This one’s no secret, Moto leaked the ROKR E8 way back in September, but the company is finally getting official with the musicphone at CES tonight. The phone is free of physical keys, with a completely smooth face and vibrating haptics to denote key “presses.” There’s a nav wheel in the middle, which might not be the revolution Motorola is touting it as, but sure looks nice. The handset has 3.5mm heaphone jack, 2GB of flash storage, a microSD slot, FM radio and a microUSB plug. The phone is Linux-based, and Moto is quite proud of its audio fidelity, but we suppose the proof is in the listening. No launch or price info just yet.

Kinda looks like a Photoshopped E6 to us, but Chinese site ZOL is touting this bad boy as the MOTOROKR E7 with a very impressive set of specs. Like, unrealistically impressive — especially for a phone that looks virtually indistinguishable from the far less impressive E6: VGA touchscreen, 5 megapixel cam with xenon flash, integrated GPS and WiFi, 2GB of integrated storage, HSDPA, you get the idea. If legit, the device will apparently be powered by Linux — Moto’s MOTOMAGX platform, we imagine — the very same one that we’ve heard can’t presently handle HSDPA speeds. So needless to say, we’re skeptical here; hopeful that Moto really does have something this hot up its sleeves, yes, but until we get more confirmation, skeptical.

So magical keypads are going to be all the rage in the next couple years. Taking a cue from Optimus Maximus, perhaps? Following the Firefly flyPhone we saw a few weeks ago comes word from China of this rather bizarre Motorola prototype, apparently dubbed the MOTOROKR E8. Besides an illuminated, dynamic keypad that can change modes to provide dedicated music controls, the candybar is supposed to feature 2GB of onboard storage, the typical microSD expansion and miniUSB jack, and a 3.5mm headphone connector. The UI is brought to you by Motorola’s Linux-based JUIX (MOTOMAGX?) platform powering a QVGA display. We’re skeptical about the goodness of that keypad until we get our hands on it, but we guess it could be cool.

While we were already looking forward to the N800 Internet Tablet’s inevitable successor, it seems like Sprint may have something else in mind. According to LinuxDevices, the operator “will offer a mobile WiMAX-enabled version of Nokia’s N800 Internet Tablet to North American customers next year,” which reportedly falls in line with the carrier’s grand scheme of making 4G services available “to over 100 million people during 2008.” Furthermore, Nokia’s director of open source, Dr. Ari Jaaksi, was quoted as saying that this here device would “most probably” include WiFi and Bluetooth as well, but as expected, no details regarding a specific launch timeframe were divulged.

That sound you’re hearing is the collective sigh from everyone patiently waiting for Palm to actually get its act together and unveil its depressingly overdue Linux mobile OS. Yet again, it seems we’ve been fooled into believing that Palm actually had its ducks in a proverbial row, as BrightHand is now reporting that Palm CEO Ed Colligan recently announced on a conference call that “products based on the new Linux-based platform won’t be available until some time next year.” Interestingly enough, Colligan also insinuated that the firm would “continue to use Windows Mobile and Garnet OS / Palm OS II for the foreseeable future.” Wait, they can actually see some light at the end of this perpetually growing tunnel? We sure as hell can’t.

While we’re seeing more Linux-powered mobile phones, not a single such device brought the navigation with it. Truth to be told, Nokia is pushing its 770 and N800 Internet Tablets with navigation apps, but those two devices are not mobile phones.Finally, China-based Tranzda showed its PM328, a thin (16 mm) smartphone with integrated GPS navigation. The device itself runs Tranzda’s “Newplus” software on top of the Linux core, and for navigation it uses u-blox’s navigation app. In terms of connectivity, the PM328 supports Bluetooth and USB connections.

The new device is now in China, and it is not yet know whether it will be available in the western world.