Hasta La Gadget!

On the heels of RIM’s official announcement of the BlackBerry Tour 9630, both Sprint and Verizon have rolled out teaser sites for the hot new phone.

Sprint gave away some specifics of their launch, too. The Sprint Tour will cost $199.99 with a new two-year contract and $100 mail-in rebate, and it will include some Sprint proprietary services: Sprint Music Store, Sprint TV, Sprint NFL Mobile Live and NASCAR Sprint Cup Mobile.

Sprint, Verizon, Bell and Telus are all remaining a little vague on their launch dates other than to say the phone is coming this summer, so if you want more details you can sign up on Sprint’s or Verizon’s sites. Check out our full news story about the Tour on pcmag.com.

Nokia today announced two new handsets set to debut before the end of the year. The smartphone wars got a bit more heated today with Nokia’s announcement of the E72. The successor to the E71 adds 10.2Mbps HSDPA, a 5-megapixel camera, an optical navigation pad, and a 3.5-mm headphone jack. The phone is due out in the third quarter of this year for €350 ($489).

Also due out in Q3 is the 5530 XpressMusic features a 640 x 360 touchscreen, a 3.2-megapixel camera with LED flash, and built-in Wi-Fi accessibility. The handset is set to retail for €199 ($278).

The new iPhone 3G S is coming out on July 19th. Because it’s a mobile phone, the pricing is really difficult to understand. Here’s the full deal.

All prices below are for the 16 GB model. For the 32 GB model, add $100. For the old 8 GB iPhone, subtract $100.

If you are an existing AT&T customer who has been in your current contract for at least somewhere between 18 and 22 months (it varies by individual), you pay $199.

If you are a new AT&T customer willing to sign a two-year contract, you will pay $199 plus a $36 activation fee, for a total of $235.

If you are an existing AT&T customer who hasn’t been in your current contract for 22 months, and you’re willing to extend your contract, you pay $399.

If you want no commitment and no contract, you pay $599 – plus the $36 if you’re activating it on a fresh line.

You will want to get AppleCare, which gives you decent service beyond the iPhone’s 90-day support period, for up to two years. That’s an extra $69.

Now, this means that most folks who signed new contracts for iPhone 3G models a year ago are not eligible for the lowest possible price. That was in your contract. Your two-year contract only gets you a discounted phone every 22 months. You agreed to that.

iPhone service plans are similarly complicated. Here’s how they break down.

If you want a Palm Pre, you may want to go get it this Saturday. Sprint’s president of business market groups, Paget Alves, said today that “there will not be shortages immediately, but eventually this product will end up being constrained” – that’s sales-speak for stores running out before they’re resupplied.

“This is like the [Nintendo] Wii for us,” Alves said.

We’ve been hearing contradictory things about Palm Pre shortages for the past few weeks; a few weeks ago, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse gave a dire prediction of shortages of units. 

Alves’ assessment was more nuanced. He said that any shortages will clear up “sooner” than “months,” and that Sprint is distributing devices to stores based on sales volume. He declined to predict exactly when the shortages would ease up, or how many Pres Sprint would sell.

“You can’t predict when the constraints will lift. It’s just a function of finding that intersection point between supply and demand,” he said.

Customers who aren’t able to pick up a Pre will be able to sign up on a waiting list online to be informed when it’s available at their nearest store, Alves said.