Discussion on:

Windows Phone: The Hail Mary pass is now in the air

Loving my Samsung Focus S WP7

I spent a year waiting for Verizon to get some decent WP7 phones. When the Focus S came out, I broke down and went with AT&T.

I'm not in a big city, so I know *that* makes a difference, but I haven't experienced any problems with dropped calls, call quality or customer service. The phone works even when there's only one bar.

Also, I don't have a big investment in Apple apps, etc., so I'm not losing anything there. I use Windows at work and home. I'm hoping to add a Windows 8 tablet to the mix and praying that everything communicates with everything else.

My kid has an iPhone. It's OK, but the WP7 platform is much better.

The Windows Phone OS interface is badly designed - plain and simple.
Bold plain overly simple blocks - live tiles - are boring and bland.
The home screen is a waste of screen real estate - bad design - why have such a large screen if a large portion is just black space??? Look down the right hand side and along the top of the tiles - what a waste of screen real estate!
Half the time when you go into the apps you can't read the whole title on the screen - it runs off the side of the screen and you can't actually see what it says! Bad design. Stupidist GUI I've ever seen.

Tell me how jaciii can "love" it so much when it's this bad? Maybe it's a step up from Windows and they don't know what a good interface is like until they play with a WP7 phone.
I don't understand unless they're just fanboys/girls or MS employees promoting the phone.

Different strokes for different folks.

After all I know some people who thought that ME was the best OS ever made by Microsoft and they truly believed that. They refused to have 98SE Loaded because ME was so much better in their eyes.

Col

Actually, the screen wastes much less real estate. On other phones you see oceans blank space between their buttons/icons. The problem of course is developer's and their tools when they layout those icons they MUST create a MUCH larger touch area then the small icon. So the tools in general force placement of icons to be wide part (you cannot move them close to each other - ALL PHONES force this grid layout.

The result of this touch requirement is that MUCH BLANK SPACE is required around the icon. The result is about 50% or more of the screen is simply you staring at some silly background wall paper.

The result is wide spaces between each icon are NOT used. You MUST keep that spacing to make the icons useable for your fingers which are far fatter than a mouse.

Since all that space is required for touch, the live tiles are brilliant since they now are butted against each other without oceans of blank space (which you can't use on other phones). This result then opens up the doors for live tiles that display messages, your next appointment, how many emails, current water etc., and do so without you having to open up each individual application. And to save some trolls - those applications are running and updating and receiving messages in the background anyway ??? the cost of battery to update a tile is insignificant.

It is laughable to stand here and tell me this setup wastes screen space when EVERY other phone allows you to darn near see 50% of the desktop wall paper behind the icons.

On wp7 you cannot see some desktop background. There is no wall paper and you can ONLY see icons because they are large and cover up and use all of the screen.

Contrast above to tiny silly little icons with huge amounts of UNUSDED BLANK space between them. Now how stupid is it now to stand here and waste all that blank space between icons?

For what reason should not the tile you touch be the same size as the touch area for that icon that is reserved? All of the other phones FORCE such a large touch area for the icon, but thy ALL waste the space!

Larger tiles and "live" tiles = more information in same screen space.

One glance at my phone, and number of personal emails, business emails, text messages, voice mails and outside temp (including raining, sunny, cloudy etc.) and my next appointment can be seen without even opening any application at all.

In a word:

Live tiles scooped the marketplace. For those standing here telling me about larger tiles when other phones are restriced to the SAME number of icons is oh so funny.

Looking at other phones, it seems so silly to see a bunch of tiny icons that have huge oceans of WASTED space between those icons. WORSE those tiny icons cannot display anything of use compared to a live tiles!

And the real kick in the pants? The icons and live tiles HAVE to take up the same spacing and distance apart for the touch UI, it just one of them is brain dead and only shows some silly icons where we have a set of tiles that displays information in real time.

The ones lamenting live tiles are either users who never used a smartphone (can't afford one), or they prefer the SAME NUMBER of icons in the same spacing and grid layout with huge gaps of space between that remains un-used and does zero for increased phone usability.

Too funny!

