Like all electronics, cell phones often “freeze up,” especially if you have installed a bunch of applications or haven’t deleted old text messages in a long time. When a cell phone freezes up, or if some other minor glitch is occurring, performing a hard reset will often solve the problem. I’ve dealt with many customers who were freaking out about their Blackberry cell phone, Palm cell phone, or a number of other phones freezing on them but nine times out of ten, a hard reset took care of the issue.

Before performing a hard reset, you should always try a soft reset, if you can. To perform a soft reset, simply remove the battery from the device while the device is still on then re-insert the battery and turn the phone on. If the soft reset does not solve the problem, go ahead and try a hard reset. It is important to back up any information that you have stored in your phone to your computer, however, because performing a hard reset will reset the device to the original factory settings.

Here is a guide to resetting several of the currently most popular models of mobile phones:

Blackberry

For all newer Blackberrys (which have a trackball) such as the Pearl, the Curve, the Tour, etc., follow the following instructions:
1. Go to Options
2. Select Security Options
3. Select General Settings
4. Click Menu
5. Finally, select Wipe Handheld

For older Blackberrys that use the scroll wheel:
1. Go to the Options on your Blackberry device.
2. Go to Security Options
3. Go to General Settings
4. Choose the options by clicking the click wheel or menu button and select Wipe Handheld.
5. Confirm you want to wipe the handheld by clicking on the “Continue” button. The message is “Warning, all application data will be lost! Message service and other services will be disabled.”
6. The device will prompt you to type in the word “blackberry.” Type in “blackberry” and confirm.
7. The handheld will wipe itself of all information. In some cases after 10 minutes the hourglass will still run. After 10 minutes, pull your battery and restart your Blackberry.

HTC

For the HTC Magic G1, and the HTC Hero G2:
1. Turn the device off
2. Hold the “home” (house) and “back” (the arrow in the lower right corner)
3. Press the “end call button” while still holding the “home” and “back” buttons
4. Release the “home” and “back” button. A white screen containing technical information will appear with a red message asking to press the “menu” button.
5. Hit the “menu button.” The HTC Magic G1 will now boot with factory settings.

For the HTC Touch and the Touch Diamond
1. Press and hold the Talk and End buttons simultaneously
2. Use the stylus to press and release the Reset button on the bottom of the phone to the right of the charging port, but continue to hold the Talk and End buttons
3. Release Talk and End buttons when the menu appears and press enter to perform the hard reset

Motorola

For the Motorola Black Jack there are two ways to perform a hard reset:
1. The phone should be powered off first. With the phone off; press the Up Navigation button and the Power button at the same time. You will then be asked to format the Phone. Press 1 for YES!
2. You can also go to the Start menu and navigate to Settings/Security/Reset. Then, enter “0000″ for the password. The phone will format and reload the OS.

For the Black Jack II, there are also two ways to perform a hard reset:
1. Go to Start \ Settings \ Security \ Reset and then follow the prompt to wipe the device and/or the storage card.
2. With the phone powered off, press and hold UP on the directional pad. Then, turn on the device and continue to hold the UP key until you see a message on the screen. You will be prompted to select 1 for reset or any other key to cancel.

For the Motorola Q:
1. Turn the Moto Q off
2. Hold down the power button (hang up button) and the center key button (the button between the arrows) at the same time.
3. When the verizon logo appears on the device. Let go of both buttons.
4. A screen will come up saying to do a Master Reset. You will hit the left soft key to say yes to confirm.

For the Motorola V3 Razr:
1. Open your phone up and go to “Settings”
2. Next go to the selection for “Initial Setup”
3. Next go to the selection for “Master Clear”
4. Then select to confirm the option.
5. Now enter the security code which should be “000000”
6. Finally press select or ok and the phone will reset itself to the factory condition

Palm

For the Treo 650:
1. Turn phone off
2. Remove battery cover
3. Press and hold the Power key on the keypad
4. While holding the Power key, insert the stylus in the reset hole on the back of the device. Press and hold stylus for about one second
5. Two logos will appear during the reset
6. Release the Power key when the “Palm Powered” logo (second logo) appears
7. A warning message will appear: “Erase all data?
8. Press Up arrow key to complete the hard reset. Press any other key to cancel the reset.

For the Treo 680:
1. Remove the battery from your
smartphone, and then reinsert it.
2. When the Palm logo appears, press and
hold Power/End until the black
status bar at the bottom of the screen
fills and disappears, and then release
Power/End .
3. When the Erase all data? prompt
appears, press Up to confirm the
hard reset.

For the Treo 700wx:
1. Take off the battery door, but don’t take out the battery yet.
2. Press and hold Power/End .
3. While holding Power/End, remove the battery for approximately one second, then replace it while still holding Power/End.
4. When you see “Erase all data?” you can release Power/End. Press Up to confirm the hard reset.
5. If a language selection screen appears, pick the same language you use in your desktop software.

For the Pre:
1. Go to Device Info
2. Choose the hard reset option

T-Mobile

For the Sidekick II:
1. Swivel the screen 1/4 of the way
2. Insert a paperclip into the tiny hole to the upper left underneath the screen
3. Hit the power button while paperclip is inserted.

For the Sidekick Slide:
1. Make sure battery is minimum 25% charged
2. Switch phone off
3. Take out battery and re-insert it
4. Hold the letter R and power on button
5. Phone will start and loading picture will appear on screen
6. Phone will restart again
7. Now let go of the R and power button

For the Sidekick LX:
1. Press the Menu button.
2. Scroll to and select Settings
3. Scroll to and select System Info
4. Press the Menu, Shift and X keys simultaneiously.
5. Select Erase to erase the flash settings.
6. At the System Info screen, press the Menu, Shift and R keys simultaneously.
7. Select Erase to erase the Sign-In information.
8. Insert a paper clip in the reset hole while holding down the Power button.
Note: The device vibrates if all steps are performed correctly.

For the Google G1 HTC Dream:
1. Power off the Google G1
2. Hold Home Key + End key for about 20 seconds or until you see a “triangle with an exclamation point and a picture of the Google G1″
3. Open the QWERTY keyboard and hit Alt+W

Please feel free to post hard reset instructions for any other models in the comments!