why they don't do it? ipad as iphone os... many slate are coming with android... why not a wp7 slate? i think it should be awesome, don't you?
I'm sure it will happen. By MS? I wouldn't bet on it, but there's nothing stopping MS's official partners from making a device. C-Motech made a Windows Mobile 6.5 tablet last year. If it does happen it will probably be anywhere between 5-8 inches since the highest resolution possible is only 800x480
Blue Ice K4 said:
why they don't do it? ipad as iphone os... many slate are coming with android... why not a wp7 slate? i think it should be awesome, don't you?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe HP Slate will comes with WebOS from Palm, I guess you already know that HP bought PALM
4 main OS's
Out of the 4 main OS's of choice Android,iPhone,WebOS & WP7 I personally think WebOS & WP7 would be the best tablet experience to have on a device with w 7"+ screen size.
I really don't understand what everyone's hang up is with having a phone OS on a tablet.
It's bd enough that we have to endure the closed phone OS ecosystem on phones, why would you want to move that to the tablet realm?
What happened to all the people maligning the iPad because it ran a phone OS?
Spike15 said:
I really don't understand what everyone's hang up is with having a phone OS on a tablet.
It's bd enough that we have to endure the closed phone OS ecosystem on phones, why would you want to move that to the tablet realm?
What happened to all the people maligning the iPad because it ran a phone OS?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
more people are buying into the "what it does, it does really well" talking point. I don't know how many times I've read that, and heard it by ipad owners. Real tablets need another year or 2 to get the right hardware to use a real OS well at acceptable battery life, weight, and performance.
The HP Touchsmart is a step in the right direction. We're at like 1st & Goal for a real tablet envisioned like 10 years ago.
gom99 said:
more people are buying into the "what it does, it does really well" talking point.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which is kind of ridiculous because the point of the evolution of the computer is that it enables you to do more and more with one device.
This single-minded design ethos just restricts the customer further and further, and the fragmentation of operating systems is going to ensure that development is spread between all of them, rather than focussed on one of them (alternatively you're just going to see one rise to dominance and all the others will fade away).
Having a desktop OS on a tablet allows you to leverage the design and development work that's already gone into that operating system.
I see a lot of people/sites talking about how HP -- in their supposed killing of the Windows 7 Slate -- wants to own both the hardware and the software. I think these companies really need to take a more in-depth look at that business model -- the only company it's worked for is Apple, and it's arguable whether or not that's because Apple actually makes it work, or because Apple has their reality distortion field at full power.
Besides, if you've ever used an HP OEM PC that hasn't been formatted, you know just what a terrible idea it is having HP responsible for any kind of software development...
Spike15 said:
Besides, if you've ever used an HP OEM PC that hasn't been formatted, you know just what a terrible idea it is having HP responsible for any kind of software development...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's actually true about every OEM out there.
vangrieg said:
That's actually true about every OEM out there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know, I was just citing HP as a specific example because they're rumoured to be killing off the Windows 7 Slate in favour of using an in house OS (WebOS).
The fact that companies are looking to own the OS and the hardware just sooms like a quality-sacrificing money-grab to me.
HP is a hardware company, and they make really good hardware. Microsoft is a software company, and they make really good software. There's a reason that they keep out of each others' markets, and that's because they would compromise the quality of the finished product. Great HP hardware running crappy HP software wouldn't amount to anything...
Spike15 said:
The fact that companies are looking to own the OS and the hardware just sooms like a quality-sacrificing money-grab to me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They have tons of ambitions usually, and within big corporations like HP it's impossible to say that something they make sucks. So at the end of the day even if they may know they're bad at software they'll never acknowledge it, which sooner or later leads to bad decisions. They have reality distortion fields of their own.
Anyway, HP isn't a company that knows how to focus on anything. So I would expect to see different tablets from them, their acquisition of Palm doesn't mean much in this respect.
gom99 said:
Real tablets need another year or 2 to get the right hardware to use a real OS well at acceptable battery life, weight, and performance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Everyone seems to forget that tablet laptops with tablet versions of Windows XP/Vista/7 have been available for years. And yes they have acceptable battery life, weight, and performance.
Anyone who ever mentions "Laptop Replacement" and iPad in the same sentence should be required to look up the Lenovo Thinkpad X200 multi-touch tablet. Heavier and more expensive? Sure. But you only need one! No need lug that useless laptop around with you for every occasion that you might want to type something a bit longer than a web address or a text message, or every time your iPad fails at some trivial task that any 10 year old computer could easily perform.
But of course the iPad is not about features is it, it is about ease of use, and "doing what it does really well".
So what are these things that the iPad does "really well", compared to a laptop or desktop computer? Is Mobile Safari on the iPad really any easier to use than any desktop web browser? What about watching movies and listening to music (was this ever difficult)? Well it's optimized for touch input you say! But really, with 1024x768 and above screens, the difference between a finger and a mouse pointer is pretty close to being insignificant.
And lets not forget that Windows 7 came with multi-touch friendly features built in well before the iPad was even announced.
But of course no one knows this.
Anyway, I had a point, before I got sidetracked ranting about the iPad (I really need to work on this). My point was, tablet computers running the Windows operating system already exist, are available for a price no more than an average laptop, are optimized for multi-touch, and are easy to use, fast, and extremely powerful.
Pick one up, or at least check one out, and you'll forget that you ever thought you wanted to own an over-sized phone.
and you'll forget that you ever thought you wanted to own an over-sized phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's not even an oversized phone, cause it can't make phone calls. It's just an oversized music player.
MooGoo said:
And lets not forget that Windows 7 came with multi-touch friendly features built in well before the iPad was even announced.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I saw this when Windows 7 was released and was totally psyched for Windows 7 multi-touch tablets.
I had the fortune of grabbing a tablet that my Uncle was trying out for work back in the early 2000s, one of the old school HP or Compaq ones that only worked with the stylus and ran XP Tablet Edition. I was reading an eBook version of Angels and Demons, and it was love at first sight.
Ever since I've wanted a modern tablet, but there really hasn't been anything.
MooGoo said:
My point was, tablet computers running the Windows operating system already exist, are available for a price no more than an average laptop, are optimized for multi-touch, and are easy to use, fast, and extremely powerful.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been thinking of picking up a convertible ultra-portable (most likely the HP EliteBook 2730p if I go that route) and I'm just mostly concerned about the increased weight. I want a tablet to fill a very specific niche (replacing and enhancing the functionality of a book) and I don't need 3.3 pounds worth of keyboard et cetera to do that...
i think that we are already ready at hardware specs to make a slate with real os onboard... 5 hours aren't so bad...
but did you think wath can mean using windows 7, also with multitouch pack, ONLY with fingers and... on a 9" screen? don't forget that if os has touch optimization... the apps don't, if they weren't already designed... try to think about web surfing with firefox without touch optimization like form management and with menus not finger and friendly... now think all the others apps... i think we'll go crazy after few minutes
i think that mobile os are not better, but they are build to be finger friendly (unless winmo6 hehehe) and the experience with that is completely different and awesome respect a real os only with finger gesture, unless somebody develop an entire ui for win7 and sw start to have a finger friendly design and gestures...
different are the tablet pc, with keyboard and touchpad, in that case you can switch and having always the best input device method available.
bye!
Blue Ice K4 said:
but did you think wath can mean using windows 7, also with multitouch pack, ONLY with fingers and... on a 9" screen? don't forget that if os has touch optimization... the apps don't, if they weren't already designed... try to think about web surfing with firefox without touch optimization like form management and with menus not finger and friendly... now think all the others apps... i think we'll go crazy after few minutes
i think that mobile os are not better, but they are build to be finger friendly (unless winmo6 hehehe) and the experience with that is completely different and awesome respect a real os only with finger gesture, unless somebody develop an entire ui for win7 and sw start to have a finger friendly design and gestures...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm so tired of people preaching "finger friendliness". It seems in order to be "finger friendly" to these people, the entire screen needs to be occupied with just one giant button.
Do you all have Parkinson's?
dont worry, i haven't parkinson...
i just want a device where i dont want to touch twice the button because the first time i didn't aimed well the touch.
i just want a device where the apps doesn't require a keyboard.
i just want a device where there are apps...
what do you want to do with a slate? a device without keyboard and 9" screen...
internet, mail, youtube, movies, gps, mp3, chat, skype, videocall, games and others "mobile apps"... at this moment all these thing can be made with a mobile os with a best experience; with win7 they could be made, but there aren't all (games for example) and the experience it's surely poor respect to a mobile os...
Spike15 said:
I'm so tired of people preaching "finger friendliness". It seems in order to be "finger friendly" to these people, the entire screen needs to be occupied with just one giant button.
Do you all have Parkinson's?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OMG YOU READ MY MIIIIIIIIIIIIIND.
Finger friendliness does not require super sized UI elements. An operating system that has a finger controlled touchscreen as one of its input devices, can be programed so that, on detection of finger input, the areas of activation for common control elements such as buttons, check boxes, scrollbars, links etc, would be expanded, and thus not require precise placement as would be the case with a mouse pointer. You can already see this kind of finger adaptation on decent mobile web browsers such as the one built into Android which can accurately detect clicks on links even on a completely zoomed out web page (Opera Mobile 10 on the other hand could barely detect a click if the entire screen was a link...sigh)
This same finger awareness could be used to detect presses within scrollable areas to enable finger drag scrolling, just as TouchFlo originally did for WinMo.
And on the off chance you are presented with some nightmare of overlapping buttons, then the ability to zoom in the entire screen (Magnifier in Windows 7) can be used to compensate.
In short, no UI redesign should be necessary for finger control of most computer applications. Of course there will be exceptions, games in particular, many of which will get patched, some needing significant redesign.
That is the one thing the iPad offers that thus far is unique. It is the only significant platform for large format touch screen applications. Apple's trick this time around was to outsource their trademark innovation almost entirely to 3rd party developers. So far seems to be working.
Blue Ice K4 said:
i just want a device where i dont want to touch twice the button because the first time i didn't aimed well the touch.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then learn to not suck so much at touchscreens.
That's like saying you want a keyboard that you don't have to learn to type on. Every interface paradigm is going to have somewhat of a learning curve.
Blue Ice K4 said:
i just want a device where the apps doesn't require a keyboard.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What are you talking about? Until they take speech recognition (or something else esoteric) to the next level, all apps that require any kind of input of text are going to require a keyboard, which onscreen or hardware.
Blue Ice K4 said:
i just want a device where there are apps...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And there are no "apps" for Windows 7?
You're just coming off as stupid. Your beyond-atrocious grammar doesn't help matters.
Blue Ice K4 said:
what do you want to do with a slate? a device without keyboard and 9" screen...
internet, mail, youtube, movies, gps, mp3, chat, skype, videocall, games
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What are you talking about?
The only thing in that list that I can't see myself doing easily on Windows 7 is GPS. There's probably some kind of GPS software for Windows, but I can't name any off the top-of-my-head, so I'll have to acquiensce that point.
As for the rest:
Internet: I love how people just throw "internet" around. What exactly are you referring to? "Internet" refers to "inter-network" and is therefore any situation wherein hosts on separate networks communicate.
The HP Slate has 3G and WiFi, so I think this qualifies.
Perhaps you were referring to "web browsing", which would be using a browser to view pages on the internet via HTTP. What's wrong with doing that in Windows 7? Does everyone not know that Windows 7 has built in multi-touch capability? You can get an HP Slate with Windows 7 and fire up IE and browse by touching links, pinch to zoom...it even has more robust multi-touch support that iPhone OS, being that it supports right-click and rotate multi-touch gestures.
