14 DAY TRIAL // Last month, Redmond-based software giant Microsoft announced the launch of a new type of mobile phones, which is meant to keep users socially active at all times, namely the KIN handsets. At that time, the company unveiled that two phones would arrive on the market under the KIN brand, namely KIN One and KIN Two, and that they would be sold exclusively via Verizon Wireless in the US, yet didn't provide a specific release date for the handsets. According to the latest news around the web, we might be closer to the launch than expected, as both phones should land on May 13.
Last month, Microsoft said that the two handsets should arrive on the market in the US sometime in May on the airwaves of Verizon, and that they were expected to be launched in Europe via Vodafone during fall. However, a recent article on slashphone states that the two devices are set to become available for pre-order at Big Red on May 6 and that they will be put on sale on May 13. According to the news site, the info comes from a leaked internal Verizon report, but nothing has been officially confirmed so far.
The two KIN phones announce themselves as quite appealing devices. KIN One sports a 2.6-inch TFT capacitive touchscreen display that boasts a QVGA (320 x 240 pixel) resolution, a 5-megapixel photo snapper with dual-LED flash, 256MB of RAM and 4GB of flash memory, WiFi b/g, Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP, and USB 2.0 connectivity options, GPS receiver, FM radio, and others more. The handset is one and the same as the previously leaked/rumored device called Turtle.
As for KIN Two, its specs are meant to make it even more appealing. The phone rocks a 3.4-inch TFT capacitive touchscreen display that delivers a 480 x 320 pixel (HVGA) resolution, an 8-megapixel photo snapper with Lumi LED flash, 256MB of RAM and 8GB of flash memory, the same connectivity options as KIN One, and GPS receiver. The phones come with a custom OS, which is focused mainly on social networking and entertainment, but they won't offer the possibility to add more storage space to the equation.