Albert D. Kallal (Access MVP)
Edmonton, Alberta Canada

Would you consider ditching your iPhone for this device? Do you think I'd switch back from Android for it? If the answer is "unlikely" - then it isn't compelling enough. I'm not sure what the value add is going to have to be for me... but it would have to be something pretty special. They're doing AWESOME things with the Xbox 360 - which now features a Metro-like interface on the dash. They've got all the pieces to hit huge, but they're still missing something.

I think you would be surprised if you actually tried out a Windows phone. I know of a couple people who replaced a iPhone 4 and a Droid for a Windows phone. From what I gather from them they were unhappy with the quality of the phone for the price they paid. They were happy so I went out a bought one too. See below for my comment.

I've just had 3 of my customers switch from their Windows Phones to iPhones as a Christmas Present to themselves.

Personally you might prefer the Windows Phone but I think that the majority of people will still prefer something different particularly if they have had older Windows Phones why should they take the risk with another new one?

Col

Yes, I'm still feeling burned by the old Windows Mobile versions 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 5 and 6 and 6.5. I'm not sure I'm willing to take another chance on Microsoft's view of my world.

Particularly when on a MS blog post, they indicated that the new firmware would be rolled out by the telcos, not by MS... This means we're right back on the worst aspect of WinMobe6.5, without the benefit of XDA versions of it that had fixed the most annoying aspects of MS/Mfg not knowing how to configure the OS, and carrier bloat. From my perspective, WinMobe 7.x is actually a step backwards from the previous versions in terms of flexibility and power. It looks prettier, but Android was the logical upgrade for those of us that were on WM6.5.

For one of the most inflammatory blog entries from MS in a long time (for those of us who remember the bad old days of "no updates":
http://windowsteamblog.com/windows_phone/b/windowsphone/archive/2012/01/06/new-maintenance-release-for-windows-phone.aspx

Unlike many posters, I was a fan / evangelist for the old Classic WM. WM was the only mobile OS that met all my needs out of the box. Although I experimented with custom firmware etc, my everyday drivers were stock from the vendor, and surprise of all surprises, were very stable, and reliable. Yes, I did get the occasional 3rd party app that was bad, but just deleted it, and purchased a competing stable app. I have to reset my iOS, and Android devices as often, if not more often, than my former WM PDA's / smartphones. When Microsoft abandoned the power user, I was forced to abandon them, and the natural choice was Android since iOS is just as restricted / feature deficient as WP7.

I agree with your comments about WP7 being a step backward from previous versions of WM. I can understand them wanting to "pretty it up", and make it smoother. No problem with that, but why did they throw out the baby (power user features) with the bathwater? I was hoping based on initial comments from MS, that the power user features would be added back over time. Now, I know that is not going to happen. I have tried WP7, and own a HD7. The interface is definitely smooth, and fluid, but I find it bland, requires too much scrolling, some constantly changing active tiles are as distracting as Las Vegas billboards, and bottom line, I cannot accomplish what I need because of the features they removed from Classic WM. I respect other love it, and I say great for them. I did want to love WP7 since I was a big fan of the old WM, but unfortunately for me, it looks like that is not going to happen.

I know some will say look how well the iPhone sold vs. WM. Yes, the iPhone leaped over WM in sales, but the iPhone was also very heavily advertised in the mainstream media vs. just about no mainstream advertising for the old WM. Is it a surprise that a device you saw advertised on prime time network TV daily, advertised on many stand alone illuminated kiosks downtown, advertised on the end panel at many bus waiting areas, and was the darling of the mainstream media (and received constant mentions in their newscasts) outsold a device which had just about zero mainstream advertising?. The radio talk show host with the largest audience is an avid Apple fan. When a new, or upgraded iOS device is announced / released, a segment, or two of the show could be mistaken for an Apple infomercial. Apple did the same successful marketing strategy with the iPod, and now with the iPad.

I am still a fan of Windows desktop, but goodbye to Microsoft's mobile offering; it was great while it lasted, but ended when you threw the power users under the bus in your quest to mimic Apple's over-control, over-restricted mobile offering.

Don't blame MS for the WP7 update issues. It's the damn carriers who don't want users to have a fresh experience and would rather sell them new phones every two years.

I agree about the carriers, but Apple got favorable contracts with telcos to be the sole supplier of firmware.

