10. 03. 2007
Verizon's New Phones - iPhone killers?
In an obvious attempt to compete with Apple's iPhone, Verizon Wireless announced on Wednesday their new cell phone lineup, including the much-rumored Voyager (made by LG Electronics) which has a large touch screen very similar to the iPhone, but also includes a second screen and keyboard which folds out laterally like the LG EnV.
The LG Venus, which comes in pink and black, is a slider phone with two screens: the phone keypad slides out from under a touch screen. As with Voyager, it vibrates when a user taps a menu option on the screen.
Both Venus and Voyager have 2-megapixel cameras, and high-speed wireless connections for fast music and video downloads, and since the Voyager does not come with a large built-in memory for songs and video, it offers instead a slot for memory cards up to 8 gigabytes. By comparison, the iPhone has 8 gigabytes of built-in storage. Going after iPhone's achilles heel -- it's painfully slow AT&T network -- the Voyager will connect to Verizon Wireless' latest data network, providing speeds much higher than the "EDGE" network the iPhone uses.
The Juke (Samsung) is designed as an entry-level device, retailing for about $100, with tiny keypad and dressed in dark blue, red and teal. As befits a young teenager, it has dedicated keys for playing music but does not have a high-speed wireless link.
Playing coy, Verizon Wireless did not say how much the Voyager or three other new phones would cost OR give a specific launch date, saying only that they would be in stores before Thanksgiving.
Is the Voyager an iPhone killer, as Verizon boasts? Sure, Verizon coustomers who don't want to switch to another network will probably buy a few come Christmas, but they have a long way to go to catch up with Apple's 1 million units sold since June 29th.
Posted by Evan
Category:
cell phones
| current affairs
Tags: iphone verizon
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