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One last thought about last week’s CTIA cell phone industry show in Las Vegas, anywhere you went you were able to run into a new Android phone.

Take Motorola (please).  If you moseyed over to their booth on the show floor you were immediately greeted by their new i1 (that’s a small letter I and the number one) — the world first iDEN Android smartphone.

iDEN means that the phone works on the Sprint Nextel network and allows you to use the infamous Direct Connect wireless voice message system. You know – the one with the “chirp” sound when you press down the push-to-talk button.

The phone itself is a full-fleged Android phone.  It has a 3.1-inch screen, runs on Android OS version 1.5, sports a 5 megapixel camera, comes with a 2GB microSD memory card (and supports the big, new 32GB cards), also has Wi-fi, Bluetooth, Microsoft’s Document Viewer software as well as Swype and T9 on-screen keyboard input.  (Love that Swype!)

iDEN is Motorola’s technology that Nextel (and now Sprint) use.  Most people are familiar with iDEN’s Direct Connect, push-to-talk feature and the famous “chirp” sound the phone makes when you have a two-way “walkie-talkie”-type conversation with another Direct Connect user.

iDEN is neither a 4G or 3G system.  It’s actually much older 2G technology which still has a lot of life left in it. 

To get the most out of this iDEN technology, Motorola features the new Opera Mini 5 Web browser.  It uses fewer phone resources and provides a terrific browsing experience.  It looks very, very speedy in practical use situations during the limited time I had to play with a sample device. 

On the other hand, when you’re i1 is near a Wi-fi network it will work at Wi-fi speeds.  For many users that is just fine.

Morotola and Sprint didn’t actually announce pricing or availability just yet.  All they’ll say is the “i1 will be available in multiple regions around the globe beginning in Q2 2010.” 

Expect to actually see one in the wild toward the beginning of the summer.