As you well know, Motorola's RAZR 2 V8 isn't slated to land on T-Mobile until October 15th, but how's about a few looks to keep you antsy over the weekend? Thanks to a tipster who managed to get his hands around one of the T-Mobile-branded handsets, we're now getting our first looks at the device. So without further ado, why not check out the gallery over at Engadget Mobile to see what the fuss is all about?

We still think it's a little early in the RAZR 2's life to be changing up colors and trimmings and turning it into a special edition, but what do we know? As expected, Motorola's announced the "Luxury Edition" of the EDGE-only RAZR 2 V8, trimming the phone with 18 and 24 karat gold accents, a black "vacuum metal" finish, etched sides and nav wheel, and a soft-touch posterior endowed with a snakeskin pattern. A bundled H680 Bluetooth headset (trimmed with 18 karat gold, naturally) and a leather carrying case round out the package, fit for the aspiring Vertu owner who hasn't quite yet reached a Vertu salary. Look for it to start showing up in "select regions" -- the US included, we suspect -- before the year's out.

They sure do look beautiful flying in formation during their annual migration, but when one of Illinois's rare Aves Razeruses crashes and burns on a busy Moscow street corner, well, it's never a pretty sight. Check out another pic of the carnage after the break...

[Via Tech Ticker Blog, thanks chirag]

What a refreshing change of pace! AT&T actually beat its estimate of "early September" for its variant of the Motorola RAZR 2, the V9 -- albeit in a rather bizarre shade, "mahogany" (where we come from, that's called purple, but whatevs). Though it's not showing up on AT&T's online store just yet, it's showing up for their business "premier" customers (note the screen shot above) and seems to be filtering into brick-and-mortar locations as we write this. The premier site shows a rather shocking off-contract price of $749.99, though with a combination of discounts, rebates, and contracts, it should fall into a far more reasonable price range for pretty much everyone involved. Seriously, $750? Sheesh.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

It's August 29th and that can mean only two things: Nokia is about to drop a slew of handsets and the Motorola RAZR 2 V9m just went live on Verizon. As expected, $250 (after online discount and 2 year contract) takes home all the V CAST Music and Video downloading you can handle over EV-DO with microSD expansion, 2 megapixel shooter, and Bluetooth stereo in tow. Yeah, nothing groundbreaking but this is as good as it gets for Moto fans.

[Thanks, Jon]

As expected, Verizon and Sprint have given Motorola a venue for its latest and greatest hardware today, releasing the Q9m Windows Mobile smartphone and RAZR 2 V9m flip respectively. Though the media centric Q9m's $350 price on a two-year contract ain't exactly pocket change, it's interesting to note that it whittles right down to a more manageable $250 after rebate -- a mere $20 more than you'll pay for an old school Q Black. Meanwhile, minions from the other side of the CDMA camp (yes, we mean Sprint) have prepped the V9m for launch today at the same $250 price point after rebate, making it the first of several US carriers committed to a RAZR 2 launch to actually get it out of the door. If everything goes the way we expect it to, both of these devices will land on the other carrier in the next few weeks, so the "grass is greener on the other side" effect should be kept to a bare minimum here.

[Thanks, Dan and Boy Genius]

Read - Verizon Motorola Q9m
Read - Sprint Motorola V9m

Neither carrier has launched it just yet, but yes -- the RAZR 2 V9m has now officially found a home on both Sprint and Verizon, with both promising availability in the next few weeks. To split hairs, Sprint will be beating its sworn enemy by a few days, launching its variant on August 22, while Verizon's just promising "September" at this point. Unless AT&T manages to pull a rabbit out of its hat, it looks like the two will be the first in the US to launch what Motorola hopes will be the centerpiece of a turnaround for its flagging handset business. Thanks to EV-DO, attractive styling (yes, we realize we'll be really tired of it in a couple years, but it's still hot for now), and a gargantuan external display with touch controls, the phone is being positioned on the higher end of both carriers' dumbphone offerings -- and the price reflects it. Look for it for $300 with a $50 rebate on Verizon, $250 on Sprint, both on a two-year agreement.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Update: Looks like AT&T didn't want to get left out of this little party after all! The carrier joins Sprint and Verizon in announcing its version of the RAZR 2 today, the HSDPA-powered V9. Look for it in "early September" for $300 on contract. Check the release here.

Read - Sprint press release
Read - Verizon press release

While most of us have to wait until next month (or later for CDMA-dependent folks) to get our hands on Motorola's shiny new RAZR 2 (otherwise known as the other big phone coming out this summer), those in South Korea can now lay claim to a few early bragging rights, as Moto's decided to give them first dibs on it. According to Motorola Korea, the somewhat unusual move is being done "in recognition of tech-savvy and fashion-aware Korean consumers." The perks end there, however, as they'll still have to cough up a hefty 580,000 Korean won (or $630) to call the phone their own, although that price is before the usual discounts and subsidies.

Hungry for some more pics of Motorola's RAZR 2? We thought you might be. Head on over to Engadget Mobile, we've got a boat-load more shots of the RAZR 2 V8 and some initial thoughts on the handset. That should tide you over until every carrier in the friggin world starts making plans to stock the thing.

