The Samsung Galaxy Nexus is the first smartphone with the latest Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) operating system, and according to Mashable’s Charlie White, it’s the best Android phone yet.

A few reasons:

The screen. There are no buttons on the bottom of the phone, resulting in an enormous screen — an impressive 4.65 inches diagonally. The 1280 x 720-pixel Super AMOLED high-definition display gives an “exquisitely sharp view,” White says.

Its weight and shape. It’s a lightweight phone at 4.8 ounces and is only 8.94mm thick. “And, it’s the first smartphone I’ve ever seen with a gentle curve to its body, accompanied by a remarkable ‘Contour Display’ whose glass is also gently curved. It’s a subtle effect, but I think it’s downright beautiful,” White says.

Highly capable hardware inside. For the first time Samsung is using a 1.2GHz dual-core processor from Texas Instruments. It also has 1GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. The result is snappy performance and quick startup.

Google’s Android 4.0 “Ice Cream Sandwich” (ICS) operating system. White says it represents a giant leap in usability for this popular operating system. Scrolling down long lists is improved. You can toss off notifications by swiping to the left or right and more easily switch between apps that are running with Android’s true multitasking. There’s a new center button (the app drawer) that immediately takes you to screens full of icons that show apps separately from widgets.

Once knock, however, is the facial recognition feature you can use to unlock the screen. He says it often doesn’t work.

Read more at Mashable ^[1].