Samsung Galaxy Tab Launching November 1 in the UK

Samsung announced Friday that the Galaxy Tab will be available in the U.K. starting November 1, but pricing on the device is still under wraps.

The tablet will be sold at retailers like Carphone Warehouse, Dixons Store Group, and T-Mobile stores, Samsung said in a statement.

Samsung said the Galaxy Tab will "be available on a range of attractive price packages" that will be "as widely accessible as possible to all consumers," but declined to elaborate.

The Galaxy Tab made its debut last month. The 7-inch tablet PC is powered by Google's Android 2.2 Froyo operating system. It has a 1-Ghz Samsung Hummingbird processor, and the LCD screen is 1024-by-600 resolution. There's a 3-megapixel camera on the back and a 1.3-megapixel camera on the front, specifically for making video calls. The tablet has either 16 or 32 G-bytes of internal memory, with a MicroSD card slot supporting up to 32GB more. The tablet weighs 13 ounces, and according to Samsung, the 4000 mAh battery will last for seven hours of video playback.

Samsung said two weeks ago that the Galaxy Tab will be coming to all four national wireless carriers in the U.S., but in terms of a release date, said only that it will be available here "in the coming months."

The price is the most important piece of the puzzle. PCMag mobile analyst Sascha Segan wrote recently that the Samsung Galaxy Tab might be a great seller at $299 plus data for $20 per month, with no contract. But it's safe to say that it wouldn't do so well at $599 plus $60 per month for data, he said.

For more details, see PCMag's full hands-on with the Galaxy Tab.

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Analyst: Android Could Help Google Become ‘Virtual Telco'

Analyst: Android Could Help Google Become ‘Virtual Telco’

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By Ed Sutherland (7:47 am, Oct. 01, 2010)

At first glance, offering an open-source mobile operating system like Android, wouldn’t be a major profit center for Google. However, one analyst Friday offered multiple ways Android could even further enrich the Mountain View, Calif. firm’s coffers, including become its own ‘virtual telco’ for smartphone owners.

Google gains $500 million per year because Android offers hardware makers and carriers an attractive alternative to payments to Apple for the iPhone, according to Goldman Sachs analyst James Mitchell. In addition, although Apple leads the mobile apps market and is increasing its share of the mobile advertising pie, Google collects 30 percent of apps sold through its Android market and 40 percent from in-app advertising via AdMob.

Perhaps most intriguing, however, was the potential for Android to turn Google Voice combined with Google’s stake in Clearwire into what Mitchell calls a “virtual telco.”

“Google could use Android to evolve into a virtual telco, providing a single contact number and populating its Internet-based calling services,” the analyst told investors.

There is a downside for Google, however. The analyst foresees slow growth of search in Europe and Apple’s continued domination of the mobile Internet