Click here and scroll down to "Gestures" to see just how robust multi-touch support in Windows 7 really is...for clarity's sake, all those gestures emulate calls that already exist in Windows, so an application doesn't need to be multi-touch aware for you to be able to use multi-touch to zoom in it.
Mail: Why not? I think this point actually exemplifies what Windows 7-based tablets have over other operating systems. Look at all the crying that Android users do because Android doesn't have native support for Exchange.
Get a Windows 7 tablet, throw Outlook 2007/2010 on there, how much money says I have the best Exchange support available, plus support for all the connectors etc. and built-in POP3/IMAP4 support Outlook has.
If you're going for a touchscreen device, and you want to do mail, you'd have to be stupid not to go with Windows.
YouTube: Flash support (HP actually released a video that was devoted to nothing more than Adobe discussing AIR and Flash on the Slate) and Internet Explorer? How could that get any better?
Movies: I keep coming back to this whole "it is Windows" argument, and you're going to see that be a recurring theme. This is what really makes a Windows 7-based tablet special -- the fact that you can just run Windows software on it. This is why fragmenting the mobile OS market is bad, because your support isn't all consolidated on one platform.
You want to watch movies? I'm pretty sure Windows 7 ships with WMP12, and that, that has built-in DivX support. If that's not good enough for you, I'm sure you can use the WiFi/3G connection (or plug in a thumbdrive!) and install VLC media player.
Plus the Slate has graphics acceleration support for viewing 1080p movies!
Again: What more do you want?
GPS: I already acquiesced on this one.
MP3: Gee doesn't WMP come with Windows 7? Pretty sure that's been playing MP3s since...
...since...
...it came out in 1998?
And again, it is Windows! Don't like the built-in media player, get VLC or WinAmp or...
Chat: I'm pretty sure all the major IM clients are available for Windows. If you want to use a lot of IM protocols at once, I'm pretty sure things like Trillian and Pidgin are available for Windows!
Skype: See "Chat".
Videocall: See "Chat".
Games:
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Dear God!
Blue Ice K4 said:
"mobile apps"... at this moment all these thing can be made with a mobile os with a best experience
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For the record, "mobile apps" are people reinventing the wheel. They have a Facebook website, they have a Mobile Facebook website, so instead of leveraging that, and the fact that HTML/CSS/JavaScript is a relative standard, they make an app that's specific to each platform.
With Windows 7-based tablets, existing Windows development can be leveraged upon. Rather than redeveloping the entire application they can just build in the multi-touch features that are built into Windows. There's no hacking, to third-party garbage, this is a Windows-based device leveraging built-in Windows functionality.
Blue Ice K4 said:
the experience it's surely poor respect to a mobile os...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All these myraid "mobile os[es] [sic]" do is fragment the market to the point where developers cannot have their application on every platform. When you buy a tablet buying some funky OS, like WebOS (for example) or some funky custom distro of Linux, do you really think some developer is going to get you an app before Windows 7.
No, because by targeting the Windows 7 tablet, the developer can simultaneously target the desktop audience.
Which is far bigger than the mobile audience, and will be most likely indefinitely.
i have a prototype tablet my company has been developing and all i can say is windows7 on it is amazing plus all the features you have in your cell phone can be implemented in these tablets with windows 7. i think apple did another FU customer with the ipad. tablets are not toys but products to be used in an educational or work manner then in between play. i think everyone wants an ipad like tablet as over the years there has been a degradation of intelligence. if you want eye candy use your phone. if you want functionality use your tablet.
HackMimic said:
if you want eye candy use your phone. if you want functionality use your tablet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Or you could just use a phone with WinMo or Android.
Related
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I have been a long time Windows Mobile user and I've had the SX66, Dopod, Kaiser and I've bought a Tilt2 from eBay (haven't received it yet).
I'm thinking of switching to an iphone mainly because of the amount of good software it has; There are apps to manage wordpress blogs, joomla admin apps, sugarcrm applications to manage customer relations. It seems that it can get a lot more done on the iPhone than the Windows Mobile.
On the Windows Mobile platform, you tend to fiddle with ROM updates, setting up your device so that "hopefully" this time it will work fast and smooth only to discover you need another ROM flash to fix new things.
Software has been disappointing on the Windows Mobile platform, but maybe the Marketplace will change all that...I know I might get a different opinion, so what would you have to say being a Windows Mobile user?
Most of the so-called "good software" that the iPhone has is a replacement for webpages.
The Facebook iPhone app? http://m.facebook.com.
Manage a WordPress blog? Correct me if I'm wrong (which I doubt, I administer my own WordPress) but doesn't WordPress have a WebGUI you should be able to access from your phone's web browser?
The best thing about the Windows Mobile platform is that it's Windows. Microsoft doesn't try and lock down development, they don't try and lock down the apps that you can run, they don't try and lock down fiddling with the OS. You don't have to hope and pray it's in the appstore, because anything that's written for WM you can just drag-and-drop to your phone, run the *.CAB, and it's installed.
There's also the freedom from iTunes (which is the biggest PoS piece of software ever).
WM6.5 has an intuitive, speedy, and finger-friendly interface. There's really no reason to buy an iPhone over a Touch Pro 2 at this point, beyond wanting to be "trendy" (which makes you an idiot, btw).
EDIT: You say you can get "a lot more done" on an iPhone. But how when you can't run simultaneous apps?
Spike15 said:
There's really no reason to buy an iPhone over a Touch Pro 2 at this point, beyond wanting to be "trendy" (which makes you an idiot, btw).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What about the fact that it has hugely much more powerful hardware, a capacitive touch screen, better games, and better sound quality when playing music? Or the fact that it has a far superior and much more intuitive UI? Don't get me wrong, I own a TP2, and the iPhone was one of the options I rejected when choosing what to buy; but really, both are excellent devices. The TP2 is aimed more at business users with multimedia an afterthought, while the iPhone is primarily a multimedia device with business use an afterthought; but both are very good at what they do.
It all depends on what kind of person you are and what's important to you..
The iPhone has it's advantages. It is easy to use out of the box, and has a lot of apps for it. The TP2 is close, but not quite there yet. There are less apps and still lots of "old Windows Mobile" holdbacks like small menus (ie. the left and right menus on the menu bar).
The iPhone's screen, being a capacitive screen, is also much more responsive than the TP2's resistive screens. However, the TP2's screen has a higher resolution and IMHO looks much nicer.
What is basically comes down to is, how much do you want to customize your phone?
If you want to change anything about the basic way the iPhone works, you can't. From what I understand, you can't even change the background on your home screen. This may not be the case for jailbroken phones, I'm not sure.
If some kind of snazzy new way of navigating comes out for the iPhone 4G or whatever, you can't upgrade to it. This is not the case for Windows Mobile phones. When WM6.5 came out, I know people that have flashed it to their old HTC touch pro phones. Yes, it takes some technical know-how, but once you do it you can get almost a brand new phone out of it.
The iPhone's browser is better than Opera, but it's pretty close now. And when a new browser comes out, you can use it on your TP2, whereas with Apply you are stuck with what Apple allows you to have.
I recently bought a Tilt2 for myself and an iPhone for my wife. I am technical, she is not. I care if my phone won't turn on using a specific button, she does not. So there you have it..
Now Android, that's a whole other ballgame
if you are a WM user and even consider of a iphone just go with the Iphone i have neve consider iphone ever...yes i have tried it and know the ends and out of the iphone more than more iphone user but WM is much better.
I am surprise to find that you can run WM6.5 and most likely WM7 on old device like Blue Angel, Prophet etc.
I'll just pretend to argue for a moment:
- It could also mean that the platform itself did not evolve much.
- Platform couldn't evolve much because the software are holding back evolution.
- There are too many Windows Mobile devices, means more QA time to ensure it works on the common hardware / resolutions etc. and less time for innovations.
iPhone; one device, Appstore does the final QA process so that it at least have a good looking icon.
I seriously hope that the Marketplace changes all that in the future, is everyone happy with the window mobile apps and games at this point?
edmondt said:
I am surprise to find that you can run WM6.5 and most likely WM7 on old device like Blue Angel, Prophet etc.
I'll just pretend to argue for a moment:
- It could also mean that the platform itself did not evolve much.
- Platform couldn't evolve much because the software are holding back evolution.
- There are too many Windows Mobile devices, means more QA time to ensure it works on the common hardware / resolutions etc. and less time for innovations.
iPhone; one device, Appstore does the final QA process so that it at least have a good looking icon.
I seriously hope that the Marketplace changes all that in the future.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can run Windows 7 on a 10-year-old PC.
Your "argument" is total trash.
Spike15 said:
I can run Windows 7 on a 10-year-old PC.
Your "argument" is total trash.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you mean?
edmondt said:
I am surprise to find that you can run WM6.5 and most likely WM7 on old device like Blue Angel, Prophet etc.
I'll just pretend to argue for a moment:
- It could also mean that the platform itself did not evolve much.
- Platform couldn't evolve much because the software are holding back evolution.
- There are too many Windows Mobile devices, means more QA time to ensure it works on the common hardware / resolutions etc. and less time for innovations.
iPhone; one device, Appstore does the final QA process so that it at least have a good looking icon.
I seriously hope that the Marketplace changes all that in the future, is everyone happy with the window mobile apps and games at this point?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
edmondt said:
How do you mean?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your argument is based around the fact that the newer Windows Mobile OSes can be made to run on older hardware, and supposing that because of that, the platform [Windows Mobile] hasn't evolved that much.
This [your argument] is fallacious because 10 years ago the de facto operating system standard was Windows 98, Windows ME, perhaps Windows 2000.
I recently took a PC from this era, and installed Windows 7 on it. Windows 7 runs slower on this PC than it does on a more modern PC, granted, but it still runs acceptably.
Your argument, therefore, is trash, since most (all?) of the phones we're dealing with in this context, are not so ridiculously old, and therefore it is very plausible that they run a newer OS quite well.
I read this in someone signature today and it is sooooooooo true and fits this thread...
Windows Mobile = Freedom
Apple iPhone = Fascism
I'd give credit but can't remember who...
Basically, if you want someone telling you how your phone should look, operate and preform, go with the iPhone... If you want the freedom to tinker and play with settings, layouts and preformance, Windows Mobile all the way...
Both have the ability to be plug and play devices... If this is how you plan to use it, as is, then go iPhone... As you stated, There are way more apps available to the iPhone user... But look out... Some of Microsoft recent developments show that there may still be some fight left in them... With the recent release of MarketPlace, the highly anticipated release of Windows Mobile 7 and Zune integration, it seems they are trying to spark up some competition by following in Apples footsteps...
Microsoft knows they have fallen way behind in the Mobile Phone market, especially when windows mobile is being referred to as a Legacy OS... Now it's time to take action...
Personally, I'm looking forward to seeing what they can do...
So, is it the Red Pill or the Blue Pill...? Choose wisely...!!!
Spike15 said:
Your argument is based around the fact that the newer Windows Mobile OSes can be made to run on older hardware, and supposing that because of that, the platform [Windows Mobile] hasn't evolved that much.
This [your argument] is fallacious because 10 years ago the de facto operating system standard was Windows 98, Windows ME, perhaps Windows 2000.
