For the last two years, Amazon Wireless has been the best place to go to score cutting edge cellphones during the big holiday shopping season. A few years ago,the online retailing giant had every single smartphone for a penny, including then-$199 top of the line devices. Amazon has gone live with a “4G phones for a penny” sale. Some are are stating is the sale for this year, while others are calling it a pre- sale. Either way, it’s quite the mixed bag.
If you’re a Sprint user, your choices are two phones on Sprint’s aging WiMax network (Samsung Epic, Epic Touch) that I’m fairly certain have been a penny on Amazon for months now, a 4G smartphone free from Sprint (LG Viper 4G), or a non-4G phone curiously thrown in and free from Sprint (Kyocera Rise). Why waste the penny?
Verizon Wireless users get a slightly better break, with the RAZR 4G and the LG Lucid. However, the inclusion of the less than Stellar Samsung Galaxy 4G and Stratosphere, as well as the Galaxy Nexus 4G, muddies Verizon’s options. Good phones, but a bit last year. You can file the Pantech Marauder and Breakout under “do not want.”
AT&T devotees get the best deal, as they can get the HTC One X for a penny. While the One+ phones have been announced, the One X is one of the absolute best phones on the market with one of the best screens on the market, a fast processor, and one of the least intrusive Android skins out there. To get the One X for a penny (in white or gray) is a great deal.
You can also get the Xperia Ion or the LG Nitro HD. The Blackberry crowd will be happy to see the Torch 9810 and 9860, but with Blackberry 10 coming down the pipe, you may want to wait it out. Windows Phone 8 users are out of luck, as the only choices are the Windows 7.5-using Nokia Lumia 900 and Samsung Focus 2. Rounding out the choices are the also-ran Samsung Rugby Smart, Galaxy Exhilarate, and the Captivate Glide for those who simply must have Android and a keyboard.
Remember that there is a chance that this is only Amazon’s pre-sale leading up to Black Friday. If this is the case, better deals might come down the pipe. If not, you may want to head down to Sam’s Club to score a Samsung Galaxy S III for a penny.
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