<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-50872" title="EVO3DROUGHLAUNCHDATE" src="http://phandroid.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/EVO3DROUGHLAUNCHDATE-550×412.png” alt=”" width=”550″ height=”412″ />

Until now, we’ve seen nothing but the occasional print ad in men’s magazines and HTC has been tight lipped on any kind of expected launch date. This is the first leak we’ve seen that finally gives us a number to mark in our Google calendar so cross your fingers, folks!

What do you guys think? Could this be a preemptive strike by Sprint to get a heads up on T-Mobile before they drop the Sensation on June 8th? The Evo 3D was actually announced before the Sensation was announced for T-Mobile so it kind of makes sense.

Whether true or not, this definitely has me in a frenzy to gather up my extra pennies in anticipation of a possible early June release.

[Via XDA]

Happy evening to everyone! Just wanted to let everyone on Phandroid know that we’ve been receiving a megaton load of Phantips in our email inbox. So what’s got everyone in such an uproar? No, it’s not that annoying ad pop-up from our homepage. It’s that many of our readers are receiving that special email from Google inviting them into the Google Music Beta!

So scour your email and check those spam filters. You definitely don’t want to miss out on something this big.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in. I personally get excited for our readers when I find out they finally get to try out Google's newest service.]

Solitaire Chess – This is a unique chess game that strays far from “traditional”. You play over 400 challenges (they get harder over time) that has you capturing pieces with legal chess moves. You’ll complete the challenge once all pieces but one have been captured. It looks to be a fun entry-level game that’ll give you a good idea of the nature of chess. [Market]

GTasks – The app is simple: sync tasklists from your Google account to your phone. Since Google doesn’t provide this functionality natively, users rely on applications like these to get the job done. The UI is simple, the functionality is everything you need it to be, and it’s free. [Market]

Coin Pirates – If you’ve ever been to Chuck E. Cheese’s or any other arcade that values coins, you’ve probably played a game like Coin Pirates. You drop your coins in, pull the handle and you pray that more coins will drop out in front of you. Graphics look great, sound is good and you don’t have to spend any real coin to play this one. [Market]

SnapBucket – The folks at PhotoBucket have come to market with their first Android application. You can snap a picture with the app and apply various special effects and filters. Once you’re happy with them, you can have it uploaded directly to your PhotoBucket account. You can even create your own and unlock filter sets. We’d like a fully-fledged PhotoBucket application, but this’ll do for now. [Market]

Grow - Don’t let the simple name fool you, or go ahead and let it fool you. Grow is, indeed, a simple game with one goal and one goal alone: gorge on everything smaller than you until you’re the biggest fish in the sea. Repetitive gameplay is made up for by a campaign long enough to munch away whole portions of your day. Fun graphics, smooth and easy controls, and a nifty upgrades and power-up system keep things engaging. We enjoyed it, but you may want to watch the video demo before deciding if it’s worth your $1.99. For those that can’t decide, Epic Pixel just launched a FREE version moments ago. [Market]

Official Preakness App – As a Baltimore native, the Preakness has always signified a day spent drinking epic proportions of beer while a horse race may or may not be occurring in the background. For everyone else the horse race takes center stage. No matter which side you fall on, the new official Preakness app has you covered. News and info on all the horses and jockeys, a schedule of events and map, and video replays will keep you in the action. [Market]

Prox – This handy utility allows you to assign actions to gestures made up of a combination of proximity sensor and accelerometer feedback, creating no-touch operation of you Android smartphone. Sound confusing? You can view a tutorial video over on YouTube for an idea of what to expect. The app works as advertised, though assignable actions are currently quite limited. More are promised in the future. While Prox strives to create an easy an efficient way to interact with your handset, it so far seems like little more than a novelty. With some refinement perhaps the utility’s true power will be realized. [Market]

Motorola is preparing a new update to the Cliq 2, and they are in search testers eager to give the new software a go. There is room for 200 users to be part of the beta, which should culminate with a final update getting pushed to all Cliq 2 owners. As Moto has done for these things in the past, completing a survey is the first step towards acquiring the update early. No word on what will differ with this build, but we can say for certain that it won’t be anything along the line of Gingerbread.