I recently took a PC from this era, and installed Windows 7 on it. Windows 7 runs slower on this PC than it does on a more modern PC, granted, but it still runs acceptably.
Your argument, therefore, is trash, since most (all?) of the phones we're dealing with in this context, are not so ridiculously old, and therefore it is very plausible that they run a newer OS quite well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You also have to consider that just because it is newer does not necessarily mean it requires more power. Development can improve power and performance, but do not forget that development can improve efficiency as well.
I will also note that I got my tp2 yesterday. Third windows mobile phone after a Mogul and a TP1. The TP2 is -VERY- similar to the tp1, which I expected, being that they have the same OS. I will have to concur with everything that has been said defining the differences so far in this thread.
I am a manager at a sprint store and -ALWAYS- describe windows mobile phones as the free-est (is that a word?) experience out of any phone I have owned. The countless modifications you can perform overwhelm any other smartphone I have owned [iPhone, Palm Pre, HTC Hero(which rocks too)] There is almost no limit to what you can customize in your WinMo device.
This also has its drawbacks. People who want a cookie cutter, out of the box, cool device should stick to an iPhone or a Palm Pre. Those who have the know-how and the desire to tweak their device should lean toward a windows mobile device. Apples and Oranges imo.
Good luck, I know you will enjoy whichever device you decide to use.
I've been a WinMo man since 2005, when I got my Dell Axim. When the Axim was obviously dying, I decided to be open-minded and gave the iPhone a try (borrowing it from a friend) before settling on HTC TP2.
I have to say I really liked iPhone for its consistency. You only need a finger a button, and after a couple of minutes you've figured out when to use which. Graphics performance is outstanding: you drag a picture or map and it stays glued to your finger without any sign of jerkiness. And generally, everything works the way it's supposed to.
By contrast, with TP2 there is no such consistency. You start off with your finger and after a while get annoyed and pull the stylus out, then after a minute you realize you need a keyboard and pull out that one too. Then you get bored of landscape mode and shove the keyboard in, then you put the stylus back in only to pull it out a minute later (iPhone is much easier to operate with one hand than TP2). And of course it takes a lot of effort to make many things run the way the're supposed to.
Ultimately, I got TP2 for many reasons: I didn't want to be a slave to Apple, I didn't want to be a slave to iTunes, and the fact that AT&T network sucks didn't help. There is so much more you can do with Windows Mobile: with a little patience, you can customize almost anything. There is a wealth of free applications that offer really important functionality, and it doesn't feel like somebody is trying to control every one of your steps.
So I just have to agree with the others: for a lay user iPhone is the better choice but if you are technically inclined WinMo devices are more interesting and offer way more opportunities.
NilRecurring said:
I have to say I really liked iPhone for its consistency. You only need a finger a button, and after a couple of minutes you've figured out when to use which. Graphics performance is outstanding: you drag a picture or map and it stays glued to your finger without any sign of jerkiness. And generally, everything works the way it's supposed to.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I must have better hand-eye co-ordination than everyone, but I never pull out the stylus unless I'm hand-writing notes ( :3 ) or I'm using regedit.
The only time I miss buttons is when I'm trying to select a new artist / song from the list in Windows Media Player while driving.
And seriously, when you're watching the road and operating a touchscreen out of the corner of your eyes...the icons could be the size of Texas...you'd still miss...
NilRecurring said:
By contrast, with TP2 there is no such consistency. You start off with your finger and after a while get annoyed and pull the stylus out, then after a minute you realize you need a keyboard and pull out that one too. Then you get bored of landscape mode and shove the keyboard in, then you put the stylus back in only to pull it out a minute later (iPhone is much easier to operate with one hand than TP2). And of course it takes a lot of effort to make many things run the way the're supposed to.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I prefer to think of the stylus and keyboard as advantages. Texting/reading emails/writing emails while driving is a terrible idea. Like most terrible ideas, I have done it before. A lot. Having used a Mogul and Touch Pro before a Palm Pre, an iPhone, a Hero and a Samsung Moment, I find myself reaching for the stylus occasionally for the increased accuracy. I cannot stand even the most intuitive touch screen keyboard. I hate the Mogul, Touch Pro, Touch Pro 2, iPhone, Hero and Instinct virtual keyboards equally. Having to slide out the keyboard? I am grateful that this advanced, useful and stylish equipment allows me that convenience.
warrenmrogers said:
I am grateful that this advanced, useful and stylish equipment allows me that convenience.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am equally grateful.
However, I'm enraged that the HD2 won't offer this...
>_>
i've been using winmo devices since 2004 when i bought a motorola mpx200 and i've been using windows since 3.1, i've used every windows in both platforms until then. the thing i can say about windows in general is it is evolving indeed. you can't even compare a win 3.1 or even 95 with xp or especially with 7 imo and same goes for wm 2003 and 6.5.
saying windows isn't evolving based on it can be run by older devices is just dumb (no offence intended) being a former computer science engineering student i can say that the most important thing our instructors were telling us was when you programme improve your coding to require less ram and cpu power and modulate. especially win 7 does this perfectly. so it is basicly good programming rather than a not evolving platform.
about iphone vs tp2, i prefer tp2. i've used my friends' iphone 2g and 3g (i even jailbreaked and unbricked 2g actually and tried to teach how to use the 3g to the other one so you can say i tampered with both of them for a pretty good time) i truly hated both of them. i am not saying this because i want to trash iphone i understand why some people may like it but it is just no good for me. simple example: when i went into the settings i was like "what this is it??" and no multitasking? thanks but no thanks.
let's return to good programming and not evolving issue for iphone. iphone 2g os was ~250 mb, our HTC wm6.5 is what 175 mb custom roms are 130-140 mb. the nice things iphone does are because of its larger os. what apple is doing is just putting an enormous os to a phone and expecting their fast cpu to be able to handle it. i don't know about 3g s but the others weren't handling it so much imo. that's why it has no multitasking i guess, because it is barely handling the os.
and not evolving? let's take a look at iphone history. what's is the difference between 2g-3g and 3g s again? i am so glad it can now copy-paste and take videos btw (can't remember how long i've been doing these with a winmo phone). maybe even some day apple releases a 3g-sx or something and iphone users can even use video call
conclusion is you may like iphone i don't iphone has its advantages tp2 has its own but let's not be silly by saying win platform is not evolving because it can be run by older devices especially when iphone's "evolving" is well known
Why do these iPhone/Touch Pro2 comparisons keep coming up? They each have their advantages and disadvantages just like the Macs and PCs. This is a TouchPro2 forum, so obviously the bias will be towards the TouchPro2. There are numerous threads already on this. You like to play games, get the iPhone. You want your phone for business, get the TouchPro2.
One thing I really miss on TP2 is scroll buttons I had on my Axim. Now, iPhone doesn't have them either, but I found its finger scrolling works much better than on TP2. I often view pages in landscape just to make use of page up/page down buttons. I tried VolDPad to configure the volume buttons for scrolling but it's very buggy and the volume buttons are not too comfortable for scrolling anyway. BTW, what I liked best about myTouch was the trackball (you don't know what you're missing until you've tried it), but that's for another discussion.
warrenmrogers said:
I am a manager at a sprint store and -ALWAYS- describe windows mobile phones as the free-est (is that a word?) experience out of any phone I have owned.
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Click to collapse
Agreed. Compared to Apple, Microsoft is much more open and less intrusive. Apple has already become an evil empire, and Google seems to be going there.
Pocketnow.com has a great story on Windows "Phone" 7 and details about what happened to Windows "Mobile" 7, codenamed Photon.
I think it's worth a read. I can add a little detail: Photon has been killed about 18 months ago. That's how long development of Windows Phone 7 took them. 18 months. And that's why the Windows Phone 7 they've shown at MWC looks so unfinished: Because it is.
Photon was the original Windows Mobile 7 project. An evolution of Windows Mobile 6. They were hard at work back then, trying to make Windows Mobile 7 competitive to iPhone OS. Windows Mobile 7 was originally planned to be released in mid 2009.
But at some point, they dumped the whole project and decided to start from scratch. Photon was dead. And Windows "Mobile" was doomed, making way for Windows "Phone". Instead of Photon, they released Windows Mobile 6.5 in mid 2009, a stop gap release to give them more time to finish their new Windows Phone 7 project.
Well, we all know how that turned out.
I personally think that they've made a mistake. I think Windows Mobile 7 (Photon) would have been competitive, as it essentially would have solved all of Windows Mobile's problems, but preserving the power of Windows Mobile, the reason we use and like it.
Windows Phone 7 will instead be much more closed and remove a great proportion of the power user features, that were the reason for us not to move on to other platforms, like the iPhone.
But what do I know? Windows Mobile 7 wouldn't have been much different from other platforms, like Android and iPhone OS. Sure, it would have had much more power user features, but it would have been centered around applications, like the others. It would certainly have gained a significant market share, but no dominance. With Windows Phone 7, instead, Microsoft is aiming higher.
But that also means a lot of risk. It means Windows Phone 7 might fail completely. In the end, it will come down to how good they are at getting developers excited about their new platform. That's where Palm failed, despite having a very compelling platform with webOS. Microsoft might fail the same way, though they have a much better starting position than Palm (more money, more resources, better developing tools).
In my opinions, they've taken too much risk while desperately trying to create something different from their competitors' app-centric platforms. As Engadget said it: Being different does not necessarily mean making a difference. If they can make a difference, they might dominate the smartphone market some time, like they dominate the desktop OS market. But if they fail to make a difference... well, Windows Phone might fall into oblivion, like Palm's webOS.
I like the Windows Phone 7 UI. I like it a lot. See my take on the interface quoted at the bottom of this post.
But Windows Phone 7 is very similar to Vista: Just like they killed the "Longhorn" project, they killed "Photon", and started from scratch. And just like Vista, what they're going to release by the end of 2010 will be an unfinished product.
They're trying to make you think that 7 is their lucky number, but actually, it might turn out that it's not, and Windows Phone 7 is just like Windows 6 (Vista).
Also, Windows Phone 7 is not that different from Palm's webOS: When the Palm Pre was released, webOS was a nice looking mobile OS, but lacking features and refinements. And lacking third party applications. Expect the same to happen with Windows Phone 7.
Here's the Pocketnow story: http://pocketnow.com/thought/thoughts-on-windows-phone-7-series-btw-photon-is-dead
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In short: This is easily and by far the best and most well thought through UI I've ever seen. Ever.
I particularly like
- the ability to pin pretty much everything to the first page (but unlike Sense, as many things as you want), whether it's contacts, programs or whatever
- the things you pin to the first page not being static, but also showing information - a very clever way to bring together the iPhone's icon-based home screen with Windows Mobile's information based home screen.
- the navigation through the pages, with the text on top going out of the screen to show you that there's more you can discover by swiping left/right
- the panorama backgrounds on all the screens (cover arts in music, a random picture in photos etc.)
- the ability for third party developers to integrate their stuff (like additional social networks or streaming services) into the hubs (I hope there will be a lot of freedom for third parties to do so!).
- the seamless integration of all kinds of services in general, whether it's Exchange, Windows Live (finally!!), Facebook...
I also particularly like that some good concepts from previous Windows Mobile versions have been preserved:
- long press menus
- softkeys
- quick search through any list (in WM6.5, it was the keyboard icon, now it's the required search button)
Those enable a consistent UI throughout all applications, contrary to the mess you find on the iPhone, where important buttons like "back" are in different places depending on the application you're in.
