OpenMoko announced the upcoming release of its new Linux-based FreeRunner mobile phone. The event will take place tomorrow on July 4 and its shipping will begin on July 7. The highly anticipated device will also be available in several markets in India and Europe.

The open source handset was first introduces in January at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and even though since then it has encountered many developments, there is still room for many more. The company announced that several updates will soon be available in order to further improve the product and increase its appeal for the nontechnical user segment.

The retail price announced for the U.S. market is of $399. The device will be available with 850 Mhz or 900 MHz tri-band GSM support. It will feature a 400 Mhz processor, a 2.8 inch VGA touchscreen and a resolution of 640 x 480. It will also offer GPS, 128 MB of synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM) which is the new and popular solid state computer memory, 256 MB of storage, two accelerometers, WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0 and GPS.

The handset measures 4.8 by 2.4 by 0.7 inches and weighs 6.5 ounces.

One of its biggest problems is the lack of 3G support which is one of the main features requested by smartphone buyers.

OpenMoko was found in 2006 as a project looking to build a new line of open source mobile phones. The company’s first project was an open source Linux based OS developed with free software for mobile phones. Soon after came the first device called Neo 1973, which is FreeRunner’s predecessor.