Motorola DROID 2 to launch with Froyo out of the box on August 12th?

Tuesday brought forth some interesting new information about the still unofficial Motorola DROID 2. Those who have had the opportunity to play around with a phone that doesn't yet exist, have found that as expected, the new QWERTY keyboard was an improvement over the one on the original. The phone also was much zippier with the 1GHz processor under the hood. Thankfully, the device apparently will be launched with Android 2.2 powering the unit which is great news for Verizon customers. The news that the Motoblur lite seen on the DROID X is also on the DROID 2? Not so great news. But when you stop and consider that Motorola has already been able to update the new Motorblur to accommodate Android 2.2, that could only mean that the Froyo upgrade should be closer to reaching the first-gen DROID and the DROID X.

Originally, as we reported, August 23rd was considered to be the launch date for the sequel to the DROID. Some new speculation suggests that August 12th would be a more accurate date to see the DROID 2 head out the doors. While heavy duty marketing of the DROID 2 is set to begin August 23rd, the 12th would see a "soft launch". With something like that, you see the real cellphone fans getting the first crack at the phone because only those who follow the industry closely would be aware that the phone is available without seeing commercials playing in heavy rotation on television.

Lastly, when the original DROID was released for sale last year, Verizon and Motorola had to get approval to use the name from Lucasfilms, the company owned by Star Wars creator George Lucas. To pay homage to the series, Motorola and Verizon will be offering a special Star Wars edition of the DROID 2 with the image of R2-D2 on the back of the handset. It is not known yet if the special edition will launch first, or if the Star Wars edition of the DROID 2 will cost you a few more dollars. Getting cellphone customers to pay a few extra bucks for a special edition has never required the use of an ancient Jedi mind trick. We still need to see Big Red introduce the phone and with the DROID X having been released just this past week, the carrier has its mind set on trying to ensure that there is enough inventory of that model in the system to meet the extremely heavy demand. In other words, Verizon still has plenty of time to pass along the important info like specs, launch date and cost of the DROID 2. And you will have plenty of time trying to convince your significant other that you need to use an upgrade to score the improved QWERTY and the zippier processor. May the Force be with you.

Motorola DROID 2 A955 Preliminary Specifications

source: DroidLife, Engadget