HTC Desire Z

Finally someone has snapped off a picture of what will supposedly be the HTC EVO Shift 4G’s (otherwise known as the HTC Knight) slide-out QWERTY keyboard, a feature oft-mentioned but never 100 percent confirmed. It looks a lot like this phone could line up as Sprint’s closest relative to the HTC Desire Z, much like the T-Mobile G2 and yet-to-launch HTC Merge. The phone definitely carrier some EVO-like stylings, so we are pretty confident the Shift 4G name will stick.

And as leaks are heating up for the new HTC handset, so too are release rumors. The latest assumes an HTC A7373 model number belongs to the EVO Shift 4G and pegs a January 9th, 2011 release date on the device. The date comes from the above internal Sprint document. That gives them plenty of time to show it off at CES before launch, right?

[via TalkAndroid, AC]