T-Mobile Sells First Google Android Phone At SF Store
T-Mobile, headquartered in Bellevue, Wash., will officially launch the G1 at its retail stores in 95 cities across the United States Wednesday, many of which will open early at 8 a.m. for the release of the $179 handset, and as many as 1.5 million existing T-Mobile customers have reportedly pre-ordered the devices. But for one night only, a couple hundred customers who lined up outside the telecom provider's store at Market and 3rd streets in downtown San Francisco had the 3G-enabled smartphone all to themselves.
Brody Yazaki, second in line Tuesday night, came all the way from Maui for his G1. Yazaki already owns an Apple iPhone, but he said he wanted a smartphone with a keypad, with an accessible panel to switch out the battery when he wanted. Charles Register of San Francisco had a less finicky reason for waiting in line -- he lost his cell phone Monday and figured he might as well get the G1.
The T-Mobile G1 is available with a two-year voice and data agreement. Support for Web-based services from Mountain View, Calif.-based Google includes popular apps like Gmail and Google Maps, and the G1's full HTML Web browser is already winning rave reviews. In addition to T-Mobile's 3G network, the G1 has built-in support for the telecom's Edge network, as well as WiFi and GPS.
The new smartphone, 4.6 inches by 0.6 inches and weighing 5.6 ounces, has a 3.2-inch HVGA touchscreen but also sports a QWERTY keyboard, unlike the iPhone. It featurs a 3.2 megapixel camera and a microSD card slot.
Also on Tuesday, the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (HSA) followed through on a promise to release the Android source code for free to developers through the HSA's Android Open Source Project.