as a special edition in partnership with the guitar experts at Fender, sporting a woodgrain finish (maybe a little too much inspiration from the Ply and Touch Wood over in Japan?), bundled 16GB microSD card, and preloaded music content. There's no word on an exact release date or pricing yet, but the gap between this and the Hero just got a whole lot smaller, didn't it? Check out a shot of the slightly less-interesting front after the break.

Donuts for everyone! Well, not everyone -- but as we'd heard, at least some G1 and myTouch 3G owners on T-Mobile USA are now being blessed with an official Android 1.6 build over the air. The carrier says it has "begun delivery," which we take means it's not all happening at once; that's the way the 1.5 rollout was handled, so it really doesn't come as a surprise. Keep checking for that update notification, folks.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

This is totally out of left field, but TmoNews (which tends to have a pretty solid track record when it comes to all things T-Mobile) is claiming that "select" G1s will be receiving Android 1.6 "Donut" starting... well, right about now. So much for any lingering worries that the first retail Android device was being left high and dry, eh? If everything goes well, the rumor goes on to say that myTouch 3Gs would be getting their own over-the-air upgrade in about 24 hours -- and like the 1.5 update before it, it'd likely be a staggered rollout to make sure that T-Mobile doesn't brick a bazillion phones in one fell swoop. Any G1 owners out there seeing anything yet? This sounds awfully quick, especially considering that the Dev Phone 1 just took delivery of 1.6 a handful of hours ago -- but hey, if it's true, we like T-Mobile's hustle.

	CLIQ	Galaxy	Tattoo	Hero	Magic / MT3G	Dream / G1
Carrier	T-Mobile	-- (GSM / HSDPA)	-- (GSM / EDGE)	Sprint	T-Mobile	T-Mobile
Manuf.	Motorola	Samsung	HTC	HTC	HTC	HTC
Price	--	--	--	$179.99	$99.99	$149.99
Released	--	July 2009	--	Oct 11, 2009	Aug 5, 2009	Oct 22, 2008
Keyboard	Slide-out	Virtual	Virtual	Virtual	Virtual	Slide-out
Android	MOTOBLUR	Standard	Sense UI	Sense UI	Standard	Standard
Processor	528MHz MSM7201A	528MHz ARM11	528MHz MSM7225	528MHz MSM7201A	528MHz MSM7201A	528MHz MSM7201A
Screen	3.1-inch (est.), 320 x 480	3.2-inch, 320 x 480	2.8-inch, 240 x 320	3.2-inch, 320 x 480	3.2-inch, 320 x 480	3.2-inch, 480 x 320
Headphone	3.5mm	3.5mm	3.5mm	3.5mm	ExtUSB	ExtUSB
Touchscreen	Capacitive	Capacitive	Resistive	Capacitive	Capacitive	Capacitive
Still Camera	5MP with AF	5MP with Flash	3.2MP	5MP with AF	3.2MP with AF	3.2MP with AF
Bluetooth	2.0	2.1	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
Exchange	ActiveSync	ActiveSync	--	ActiveSync	Depends on version	Depends on version
Storage	256MB, microSD	8GB, microSD	512MB, microSD	512MB, microSD	512MB, microSD	256MB, microSD
Battery	1400mAh	1500mAh	1100mAh	1500 mAh	1340 mAh	1150 mAh
Weight	163g	114g	113g	135g	116g	158g

It's been over 11 months since the Android first hit the scene with HTC's T-Mobile G1, and in that time we've come to the conclusion that, despite having more or less a clean slate on industrial design choices and specs, little progress has been made in the way of variation. Stacked up side-to-side, Motorola CLIQ manages to stand out with a slide-out keyboard and MOTOBLUR skin, but under the hood, it's pretty much as uniform as a netbook. Peruse for yourself in the chart above.

[Thanks, Scott]

You knew good and well this day was coming, but if you're sick and tired of lusting after your proactive neighbor's myTouch 3G, today's your lucky day. The highly customizable HTC handset will be widely available starting this morning in T-Mobile USA retail outlets, partner locations and online, and if you're really looking to celebrate, you can dart over to San Francisco at noon as 100 skydivers take a leap of faith in order to generate buzz, relieve some stress and put food on the table. Speaking of cheddar, you best bring $199.99 if you plan on snagging one on a two-year agreement, and you'll do everyone there a favor if you've already settled on black, merlot or white beforehand.

TeleNav has already launched its subscription turn-by-turn navigation service for the G1, so it stands to reason that official myTouch 3G support would be close behind -- and sure enough, the company has announced that its GPS Navigator app will be available for download to T-Mobile's second Android device starting tomorrow, August 5. The app features all of the goodies that TeleNav users have come to know and love, including traffic and incident monitoring with automatic rerouting, gas prices, business information, and a choice between 2D and 3D maps; additionally, you've got automatic day / night coloration, carpool lane and tollroad avoidance, and speech recognition for destination input -- a big plus when you're on the road and you need to keep distractions to a minimum.

We've been playing with a cut of GPS Navigator on our myTouch recently, and it delivers a totally usable car navigation experience -- a perfect complement to the comprehensive pedestrian capabilities of Google Maps. Most of the warnings from our G1-based review of the application carry over here -- you need true GPS reception, not merely cellular triangulation, so your phone will need a view of the sky to have a shot at picking up satellites (this also means that getting a location lock is a more time-consuming process, though it typically didn't take longer than a few seconds to do its thing). We're not digging how the colored lines that convey traffic information on highways flash; we'd rather they just stayed a solid color, the way most GPS systems handle it. We also found that the menus are a little wonky -- bringing your finger in contact with a menu item and swiping up or down to scroll would occasionally trigger the first item you touched, which ends up being a fairly annoying bug in practice. All told, though, if you can justify the expense, your $10 a month is going to net you a genuinely reasonable way to consolidate all of your help-me-I'm-lost needs -- whether by foot or by car -- into a single device.

