Motorola enjoyed somewhat of resurgence in popularity in 2009 thanks to the excellent Milestone handset. Now in 2010 the manufacturer looks set to continue this with the introduction of the impressively named, impressively featured Backflip.

Obviously the main talking point about this phone is its unusual flip design, but I will talk about this a little later, as there are plenty of other features boasted by the handset that tend to get overshadowed by its initial appearance. In terms of the all important OS, or operating system, the Backflip used the much hyped Google Android System. This impressive OS is being used by many handsets now, and seems to be the real competitor to the iPhone. Social Networking fans will love android, and lets face it, this isn't just a group of teenagers anymore with the age of online users getting older by the day! Several apps are available to not only allow you to view sites such as FaceBook and Twitter, but also apps that allow you to enter multiple status updates and groups all of your sites together. Another appealing aspect of Android is the much lower cost of downloading items than in Apples iStore. A 528 MHz processor drives everything along nicely, with a quick responsiveness when changing tasks and speedy loading of pages. In terms of connectivity the phone is certainly well covered. Not only is the Backflip a 3G phone but it also benefits from Edge and Wi-Fi being included.

As you may well guess, the Motorola is a phone of the flip variety, but not just the standard 180 degree kind. The physical qwerty keypad is located behind the screen, so when the unit is turned into the landscape position and flipped this keyboard sits perfectly beneath the screen, allowing for the easy composition of texts and emails. The inclusion of a physical keypad will obviously add to the physical dimensions of the handset, but at 108 x 53 x 15.3mm and weighing 133 grammes it is by no means huge. The screen itself measures a fairly standard 3.1" and shows a resolution of 320 x 480 pixels and displays 262k colours. This very responsive capacitive touchscreen performs well, but does benefit from a neatly positioned trackpad on the rear of the device, meaning more precise navigation on certain areas.

The Motorola Backflip impresses in both performance and design. The obvious draw of the handset will be its eye catching, unusual flip design. But this point aside, the phone looks great, feature a host of useful feature, with one of the key features being the excellent Google Android OS. This phone looks set to be one of THE handsets of 2010.