Samsung Continuum hands-on (photos)

The Samsung Continuum will be available for preorder from Verizon starting November 11 and in stores November 18 for $199.99 with a two-year contract and after a $100 mail-in rebate.

The Android 2.1 smartphone features two displays: a 4.3-inch Super AMOLED touch screen on top and a 1.8-inch Super AMOLED ticker display on the bottom.

Other features of the Continuum include a 1GHz Hummingbird processor, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 3G, mobile hot-spot capabilities, and a preloaded 8GB microSD card.

The ticker display shows real-time updates from your social networks and RSS feeds.

It will also alert you to new messages, missed calls, new voicemail and so forth. When you tap on an individual icon, it will launch the appropriate app.

When you tap on the small icon on the right of the ticker display, it will bring up a full view of all your RSS feeds where you can add and subtract feeds.

Here's a view of all of subscribed social feeds. If you have new Twitter mentions or Facebook alerts, it will also appear in the ticker display.

Rather than having to wake up your whole phone, the Samsung Continuum features grip sensor technology that allows you to grip the bottom of the phone to activate the ticker display. You can then swipe left to right and vice versa to see all your updates.

You can also use ticker display to control your music player while working in other apps.

If you get an incoming call while you're watching a video, the Continuum will give you the option to accept, ignore, or ignore with text. The smartphone will also pause the video when you get a call.

The Continuum comes with a 5-megapixel camera with LED flash and HD video capture. The smartphone also offers DLNA and DivX and Xvid video format support.

On the left side of the phone, the Samsung Continuum features a volume rocker and a Micro-USB port. Overall, the smartphone is quite compact and lightweight like the rest of the Galaxy S series.

Meanwhile, the right spine features a dedicated camera button.

The top of the phone houses a 3.5mm headphone jack and power button.