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Even though it wasn’t officially introduced at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show Google’s Nexus One phone was definitely the top technology topic at last week’s show.

Any and every journalist and industry wag that was carrying a Nexus One in their pocket in Las Vegas became an instant celebrity. Video cameras of all shapes and sizes followed those lucky enough to have a Nexus One so they could show off the device and describe their feelings.

I decided it was best to live my “real” Google phone test sample for a few days before telling you about it. Glad I did. I found some interesting things you should know.

Thin, slim and drop-dead beautiful, the HTC-designed Nexus One is the most modern Android-based smartphone to date. It has to be compared to Apple’s touchscreen iPhone device to understand just how important this phone really is.

Overall, both phones are nearly the same size on the outside. The Nexus One is a drop thinner overall but, for the most part, the dimensions are pretty close.

The Nexus One’s Snapdragon processor is nearly twice as fast as the iPhone’s (1GHz vs. 600 MHz). The Google phone has a 3.7-inch AMOLED screen (800 by 400 pixels). The iPhone sports a 3.5-inch display (480 by 320 pixels). Both phones handle Wi-fi connections and Bluetooth and both are GSM/EDGE world phones – but the iPhone uses AT&T’s 3G band while the Google phone uses T-Mobile’s (different) 3G band of frequencies.

The Nexus One has a 5 megapixel camera. The iPhone: 3 megapixels. The iPhone comes with either 16GB or 32GB of non-removable storage. The Nexus One has 512MB built-in plus a 4GB microSD card (expandable to 32GB).

Apple claims as much as 12 hours (2G) or 5 hours (3G) of talk time on a fully-charged battery. Google says the Nexus One can provide you with up to 10 hours (2G) or 7 hours (3G) of talk on their fully charged battery. These numbers are wildly overly optimistic. You will almost definitely never see these numbers – for either(or any other) modern-day 3G phone. Expect you’ll have to recharge your battery during the day if you use it a lot. At least you can swap out the battery for a fully charged pack with the Nexus One.

The latest iPhone is the 3G-S. Until now it was the yardstick for all other smartphone designs. But the Nexus One does it one better in nearly every way, shape or form. This is not to say that the new Google phone is perfect – far from it. But it is the first device to be able to compete and in many cases surpass the iPhone at it’s own game.

Part of Google’s secret is the software. The Nexus One runs on Google’s latest version of their mobile operating system – what is officially known as Android Mobile Technology Platform 2.1 (Eclair). At the moment this is the only Android phone to run this version of the OS – although there are rumors that Verizon’s Droid and possibly even T-Mobile’s G-1 might be upgradable is the near future.

System 2.1 allows the Nexus One to look great. The best descriptions I’ve seen of OS 2.1 new screens is “eye candy.” The graphics are crisp and clean and the almost-3D, colorful moving backgrounds are pretty amazing. They’ve also changed the “pull-up” applications menu into a single-on screen button which then dissolves into a palette of icons.

System 2.1 also adds speech-to-text everywhere there’s a text box. I can’t believe how accurate it is in translating my “Brooklynese” into English. Well done, Google.

The hardware is pretty special too. That larger screen in a super-thin shell makes the Nexus One one of the most pocket-able smartphone designs ever.

Set-up of the Nexus One was unbelievably easy. Maybe that’s because I use Gmail and all the calendar and contact frills that go with it. Either way I typed in my address and ALL my information was loaded into the new phone within 30 seconds. That’s very, very cool.

But, like I said at the beginning, the Nexus One is not a 100% perfect device. There seems to be some sort of problem with the phone having trouble keeping locked to a 3G connection (not to be confused with an iPhone not being able to keep any connection at times).

Many Nexus One users (I actually didn’t think there were that many at this point) are complaining that their new phone bounces back and forth between 2G and 3G without warning. The blogs are all abuzz with complaints.

The best non-explanation I saw was a video showing a Nexus One handling 3G perfectly when it was sitting on a desk but connected to just the 2G network when the user picks up the phone. Know what that means? When the phone is picked-up the guy’s hand is blocking the receiving antenna inside the phone.

There may be an actual problem with these phones – but you have to remember that with two-way radios for GSM/Edge frequencies, for 3G frequencies (UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA), for GPS, Wi-fi and for Bluetooth jammed inside an ever-decreasingly miniaturized device shell (with teeny antennas) you’re likely to have big problems.

The other two annoyances I found with the Nexus One was the application screen was difficult to navigate at times (it freezes unless you move it from the top) and the color red (I don’t think the phone does a perfect job at reproducing that color at least compared to other smartphones).

As for price, the Nexus One is available through Google as an unlocked device for $529 or for only $179, with a service contract, for new T-Mobile customers. Existing T-Mobile customers may also qualify for this lower price. Google is also promising a Nexus One for Verizon and Vodaphone customers sooner-rather-than-later this year.

The phone comes with a protective fabric sleeve/case (a nice touch).

Overall, the Nexus One is the best Android-OS smartphone to date – and is going to put a lot of pressure on Apple to come up with something super-spectacular in their next iPhone refresh.

Now this is getting interesting!