The carriers were largely responsible for WM's demise due to bloat and no updates. Now MS has turned over their destiny to them again, REALLY? Foolish move. Doesn't matter how good the phone HW is, if that one little annoying SW glitch (whatever that one is for you) is finally fixed, but not in a firmware available to YOU because the carrier doesn't see fit to release it, then you are going to be annoyed. Particularly when the device is only a year old and already "unsupported". At least with WM6.x and lower and Android, you can load custom firmware to get around issues like that. WP7 and higher? You're just as stuck as you are on a iPhone. No thanks.

I am not sure I understand what and how your mobile phone 'carriers' work,but here in the UK, they really have to compete with one another. OK, we are much smaller in size and therefore don't need the same coverage but we as customers can choose between O2, Orange, T-Mobile, Virgin, Tesco (who piggy back on the O2 network) Vodaphone and 3. All have to come up with the best deals and tariffs, and we benefit as a result.

I pretty much agree with you - and anyone who remembers Windows CE and WinMo 6.x and on - I don't see how they could disagree with most of what you have to say.

In fact, the very locked down model of WP7 was a major turn off to me. No side-loading apps, no SD card, no tethering and MS was spinning these as *assets*.

It is a gorgeous and polished platform that is stable and secure and runs arguably better than either iOS or Android - but that isn't the be-all-end-all of what makes a phone nice to use.

This is a whole new version and I have to say this is one of the best Windows products I've seen in a while (kinect has to be the best). We have been using them at our office for about a year now and we love them. The app store still has some growing to do but aside from that I have nothing to complain about. They are easy to use, configure and development tools are getting better. If you decide not to try it, I say your missing out.

...Is like comparing the iPhone to the Apple Newton. I agree, WinMo is horrible, but WP7 is just fresh and iOS just looks boring in comparison and Android is a convoluted OS.

Anything Pre WP7 (6.5 or 6.1) to WP7 and 7.5, HAL. They're not even remotely the same thing. It would be like comparing Mac OS Classic to OS X.

That the people who had those OS's don't trust M$ to provide another one. They expect more of the same less than Stellar lack of functionality.

Not sure if it's to do with them expecting too much or what but they are now feed up to the Back Teeth with Windows Phones and don't want to experience another.

That is what used to happen when a company sold a product that was lacking. The customer went elsewhere and got something that suited them better. Then for some idiot reason that I've never fully understood a lot of people complained about a product and instead of looking for a competing product would rush out and buy the new version of the same thing hoping that it was better.

When I asked them why they had done this the best answer I ever got was It's New.

Col

And for a long time it was the best platform for mobile embedded computing around. But the iOS model quickly proved far superior around the time of Win Mobile 6.1, and 6.5 wasn't enough to address the problem and took too long to get there. *Mostly* the issue was that Apple iOS illustrated two things:

1: Awesome apps were possible
2: They could be priced very inexpensively as commodity items and still be lucrative to developers.

There is no doubt that early iOS developers made more on their apps in months at $.99 a piece than WinMo entertainment developers made EVER selling their titles at $15... $30... and more.

Up until that point, though, Windows Mobile was the most promising (and prestigious) platform for executive gadgets like PDAs and Smart-phones. They never got the app equation at Microsoft, their "desktop layout on a mobile device" direction was something they should have dumped... and the iPhone illustrated that browsing on a mobile device didn't have to suck.

Those things - combined with Microsoft dragging their heels on responding to that effectively until... well... NOW... is what caused the problem for Microsoft.

I guess either way, net result is that customers went somewhere else and now Microsoft has to try to get back into the game...

Don't necessarily disagree with your comments, just wanted to add a different slant. When mobile IE was introduced, the cell data speeds were so slow, you did not want a full page. Mobile IE did a great job displaying mobile pages, and when you adjusted the text size, the page would rewrap, a feature still missing with the iPhone. If you wanted the full web experience as cell data speeds increased, alternate browsers were available for WM that displayed full pages as good as the iPhone, and displayed single column pages much better than the iPhone without all the horizontal scrolling for each line, or reading with a 7 point font. Using NetFront browser on a 4" VGA WM device, I was viewing my bank's secure desktop site (mobile site did not exist then) including cancelled checks before the original iPhone was introduced. MS should have upgraded their browser as data speeds increased, but if you wanted the full experience, and had the required data speed, low cost stable desktop like browser options were available.

If you did not like the "desktop" look on WM, you could easily change it to one more to your liking including just grids of icons which some of my WM device came with as a Home application.