OK, enough of the praise, here's what I do NOT like:
- The all applications list: That should be a grid, cause there's lots of wasted space there.
- There seems to be no easy way to get to the music controls while music is playing in the background.
- Apparently there is no easy way to switch between running applications, this seems to work much like WM6.5, with the back button taking you to the application you used before. This is a mess, the back button should open some kind of task switcher instead.
Will that awesome UI be enough to keep me from buying an Android device? Well, ONLY if I get all the important applications from the beginning, like for example satellite navigation (TomTom, Copilot...) and ONLY if there are no restrictions on how I use my device - give me multitasking, unlimited access to the file system and registry, let companies develop competing applications (like browsers) etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great writeup...it's obvious that in order to attain mass market share MS needs to develop an interface that just works straight out of the box. It has to work for all ages which is something Apple have done with the iPhone..simple and attractive with a huge incentive to keep ones interest high through their ever growing appstore. If they can get it right first time and with the enthusiasm from application developers they may well be onto a winner but the win may not come immediately.However, they need to make every step count along the way and the longer they take the bigger the gap to the lead.
I also believe MS may leave at least one door unlocked to get their OS to do what powerusers expect from it.
From what I've seen of the WP7 interface so far it looks pretty neat and I'm definately looking forward to it hopefully landing on my HD2 soon.
Uh... link's dead.
aussiebum said:
Uh... link's dead.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Apparently pocketnow is in the process of moving to a new server and that article is on the new server. I can't see it either.
Microsoft is MASSIVELY different than Palm. In size, skills, and especially developer support and tools.
WebOS is a great OS but like you said, it's main failure is developer support. First, it's partially their fault due to the architecture. Until recently, you couldn't really write "native" apps using their SDK (people hacked it long ago but that's another story). Basically you were limited to little more than a web page with increased access to the phone. Meh. Also, WebOS has very minimal market penetration. Until recently it was only available on the US's #3 carrier and only later on select carriers abroad. Why develop software for a device that hardly anyone has? Apple was (as they always seem to do) able to drum up a large amout of support with very little reason to show for it. Microsoft will have a much more compelling story than Apple did with it's iPhone but will lack Apple's "it" factor (Jobs' RDF).
Palm is tiny. They don't have the money and patience like MS does to sustain a long, battle for the hearts and minds of phone users everywhere. Just look at what MS did with the Xbox. They didn't turn a profit on that unit until well into the Xbox 360. But did MS quit after the original Xbox was a failure? No, they tried harder. And now look.
Palm doesn't have the devloper tools. Yea, they can write plugins for Eclipse but they lack the ability to write extensive APIs and integrate them into Visual Studio. Do not underestimate the power of .net (figuratively and literally). Silverlight is fantastic as is XNA. If I can make a 'game' (although it sucked lol) anyone can.
No guts no glory. Microsoft is playing for keeps. I have no doubt that WP7 or WP8 will be successful.
FYI, Windows 7 is really Windows 6.1. And just like Longhorn, Photon was likely destined to be a failure. Vista was a necessary step to get to 7. The hatred for Vista is largely unfounded and 7 really is just Vista with the complaints fixed and a bit more modern UI.
We still don't know the story on app compat. It's running WinCE and it will support silverlight (.net) so there's little reason, other than wanting a complete clean break, that most old apps won't work. WinCE uses cab installs just like WM (because it is CE). I can write one app and deploy it to a bare WinCE 6.0 system or to WM6.5 (CE5). Maybe they will allow old stuff, maybe they won't. We won't know til next month. They very well may not have made this decision yet.
At one time the iPhone had 0 apps and WM had a **** ton. How long did it take for iPhone to build up a huge base of devs? I'm expecting a pretty solid selection of apps written for WP7 right from launch. Microsoft already has a lot of the key stuff onboard. I've got something in mind and will likely be doing one myself (something I started for WM6).
I agree.
I wouldn't worry about WP7 apps' database like the iPhone people will get interest in it, its potential is great when it comes to the new UI (the only thing we know for sure).
About the Photon project, why do you think that it's dead?
It seems that M$ is willing to keep the old branch of Windows Mobile by renaming it to Windows Phone Classic. Perhaps Photon is the final evolution of Windows Phone Classic. I don't think, IF they keep on developping, that they are going to stop to this current bad look and poor customization of WM6.5.3.
I don't think Windows Phone 7 was supposed to be WM6.1, if it was the OS would be ready a long time ago.
I apologize for my poor english, i hope you understand my thought.
X-On said:
About the Photon project, why do you think that it's dead?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have been told by peole inside Microsoft that WM6.5 will live on for no longer than two years, more likely only 18 months from now. I've heard no word that there would be a successor.
freyberry said:
I have been told by peole inside Microsoft that WM6.5 will live on for no longer than two years, more likely only 18 months from now. I've heard no word that there would be a successor.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Due to the limited versions numbers left between 6.5 and 7 it's not really assumed they will keep it going for too long. after 6.5.3 is gonna be officially released (this month?) my guess it that they're only fixing bugs and make it run on few more devices. in 1-2 years I don't think anymore OEMS will demand it and there'll be not a lot of phones with CPUs less than 1Ghz and such and they'll all run WP7. For MS it doesn't really make sense to keep it going any longer.....
WM6.5.x will be Windows Phone Starter Edition according to the latest rumors
Win_XP said:
WM6.5.x will be Windows Phone Starter Edition according to the latest rumors
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually it's 'Windows Phone Classic'
source
Any chance of a Photon leak? Would be nice project for Xda Dev.
some screens ...
dark_sith said:
Any chance of a Photon leak? Would be nice project for Xda Dev.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We had old alpha versions. It was very unfinished, slow and buggy.
Cotulla has posted its screenshots above.
I think Photon looked good. They should at least have finished the work on it and released it instead of WM6.5.
Let those 1000 developers work on Windows Phone OS 7.0 and another 500 work on Photon, release Photon in mid 2009 as WM6.5 and Windows Phone OS 7.0 a year later.
That would have been perfect. Ah I'm dreaming...
Mamaich, any chance you could have another look at that dev document, whether third party applications get paused when sent to the background?
(i.e. whether or not developers are allowed to write programs like GPS tracking tools or FTP clients that can do their work in the background)
freyberry said:
Mamaich, any chance you could have another look at that dev document, whether third party applications get paused when sent to the background?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is no such info in the docs I have. These are OEM docs, they have lots of information on WinPhone kernel, and only brief info on user apps.
I personally like WinPhone 7 kernel. It supports lots of different sensors, hardware accelerated Direct3D API (no OpenGL ES), multi-touch, almost all drivers are split in MDD+PDD model simplifying BSP development and ROM updates, redesigned security model.
Obviously we will hack WinPhone7 to enable running native apps (similar to "rooting" Androids that we have to do to install features like VPN client), and publish our own "native mode SDKs" here on XDA.
mamaich said:
There is no such info in the docs I have. These are OEM docs, they have lots of information on WinPhone kernel, and only brief info on user apps.
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Click to collapse
Thanks a lot. We will have to wait, then.
Obviously, WP7 will be hacked and we will be able to develop native and multitasking applications. But I seriously hope that big, important applications like GPS navigation programs won't be restricted from running in the background... I'll contact MS concerning that issue
If MS continue with the Photon project, it would be more of the same.They would continue to loss marketshare. It may be technically more advanced for the WM powerusers. Unfortunately, it is a small minority for the market. the fact that Apple could sell their dump phone (1st iPhone) in millions and continue to do so well tells us what appeals to the the mass market. MS really has no choice but to follow the path they are doing now if they are to remain relevant to the mobile space. Yes, it is risky but the alternative is certain to fail.
freyberry said:
Thanks a lot. We will have to wait, then.
Obviously, WP7 will be hacked and we will be able to develop native and multitasking applications. But I seriously hope that big, important applications like GPS navigation programs won't be restricted from running in the background... I'll contact MS concerning that issue
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I assume that Navigation programs would belong to that type of application that would receive a multitasking permission by MS.... If that story about the permissions is true!? But looking at the already exisiting Designed for Windows Mobile or Marketplace submission handbook this pretty much fits in with MS's way of handling 3rd party applications.
from the picture. are thet from Windows "Mobile" 7 ?
I like these UI. Microsoft should place these UI to WM6.x if WM7 was killed
MrWhisper said:
from the picture. are thet from Windows "Mobile" 7 ?
I like these UI. Microsoft should place these UI to WM6.x if WM7 was killed
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Me only like other screenshots I've seen with the new bottom bar (battery and signal indication + start button in the middle. I don't know if it's even real. Whatever, I'm gonna make it happen on WM 6.5.x! I already managed to change look of the taskbar. the bottom bar will be next project.
RustyGrom said:
Apparently pocketnow is in the process of moving to a new server and that article is on the new server. I can't see it either.
Microsoft is MASSIVELY different than Palm. In size, skills, and especially developer support and tools.
WebOS is a great OS but like you said, it's main failure is developer support. First, it's partially their fault due to the architecture. Until recently, you couldn't really write "native" apps using their SDK (people hacked it long ago but that's another story). Basically you were limited to little more than a web page with increased access to the phone. Meh. Also, WebOS has very minimal market penetration. Until recently it was only available on the US's #3 carrier and only later on select carriers abroad. Why develop software for a device that hardly anyone has? Apple was (as they always seem to do) able to drum up a large amout of support with very little reason to show for it. Microsoft will have a much more compelling story than Apple did with it's iPhone but will lack Apple's "it" factor (Jobs' RDF).
Palm is tiny. They don't have the money and patience like MS does to sustain a long, battle for the hearts and minds of phone users everywhere. Just look at what MS did with the Xbox. They didn't turn a profit on that unit until well into the Xbox 360. But did MS quit after the original Xbox was a failure? No, they tried harder. And now look.
Palm doesn't have the devloper tools. Yea, they can write plugins for Eclipse but they lack the ability to write extensive APIs and integrate them into Visual Studio. Do not underestimate the power of .net (figuratively and literally). Silverlight is fantastic as is XNA. If I can make a 'game' (although it sucked lol) anyone can.
No guts no glory. Microsoft is playing for keeps. I have no doubt that WP7 or WP8 will be successful.
FYI, Windows 7 is really Windows 6.1. And just like Longhorn, Photon was likely destined to be a failure. Vista was a necessary step to get to 7. The hatred for Vista is largely unfounded and 7 really is just Vista with the complaints fixed and a bit more modern UI.
We still don't know the story on app compat. It's running WinCE and it will support silverlight (.net) so there's little reason, other than wanting a complete clean break, that most old apps won't work. WinCE uses cab installs just like WM (because it is CE). I can write one app and deploy it to a bare WinCE 6.0 system or to WM6.5 (CE5). Maybe they will allow old stuff, maybe they won't. We won't know til next month. They very well may not have made this decision yet.
At one time the iPhone had 0 apps and WM had a **** ton. How long did it take for iPhone to build up a huge base of devs? I'm expecting a pretty solid selection of apps written for WP7 right from launch. Microsoft already has a lot of the key stuff onboard. I've got something in mind and will likely be doing one myself (something I started for WM6).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to agree with all of the above, as well as my HD2, I have a Palm Pre and whilst I watched the WP7S presentation from MWC, I kept thinking - "that's like the Pre" Palm did a great job with the user interface on WebOS - it blows away the iPhone and Winmo for ease of use, but they did release an unfinished product (although they have managed to put a reasonable spin on the ongoing development by pitching "new features" into the mix every couple of months - things that should have been there day1).
