Hard Reset
 

I've searched and wasn't able to find the actual keystrokes needed to hard reset.

Lots of threads discuss just to hard reset, but for the life of me, couldn't find how to 'actually' do it. Is it just the soft keys at the same time and the power button?

soft keys and reset button.

Press and hold the 2 soft keys on the fromt of the phone (the 2 above the talk/end buttons) and while holding them, press the reset button with your stylus.

As a side note, if you want to avoid the extra software that your carrier installs, after the reset, it will give you a countdown to installation of software (3 seconds I believe). If you hit the reset button (soft reset) then, it will reboot and not install what many consider to be bloatware.