Whispers of the G2 Android phone grow louder

Yesterday, the T-Mobile blog CellPhone Signal published a list of new features it claimed would be in the G2, the second HTC-built phone built for the T-Mobile network running Google’s Android platform. The most outrageous claim, however, was the supposed date of the device’s release: January 26, 2009.

Would T-Mobile really risk enraging the million or so people who bought the G1 just a few months after its release by launching an updated version? No, says the blog Boy Genius Report, which has a separate tip containing some of the same G2 information, but a later launch date: April 2009.

Still, that is just six months after the launch of the G1. Shortly after the original iPhone was released, Apple received a lot of heat from early buyers when it cut the price by a couple hundred dollars. There was so much heat, that Apple decided to give Apple store credits covering half of the difference to those early buyers. And that was just for a price change, this is a entirely new, and presumably much better device launching just a few months after people shelled out around $200 for the first one.

Still, as BGR points out, this is all still very much a rumor and far from confirmed. But the highlights of the rumored G2 include the removal of the QWERTY keyboard (which I hated), a 5 megapixel camera with a flash, a memory card slot (for up to 16 gigabytes). There is also talk of the phone being able to do video calling.

My favorite part of the G2 rumor, though, is that it also says the G3, yes the third version of the device, is also just around the corner. If true, that’s an interesting strategy, but with a lot of Android-powered devices due to be released this year, HTC and T-Mobile do need one that’s better than the G1 to stay in the game.