Verizon has opened up its pre-order page for its version of the Samsung Galaxy Note II ahead of an official announcement. The phone will be launched by the carrier next month on November 27th for $299.99 after new 2 year agreement or for those that want to keep unlimited data, $699.99.
The Verizon version of the Samsung Galaxy Note II features the 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos processor and 2GB of RAM, 5.5 inch 720p HD display with a Wacom digitizer layer and Samsung’s S-Pen with 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity. Other features for the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 include an 8 megapixel 1080p HD video camera , a 2 megapixel front-facing camera, NFC, 16GB of internal storage with microSD expansion slot and Android 4.1 with TouchWiz 4.0 along with Samsung’s own suite of built-in S-Pen apps.
Of note is that Verizon has chosen to place its logo in the middle of the large home button on the phone, which has caused an irrational amount of backlash from enthusiasts, owing to the size of the logo in terms of the size of the home button, with many complaining that placing the logo in such a cramped space was simply not necessary. and could have been placed on the back. Such blatant branding is also being construed as hostile to Verizon customers, though that stretches the definition and context of the word and should be treated as mere hyperbole.
With T-Mobile launching its variant on Wednesday and AT&T opening up pre-orders today for an early November launch, this makes Verizon the third carrier to launch the device and its version is the closest to being sold during the holiday shopping season. This also marks one of the few examples of Verizon selling a flagship device with few, if any core changes from its reference design, as even its version of the Galaxy Nexus underwent subtle changes from its reference design.
The changes were made to the point where it was initially excluded from AOSP updates before being recently included once again and the key difference for its version being the exclusion of Google Wallet support in favor of its own mobile payment solution in the recently launched Isis initiative, owing to the differences in which Google Wallet and Isis handle transaction security.
I have tried to pre-order the Note II at full price. The website won’t allow it stating the unlimited data is no longer available. Does anyone know a way around this glitch?
My dilemma now is whether I shell out the $650 to get a Note II and keep my unlimited data plan, yeah I average 40GB of data month, or get it on an upgrade and modify my usage to get on a tiered data plan. Ugh, I want a Note II so bad. Of course option #3 is to just keep my Razr Maxx and be happy. Oh yeah, I’m a concession account so I get an upgrade every 9 months that’s why I’m eligible and don’t have that bad of a phone. Verizon unlimited is true unlimited, not like that garbage AT&T passes for unlimited, so that is like a priceless thing to have in reality. Who knows what even more data intensive phones might come out in the future. Then again Verizon could decide that even without getting an upgrade you lose unlimited, they could do that too if they wanted. Then I’d feel really stupid for having shelled out full retail just to keep it.
Ugh, so much speculation and conjecture. Everything is just soooooo grey. Check out my blog post about my Galaxy Note II/ unlimited data dilemma at…….. http://www.gosellcrazy.com/2012/10/cellphonedilemma/
In six months, you could probably get that Note II preowned for half the price. But your unlimited data will be gone forever.