T-Mobile Selling Samsung Galaxy TabT-Mobile Selling Samsung Galaxy Tab

Samsung Galaxy Tab Teardown

T-Mobile on Wednesday became the first U.S. carrier to start selling Samsung's Galaxy Tab, offering the Apple iPad competitor for $400 with a two-year service agreement.

Samsung's price includes a $50 mail-in rebate for the Android-powered tablet, which has been a hot topic of conversation among technology enthusiasts for months. T-Mobile is also selling the Galaxy without a service contract, which jacks up the price by 50%, to $600.

T-Mobile is offering two service contracts, one for $40 a month for 5 GB of data and the other for $25 a month for 200 MB.

T-Mobile is not expected to be the only carrier selling the Galaxy for long. Verizon Wireless is scheduled to start selling the device Thursday and Sprint Nextel on Sunday. AT&T also plans to offer the Galaxy, but hasn't said when.

Verizon plans to sell the Galaxy a bit differently than T-Mobile. The carrier has decided to skip a service contract discount and sell the device for $600, with the option of a month-to-month data subscription. Data plans begin at $20 a month for 1 GB.

Sprint Nextel plans to sell the Galaxy only with a two-year data plan. After paying $400 for the device, customers have the option of two plans: $30 a month for 2 GB or $60 a month for 5 GB.

The Galaxy runs Google's Android 2.2 operating system and has a 7-inch diagonal touch screen, which is 2.7 inches smaller than the iPad. The Galaxy ships with MediaHub, which is Samsung's version of the Apple iTunes Music Store. Third-party apps are available for download through the Android Market.

Samsung introduced the Galaxy Tab at a New York event in September. The Galaxy is expected to be the only major rival to the iPad until Hewlett-Packard and other major computer makers start releasing products. Without any real competitors, the iPad in the third quarter captured 95% of the tablet market, according to Strategy Analytics.

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