Virgin Mobile Officially Announces The LG Optimus Slider

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This handset made an early appearance with Best Buy earlier in the week, and as of today it has been officially announced by the carrier. The handset is the LG Optimus Slider and it will be arriving with Virgin Mobile next month.

More specifically, the LG Optimus Slider will be available direct with Virgin Mobile beginning October 17th. In terms of the price, the handset will be $199.99, and keep in mind, that is a contract-free price. In other words, no long term commitments to make.

In addition, that October 17th availability date is only with Virgin Mobile. The handset will not show up in retail stores until a short while later. According to the details coming from Virgin Mobile, the Optimus Slider will be available with Best Buy and Radio Shack beginning on October 31st, with Target on November 6th and in Sprint stores as of November 13th.

And just in case there is any question on the placement of the Optimus Slider, Virgin Mobile is touting this as being an update to the non-keyboard having Optimus V.

“With the new LG Optimus Slider we’re bringing our customers an updated operating system and slide-out keyboard,” said Mark Lederman, Business Line director, Virgin Mobile USA.

As far as features, the Optimus Slider will have a 3.2 inch HVGA capacitive touchscreen display, slide-out 4-row QWERTY keyboard, microSD card slot, 3 megapixel camera with auto-focus and flash, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1, 3.5mm headphone jack, 1500 mAh battery and arrive running Android 2.3 Gingerbread. In terms of the size, the handset will measure in at 4.53 x 2.32 x 0.58 inches.

Lastly, touching back on the Optimus V for a moment, that handset is now priced at $149.99 with Virgin Mobile, however Best Buy has had it for as low as $99.99 recently. And while that handset is not brand new, it may be a good contract free device given the price point.