subject: The Not So Speedy T-mobile G2 [print this page] During this summer, the G2 was hinted by T-Mobile, the successor of the beloved G1 model. Everyone knew that the G2 was going to arrive sometime before Christmas 2010, and even though T-Mobile was able to remain quiet though the month of August, the have finally broke their silence with the September press release. Since that press release, rumors, speculations and other details have been buzzing though tech blogs and Twitter. There have even been announcements over all-new G2 accessories by the third-party manufacturer. However, the one burning question that we all want answered has gone unanswered. When is the T-Mobile G2 release date?
Although we don't have the definitive answer either, we can make a good guess. Here's what we know: T-Mobile says that preordering begins on September 29, 2010, and some people have been tweeting that preordering could even begin earlier than that. In addition, we know that T-Mobile wants these bad boys on the shelves by Christmas, and by Christmas, we mean prior to Black Friday in the US, which is November 26. Assuming that T-Mobile needs six weeks from the open of preordering, we're going to guess that the G2 gets a wide launch on the November 13 weekend. This gives some breathing room for their preorder and gets the G2 into retailers by a few week prior to Black Friday. Expect the new Google G2 accessories to be hitting stores as early as October.
The best news is that tha price is pointing out at no more than $199.99 with a contract. That makes sense since that mark is just around where the G1 is. Now, RadioShack tweeted almost immediately after the Facebook press release that they would be selling the G2 initially for $149.99, $50 less, with the same 2-year plan that T-Mobile demands. That is definitely a great price, and if that eventually holds up, we should be expecting that T-Mobile will counteract that a similar deal in their stores. We don't usually suggest that the average consumer jump on the early adopter bandwagon, but in this case, there may be too much value not to.
For those that haven't heard the news, the T-Mobile includes an 800 MHz Snapdragon CPU, which is not quite the 1 GHz Scorpion processor most of us were expecting. T-Mobile has also made several changing with the G2's battery life as well, which supports the rumors about the HSPA+ connectivity apps drawing a lot of juice. We think this design decision hurts the G2 image a bit, so we know T-Mobile didn't make it easily. In light of that, we have some concerns over battery life, and if we spot any deals at launch involving T-Mobile G2 batteries, we'll go ahead and jump at them.
We also have concerns that the 800 MHz Snapdragon may barely be enough for the Android 2.2 environment, but at least we'll be getting 4G-like speeds. You've probably already heard AT&T complaining about this, but we wouldn't pay it much mind. The bottom line is that you'll have access to 14.4 Mbps speeds on the G2 rather than 7.2 Mbps on the G1. Although, theoretically, it might not reach the 4G numbers, it shouldn't be an issue during the life of the T-Mobile G2.
