CTIA 2013 is happening this week in Las Vegas and Tim is there in attendance for one reason, because Verizon scheduled a press event to take place, their first in quite some time. We have no idea what to expect once they take the stage, but you can probably think of a few good reasons. Will it be network related? Is their initial 4G LTE rollout complete? Will VoLTE make its first appearance? Or will we finally see the Verizon-branded HTC One? It could be a combination of all of those things for all we know. Verizon has been tight-lipped on this one, so stick with us during our live blog to see what happens.

The event kicks off at 11:00AM Pacific (2:00PM Eastern).

Hypebeast tank tops on? The HTC One on Verizon rumors won’t seem to die, and we’ve got another random one to toss out this afternoon, the day before Verizon takes the stage at a press event at CTIA. According to an XDA member who works for Sprint, their HTC rep stopped by this afternoon to check on things and happened to have a special device tucked away in his pocket. When asked about the 4.2.2 update for the Sprint version of the One, the rep reached for a second device, which he claims to be the Verizon version already running 4.2.2. This tipster mentioned that the device had the 4.2 notification toggles, likely similar to what we saw in the leaked 4.2.2 ROM for the HTC Butterfly. 

Over the last year or so, we’ve talked a lot about switching carriers. With policy changes frustrating consumers, tiered data hampering usage, and phones not being offered across the board on all carriers, there may not be a better time than now to consider a move. One downside to moving, though, is the worry of coverage with a new carrier not being equal to what you were previous receiving. The last thing you want to do is commit to a new carrier, only to find that your phone can barely hold a signal at home or that LTE won’t be in your neighborhood for years. 

If Verizon ever opens up a pre-order for a new flagship device that you are strongly considering or have already made your mind up on, jump on the pre-order. Over the last couple of years, I’ve seen pre-orders arrive early time and time again from Big Red. The Samsung Galaxy S4 is no exception, as pre-orders shipped at the end of last week and are now arriving as early as today to many. Readers of ours (as you can see by the image above) are now the “envy of everyone” they work with.

The device doesn’t officially launch until May 23.

Have you received yours? If so, we’d love to hear your initial thoughts on it!

Cheers Chris!

A couple of weeks ago, Dan Rosenberg announced that he had unlocked the bootloader of the AT&T Samsung Galaxy S4, but that he wouldn’t release his method until Verizon’s variant was also out in case they tried to patch it. With Big Red’s version arriving on doorsteps of pre-orderees, Dan had a chance to test his method thanks to a “helpful tester” and came out successful. According to a Tweet sent by Dan this morning, he successfully booted a custom recovery onto the Verizon version of the device and that he is looking forward to a release. 

Back on February 1, Verizon introduced a new set of prepaid plans that were laughable, to say the least. These new plans started at $60, which would get you unlimited talk and text along with 500MB of data. The second tier landed you the same unlimited benefits, but only 2GB of data for $70. Keep in mind that neither is capable of connecting to Verizon’s nationwide 4G LTE network and are instead stuck on their insanely slow 3G CDMA network. Also, prepaid offerings from companies like SmartTalk offer unlimited talk, text, and data for as little as $45 per month on HSPA+ networks. 

Yesterday, readers reached out to inform us that their pre-orders of the Samsung Galaxy S4 on Verizon were being processed and potentially getting primed for shipping. They weren’t messing around, as orders for many of them have begun to ship with estimated arrival times of early next week. The device was supposed to arrive around May 23 – at least that’s the new release date – but if they are shipping now, some lucky future GS4 owners could have their devices a day or so early.

Get ready! And be sure to browse through our Galaxy S4 review and 20+ tips and tricks video, so that you know all there is to know about Samsung’s new flagship. 

According to some of our readers, their Galaxy S4 pre-orders on Verizon are starting to be processed, and some even say they’re being shipped. Verizon previously listed that the Samsung Galaxy S4 would launch on May 30, but then bumped it up a full week to May 23.