IMO, MS should have kept the power user features of Classic WM while smoothing out the interface, improving the browser, and fine tuning the code. I know many will disagree with my next comment, but I preferred browsing with the old WM IE than IE on WP7 because I could adjust the text size, and the page would rewrap. Yes, I can pinch zoom IE on WP7, and the text smoothly increases, but then I have to horizontally scroll to read each line for single column pages like forums (or read at an uncomfortably small font size), a deficiency it shares with the iPhone. With NetFront on the old WM, and Opera Mobile on Android (set as desktop client), I can adjust the text to a size comfortable for my aging eyes without the dreaded horizontal scrolling required for many single column pages with WP7, and iOS. I wonder how much of the "browser jerkiness" with Android, and the old WM is actually just the browser rewrapping the text as you zoom, or slow data speeds. WP7, and iOS would have a problem with low data speeds, but since they do not word wrap with pinch zoom (not double tap), the text enlarging is very smooth.

Sometimes you just have to re-engineer everything and move on.

Apple has done this about 2 or is it 3 times in the same time frame as Microsoft. So Apple comes out with the next great OS, then all of the old software simply could be not used. In fact every time Apple did this they lost a ton of business customers. (if I have to change all my software then why not change right off the platform - this explains the low apple market share).

Today I can run a 20 year old version of DOS FoxPro on a brand new windows 7 box (32 bit). So the compatibility they maintained is second to none in the industry. And all that business software still works on the next new version, but in the same time frame Apple has more than once essentially done with their desktop as to what MS just did with the wp7.

For consumers, they don't care about backwards compatibility when they go out a purchase a mac laptop, windows users do.

However, by breaking with the old, in some cases this gives Apple the advantage since they can simply start with a fresh platform.

So after a certain point in time, a complete break with the old often has to occur.

Even up to the 1940's using lots of wood in an airplane made sense. However, you start trying to pressurize the flight cabin and wood frames are just not in the game anymore.

When I look at what happed to the Palm OS over the years and the fact that they had the first great smartphone in the marketplace (Treo), the problem was the OS was just too limited and the "under pinning's" of the system could not compete. This is similar to folks at WordPerfect using assembler to code the platform when the competition is cranking out 10x the features in the same time frame using c++.

So be it Palm OS, older windows mobile etc, the platform simply could not allow one to build the next gen of software that everyone required. You just can't use wood to build those new planes and compete in the marketplace.

The windows phone platform needed a rebuild to compete. It was now or never.

A new fresh platform was required and no question this step hurts existing winMo 6 phone users.

However, the plus side is you get the newest and best phone in the marketplace based on the latest and new development tools and the newest ideas in terms of UI.

It called leap frogging everyone else, but it not always an easy "hop" to make!

Albert D. Kallal
Edmonton, Alberta Canada
Nospam-kallal@msn.com

I too was happy to drop my iDevice for a WP7 device (Samsung focus) - about 6 months ago and have never regretted it. The UI is so much more compelling, and post - Mango the experience is significantly better. The limiting factor is the app ecosystem - there aren't enough apps being developed for this platform - hopefully that will change.

my phone needs:
sd slot
google maps - im sorry but bing maps just does not cut it.

if i got those things, i would be wm7's biggest fan.

my phone needs:
sd slot
google maps - im sorry but bing maps just does not cut it.

if i got those things, i would be wm7's biggest fan.

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/smartphones/verizons-htc-trophy-wp7-offers-nothing-to-hate-or-love/3579?tag=content;siu-container

That is my review of the HTC Trophy. I mention somewhere there that one of my co-workers renewed with a WP7 after checking out the demo device I was reviewing - and the e-mail client is the best mobile e-mail client out there, bar-none.

Not a lot to love... or hate... but that isn't enough to get me to give up on an app ecosystem I'm invested in. Especially when replacement apps on the WP7 market are more expensive relative to the same titles on other markets - if they're available at all, and very seldom are there free ad supported versions on WP7, as well. Microsoft has to figure out how to overcome this to lure people away from other platforms in large enough numbers - and so far, this hail mary pass doesn't seem to be enough from my perspective.