MS are huge in comparison to Palm and provided they do not get bogged down with "big corp intertia", my guess is that the new OS will lauch complete with all bells and whistles intact.
We have been getting off topic in the advanrtages of WP7 or andriod and iphone. So let's take the discussion to one thread with an all out brawl between the three
With the recent announcement from apple I think Microsoft will have no choice but to throw everything they have at WP7 coming out the gates in order to compete. I think Apple's annoucement of a gamer community was a real low blow and Microsoft's xbox live offering but atleast xbox live can span platforms for right now that keeps an advantage.
vangrieg said:
Me, I love to see things escalating in this market - it just smells great phones! Redmond must be pissed off now - I suspect Apple just stole their show. I suspected something like iPhone's new approach to multitasking in WP7, there are hints this was the plan. I don't feel like its the end of the world for them, they have a lot of patience and recently decided to invest a billion dollars into their mobile platform. Let's not forget that there are advantages and disadvantages to being the first mover, and Microsoft has a lot of information about where others succeeded and failed. Remember XBox? they came late to the party Sony was ruling, but it's all different now.
As regards Android, I wouldn't expect dramatic changes from this side now. It's a successful platform, there's no sense of urgency, and Google usually dramatically reduces investment after initial rapid development. Political issues will prevent platform unification and radical changes in their policies towards OEMs, and there's just too much talk about freedom and openness and all that to reverse the course even a little bit. Especially given that not everyone even sees dangers here.
It's going to be a great year.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with all of that. The more competition there is out there the harder all the companies have to work and that is always a plus for the consumer. I predict alot more out of WP7 just because of these announcements from Apple. As far as google goes, the platform is already so open what more can they add? It's about to the point where the only thing they can do is take things away.
I agree. I strongly disapprove of Apple, but this was a slick move. As far as multitasking goes; I always thought Microsoft would probably bring multitasking in an update down the road. My guess is now they are just going to haul ass and get it out with the release. But I still don;t think it will be full 100% multitasking, more like iPhone OS 4.
A big worry I have is that Microsoft will now hurry along with things trying to make WP7 better, and rush it too much. But they still definitely have time to fix some things.
I also agree about Android. My guess is that most of what is done with Android will be done through OEM's and carriers. If phones like the Droid get advertised for the phone's specific qualities, I think Android will continue to see success. Android apps are really picking up, as is the number of devs.
So yeah, when it comes down to it we the consumers will likely have a good (but with some possible pains) year.
Google have already announced that they are slowing down development of the core OS as it's stable, and will concentrate on applications. The whole point of the platform is being a showcase for Google services, and I'm sure we will not only see new apps for Android itself but also ports to other platforms.
Well I don't think Microsoft need to push full multitasking anyway. I believe get letting some services run like how iPhone 4.0 is going to do it is a great way to do it. Why have the whole app run in the background when you just need what you don't actually have to look at run. This could be great for navigation. Still give you turn by turn in the background without have to show the map when you want to look at something else.
I don't think Microsoft will rush a broken SO out the door this time. They've come a long way and Windows 7 prove it. By far, the most complete and stable OS to hit the market for them. I bet they make sure WP7 does the same.
vangrieg said:
Google have already announced that they are slowing down development of the core OS as it's stable, and will concentrate on applications. The whole point of the platform is being a showcase for Google services, and I'm sure we will not only see new apps for Android itself but also ports to other platforms.
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Click to collapse
I've seen some TV's will be powered by android in the future. I think spreading across platforms is really what Google was looking for.
Kloc said:
Well I don't think Microsoft need to push full multitasking anyway. I believe get letting some services run like how iPhone 4.0 is going to do it is a great way to do it. Why have the whole app run in the background when you just need what you don't actually have to look at run. This could be great for navigation. Still give you turn by turn in the background without have to show the map when you want to look at something else.
I don't think Microsoft will rush a broken SO out the door this time. They've come a long way and Windows 7 prove it. By far, the most complete and stable OS to hit the market for them. I bet they make sure WP7 does the same.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well I don't think you're trending MS correctly...XP was great and stable for it's time but it was a fixed version of windows 98. Windows 7 is a fixed version of Vista. MS usually needs a meh product to build upon to actually make a good one, or sometimes 2 meh projects like IE 7 & 8...but IE 9 looks pretty good so far if they can get it out the door within the year anyway.
You could make the arguement that the precedessor of wp7 is the Zune though...but MS is bringing that Zune experience and intregrating it with phone services, it's a way bigger conceptual step than 98 -> XP or Vista -> 7. We'll see how this all plays out as far as stability is concerned though.
I've seen some TV's will be powered by android in the future. I think spreading across platforms is really what Google was looking for.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That much is obvious...it's google's business model...produce free stuff, get people to use it...get as much data as you can from the user through their auto-opt-in policies to better target you with Ads. TV is a good market for google to target custom ads to users. But it's this same philosophy that causes me to dislike Google. However, I think that I'd preferr if Google showed me commercials I'm interested in rather than just watching whatever crap commericals the networks felt like showing me...but that's way way in the future, when set-top boxes are more just internet DRM'd devices.
gom99 said:
Well I don't think you're trending MS correctly...XP was great and stable for it's time but it was a fixed version of windows 98. Windows 7 is a fixed version of Vista.
MS usually needs a meh product to build upon to actually make a good one, or sometimes 2 meh projects like IE 7 & 8...but IE 9 looks pretty good so far if they can get it out the door within the year anyway.
You could make the arguement that the precedessor of wp7 is the Zune though...but MS is bringing that Zune experience and intregrating it with phone services. We'll see how this all plays out as far as stability is concerned though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see what you're saying. What I'm trying to put across is that MS is realizing that usability and fluidity is what the market is going towards and away from strict functionality. They are focusing more on ways to make sure programs released for their OS work better because usually when software doesn't work now a days especially on a phone OS the user contributes it to being a bad phone and not just bad software. I think they understand this now and are going to make it happen right out the gate and not have to learn from past mistakes like they did with previous platforms. Of course they'll have to add on to WP7 in their next iterations and we will probably say that's what WP7 should have looked like to begin with but we will continue to say that to anything with an update that adds features. I liked Vista when I used it more so then XP and now I like 7 even better. As long as they are taking strides forward I'm a happy camper along for the ride.
gom99 said:
Well I don't think you're trending MS correctly...XP was great and stable for it's time but it was a fixed version of windows 98. Windows 7 is a fixed version of Vista. MS usually needs a meh product to build upon to actually make a good one, or sometimes 2 meh projects like IE 7 & 8...but IE 9 looks pretty good so far if they can get it out the door within the year anyway.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I love it when people who have no idea what they're talking about, try and talk anyway.
1. There were three versions of Windows between Windows 98 and XP: Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows ME, and Windows 2000. Windows 2000 was an exemplary OS, Windows 98SE was a good OS (9.x kernel made everything it touched subpar imo), and Windows ME was a pathetic OS.
2. Vista was fine. The only reason Vista was terrible was because people plugged XP (XP was NT5.1, for reference) drivers into Vista (Vista was NT6.0) and then gnashed their teeth when the OS didn't work properly.
Major kernel revision, you should be praising M$ that the drivers worked at all.
And then there was the fact that Vista was a very forward-thinking OS, and the average consumer-grade hardware at the time wasn't built to maximize Vista's potential. Once your hardware was adequate, Vista out-performed XP. Sure 7 is better than Vista, but that's not the point.
3. IE8 is a good browser. I use it on some of my PCs, and I have no complaints. Obviously there is some issue with standards compliance, but IE8 is a step in the right direction. If the web developers know how to properly take advantage of IE8's doctype sniffing, it's very close to standards complaint. There are a few things it doesn't implement, but for the most part it's pretty good.
Spike15 said:
I love it when people who have no idea what they're talking about, try and talk anyway.
1. There were three versions of Windows between Windows 98 and XP: Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows ME, and Windows 2000. Windows 2000 was an exemplary OS, Windows 98SE was a good OS (9.x kernel made everything it touched subpar imo), and Windows ME was a pathetic OS.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sigh, if you're going to insult me at least do it correctly.
Windows 2000 was a replacement for Windows NT so it was more business related than general consumer related. Instead of Windows 2000 replacing Windows 98 they released Windows 98 2nd Edition. Yes Windows ME was supposed to replace 98 but it was a failure, but that's just another one of MSes blunders on the way to XP.
XP united the fragmentation of the 2000 line and the ME line. But yes, I guess you're right XP was built from things they learned in 2000, failures of ME, and things people liked from their flagship consumer product at the time which was 98.
Spike15 said:
2. Vista was fine. The only reason Vista was terrible was because people plugged XP (XP was NT5.1, for reference) drivers into Vista (Vista was NT6.0) and then gnashed their teeth when the OS didn't work properly.
Major kernel revision, you should be praising M$ that the drivers worked at all.
And then there was the fact that Vista was a very forward-thinking OS, and the average consumer-grade hardware at the time wasn't built to maximize Vista's potential. Once your hardware was adequate, Vista out-performed XP. Sure 7 is better than Vista, but that's not the point.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Vista bombed because MS didn't coordinate well with driver manufacturers and it was a buggy launch. And it was a fairly big shift from XP, the shift from vista to 7 is less significant, vista drivers tend to work fine in 7 where as that's not the case in xp -> vista.
Also Vista was a fairly bloated OS. It's memory consumption of core services was higher than windows 7. I can't even imagine Vista running on a netbook.
Vista eventually became a pretty good experience a few months down the line, but it's reputation was sown in, and it was still bloated.
Spike15 said:
3. IE8 is a good browser. I use it on s
ome of my PCs, and I have no complaints. Obviously there is some issue with standards compliance, but IE8 is a step in the right direction. If the web developers know how to properly take advantage of IE8's doctype sniffing, it's very close to standards complaint. There are a few things it doesn't implement, but for the most part it's pretty good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The differences in browsers isn't as significant to the time when ie6 became very dated and things like opera and ff were clearly better for a time. Things are a bit closer, but IE8's javascript support is pretty lacking if you look at benchmarks.
ie9 looks to be much faster than ie8 and it's adding more hardware support for GPUs. Also if ie9 adopts Pivot's zooming scroll bar, that will be an amazing feature.
gom99 said:
Sigh, if you're going to insult me at least do it correctly.
Windows 2000 was a replacement for Windows NT so it was more business related than general consumer related. Instead of Windows 2000 replacing Windows 98 they released Windows 98 2nd Edition. Yes Windows ME was supposed to replace 98 but it was a failure, but that's just another one of MSes blunders on the way to XP.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Windows 2000 was the beginning of the end of Windows 9.x. Sure they released ME after 2000, but 2000 was really the end of Microsoft's dedication to 9.x (as evidenced by ME's performance...).
The only reason that it took so long for the market to shift was because driver manufacturers were deeply entrenched in 9.x and didn't want to develop for the new model that NT presented (which was a lot more restrictive since Windows NT was actually a proper, multi-user, hybrid kernel operating system rather than a single-user, monolithic kernel operating system which allow most (all?) drivers to run in kernel mode.
Windows ME failed (or, at least that's the story) for roughly the same reason. It was an attempt at reforming the Windows 9.x driver model, but instead people just stuck Windows 98SE drivers in it.
