Verizon Samsung Galaxy Nexus drops Google Wallet support

When Google released the Samsung Galaxy Nexus last year to coincide with the release of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, it was pretty much one of the more advanced handsets in the smartphone market despite the fact that some of its components do not befit a handset considered as a flagship device. At the time it hit the shelves, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus for a long time was the only handset in the world to run the official Ice Cream Sandwich version of Android and is also capable of making use of the NFC chip in its chassis to support the Google Wallet mobile payment system.

The Samsung Galaxy Nexus for Verizon is on sale now starting at 29.99.

Sad to say, the Google Wallet feature is not supported in the Verizon version of the smartphone that’s why users of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus had to result to sideloading the application onto the handset just to take advantage of it. However, these same users are officially no longer able to take advantage of the sideloaded Google Wallet on their devices.

Last Friday, it was a big surprise for users of Google Wallet on the Verizon version of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus to be confronted with a little error message that said “This version of Google Wallet is no longer supported.” This shouldn’t be a surprise at all considering the fact that Verizon never officially supported the Google Wallet functionality that’s why users of the handset had to resort to workarounds just to get the feature working on their devices. In fact, the reason for the non-support is because Verizon is among the carriers that is backing the ISIS mobile payment system, a competitor of Google Wallet.

And when you thought things are going to be rosy for Google Wallet moving forward after usage of the feature doubled in recent weeks, this development leaves Sprint as the only carrier in US shores that packs official support for the Google Wallet functionality. This however is not expected to last long because the carrier is already working on its own mobile payment system that will also compete with Google Wallet. If you still however want to make use of your Verizon Samsung Galaxy Nexus as a mobile payment solution, then you just have to wait for ISIS to be officially launched though.

As for the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, the handset is still one of the better performing handsets in the lineup of Verizon. Still waiting for the official Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update, the handset relies on its Texas Instruments OMAP4460 chipset to power its operation. The computing power needed by the device is supplied by its dual-core 1.2 GHz ARM Cortex-A9 processor and 1Gb of RAM. Storage space on the smarthone comes up to 32GB but there is no option to have this expnanded. Its display on the other hand is a 4.65-inch SuperAMOLED panel with an HD resolution of 1280 x 720 pixles. A major pain point however of the device is its mediocre camera department with only a 5MP shooter at its back panel and a 1.3MP snapper at its front-bezel.

Buy the Samsung Galaxy Nexus for Verizon now starting at 29.99.