WIRELESS AND MOBILE NEWS

2009 showed an increase in features in smartphones with a decrease in prices with "Buy One BlackBerry Get Any" deals selling a lot of BlackBerry smartphones, netbooks and MiFi.  As our readers know, we like to review all the reviews, summarize them and then let you know a consensous of  our finding, we took crunched some numbers and came up some interesting results for the the Top Ten Best Coolest Smartphones for 2009.

This truly is the year that Android gained momentum. Android was only featured on one winning smartphone, last year.  This year Android was top Operating system of the winners, followed by RIM

The top manufacturers were HTC and RIM, followed by a a no-show last year Motorola.

As far as the smartphone that garnered the most attention and made  the most lists, it was no surprise that Apple's iPhone 3GS was mentioned consistently in almost every round-up article.  Last year, there was a three-way tie between the BlackBerry Storm, iPhone 3G and T-Mobile G1.  This year, the iPhone came in first place by one mention. 

Here are the results from Wireless and Mobile News' search for the top ten best coolest smartphones of 2009.

1. First Place:

iPhone 3G S (AT&T) - the iPhone was buzzed more than another smartphone, is popular with a younger crowd and has a cult-like following. Exclusively from AT&T, after studies of network speeds, it has been suggested that dropped calls and data problems are caused by the iPhone hardware.

2. Second Place: 3-Way Tie

Droid  by Motorola (Verizon) - Since Droid landed in November, it has received great reviews and helped the Android operating system gain huge momentum. Verizon is heavily promoting the Droid by offering a free Droid Eris with a 2-year contract (until 12/24.) Featuring Google's Android 2.0 operating system, the DROID has a large and brilliant display, and is fully customizable with apps downloaded from the Android Market. The voice search on all Droid phones is a major asset.  Droid is packed with  time-saving  features.

Palm Pre (Sprint) - Announced at CES, last year, the Palm Pre has almost physic-social networking and calendaring features. The Palm Pre  received good reviews, and  was called the "sexist phone since the iPhone." There are many downloadable useful Palm Pre apps.  The Sprint Everything Plan saves money.

BlackBerry Bold 9700 - This well-reviewed BlackBerry Bold 9700 received a rating of 4 out 5 by all the reviewers we surveyed.  Reviewers thought that the addition of the trackpad was a great improvement. Wirefly is still offering their free deal on the BlackBerrry Bold 9700 from AT&T for new customers and renewals. The BlackBerry Bold 9700 is the latest in the BlackBerry Bold series that features a QWERTY keyboard, Wi-Fi, email integration, and 3.2 megapixel camera with video capture. 

3. Third Place

BlackBerry Tour - Reviewers called  BlackBerry Tour "the best Verizon smartphone," while one just wrote that the BlackBerry Tour is the "no-brainer" choice for CDMA networks, where you can't get the BlackBerry Bold.  It has a QWERTY keyboard, sharp/crisp screen, standard 3.5 mm headphone jack, push email and is a world smartphone. It is part of the  Verizon a Buy One BlackBerry Get Any Free BlackBerry or Device deal. If you buy one BlackBerry Tour, you can get another BlackBerry or mobile broadband device for FREE.

4. Fourth Place 2-Way Tie

HTC Touch Pro2 - the most keyboard-tastic smartphone of the year. The HTC Touch Pro2 sold-out when it first came out from Verizon.  Reviewers of the HTC Touch Pro2 called it the the King of Windows Mobile smartphones and the best high-end smartphone. The world phone has a 3.6 WGA tilting touchscreen, 3.2 megapixel camera, Bluetooth and up to 5.2 hours of battery life.  It sold-out quickly, came back in-stock and then sold-out again. If you buy a HTC Touch Pro2 to replace a smartphone, HTC will give you a $100 rebate.

Droid Eris - The Droid Eris  by HTC has also gotten great reviews. It has 528MHz Qualcomm processor, a 320x480 screen, and Android 1.5.  This touchscreen-only smartphone also has HTC enhanced Touch Sense UI, visual voicemail, Wi-Fi, MS Exchange Sync, Media Uploader(for Facebook, Flickr, Picas, Gmail,) Google services, news widgets, and Footprints Geo-tagging for photos. The HTML Browser supports Flash Lite. The Droid Eris by HTC comes with 8 GB MicroSD card, Bluetooth, 5 megapixel camera.

5. Fifth Place

HTC Hero - The HTC Hero is a full-featured smartphone with Wi-Fi capability, a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen with pinch-to-zoom capability and a fingerprint resistant coating, integrated GPS navigation, and trackball navigation.

6. Sixth Place

Nokia E71 (which also placed last year) - The Nokia E71x is a world smartphone, full of bells and whistles for a great price.  Reviewers all wrote that the push email and business functions are great for the Nokia E71x. It has 3G access, GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and a 3.2 megapixel camera that shoots video.

BlackBerry Storm2 - The BlackBerry Storm2 has received good reviews and is an improvement over the first version.  Where it really excells in the email department.  The BlackBerry Browser is improved with faster JavaScript and CSS processing as well as support for Gears and BlackBerry Widgets. is part of the  Verizon a Buy One BlackBerry Get Any Free BlackBerry or Device deal. If you buy one BlackBerry Storm2, you can get another BlackBerry or mobile broadband device for FREE.

myTouch 3G - Reviewers liked the sleek compact design and the stylish zippered case it comes packaged in. It features the now famous Android OS, Outlook email, GPS, 3.2 megapixel camera and customizable widgets. 

Motorola Cliq - The Motorola Cliq has MOTOBLUR that offers peace of mind, widgets and social-networking skills. Features include a 5 megapixel camera, GPS, Wi-Fi, video capture, Full HTML web browsing and Android Market apps.

Because of al the ties, there are actually a lucky 13 on our "Top Ten List." Also-rans with one mention were not given places in the list.

Smartphones That Received One Mention (No Place)
BlackBerry Pearl 8130
LG enV3
LG Xenon
Samsung Solstice
Samsung Moment
Samsung Instinct HD
Samsung Memoir
LG enV Touch
Samung Impression
Samsung Behold
Samsung Omnia
BlackBerry Curve 8900
HTC Ozone
Nokia N900
Samsung Reclaim
HTC HD2
Palm Pixi

This non scientific round-up of the best top smarpthones of 2009 was distilled from the following reviews, articles, and trends: Digital Trends, Consumer Reports, Top Ten Reviews, CNET (mutiple articles), PC World,  Consumer Research, Tech Crunch and eWeek (Notable Splashers)