I've seen quite a few consumer desktops that were sold with Windows 2000. They're not so plentiful, but they exist, and most of the people who had them swear by them.
gom99 said:
XP united the fragmentation of the 2000 line and the ME line. But yes, I guess you're right XP was built from things they learned in 2000, failures of ME, and things people liked from their flagship consumer product at the time which was 98.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's not really much different between XP and 2000.
gom99 said:
Vista bombed because MS didn't coordinate well with driver manufacturers and it was a buggy launch. And it was a fairly big shift from XP, the shift from vista to 7 is less significant, vista drivers tend to work fine in 7 where as that's not the case in xp -> vista.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
While what you're saying about driver manufacturers may be true, I disagree that Vista was a "buggy launch". I replaced XP with Vista (64-bit at that!) the moment it went gold, and never looked back...never had any serious problems with performance or compatibility either.
Now, I have to quantify that. I was running a new PC that was relatively top-of-the-line with hardware from big name manufacturers. Therefore, the driver support was good and the hardware was of the calibre that Vista was designed to capitalize on.
I ran Vista until Windows 7 RC, and in that time had 4 crashes:
3 BSoDs from nVidia drivers (graphics drivers still run in kernel mode... : ( )
1 full system lock-up from a hard drive crash (!)
You can't blame those on the operating system.
gom99 said:
The differences in browsers isn't as significant to the time when ie6 became very dated and things like opera and ff were clearly better for a time. Things are a bit closer, but IE8's javascript support is pretty lacking if you look at benchmarks.
ie9 looks to be much faster than ie8 and it's adding more hardware support for GPUs. Also if ie9 adopts Pivot's zooming scroll bar, that will be an amazing feature.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll admit that I'm psyched about IE9 -- Microsoft looks like they're fully throwing themselves behind their browser for the first time since IE4 or 5.
As for IE8's JavaScript benchmarks, I don't consider poor benchmarking (and I'll admit that it's poor benchmarking) a lack of support per se. It's still lamentable, but IE in general has a lot more compatibility code than other browsers...trying to maintain/achieve standards compliance while still fully supporting "quirks" mode...
-_-
Spike15 said:
Windows 2000 was the beginning of the end of Windows 9.x. Sure they released ME after 2000, but 2000 was really the end of Microsoft's dedication to 9.x (as evidenced by ME's performance...).
...
There's not really much different between XP and 2000.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well I don't know about beginning of the end, since it was meant to run parrallel. Originally they wanted 2000 to replace 98, but it wasn't "there" for consumers yet, so it just replaced NT.
And the differences between 2000 and XP have to do with the consumer items packaged allong with XP as well as full support for things like gaming and such. Since XP was the merger of consumer and business users.
Spike15 said:
While what you're saying about driver manufacturers may be true, I disagree that Vista was a "buggy launch". I replaced XP with Vista (64-bit at that!) the moment it went gold, and never looked back...never had any serious problems with performance or compatibility either.
Now, I have to quantify that. I was running a new PC that was relatively top-of-the-line with hardware from big name manufacturers. Therefore, the driver support was good and the hardware was of the calibre that Vista was designed to capitalize on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Even with a top of the line computer if you had the nvidia chipset on your mb, getting Vista at launch was not a good ordeal. The nvidia chipset is no small isolated chipset either. Not every single hardware configuration failed, and some machines did have a good experience with Vista at launch. But a significant portion did not, which cause a bad stigma for Vista.
On top of that, it took significantly more memory just to run a barebones version than XP. I forget the hard numbers, but I think Windows 7 takes half as much ram as vista did.
Spike15 said:
I'll admit that I'm psyched about IE9 -- Microsoft looks like they're fully throwing themselves behind their browser for the first time since IE4 or 5.
As for IE8's JavaScript benchmarks, I don't consider poor benchmarking (and I'll admit that it's poor benchmarking) a lack of support per se. It's still lamentable, but IE in general has a lot more compatibility code than other browsers...trying to maintain/achieve standards compliance while still fully supporting "quirks" mode...
-_-
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
IE9's success will be determined by how quickly they can release it. Firefox is already working on hardware acceleration too. IE is playing catchup as far as javascript, html5, and css standards are concerened. But if they can get that worked out, and get their hardware acceleration worked out. Extra features with a more pivot like style, and get it out of the door by the end of the year, they'll have a really good product at a really good time.
gom99 said:
Even with a top of the line computer if you had the nvidia chipset on your mb, getting Vista at launch was not a good ordeal. The nvidia chipset is no small isolated chipset either. Not every single hardware configuration failed, and some machines did have a good experience with Vista at launch. But a significant portion did not, which cause a bad stigma for Vista.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had an nVidia chipset, as I had in most of my PCs up until my last one (Intel chipset -- core i7 x58 system), and I had no problems other than those specified.
I think that with operating systems like these though, the first major kernel revision obviously is not going to do as well as the second. With the first you have a major change under the hood, and the end user doesn't really understand why they can't just stuff in their old drivers and be good to go.
Plus, hardware manufacturers are still learning how to properly code for the new model.
Once the second revision comes out, everyone has it figured out. It's not really a fault of the operating system manufacturer, but more a necessary evil of the way things work.
Spike15 said:
I had an nVidia chipset, as I had in most of my PCs up until my last one (Intel chipset -- core i7 x58 system), and I had no problems other than those specified.
I think that with operating systems like these though, the first major kernel revision obviously is not going to do as well as the second. With the first you have a major change under the hood, and the end user doesn't really understand why they can't just stuff in their old drivers and be good to go.
Plus, hardware manufacturers are still learning how to properly code for the new model.
Once the second revision comes out, everyone has it figured out. It's not really a fault of the operating system manufacturer, but more a necessary evil of the way things work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/new...it-paints-picture-of-buggy-nvidia-drivers.ars
M$ didn't coordinate with Driver manufacturers?!?! Come on!! It came out in beta MONTHS before the OS was even released ANYONE could download and try it. The manufacturers are lazy, simple. Is it no surprise that W7 has taken off, because the drivers for vista dont need much change so therefore manufacturers will do it but a large kernel change and manufacturers twiddle their thumbs and blame M$.
I used Vista for years and never had a problem.
Back to the phones!
In order of greatness
Android > iPhone > WM6.5 > WM6.1 > WP7
Android has the best mix of features with eye candy, and WM6.x is... well... windows 3.1 on a phone.
Jamoflaw said:
M$ didn't coordinate with Driver manufacturers?!?! Come on!! It came out in beta MONTHS before the OS was even released ANYONE could download and try it. The manufacturers are lazy, simple. Is it no surprise that W7 has taken off, because the drivers for vista dont need much change so therefore manufacturers will do it but a large kernel change and manufacturers twiddle their thumbs and blame M$.
I used Vista for years and never had a problem.
Back to the phones!
In order of greatness
Android > iPhone > WM6.5 > WM6.1 > WP7
Android has the best mix of features with eye candy, and WM6.x is... well... windows 3.1 on a phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're putting the iphone that high really? Why do you like it? It's fluid sure but its like a fisher price toy in terms of what you can do with it. It's a program launcher with apps. The next release does look better with all the things they are adding but as of now it sucks if you have any ounce of nerd in you.
I'm not sure where WP7 sits as of now because it's not out yet but I've used Android and I currently use WM 6.1 here's my line-up.
WM 6.x>Android>iPhone
Kloc said:
You're putting the iphone that high really? Why do you like it? It's fluid sure but its like a fisher price toy in terms of what you can do with it. It's a program launcher with apps. The next release does look better with all the things they are adding but as of now it sucks if you have any ounce of nerd in you.
I'm not sure where WP7 sits as of now because it's not out yet but I've used Android and I currently use WM 6.1 here's my line-up.
WM 6.x>Android>iPhone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have to preface that ranking saying "for advanced users". Even just looking at the side-by-side they have on engadget...wm 6.5 dominates that considering that a few of their "facts" are just taking into account wm 6.5 stock.
But I do like that the iphone added some nice features, even though some of them are hypocritical, but that's apple for you. From what Jobs was saying, I thought Folders were too complicated, and people just liked swiping their fingers through 100 applications.
I wouldn't put iPhone > WM6.5. They're different, though iPhone keeps getting better, WM6.5 not.
Android, of course, beats them all.
Android >> iPhone = WM6.5 > WM6.1 = WP7
Since this thread is going too off-topic, I want to have my own, for my comparison. See here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=6132000#post6132000
Sethos II said:
Here's my comparison between WP7, iPhone OS, Android and WM6.5!
It's been about time that somebody did it.
It's a work in progress, I will add and update things.
Feel free to post your comments, I will consider them for updates to the chart.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
gom99 said:
Well I don't think you're trending MS correctly...XP was great and stable for it's time but it was a fixed version of windows 98. Windows 7 is a fixed version of Vista. MS usually needs a meh product to build upon to actually make a good one, or sometimes 2 meh projects like IE 7 & 8...but IE 9 looks pretty good so far if they can get it out the door within the year anyway.
You could make the arguement that the precedessor of wp7 is the Zune though...but MS is bringing that Zune experience and intregrating it with phone services, it's a way bigger conceptual step than 98 -> XP or Vista -> 7. We'll see how this all plays out as far as stability is concerned though.
That much is obvious...it's google's business model...produce free stuff, get people to use it...get as much data as you can from the user through their auto-opt-in policies to better target you with Ads. TV is a good market for google to target custom ads to users. But it's this same philosophy that causes me to dislike Google. However, I think that I'd preferr if Google showed me commercials I'm interested in rather than just watching whatever crap commericals the networks felt like showing me...but that's way way in the future, when set-top boxes are more just internet DRM'd devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A fixed version of win 98 ?? They dont even run the same file system. They are so different. XP was built off of 2000
ilmar72 said:
A fixed version of win 98 ?? They dont even run the same file system. They are so different. XP was built off of 2000
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
"Multi-user" and "hybrid kernel" would've been the two biggest changes I would've selected for "they don't even [...]", but to each his or her own...
Spike15 said:
"Multi-user" and "hybrid kernel" would've been the two biggest changes I would've selected for "they don't even [...]", but to each his or her own...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'd have to go with you on that one. Win ME and below use hybrid 16/32 kernal while NT+ uses 32. That's a pretty significant change.
Ok now... we all have heard whats bad, or not so good or what can be improved with WP7.
But on the other hand anyone has good news for all of us to contiune with windows and not jump ship to android or iPhone. At the moment I dont see the why I would want to buy an WP7 yet! maybe in few years when it matures as an OS.
Windows phone 7 gives you a lot of choice in hardware devices, unlike the iPhone, unless you don't mind being stuck with one manufacture (see how that turned bad with the iPhone 4 reception issue). I think this is a big point especially for people who like physical keyboards and different shapes or colours.
Now you are thinking "Android offers a wide range of hardware as well, so what is the difference?" One thing if find bad about the Android ecosystem is OS fragmentation. I know being open source is a big plus, but in this case it backfired because anyone can put the OS on any device, so we ended up with a lot of devices not getting upgraded by their OEMs/carriers rather than let Google handle updating devices.
Microsoft is tackling this problem by putting minimum device requirements so that any update Microsoft releases, it can be easily pushed to all kinds of devices.
So overall, I think Microsoft is approching this market in a balanced manner, they are not extermly closed (think Apple) nor very open (Google). Which is a good thing for developers and end users.
There are a lot of other things, like Windows Live and Xbox integration (if you care about those).
