Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus will cost $450 over two years at T-Mobile

Samsung has refreshed the original 7-inch Galaxy Tab with the Honeycomb-bearing Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus. Besides having a name that is a mouthful, the new Tab 7.0 Plus will be available on T-Mobile November 16. The new tablet will tap into the T-Mobile 4G network and requires a data plan with the carrier. What is bizarre is that T-Mobile is charging buyers a $249.99 down payment at purchase time, followed by two years of monthly payments to purchase the Tab Plus.

These monthly payments are $10 for 20 months, and are free of interest. This means the subsidized cost, since T-Mobile also requires a 2-year data plan, is $449.99. More importantly, this strange payment method means you do not own the Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus until after making these payments for almost two years. It appears T-Mobile is trying to make it cheaper up front to get the tablet, but not clear at all what happens (besides the standard ETF) if you cancel your plan inside of twenty months. Do you owe them an ETF and the remaining monthly payments on the tablet in that case?

The Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus looks like a nice update for the 7-inch tablet line. It ships with Honeycomb. where the earlier model is running Gingerbread. My experience with a 7-inch tablet running Honeycomb wasn't very good, but hopefully Samsung has figured out how to do it properly.