If you are in the market for a mid-range Android 2.3 Gingerbread smartphone on Verizon rather than that top end Samsung Galaxy Nexus, and don’t mind hanging on for a while word has come down as to just when you could pick up the Gingerbread packing Samsung Illusion from Verizon.

According to the guys over at Rootwiki, their sources of the unnamed variety have let them know that the Samsung Illusion will be releasing as of the 12th of January 2012, although apparently the Android handset is also listed as available for “direct fulfilment” as of tomorrow the 23rd of November so if you happened to be on friendly terms with a Big Red rep you might stand a chance of getting the handset then, but this hasn’t been confirmed.

The same source has also revealed the specifications of the Samsung Illusion, which are a 3.5-inch 320 x 480 HVGA TFT display, 1GHz Cortex A8 Hummingbird processor, 3 megapixel rear facing camera, 2GB internal storage, pre-installed 2GB SD card, microSD expansion up to 32GB, Bluetooth, 3.5mm jack and runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread.

Obviously not a top end smartphone, but as the Google guys have said if a handset is capable of running Android Gingerbread then there is a possibility such a device could possibly see an update to Android Ice Cream Sandwich at some point, so that’s not out of the question.

The Samsung Illusion being a mid range device will no doubt come with a price to suit, however at this time the asking price for the handset is not known, but one can expect the pricing to be reasonable if not free on contract.

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