We’re not at CES in person but we’re definitely there in spirit, looking over the various coverage from top tech blogs. Engadget, once again, has one of the first comprehensive review of one of the hottest mobiles at the moment: Google’s Nexus One. Joshua Topolsky gives the Nexus One high points on design and feel of the hardware and noted the very powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, which is still hard to come by in mobiles. The AMOLED display holds a special place among the Nexus One’s honors, with a few minor drawbacks:

“In terms of touch sensitivity, the display is as good or better than any Android phone we’ve used. While the resolution is high (480 x 800), it’s missing 48 pixels that we expected given the size of the Droid’s screen. It didn’t bother us that much, but it’s noticeable in certain apps — Gmail for instance, where you have to scroll further in some menus than you do on the Droid. The big issue with the screen, though, is actually the color balance. We found colors on the Nexus One, particularly in the reds and oranges, to be severely blown-out and oversaturated — a common effect with AMOLED displays like the Nexus One’s.”

The 5 megapixel camera is an out-and-out success. The real score of the Nexus One lies in Google itself and how it sees its mobile OS. Noted, Motorola has produced a fine handset to run Android (currently our best smartphone) and with the coming out of Nexus One not long after may jeopardize the Motorola Droid’s future success. We agree with Engadget that the Nexus One is “just another Android phone.” We also agree that the Droid with its QWERTY keyboard and its Verizon tie-in is the better deal. We also want to add that had Google seen the finished product that is Moto Droid, it might not have contemplated the Nexus One at all. My own guess, but suffice it to say Nexus One is too small an effort in pushing the Android OS for the search giant. We expected a lot more.

[read: engadget]

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