MobileBurn got themselves a hands-on with the hot new Motorola RAZR 2 V8 --- if you don't think it's hot, at least admit that it's what the original RAZR should have been. The most notable change is obvious, and very welcome: no more hump, chin, or lump used to accommodate the chunky internals. The semi-touch screen is also an interesting variation on the usual touchscreen style, with tactile buzzing feedback when one of the three touch buttons on the external screen are pressed. The pre-production model had a poor shutter button, which is a bit of a disappointment since this is usually a well used button, and considering the effort put into the external screen. (Let's hope that this'll get fixed for production models.) The reviewers found that the main keypad was great, with a not-too-rubbery feel, and the UI is an improvement in all the areas that count -- snappy, clear, and customizable. The refinements make the RAZR2 V8 sound like a winner to us: a pity it had to be such a long time coming.

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about technology, multimedia, and digital entertainment:

Last week's fake iPhone delay memo may have served as a rare marketplace laboratory. When Apple announced that Leopard was slipping four months, the investors mostly shrugged, but news that the iPhone was being delayed sent Cupertino's Apple tumbling faster than the one that fell on Newton's head. (However, of course there are no perfect lab conditions in the market, and the reaction may have been compounded by this being a second delay for Apple's OS.)

Yes, Apple is a latecomer to the handset market, but the iPhone is early to market in some ways. Had Apple not announced it back in January, it might not have stood out as much from an increasing wave of touchscreen handsets from LG, Samsung and others. But the most ostensible reason for Apple to launch the iPhone is to strike back against a rash of music phones that enjoy the luxury of prime pocket real estate and carrier subsidization. Although the distribution of such phones is growing every quarter, they haven't yet seemed to slow the sales of iPods.

Over-the-air wireless services offer promising capabilities such as song identification and the untethered building of playlists on the fly. Handset manufacturers, though, are still several years behind in terms of Apple's technology -- or at least marketing -- if last week's official unveiling of Motorola's handsets was any indication. Motorola touted the superiority of its ROKR Z8 "media monster" over other music phones due to its use of USB 2.0; Moto also spoke of the benefits of being able to swap out multiple microSD cards without having to remove the Z8's battery in order to provide users with nearly infinite storage.

Well, it's finally here, the RAZR 2, proper sequel to the Motorola RAZR, one of the best-selling cellphones of all time. This newb's got big shoes to fill, but at least in its GSM / EDGE and CDMA variants it's 2mm smaller (sorry HSDPA fans, it's the same thickness for that flavor of 3G). For fans of the RAZR form factor, though, this is what you've been waiting for: two huge, crisp QVGA screens, Moto's JUIX Java Linux platform, 3G, HTML browser, the works. All that's yet to be seen is the price and carriers; we're guessing somewhere in the range of $500, like where the original RAZR debuted. (Also, we did spot Alltel and T-Mobile up in here.) We've got plenty of gallery shots to indulge yourself with, so enjoy.

Motorola has today officially unveiled the successor to one of the most iconic mobiles ever made, the RAZR 2. Available in 3.6Mbps HSDPA, EV-DO, and GSM / EDGE variants as the V9, V9m, and V8 respectively, the GSM and CDMA versions of the device comes in 2 millimeters slimmer than its predecessor and -- on some versions, anyway -- will be the second to use Motorola's new Linux-based platform (the first being the Z6). It includes something Moto is calling "Crystal Talk" technology that automatically adjusts volume and tone based on ambient noise. Other features include external music controls, haptics (read: vibration) for tactile feedback when external touchscreen keys are pressed, a full HTML browser, 2 megapixel cam, the full suite of Bluetooth profiles, Windows Media Player sync, a 2-inch QVGA external display, 2.2-inch QVGA internal display, and twice the screen resolution of the original RAZR. GSM versions start shipping in early July, with CDMA following up later in the summer.

Shots of what is apparently the CDMA version of Motorola's hotly anticipated successor to the RAZR have appeared on Phone News. To be designated as either the V9m or the V9c, the 2-inch external display on this thing looks positively huge in comparison to the KRZR's stamp sized external screen, and the first side shot of the phone makes us really appreciate the trimmed design: no more hump! Phone News says that Motorola's flagship will feature internal and external touchscreens and the BREW user interface with Flash support, and that it'll launch on Verizon Wireless first. We can't attest to the accuracy of these claims, but we certainly wouldn't say no to the former two's inclusion.

And just when we thought "LAZR" was about the least creative name Motorola could've possibly dreamed up for its shiny morsel with the giant external screen, Boy Genius reports that the handset will roll out the door with the "RAZR 2" moniker instead. The choice of verbage there is actually very interesting, because it indicates that Moto views this clamshell as the true successor to the RAZR -- not only one of the first true fashion phones, but the singular device that pulled Motorola out of its rut and back into the manufacturer big leagues. Whether the RAZR 2 will be able to perform the same magic trick, of course, remains to be seen. Boy Genius also reports that the phone will be available in both GSM and CDMA versions (cross your fingers, Sprint and Verizon customers) and will in fact rock a memory expansion slot by the time it makes it into stores. We're wearing our lucky baseball caps today in the hope we see it in official form this week at CTIA in Orlando, and we suggest y'all do the same.