The way ahead for Microsoft is to take the people who've been successfully running the Xbox department, and promote them all the way up.
Those guys would have had the courier tablet out, and they've shown that they know how to give consumers a thrill.
And people really like having a thrill... just look at Apple, they're all about the thrill. The trick isn't to copy what Apple is doing on the concrete level; the trick is to get the right idea - that technology needs to feel awesome no matter what.
People don't care if the Star Fleet Transponder has a USB jack or not... they like everything about what it is - and don't even care what it isn't.

I just bought a HTC Trophy and have to say for the $40 I paid for it with my Verizon discounts. I am very impressed to get such a decent smartphone for that money. Not everyone wants to throw down $200 for a smartphone or for that matter needs to.
I think everyone's demands are different. I pretty much live in a Apple products household but choose the Windows phone for the price and I really thought it performed as well as the iPhone 4. The 4S was not even a option because of my budget. I think Microsoft might do well trying to market their phones at a slightly cheaper customer.

I've been hounded for the past couple of years by Mrs Wiz for a new cellphone...
then my stepdaughter finally finished off an old BB Storm I had given her...
So for Christmas I purchased a couple of Samsung Focus phones...all is well
on the home front now, stepdaughter happy, loves the Focus. Mrs Wiz is
coming from using an old Motorola Razr, and she really doesn't take to new
technology very well. She's learning the UI of the WP7 Focus quite well, and
now can SMS text quite a bit faster!
Me, I still have my 5 year old Samsung Blackjack...it still works!
The point to all this is that if the gals in my household can operate these
little gadgets WITHOUT intensive instructions from me, it means these phones
are pretty decent and Microsoft has the potential for big things!
My only complaint...the Focus phones get LTE 4G...my old Blackjack only
does 3G!1 ;(

I remember wanting that much power for my desktop system

I remember all the Ooooing and Ahhhing back when I put the 90 MHz Pentiums out on the floor. They were the biggest things since the 33 MHz 486.

You guys must be pretty young. I remember the whopping 1.023 MHz 6502 Apple IIe and even the advanced TRS 80 Model I at 1.78 MHz. What about the ultra portable Osborne and Kaypro. You had to be in shape to haul those portables around.

i still have a working one of those. The screen is smaller than the floppy disks and it has a 300 baud modem.

You are old like me.

and raise you an Oasis CP/M box with 8" floppy drive in the attic.

Don't remember that one. You won!

I bow to you sir. You win.

Nevermind about my overclocking a 8088 to 12Mhz from 10Mhz so that I could change the rll hdd's interleave from 4:1 to 2:1.

I still have a TRS 80, new in box as well as the little portable printer...

When I got my first turbo 8088 running at 8MHz with 640K RAM and a 20M HD it was a screamer compared to the model A of the IBM PC that only ran at 4.77MHz, had 64K RAM and a 360K floppy.

I think it was sometime in the early 80???s I built a Sinclair Z80 kit that hooked to an old black and white TV and came with a manual which told me how to program in basic. But my first real computer was an 8088 Radio Shack PC that sported a upgrade card that brought the memory to a full 1meg! It came with DOS 2.0 but I upgraded to 3.1. It lacked a hard drive but did come with 2 floppies. You booted off of disk 1 and ran all your programs off the floppy.

I have had the HTC HD7 for a couple of months now, recently updated to Mango and believe it or not I am not going back!!!! Love the Metro UI and the look and feel of the OS entirely.

With MS patnership with NOKIA maybe markets like the ones in Nigeria should be given a focus. Nokia brands an hugely popular here so MS stands to gain from the existent customer base.

With the steady decline of RIM in terms of market share, MS can be better positioned to convert RIM fans.

Anyway, only time will tell if this happens.

WIndows Phone whilst not as "smart" as say (some) Android phones or iPhone defitnly seems to have a good UI. So I reckon if Microsoft+Hardware manufacturer+Phone network get the overall price right they could have a winner.

Personally I still hate what Elop has done to Nokia and I am not that keen on Balmer either so the photo could have looked a bit different if I had been there with a basket of tomatoes :- )

The fact that the final distribution and utilization of new phones will be at the whim of American Telcos is ludicrous. Americans say that any move by the Government to mandate that Telcos should provide a "common carrier" service is Communism. The rest of the World calls it corruption.

America is at the mercy of Big Business - and there ain't no mercy.

nt

If that's the guiding principle, even the contributors and bribers aren't getting their money's worth.