From a developer point of view, it's also the most attractive mobile platform that ever been made. It's amazingly easy to make complex apps and games, and it's a standard way of doing it, opposed to iPhone and Android's "lets reinvent the wheel" technologies.
Plus, it's the only phone development environment that have a visual editor (Expression Blend), which is a big plus for rapid development.
(Not to mention, you don't have to buy a Mac to code for it!)
From a consumer point of view, it's a strong phone, works with all existing services, specially all Microsoft ones, but also all the others. It'll be the first phone with Windows Live Messenger available on, and Zune integration.
Basically you get all the power of Microsofts platforms, in a single device, without the limitations of Apple. Everybody who's used to using Windows will get a greater experience with this phone, than any other phone on the market.
So it's a win/win/win, situation
I'm getting one just for the fact it has Zune on it, this alone makes it worthy of a purchase if you use multimedia heavily.
Also I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the things the OP consider "bad" is what the majority considers "good"
Windcape said:
So it's a win/win/win, situation
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hahaha.
Good points.
The biggest thing is the UI. Frankly put; it's innovative, attractive, intuitive, and just works really well. When you get your hands on one and play around with it for a few minutes you'll see.
I'm stoked about Window Phone 7. I know if won't have as much freedom out the door as Windows 6.5 but I've seen the demo's and from what I can see it looks great. Here's my top 10 good list:
1. Actual Xbox Live integration with achievements
2. Finger Friendly
3. Sharp modern UI
4. Hubs that bring in a multitude of information that covers the work of many apps, but all in one place.
5. Good minimum requirements
6. Easy and well thought out development tools.
7. Everything about Zune all in one Hub.
8. Great Social networking integration
9. Multiple exchange accounts, emails and calendars.
10. Great use of Office on mobile.
What draws me to WP7 is really metro. I've tinkered a lot with windows phones over the years leveraging different UIs, skins, themes, etc. But really my favorite UI for my phone thus far has been titanium. I prefer the typography. Being that wp7 is a titanium enhancement, it suites me very well.
darkmurder said:
I'm getting one just for the fact it has Zune on it, this alone makes it worthy of a purchase if you use multimedia heavily.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should be able to use Zune with any windows phone. I have zune pass and use my omnia II to play the drm music, so you don't have to wait for wp7 to have a "zune" phone.
WTB Zune Pass in Europe already!
Windcape said:
WTB Zune Pass in Europe already!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's great, my only compliant is that you have to backup your mp3s if you purchase them or when you use your credits. It doesn't let you redownload them, probably because of some legal nonsense.
It's not too bad with 25GB from Skydrive, and using the Gladinet client to map your cloud drive to a physical drive.
let's stop being "real" and start being realistic
I have a vague feeling that people on this topic are working for the Microsoft development team...
as a faithful user of the most advanced pocketpc ever built ever since it launched (htc universal or jasjar) I'll just reply to those "strengths"
First ond foremost, the windows mobile had its success because users were able to hack it and expand it BEYOND of what they payed for. if we limited ourselves to what M$ provided, this site wouldn't exist and the HTC would have gone bankrupt.
1. Actual Xbox Live integration with achievements
You have Xbox and yet you are going to be playing on a phone?
2. Finger Friendly
in addition to every single SW company having developed the touch finger application keyboard, there are devices with their own keyboards, which actually work MUCH better then the touch mode ever will because you can feel the keys and you're able to predict where the next one is, at least until they invent the physically morphing touch screen.
3. Sharp modern UI
simplistic doesn't mean modern....ever! there is a FLAT SQUARE and Arial TEXT on it...that's a post-it for retarded. SPB mobile shell for instance gave the smooth design and modern hi-tech look to 6.1 phones. their only limitation was the processor and the memory. but that's how the digital revolution started - microsoft made ever more demanding OSes and Intel made processors to match. If you start spinning in circles around an antiquated graphics and limited applications, why would they innovate?
4. Hubs that bring in a multitude of information that covers the work of many apps, but all in one place.
apps that cannot be made by anyone else without a license by microsoft. and no one is using microsoft products on their pocketpc's because they are inefficient, large and expensive.
5. Good minimum requirements
nokia's s40 phones require even less resources, and offer greater UI, usability and stability. and they are as customizeable as the win 7, and yet people don't seriously consider using them as a PDA capable to integrate with the market's dominant and upcoming applications.
6. Easy and well thought out development tools.
We'll see...
7. Everything about Zune all in one Hub.
Zune is a MUSIC PLAYER! PERIOD! it's function is to play music! what everything?
8. Great Social networking integration
if you're referring to that travesty of facebook integration, I used the Windows Live Messenger Beta and let me tell you how it works: the system makes assumptions that videos and most popular items demand our attention, and they are in big, while the rest is small, so it's not about keeping track of your friends, it's about flashing content to a moron public.
9. Multiple exchange accounts, emails and calendars.
Will we be able to activesync our device over the wi-fi or via internet??
10. Great use of Office on mobile.
I would gladly pay good money to see a microsoft developer use a touch-only phone to create and modify a corporate-standard excel or even word file...
Dude you are in the wrong thread.
This is where you should post -> WP7 is complete FAIL
vk2000 said:
I have a vague feeling that people on this topic are working for the Microsoft development team...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Take of your foilhat.
vk2000 said:
I have a vague feeling that people on this topic are working for the Microsoft development team...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not, but I'll apply for a position in 2 years time when I'm finished with my second bachelor.
vk2000 said:
if we limited ourselves to what M$ provided, this site wouldn't exist
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Funny, I thought that Windows Mobile development was the original topic of xda-developers. It's not like the name itself says so, no no.
vk2000 said:
1. Actual Xbox Live integration with achievements
You have Xbox and yet you are going to be playing on a phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes. Welcome to 2010.
vk2000 said:
3. Sharp modern UI
simplistic doesn't mean modern....ever! there is a FLAT SQUARE and Arial TEXT on it...that's a post-it for retarded. SPB mobile shell for instance gave the smooth design and modern hi-tech look to 6.1 phones. their only limitation was the processor and the memory. but that's how the digital revolution started - microsoft made ever more demanding OSes and Intel made processors to match. If you start spinning in circles around an antiquated graphics and limited applications, why would they innovate?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see you have zero experience in usability or design. Go read some Jakob Nielsen, and come back when you find yourself in a suitable position to discuss usability design on phones.
vk2000 said:
4. Hubs that bring in a multitude of information that covers the work of many apps, but all in one place.
apps that cannot be made by anyone else without a license by microsoft. and no one is using microsoft products on their pocketpc's because they are inefficient, large and expensive.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Clearly you been living in a cave for the last five years. The developer license also grants you the ability to host your applications on the marketplace, and is common practice for all mobile developers. Even Google have it for Android.
vk2000 said:
5. Good minimum requirements
nokia's s40 phones r equire even less resources, and offer greater UI, usability and stability. and they are as customizeable as the win 7, and yet people don't seriously consider using them as a PDA capable to integrate with the market's dominant and upcoming applications.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
See again you completely misunderstood what the customers want. And the minimum requirements is so you don't get ****ty phones like all Android devices from 2009 / early 2010.
vk2000 said:
6. Easy and well thought out development tools.
We'll see...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, we already seen. Visual Studio and Expression Blend goes years back, and is popular and known development tools. Microsoft have the largest developer community on earth (MSDN), and they are so far the only who managed to actually create so much community around their technology and tools. Even the Linux community can't follow here.
And most of the developers in MSDN are professionals, so it's used for solving real-life problems. And if you're a consumer, and not a developer, you won't understand the importance of this.
Also XNA available on WP7 means it's the first phone with a gaming framework available from day one.
vk2000 said:
7. Everything about Zune all in one Hub.
Zune is a MUSIC PLAYER! PERIOD! it's function is to play music! what everything?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, Zune is a online music-service, a desktop music player ,and a music-player device. And in WP7, the online service and desktop client will work along with the phone. A lot of us like to use our smartphones for music, for example, while biking to work or studies.
vk2000 said:
8. Great Social networking integration
if you're referring to that travesty of facebook integration, I used the Windows Live Messenger Beta and let me tell you how it works: the system makes assumptions that videos and most popular items demand our attention, and they are in big, while the rest is small, so it's not about keeping track of your friends, it's about flashing content to a moron public.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Microsoft don't make assumptions, they got detailed statistics over the functionality people use in Windows Live Messenger. Just because you don't behave like the other 300 million users, doesn't make it wrong.
It's designed for the average consumer, and they done a very good job with that. More consumers = more people to buy our apps = more money for us.
vk2000 said:
9. Multiple exchange accounts, emails and calendars.
Will we be able to activesync our device over the wi-fi or via internet??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Both
vk2000 said:
10. Great use of Office on mobile.
I would gladly pay good money to see a microsoft developer use a touch-only phone to create and modify a corporate-standard excel or even word file...
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Phones are less meant for modify, as for accessing the information in the said data.
It's handy if you're on the road, and want to pull out some data to compare with people you're discussing with or similar.
vk2000
3. Sharp modern UI
simplistic doesn't mean modern....ever! there is a FLAT SQUARE and Arial TEXT on it...that's a post-it for retarded.
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You nail that one!
Actually the font is Segoe WP. And the flat squares will be replaced with images and partially display icons among others.
Which makes it even better than just a bunch of techno-color icons.
clearly you guys are either very young or like to suck up to your (hoped) employer a lot
quoting the only author you know, doesn't make you smart, it makes you a charlatan. you should find a good dictionary if you don't know what that word is, since you clearly don't understand what I am saying anyway.
If you're going to play games on something small, you should buy a PSP
and
I've been following the IT development ever since I was 8 and computers ran on Windows 3.11
I don't require a degree in design to state clearly as a user who is going to pay 300-1000 euros, that a PDA should be
1) USABLE
2) reliable
3) USABLE
4) customizable and upgradeable
the fact that people are buying does not mean that the product is good, they're either poised with offensive marketing, like apple does, or they don't have any better choice! Statistics are meaningless more often then not, and you would know their significance if you studied statistics, 4 different types of sociology, macroeconomics and international financial relations, on your way to your M.Sc., like I did
games on the phone existed since Sun decided to make Java for mobile markets, so... a decade of "nothing new" to you . if windows 7 was able to reach the sophistication of the mobile gaming consoles, it would have been something, otherwise it's a child's toy, not suitable for business!
given you know nothing about the mobile market before you learned to talk and talk-back, I'm not surprised you would be satisfied even with yet another shade of "solitaire"
and as for my design capabilities, my photographic portfolio and web-design are always a winner what do you got to offer besides a big tongue and lack of arguments?
Windcape said:
Actually the font is Segoe WP. And the flat squares will be replaced with images and partially display icons among others.
Which makes it even better than just a bunch of techno-color icons.
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we went from 3d transparent and interactive icons BACK to a SQUARE 1, junior...
you should familiarize yourself with the hard work of so many people on this forum who are trying to change the OS from "default to outstanding" for free and for the benefit of everyone
So you think your personal preferences makes up for the 300 million target users that Microsoft have in the Windows Live and Zune cloud?
You think you can invalidate a business-model just because someone done something similar before? You think the phone sucks because you don't like it, even you haven't got the slightest idea how it works, how to develop for it or how to sell applications for it (or for phones in general).
From a consumer, business and software-engineering point of view, WP7 is damn near perfect.
