For those on Verizon looking for a replacement for your aging Blackberry or even just a phone with a full QWERTY keyboard, Samsung may have something just for you. Last year, Samsung released the Stratosphere for Verizon which did kind of well. It wasn’t big red’s best seller, but then again it was a budget-device and those don’t normally become top sellers. Now Samsung has released their successor to the original Galaxy Stratosphere and it’s available for $129.99 on a 2-year contract, so it should hit those mid-range customers not looking to spend an arm and a leg on a new device. The full retail price is $449.99, so for those looking for a new device and to keep their unlimited data, it’s still not a bad price for the specs. Speaking of specs, what does the Galaxy Stratosphere 2 have?
- 4-inch WVGA Super AMOLED display
- 1.2GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor
- 1GB of RAM
- 8GB of internal storage
- 5MP rear-facing camera, 1.3MP front-facing camera
- physical slide-out QWERTY keyboard
- Android 4.0 with Touchwiz’s Nature UX
So it’s not a device that will blow the Galaxy S3 or even the Nexus 4 out of the water, but it can handle most tasks, even some gaming. In fact the dual-core Snapdragon S4 processos is also in the Galaxy S3, HTC EVO 4G LTE, and a few other devices that were quad-core Internationally that were released earlier this year. So it is quite a capable device.
So for those of you coming from a Blackberry device, you’ve held out for Blackberry 10 long enough already, this would be a pretty good device for you. Especially with the full QWERTY keyboard, which you are probably used to on Blackberry.
If you aren’t fond of the 4.5-inch or larger displays you see on a lot of other devices like the Galaxy Note 2, Galaxy S3, HTC One X+, Sony Xperia TL, and others, then this is one of your very few choices in the Android world and on Verizon. And like I’ve said before, for the price it’s got some pretty good specs along with that physical keyboard. So if you’re picking one up, let us know in the comments how you like it.