The BlackBerry Bold 9700 is like a classically-tailored suit: elegant, predictable, practical, and easy to slip into, but not visibly innovative. It advances the state of the art without making unsettling changes. In some ways, this is good; the Bold ...

Excellent form factor. Razor-sharp screen. Wi-Fi calling. Good keyboard. Solid call quality

Browser still needs help. Not a big jump up from earlier models

If you prefer your smartphones evolutionary, not revolutionary, the BlackBerry 9700 will fit your bill perfectly. It's the latest iteration of a very successful design.

Simple and affordable, the Doro PhoneEasy 345gsm looks like a good low-cost option for basic users. But it has an important design flaw, and there are better simple options available. I can't recommend this phone enthusiastically.

Very affordable. Excellent keypad

Somewhat difficult to set up. Call quality not quite as good as competitors

The Doro PhoneEasy 345gsm is an attractive, simple voice phone, but there are several better options, including another one from Doro with the same service plans.

Sometimes second-best just isn't quite good enough. Verizon's Touch Pro2 is the second-best of the four carrier models of this phone, after Sprint's. It's also Verizon's second-best Windows Mobile smartphone (after the smoother HTC Imagio) and their ...

Enough screen and keyboard for any application. Classy looks. True world phone

Huge. Windows Mobile 6.1 is old

HTC's Touch Pro2 finds a good home on Verizon, with true world phone capabilities, a proper headphone jack, and top-notch voice quality in addition to its sublime QWERTY keyboard and super-sharp touch screen.

Here's a great gift for Grandma: an inexpensive, easy-to-use mobile phone that will keep her connected. The Doro PhoneEasy 410 gives you simple voice calling on an attractive device at a recession-friendly price. Grandma will need you to set it up, ...

Excellent keys. Elegant design. Easy to use. Good voice quality. Affordable

Somewhat difficult to set up

The Doro PhoneEasy 410gsm is an excellent, affordable option for older folks and technophobes who want a simple voice phone, though they may need a more tech-savvy family member to help set it up.

The Motorola CLIQ is the company's first Android-powered smartphone. It's also a stellar device for the socially inclined. It aggregates updates from social networking sites, photo sharing sites, and Web-based e-mail. It could easily serve as the ...

Excellent call quality and speakerphone. Near-perfect keyboard. Ground-breaking social networking integration. Cloud-based MotoBlur backs up PIM data. Syncs with Microsoft Exchange

Heavy. Screen could be a little larger. A little buggy

Motorola's first Android phone is a coherent, powerful communications device that brilliantly integrates social networking systems. Oh, and the CLIQ is a great smartphone, too.

The BlackBerry Storm2 9550 finally delivers on the original Storm 9530's promise. It's a powerful device with an innovative click screen that really worksand it feels finished instead of like an engineering prototype. Having said that, the Storm 9550 ...

Vastly improved touch screen. Wi-Fi. True world phone. Powerful messaging and multimedia support

Browser doesn't live up to the screen's potential. Touch still feels grafted on at times. Still a bit buggy (though nowhere near as bad as the first Storm)

The second time's the charm for RIM's innovative click-screen smartphone; the Storm2 cures almost all of the original's ills.

The new HTC Pure is the latest in touch screen Windows phones, a business-centric crowd pleaser for folks who feel the iPhone's visceral appeal, but want to stay within the cozy embrace of the Microsoft ecosystem. It makes some major missteps with ...

Sharp looks. Stunning LCD display. Great Web browser. Good voice quality

Squished control keys and on-screen keyboards. Poor speakerphone. Horrendous dongle required for headphone use

The HTC Pure is a stylish option for business customers looking for a Microsoft-powered smartphone with top-notch Web browsing.

Phones with slide-down QWERTY keyboards are finally starting to become popular, as shown by squat but solid handsets like the Samsung Reclaim over on Sprint and the new Motorola Karma QA1 on AT&T. The Karma is just three and a half inches tall, and ...

Excellent reception. Good build quality. Satisfying keyboard. Quality music and video players

A little thick and heavy. Poor camera

The Motorola Karma is a solidly built handset with good audio quality and a very usable QWERTY keyboard, despite its small size and unusual form factor.

The Samsung Instinct HD is the first truly high-def video phone in the U.S., but you pay a heavy price for that in several ways. The Instinct HD gets its name from its capable built-in HD camcorder, plus its HD output for displaying video on a large ...

Sharp camera and HD camcorder. HD playback over HDMI really works. Capacitive touch screen. Plenty of media features. Wi-Fi

Very poor battery life. Takes a long time to boot up. Proprietary HD cable not in the box. Buggy media players. Expensive

The Samsung Instinct HD has a novel feature set and can record and display HD video (at least on an external screen), but several issues combine to make it a bit frustrating to use.

Verizon lacks a compelling smartphone lineup in comparison with other carriers, but it has some excellent feature phones. For example, the LG enV Touch VX11000, our current Editors' Choice, contains two 3-inch LCD screens and a solid QWERTY keyboard. ...

Great voice quality. High-resolution touch screen. Excellent camera and video recorder

A bit large and heavy. Required Verizon data plans are a trap for the consumer

The Samsung Rogue is an excellent feature phone, but beware of Verizon's costly required data plans.