I agree with frostfire, a #3 blade is the shortest I'd go.
With dogs that grow hair instead of fur, I don't think it really does much to the texture. I know though that with dogs that traditionally get hand stripped, when they get clippered their coat starts getting softer, like westies and schnauzers.
When I get my standards, I'm probably going to keep them pretty short as puppies for a couple reasons. I'm getting 3 puppies at once from the same litter and want to keep them all cleaner, and I'm going to be training 2 to be retrievers, that means they're going to be in the dirt and mud and water a lot and I'm going to be training so much that grooming won't be my priority.
So we'll have 1 super fluffy poodle puppy, and 2 muddy things, lol.