If you've preordered one o' them fancy new myTouch 3Gs, check your mailbox, front porch, back door, administrative assistant, or dirty, thieving neighbor -- because it might be there. T-Mobile said that preorders would be shipping at the tail end of July, and sure enough, some folks are starting to get lucky; plebes without preorders will still need to wait until August 5, though, so, you know, either sit there and drool or shout nasty remarks about how you'd rather have a Hero in the meanwhile.

[Thanks, sun]

The myTouch 3G is all well and good, but seeing how the Magic on which it's based has already launched virtually everywhere else in the world, the phone itself isn't really the big news -- it's more the strong commitment T-Mobile seems to be making to Android apps with the value-add pack it's prepping. So far, shots and hands-on time with T-Mobile's so called AppPack have been hard to come by, but xda-developers has just happened to "come across" a build that's now available to anyone who wants to install it. Problem is, the AppPack doesn't currently include Sherpa -- the location-based entertainment app T-Mobile has really been pushing hard -- apparently due to some last-minute problems T-Mob's having, so for that, we turn to another corner of xda-developers for an installable APK. It's expected that the carrier will be making the AppPack available to G1 owners, but just in case they had a last minute change of heart... well, let's just say that's not a concern anymore, if you know what we mean.

[Via HTC Source, thanks DW and Matt D.]

Read - AppPack
Read - Sherpa

Our attention is still vaguely fixed on that Hero off in the distance, but let's focus for just a minute -- the myTouch 3G for T-Mobile is now in our well-guarded possession as it trudges toward a late July release for those lucky enough to pre-order. Other than a few silkscreened details, make no mistake -- the myTouch is literally an HTC Magic in basically all but name (we compare it with a Rogers-branded Magic in our gallery below so you can see what we mean), and all things considered, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Like all of its Magic contemporaries, the phone feels small and well-balanced in the hand; one unique detail, though, is the crazy packaging which consists of a semi-soft zippered nylon case enclosed by a paper sleeve. It's cool, different, and unlike a regular box, it's something you'll probably want to hold on to.

This is the first time we've seen it in that "merlot" shade, and in person, this is a great-looking color that could play well with anybody -- man or woman, business or casual. It's a touch of highlight without going overboard (unlike, say, the actual Highlight). Software-wise, this is looking like a bone-stock Android 1.5 build so far (notice the keyboard, for example), which plays with T-Mobile's prior statements that its software value-add with these sets would primarily come through Market downloads. Stay tuned for our full review, but in the meantime, enjoy some visuals!

When we spoke to T-Mobile at the myTouch 3G launch last week, there was some doubt as to whether its Android-based visual voicemail app would be ready in time for the new model's launch -- but from a handful of videos TmoNews has managed to uncover, it's certainly looking ready for action. A series of three quick instructional videos guides users through the oh-so-simple tasks of listening to individual voicemails, saving them to a memory card (an interesting trick), and listening to them in any order you like; if you think those tasks sound too boring and obvious to really require video instruction, you're kinda right -- but we can see how users completely new to the concept of visual voicemail would benefit from the quick tutorial. At any rate, it's good to see that the software's looking good, it takes advantage of Android's standard notification mechanism, and we're hopeful it could be ready by the time the first units start hitting customers' hands at the tail end of the month.

Two long lost siblings, at last reunited. But can there ever be unity? We don't think so. At every turn, the HTC Hero seems to trounce the myTouch 3G -- it's really hardly a contest. The myTouch is certainly lighter, and in many ways "feels" smaller because of it, but the size differences really are negligible. They're still both great phones, but the Hero really feels like a million bucks, while the myTouch feels a bit like a toy. Unfortunately, only one of them just went up for pre-order on T-Mobile, and it's not the one we want to marry.

Though the myTouch 3G is really just an HTC Magic at its core, T-Mobile seems to be doing everything it can to gussy it up with as much crapware bloatware value-add software that it can. All kidding aside, this really isn't crapware -- the carrier is apparently quite serious about calling out best-in-class apps in the Android Market, going so far as to create a separate "app pack" application that'll drill down stuff it wants to highlight. T-Mobile tells us this might even include T-Mobile's own visual voicemail application, which is currently in development, but whether that's available at launch or not, nothing in the app pack won't be findable in the regular Android Market, so there's no reason to worry.

The crown jewel in the myTouch 3G's arsenal will be Sherpa, an entertainment discovery app that learns your preferences in food, stores, and attractions over time based on your ratings and bubbles them to the top so they're easier for you to find. Naturally, it's location-based so that you can find things around you; it'll be interesting to see how well this works in practice, but at a glance, we're excited to give it a shot so that we can finally stop eating In-N-Out seven nights a week (not to say there's anything wrong with that).

As much heat as the "myTouch" name has taken, we're starting to understand why T-Mobile went with it -- the myTouch 3G is a very customizable device. At device launch, we're counting no fewer than 17 trinkets to go along with your phone -- not including color variations -- ranging from the ultra-mundane (a USB cable in your choice of black or white, for example) to the awesome (a snap-on battery extender that'll add 50 percent more juice) to the crazy (a myTouch logo commuter mug). Buyers will also be able to get custom-designed shells through Skinit and have access to a fitness belt, meaning you now have absolutely no excuse not to get on the trail and run that ten miles with that trusty Magic firmly attached to your arm. Well, except the fact that The Hills is on. Right after The Hills, though, we swear.