That's it folks, the HTC-made T-Mobile G1 is now official with pre-orders due to open over at the dedicated T-Mobile website. The device will start shipping in US stores as of 22nd October and will be selling for 179 US dollars with two-year voice and data contract.
T-Mobile will be offering obligatory voice and messaging plans for the G1 priced at 25 (unlimited data, limited msg) and 35 US dollars (unlimited data and msg) on top of their regular voice plans. The G1 is SIM-locked and it won't be available with a prepaid service.
The T-Mobile G1 will also be available in the UK beginning in November, and across T-Mobile's European markets (Germany, Austria, Czech Republic and the Netherlands) in Q1 2009. European pricing is not yet known but we guess it has to be competitive to the one of the iPhone 3G.
Hardware-wise the T-Mobile G1 sports a 3.2-inch display touchscreen display, QWERTY keyboard, quad-band GSM/EDGE and dual-band UMTS support, GPS, Wi-Fi and a built-in accelerometer. We already mentioned that the camera won't support video recording and the Bluetooth support will be limited to mono headset use only (no stereo and no file transfers). The Bluetooth functionality will be enhanced later on.
So we waited a whole year now just to see a poor iPhone replica with a QWERTY keyboard that doesn't even look half as good. It seems HTC have not put any effort in the design - and even the functionality is flawed.
Source: GSMArena