So how about you let us know how old you actually are, and what you actually study, if you absolutely want to include personal attacks in your qq'ing.
vk2000 said:
we went from 3d transparent and interactive icons BACK to a SQUARE 1, junior...
you should familiarize yourself with the hard work of so many people on this forum who are trying to change the OS from "default to outstanding" for free and for the benefit of everyone
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And do you have any idea why they did this? Have you ever read a usability study of a smartphone? Have you ever done a usability study of any device, or interface at all?
Or could it be that the professionals know more than you do.
Does anyone think that the iPhone os and Android have helped kill the "smartfone"?
It seems these os's are intended for mainstream use, kind of like the symbian os a few years back where kid's, mom's and dad's used a nokia or even a motorola. While the business or tech heads used windows mobile for PC-like functionality.
Microsoft have dumbed down their w7 phone software to the point my grandmother, or 10 yr old brother could and would be sold one of these (as long as he had cash lol), in hope to compete against these new mainstream os's that are extreamly competitive already and not the business or tech-head market the os seemed to be initially intended for.
It seems the software design is focused on people updating their facebook status or tweeting that they are taking a dump, and not really using them for work purposes at all.
With windows phone 7 am i going to be able to work with basic word, excel and pdf docs? Will I be able to use remote desktop or setup multiple outlook email accounts? Will alot of the programs i use on pc be available in windows 7 phone format? I cant seem to find much info, all the reviews ive seen seem to concentrate on its "social networking features", or show its "image gallery" and uninspired UI.
A smartfone is suppose to be a mobile phone offering advanced capabilities. The iPhone and Android have pretty much become mainstream os's, so i personally wouldnt call them advanced devices, they are simply the 2009-10 standard device, a touchscreen multimedia phone with 3g connections. And windows 7 phone looks like its the same. I think Apple and Google have taken 2 steps forward and microsoft have taken 1 back. Leaving us with no real advanced mobile phone or os as they are all now on par, with android looking the most positive of these mainstream os's.
So if its not aimed at the business or hi-tech market, what are we going to buy? I wonder if we will all be trying to hack the windows mobile 6.5 os onto these new devices in the near future to get some multitasking business features and PC-like functionality back? Im sure it would run great on the new hardware hehe.
You are quite right IMHO, but there is simple reason for that.
MS was targetting PocketPC platform, giving "full PC in your pocket"-like experience. This was for techs, administrators, but not for teenagers eagerly wanting to touch their phones without stylus, browsing internet, having thousands of animations AND HAVING IT SIMPLE. With Apple and later Google coming out with platform that actually allows you to simply and naturally touch the screen with your finger without using stylus, do simple things simple way (and disabling the hard things, because why would teenager need eg PuTTY right, for security and having out of box experience "it works" without installing ton of software, going through registry etc), MS's sales are slowly moving towards 0. And now, MS is targetting those teenagers, giving them all Facebook integrated in contacts, with simple UI and powerful base for making rich applications and games.
That part is good, that MS restarted whole Phone experience, giving minimal requirements so no more sluggish phones (just look on even HD2, needing patching driver for GPU and so on), creating whole UI rendered on DirectX, having new kernel, thus having it all like.. superfast.
On the other hand, they locked it down as hell. No teenager (except me ) wants to go through registry, they just want to have ton of apps on marketplace, and ton of games they can play. No manual googling for stuff, direct access from phone with cool UI. That's it.
I wanted to say something more, but I forgot what I wanted lol.
// ohh remembered:
Let's skip the definition "Smartphone is PocketPC without touchscreen", and say how do I feel difference between Smartphone and PocketPC.
I see smartphone as being something stupid with some internal APIs, integration option. (iOS, Android)
And I see PocketPC as being full PC in my pocket. Because of screen size, CPU power, RAM etc, it ofc has to be redesigned a lot. But the main idea "do what you want anyhow you want" must be there. It isn't in case of Smartphone (WinMo, partially Android).
No smartphones are getting more advanced. Yes the interfaces are about eye candy now, but I'd take that over the old WM6 anyday.
krjcook said:
No smartphones are getting more advanced. Yes the interfaces are about eye candy now, but I'd take that over the old WM6 anyday.
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This. The OSs might have been dumbed down, but at the core, it's all what applications you use to run on them. I am way more productive with my iPhone than I ever have been an other smartphone before then, and I will be with WP7 more so with it's amazing Office integrations
can you elaborate on the office integrations? Are there new office features that we havent seen on mw6.5?
If you are more productive on your iPhone than on wm6.5 are you using it for business/pc-like features or for social multimedia use?
Im just disapointed that they seem to have locked down the device, dumbed the UI to a point it actually looks like a really bad skinning attempt to conserve ram lol. The first pics i saw of the w7phone i thought must have been someones photoshop attempt at a joke. I lol'd then got a look of concern on my face as I realised they were real pics.
They are trying to enter into a mainstream teenage market already accomodated by the iPhone and now android. Leaving the traditional "pc in your pocket-business user" market with a void.
I personally dont tweet, dont use facebook, and would never use a xbox live service while im taking notes on my device in a meeting. I regularly work on my home/work pc through remote desktop. Use the calendar to set appointments, browse multiple websites at once and generally run 2-3 apps at the same time. I regularly use word and excel, and always sync my business/personal emails from by pc each morning.
I suppose the question is will wm7 be right for me? I would have preferred them to concentrate on new touch friendly business applications, handwriting recognition and smarter gui, not concentrate on social networks and games which make it seem to much like a teenagers phone. If these features i need are there that will be great and ill consider it. If not I think ill have to look into being converted into an androidian and lay my pc in my pocket to rest in a safe place as one of the last of its kind
Many of us wonder how it will be.
From the sales point of view, you have to simplify and make more eye candy
to increase your sales 10 or 100 times.
Just count how many Communicators Nokia sold, or HTC TyTn II's
and compare to iPhone.
But it's possible that following the smartphone's expansion
users beeing more conscious will want more functionality
which will be brought back........
I'm very happy with better cameras and screens though.
And hardware became so strong too.
So not all is lost.
THE ONLY QUESTION is if Microsoft is willing to bring all those missing things
or not........................
I pray for the resurrection of the PPC!
If I had this
Vid
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mej7sf4uonI
If it was the shape and size of the HD2, I would be in love again!
Yes it would appar that MS is moving to a more of a "walled garden" approach
yeah that sony in hd2 form factor would be great, i was hoping the tp3 would have been a similar device. Bring back the ppc! hehe.
anhyeuemmaimai said:
"walled garden"
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Otherwise known as prison
devis said:
Otherwise known as prison
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More like safety. I'll keep my guaranteed updates through one provider thank you very much.
I dont see why you are complaining about the path that manufacturers are going today.
It is easy to know WHY they make advanced devices simpler to use, (to get a broader consumer base).
And I must admit I will miss the usability of winmo, but when you think about it, who uses the original UI of that OS? It's all skinned for eyecandy and simplicity to the end user.
So I would like you to see the bright side of this: The HTC TP2 will cost next to nothing very soon (well its darn right cheap already!). And it seems it has all you need!
For taking notes who needs 1ghz, right?
So I consider it a win-win situation for you, cheap phones with the functionality you require
Sent from my Dell Streak using XDA App
The concerns are understandable, but I wouldn't say MS is abandoning the business user. In fact, I would state they are allowing the business user to encompass the newer business model also which includes facebook, twitter and other social mediums. Since you don't use either (directed to the OP) you may have missed that nearly every large corporation has a Facebook page and many are using Twitter to stay in touch with their user base.
The business model of marketing has changed dramatically in the last 5 years and I wouldn't give the credit to either the Iphone or Android, but to the social marketing that occurs with mediums such as Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, etc... I must admit that I fought being a part of these as did many of my friends (ages 35-42), but truth is they work great when it comes to actually being in contact with each other and for a business, it's customer base. Word of mouth has always been the true back bone of these businesses growing and these social mediums all take word of mouth and expand it's power by the millionth.
I applaud MS for actually creating a brand new ui and os to take advantage of both. If you are really concerned with your ability to be productive on the machine look at the many videos we've seen so far. You still have outlook, the office suite, etc... I am unsure if remote desktop will remain available but I believe it will in WP7.
The people who are left out are us nerds. The systems are lockdowned for now on and we get left out the loop, but we buy less phones than the clones do even if we are the reason these things work out properly with all of our experimenting, rom chefs and willingingness to beta test any and everything that comes our way.
ok, so I'm enjoying my Desire's speed and stability compared to my WiMo HTC Touch HD. I can still use Word and Excell and synchronize email and calendars, etc. But there is one thing I am missing: handwriting recognition. Now people will tell me to use Swype (which I am) but it's still not the same thing. With the stylus and handwriting recognition I used to sit in meetings and take notes for real. Now it somehow does not work as well and I also feel a little like a joke swyping. I am not much of a poking-through-the-registry kind of guy but I did like having complete access to the file system, being able to move any file where I wanted it, and so on. But I guess this is just the way this world goes. IN the meantime, I am sticking with android for now. It seems that windows phone 7, although it does look great, I love the look, I just cannot part with copy and paste. There is more to this world than tweeting and facebooking.
^ I can agree to that. Not the swype part though, its fast as hell.
If i had to choose between windows mobile 6 or wp7, i have already made my decision
I will surely choose wp7, not because wm 6 is bad, but because wp7 works fluid. And I need my daily amount of eyecandy
tudork said:
It seems that windows phone 7, although it does look great, I love the look, I just cannot part with copy and paste. There is more to this world than tweeting and facebooking.
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Definetly find me in agreement with you on this point. I won't be even thinking about it until copy and paste come along.
addicus said:
Definetly find me in agreement with you on this point. I won't be even thinking about it until copy and paste come along.
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I think the only time I have ever used copy and paste on my Vibrant is when I had to put in my unlock code for Launcher Pro. Other than that I really don't use it on a daily basis.
I think my more frequent use is just to clear a text im writing because they texted back and it changed my opinion, so I just cut all to delete it lol
Grassy
devis said:
Otherwise known as prison
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I think you mean a court yard. One which you can freely enter or freely leave. Seriously if the first thing that pops into your head when thing of walled gardens are prisons...I'd talk to someone about that...
I think most people complaining now are not thinking long term.
Yes the OS is simpler and 'less' business and PPC focused. But. Think of it like this.
Start with simple yet powerful OS with enough feature to hook some power-users and easy enough for the average consumer to pick it up.
Now this is where the strategy plays out over the years to come. You train you base customer with update that over time make the OS more powerful and more feature rich much like PPC that they don't even know they're using a smartphone because you have "trained" them.
Sound familiar. It was the iPhone tactic from when it was released. Everyone knows the feature the iPhone4 has now could have existed years ago but they are "training" their user base.
Analogy time: If someone handed you an Indie car (PPC) and said race it you would be so confused by all the buttons and controls and not know how to handle it effectively.
But.
If they handed you a Suzuki Swift (WP7 (No idea why I thought of this car: P)) and said they will teach you to drive you'll have no worries buying from them again and buying a slightly (updates) more powerful car next time.
chaoscentral said:
I think the only time I have ever used copy and paste on my Vibrant is when I had to put in my unlock code for Launcher Pro. Other than that I really don't use it on a daily basis.
I think my more frequent use is just to clear a text im writing because they texted back and it changed my opinion, so I just cut all to delete it lol
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I am a writer/musician so I copy and paste words a lot. I also copy/paste links, etc... when I am sending them out to people on twitter/facebook.