It seems that Android and Droid are everywhere these days, and that’s no wonder given an estimated $100M advertisement budget committed by Verizon for the Droid campaign alone. On top of that, we just love new gadgets and the buzz and excitement that go with it. Who doesn’t want to join the party?

Yet, with all that media noise it gets harder to objectively decide what features and functionality really matter the most before committing to a new smart-phone and the obligatory carrier contract. No question, the new Android phones and the Moto Droid are fantastic and give you just a glimpse of things to come, but the Blackberry Storm is in many ways an equal contender on a more mature platform. The launch of the original Storm last year was a bit of a flop – mainly because the software was just not ready for prime time and subsequent patches were slow to market. Here are 5 reasons why you should still look at the Storm when shopping for your next smart-phone.

RIM OS 5.0: What took RIM so long? The latest version of the Blackberry OS, just released in October, finally provides all the features it should have had when the Storm originally launched last fall, not to mention the many bugs that were fixed. The new OS puts the Storm back in the running and head-to-head against the other devices. Here are some of the feature highlights:

• Touch screen keyboard with 3 modes to choose from
• 3.2 MP camera with AF, LED flash and video recording
• Blackberry App-World (thousands of apps exist for the BB)
• Word completion and auto correct
• Notifications on message folders (email, sms, facebook, etc.)
• Multiple email account and address book sync
• Great SMS texting interface
• Media player (pictures, music, video)
• Volume control overlay on top of all apps
• Image resizing when sharing (email sms)
• Copy & paste

The Network: The coolest smart-phone is really only as good as the network, meaning – Most of the apps are no fun to use if you don’t have fast and reliable data coverage. AT&T’s 3G coverage or the lack thereof turns out to be one of the biggest source of user complaint with the iPhone. Verizon has a great 3G network and aggressively markets that difference in the “there is a map for that” commercials. Of course all Verizon smart-phones, especially the Droid, enjoy Verizon’s domestic 3G network, but you are out of luck if you travel overseas. Verizon uses CDMA while most of the world is running on GSM. The Blackberry Storm and the older Blackberry 8830 World Edition phones feature two built-in radios to support both CDMA and GSM. This is big, if you frequently travel abroad. The Storm seamlessly switches to a local GSM network as soon as you get off the plane and gets you access to your email and apps. International data usage costs extra (~$15/month), but you can enable/disable the feature as needed. Just call Verizon before your trip and allow a little extra time ahead of your first trip to get the necessary SIM card mailed to you.

Tethering: If you can’t live with your smart-phone alone but also need broadband speed connectivity for your laptop, tethering is a must. I love working online while taking the Acela train from Boston to NY. I just connect the Storm via USB cable to the laptop, which gives me broadband speed most of the ride and also charges the phone. One thing to remember though is that you’ll lose data connectivity when making calls. Of course you can accomplish the same with a 3G USB modem or MiFi device, but I like to keep the number of devices I need to bring along to a minimum.

Enterprise Integration: RIM basically invented mobile push email with seamless and secure enterprise integration. Most IT departments prefer the RIM BES (Blackberry Enterprise Server) platform over other solutions because of its robustness and massively granular security control. If your company needs secure mobile email with tight remote administration, RIM is still pretty much the only game in town. BES natively supports MS-Exchange and Lotus Notes. Traditional POP, IMAP and Web email are also supported through RIM’s hosted email connector. You can setup up-to 10 accounts and configure individual mail filters.

Usability: I remember the first time I used a Blackberry, having used other WinMo, Symbian and Palm smart-phones before, the BB felt immediately right. Things just worked as one would intuitively expect, the same way you get into any car and know where to find the turn signal. In all fairness though, I was late to the Blackberry craze, which I’m sure had its teething problems too. With all their features and functionality, Blackberry’s are still intuitive and easy to use even for the technically challenged. The iPhones success is built on the same premise, amongst many other things, but this is not about the iPhone… The Droid is on the other side of the spectrum with maximum flexibility and geeky charm that can be overwhelming at times.

At the end there are many individual and subjective reasons for picking one smart-phone over another. Your corporate IT department may have strong opinions on this as well, if you plan on using your phone for work and/or your company pays your monthly cellphone bill. All the latest smart-phones are amazing feats of technology and personal preference maybe the deciding factor in choosing your next phone. But choose wisely, buyers remorse and an early switch can be costly…

UPDATE: There is one reason not to get the Storm – poor web experience. The Blackberry web browser is trailing  far behind compared to Droid or iPhone. The browsing experience is slow and rendering of non-mobile optimized pages is very inconsistent. Unfortunately, 3rd party browsers like Opera still don’t support the Storm.