Given Google Inc.'s reputation as a trend setter on the Web, I expected great things from its first mobile phone — especially since it is emerging more than a year after Apple Inc. launched the enormously popular iPhone.

And while it's far from perfect, the G1 powered by Google's Android operating system is packed with plenty of consumer-oriented features that may even make iPhone fans take notice.

Made by Taiwan's HTC Corp., the G1 is being released Oct. 22 by T-Mobile in the U.S. and will cost $179 with a two-year contract. The device, about the size as the iPhone but plumper, will be available in black or bronze. It sports a large touch screen, and the lower smidgen of the device is angled — the curvature seemed more stylistic than functional to me — and sports four buttons and a trackball.

Beneath the touch screen is a slide-out QWERTY keyboard that makes the G1 feel like a grownup's version of another device T-Mobile sells, the Sidekick. The keyboard will appeal to anyone who, like me, still prefers the feel of physical keys rather than virtual ones on the screen (sorry, Apple).

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