Red Hydrogen One Smartphone Launch Pushed Back To November

The Red Hydrogen One Android smartphone has been something of an enigma in the mobile industry. Red has a huge name and stands for high-end quality in the video and camera business, but the company is unknown in the smartphone realm. Its smartphone has started to seem more like vaporware than a real device with continued delays, and here we are with another delay.

The smartphone was previously expected to launch this summer, and with summer coming to an end the launch was expected this month. The only folks who will get hands on the Red Hydrogen One smartphone this summer will be pre-approved beta testers. Those folks will get their smartphone, codenamed Houdini, August 31 through September 11.

If you are among the folks who preordered the device, it will launch on October 9. However, general availability date for AT&T and Verizon will be November 2. We hesitate to call these dates firm because Red founder Jim Jannard has admitted there is a chance the launch window might slip again.

One big reason for the delay with the smartphone is a manufacturing change that the FCC required for the smartphone to get approved. The only model that will ship in the beginning will be an aluminum version in black and gray. If you want the fancy titanium model, it will land sometime next year in limited quantities. Pricing is still $1,295 which sounds more reasonable today than it did when the Red devices were first announced last year.

The big draw here is cinema quality video and the fancy 2560 x 1440 display capable of showing four holographic images. One potential downside is that the chipset inside isn't top of the line anymore. The device will use a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 instead of this year's faster and more efficient Snapdragon 845.