Interesting that Motorola is always keen to send out updates for their mid-range devices to beta testers, but never offers such a program for their high-end devices. Must be a matter of where they have resources devoted for in-house debugging. Follow the link below if you fit the bill.

[Motorola Support]

If you thought Verizon’s $29.99 per month for unlimited 4G data was a bit too good to be true, well…we all know how that goes. The dust has once again been stirred up around talks of a data plan overhaul for Big Red, with tiered pricing seeming more likely than ever. The changes are said to be coming this summer, starting with the elimination of unlimited data at a flat fee.

CFO Fran Shammo said new plans will force heavy data users to pay more, but the hope is to offset tiered pricing with new family plans for data. This would eliminate the requirement for each line on a family plan to get its own data fee, and instead share bandwidth amongst all lines for a single fee. No word on what new plans or pricing will look like as of yet.

[via BGR]

You have to give some credit to Sony Ericsson. The smartphone manufacturer went from Android OS updates that were few and far between to a lineup that not only features the latest version of Android at launch, but which also is receiving updates at a much more reasonable rate. SE revealed today that their Xperia Arc and Xperia Play will soon rank among the short list of devices running Android 2.3.4, the fresh-out-of-the-oven update that brings along GTalk video calling among other things.

The update will also include a little feature Sony Ericsson has been cooking up called Facebook Inside. It creates a deep integration between the phone and the social network, allowing users to “like” currently playing music, share all sorts of content, and contact and calendar sync.

The update is slated to hit UK networks next week, carrier willing. We can only hope Sony Ericsson extends the privilege to the soon-to-be release US version of the Xperia Play.

[via Recombu]

Here we go again, folks. Yesterday, Walmart’s stock of ASUS Eee Pad Transformer units .com/2011/05/18/walmart-has-the-asus-eee-pad-transformer-in-stock-hurry/”>sold out within seconds of me hitting publish. Thankfully, a new opportunity has presented itself today – via K-Mart. We’re not sure how in-store stock is looking, but you can order one of these online and there doesn’t appear to be any delay in shipping. This is the 16GB WiFi-only model for $400. Get to it! [Thanks Kenneth!]

Logitech is remaining hands-off when it comes to bringing their own Android tablets and instead are content with providing accessories for those tablets. They’ve detailed three new bluetooth-enabled accessories coming to a store near you later this month. A wireless keyboard ($70), mouse ($50) and speakers ($100) will essentially turn your tablet into a PC of sorts. $220 worth of accessories seems steep for a device that was meant to be mobile, but it’s there if you want it. Product images can be found above and below. [Logitech via Logitech Blog]

It seems certain models of ASUS’ Eee Pad Transformer were affected with problems pertaining to the tablet’s optional keyboard dock. We haven’t heard of these issues before today, but that’s because not a ton of people were affected by it. Regardless, ASUS has issued a patch – firmware version 8.2.3.13 – to fix whatever needs fixin’. Here’s the post from their Facebook page:

Eee Pad Transformer firmware update 8.2.3.13 released – keyboard dock issues fixed. Don’t forget once you have updated the firmware on the Pad and rebooted, you must then also click on the firmware update icon for the keyboard dock (it will appear as a triangle in the bottom right of the screen). We completed the process on our test unit here with no problems.

Note: this was posted on ASUS UK’s Facebook page. No word on whether or not the United States or other regions will be receiving the update. (Be sure to let us know if you do get one, will ya?) One users who applied the fix says it absolutely fixes every problem he was having with the keyboard dock. ASUS details those problems here:

Not all units affected. Some had connection problems (so the keys trackpad weren’t responding) and some weren’t allowing charge. The engineers are confident that the frmware update should resolve the glitches.

Glad to hear, ASUS! Now get a move on ramping that production up so more people are able to buy it. [ASUS UK Facebook, Thanks Marco!]

Itching to take a trip back to the 1970s? While a time machine is far outside of our realm of possibilities, timeless trinkets, gizmos, gadgets and antiques do well to remind us of old times. And in this day and age, with everything being digital, we can simulate most things. All you lava lamp fans might like this live wallpaper called LavaGlo. It’s simple, really. Change the color to whatever you’d like and you’re greeted to the sweet memories of the 70s as soon as you turn your phone on. While it’s not nearly as cool as having the real deal, it’s something. Go ahead and find it in the Android market for $.96.