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Nexus One is one of those phones that will be grabbing headlines and will be compared with the best mobile phones available in the market for the rest of 2010. Recent launches of smartphones from every manufacturer has had some sort of hypes and when the name Google is involved, it must be over-hyped. Yes, Nexus One is the latest flagship device engineered and sold by Google which was being rumored as the Google Phone for quite a few days. Let’s take a closer look at the phone and decide if it was worth the hype or not.

Design

All of the previous competitors of the iPhone has tried to be handsome if not anything else. ThisNexus One is not an exception by any means. The phone has an ultra thin sleek 11 mm body with curved edges that can make any gadgetophilic lusting of the device. From the design elements, you are sure to feel the classy HTC flavor and you will not also miss the Google part for its simple but effective design elements. The size of the device falls just between the iPhone and the Palm Pre with its 119 mm X 59.8 mm face. The weight is also minimal 130g for a device of its capability. The device doesn’t feel a very lightweight cheap device nor like a brick one and is just about the same weight as the iPhone weighing 135g.

Touchscreen Display

The display of the device is simply superb and most probably the best I’ve ever seen in a mobile device. The 3.7 inches AMOLED capacitive touchscreen can show 480 X 800 pixels and has other features like Multi-touch input method, accelerometer sensor and proximity sensor which does their job as usual. The pictures look vivid with very good color saturation and brightness. The texts also look crisp enough and can be read comfortably under sunlight. The display resolution is good enough for you to view the webpages even in zoomed out condition and read at least the headlines on the pages which is not possible in iPhone’s display.

Keyboard

Like the Motorola Droid, it has four hardware ‘buttons’ : Back, Menu, Home and Search. The buttons are nothing but just four touch sensitive spots on the display. But unlike the Motorola Droid, nexus one has no hardware keyboard. There is only a virtual keyboard but it functions very well and we have no complain against it. We specifically like the auto complete suggestions of the Android device. The iPhone suggests the best suitable word as you type the letters of it but nexus one and all other Android Devices show several guesses as you type it. This is very useful as you may often need a plural or an adverb of the same word which can not be suggested by the single word suggestion of the Apple iPhone OS. Overall, I feel that the virtual keyboard function is better in any Android device and in case of Nexus One, it is better than anyone else.

TrackBall

Yes, there is a trackball like other HTC built devices but somehow it feels that there was no need for it. To my perception there is no need of an extra pointing tool for a responsive touchscreen device like this and there is also no need to point or select things from the OS perspective. The placement of the trackball is also a bit awkward and does not fit naturally in the ergonomics of the device.

Applications

It is not expected that the phone will have access to the prestigious Apple App Store for its awesome applications or to iTunes for music or video but you can rest assure that you will get the necessary applications to satisfy your everyday needs and you should also keep in mind that the number of applications being built for the Android devices are growing at a rapid rate. With the phones like the nexus one or Motorola droid, it can be expected that the trend for building apps will be fueled more than ever.

Speed

The phone comes with an awesome Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD 8250 processor clocking at 1GHz. For comparison, let’s just say that the ‘fast’ iPhone has a processor that runs at a 40% slower clock speed than this. Opening Apps and scrolling through the lists are speedy but somehow you may not feel the true speed of the device (with respect to iPhone) because the current apps don’t need more processing power than the one at the iPhone. But having a beast like this will make you prepared for the future processor hungry apps.

Service Provider

Here Google calls for a divorce from the cellular phone devices and the cellular service providers. According to the sources, the phone will be available for purchase as an unlocked model and the customers can then choose the service providers between T-mobile and AT&T. There is no Verizon like the Motorola Droid but at least you have two options to choose between.

But buying the phone solo may cost you a big buck and if you like some subsidy, you have to get a two year contract with the one of these providers.

Camera

The camera is a no nonsense 5MP Camera with Autofocus and LED Flash. There are some advanced features like Smile Detection and geo tagging. To tell more about the camera, let’s just say that you won’t regret about forgetting your digital camera at home when there is a moment worth a snap in front of you.

Connectivity

It will be a standard quad band GSM phone that can be used with any GSM carrier throughout the world. The tri band 3G Connectivity also ensures that it will support the 3G services provided by any provider throughout the world. There are other common connectivity options such as the GPRS, EDGE and Bluetooth, WiFi etc. It has the common 3.5 mm headphone jack so that you can connect your favorite headphone to the device.

Memory

Internally, the phone has a 512 MB RAM and 512 MB ROM. It supports micro SD Cards upto 32GB and it comes with a 4GB Card included in the sales package.

Battery Life

The phone comes with a large 1400 mAh Li Ion Battery which is expected to last at least one day. The battery capacity is certainly better than most of its competitors but its power hungry processor and the biggie display will juice out the battery quicker than those without them. However, in any case the battery should last for at least one day for even the most heavy users amongst us.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, Nexus One has nothing in it that can be called revolutionary. The phone is of course a very good phone and will do business as usual but where is the innovative Google that everyone was expecting. This is just a ‘Me-too’ smartphone and is hardly anything more than a conventional consumer products. This is definitely not the phone that is going to turn the cell industry on its ear.

However, if you don’t like the iPhone for its limitations or don’t like the uncool quality of the BlackBerry Devices, this is a really nice alternative for your consideration.

Note : The Review is based on the observations of Joshua Topolsky at Engadget.com