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Microsoft Unveils Windows Phone 7 Lineup
adeelarshad82 writes "Microsoft officially unveiled its Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system, announcing that it will be available on a total of five devices in the US. Windows Phone 7 handsets from AT&T and T-Mobile will begin shipping in November, while devices from Sprint and Verizon will be available next year. In all, Microsoft announced nine Windows Phone 7 phones, the remainder of which will be available in Canada, Mexico, the UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Singapore, and Australia. It will debut in some European markets on Oct. 21. While early signs are encouraging for Windows Phone 7, it is being deemed as do or die for the future of Microsoft's business."
If they don't get traction with 7, they can do 8. Or buy Nokia or RIM out of couch-cushion change. Or several dozen other ways to buy into the market that I haven't thought of but I'm sure someone in Redmond has, singly or in combination.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
MS still controls the desktop, and lots of high end business market. That is a very solid, very profitable market. Then of course there's their office suite, game console, and so on. Having a strong mobile market would do nothing but help them for sure, but if you think they have to "do it or die" you've got your head in the sand. MS is doing just fine.
Maybe true. Probably a case of too little too late. They had numerous years to get it together.
They can only follow, which is fine. But they had plenty of chances to lead.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
... to apps I develop on my own phone, I'm out.
And I really, really wanted one of these things, too. Maybe they'll come around and change their policy, but until then, I'm sticking with my dumbphone.
Copy Paste is slated to come out in an update this January. (This was in their version of a 'one more thing' at the end of the keynote)
Windows 7. And yes, XBOX 360. And believe it or not, IE9 has some really awesome stuff. Office 2010
Maybe not recent, but awesome, particularly with recent updates:
C#, Visual Studio
Kin was never as great of an abomination as Windows Phone was.
Even if MSFT has a basically credible mobile phone OS, what do they have to draw people away from Apple, Android, or Blackberry?
Please take it from my lengthy, extremely painful, dissatisfied experience. Never buy a Windows Mobile phone. Ever. I don't care WHAT they might have done to this version of the software, I can guarantee you it will not work a fraction as well as any alternatives.
I own an HTC Mogul PPC6800. I have never experienced a product so poor, so lacking in quality and completely failing to fulfill its most primary functions. Every day I have to use it I wonder to myself how it was even released. I have never seen such a poor product even be allowed to enter consumer hands in exchange for money. It is just that bad.
I felt this would be a good topic with which to share that experience.
Where is cut and paste and multitasking?
Just about the only time I use copy/paste on my phone is during setup, when I need to input my long, pseudorandom WPA key. It is certainly very useful during this time. Otherwise, in practice, I just don't use it very much.
I prefer the Microsoft tools. That's not to say I wouldn't get an Android if I had to pick a smartphone, but .NET development is just easier (and the tools are just better) than what Google offers.
(I program in both Java and C# for a living, so it's not an issue of familiarity, just an honest preference)
I would like to know WHY the Lucasfilm 'droid' trademark applies to phones in any way or to any real world device at all outside of Star Wars toys/games.
Good-bye
MS didn't show it in the demo (that I saw).
The quality of the browser is paramount. Do we know if it's any good? Their last one sure wasn't.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Actually that's more like "Development in C++ will not be permitted**"
**Except for companies we allow. Like Adobe
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Yes but the Iphone has cut and paste now and has multi-tasking limited but a lot of people say it makes all the difference.
Android and WebOS have true multitasking as well.
I will add that Microsoft WinMo 6.5 also has multitasking and cut n paste.
Thing is that when IOS was lacking those features all it had to complete with was WinMo, RIM, Symbian, and PalmOS.
WM7 must face both IOS and Android in their current state and honestly I don't see a big draw yet. We will see but WM7 must compete with IOS4 and with Android 2.2 today.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
iOS is focused on consumers, not business. Android is too young and nobody's polished it enough for business. Symbian does have offer lots of business devices but they're not by far as nicely integrated as what RIM offers, it's a wildly different range of products scattered across different manufacturers and backends.
Granted, Microsoft and WP7 could move into that business niche in force. Microsoft definitely has what it takes to offer an alternative to RIM's integrated services. Then again, one might argue that their core expertise lies with PC's, not mobiles, and all their previous efforts in this sector were more or less failures.
Let's just wait and see what actually happens, ok? After all these years I'm just a bit weary of Microsoft hype, FUD and vaporware. I'll give them the benefit of doubt, as always... but I want to see some cold hard results before I get excited.
i ate crayons when i was a kid and now i have two braincells and the blue ones taste nicer
It's a great service for gamers who have Xboxes. For general consumers that don't have an Xbox or Xbox Live, there isn't much of an advantage to having Xbox Live integration.
MobileMe is a great service for iPhone owners with MobileMe. For general consumers that don't have a MobileMe account, there isn't much of an advantage to having MobileMe integration.
See what I did there?
There are far more Xbox Live subscribers than MobileMe account holders. Only a tiny fraction of iphone owners get a mobileme account. Yet several of the iphones more interesting features are locked away behind that service. If WinMo7 offers mobileme features for free + extra stuff that ties into the gamer-centric xbl it will potentially be quite attractive to a LOT of people.
There are far more Xbox Live subscribers than MobileMe account holders. Only a tiny fraction of iphone owners get a mobileme account. Yet several of the iphones more interesting features are locked away behind that service. If WinMo7 offers mobileme features for free + extra stuff that ties into the gamer-centric xbl it will potentially be quite attractive to a LOT of people.
MobileMe is for consumers that use Windows, OS X, iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPads. Xbox Live is only for gamers that use Microsoft's Xbox gaming platform. Gee, which population is bigger? Consumers or Xbox gamers? Targeting such a niche population isn't a major benefit.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I really can't see people having an interest in this. Even those uneducated masses. There's nothing remarkable about it and certainly no extra raison d'etre.
My guess is that Ballmer will loose some of his 2010 bonus also.
It just strikes me as odd that anyone would be purchasing (or even selling) this device. If they are making it it is due to legal threats and guarantees of indemnification against their Android handsets.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
Please stop spreading fanboy lies.
The PS3 has had a sub .1 percent failure rate for the entire history of the console. Nintendo has reported similar figures but has had to less often due to the fact that Xbox fans have spent less time trying to smear their console's reliability.
Just a quick google shows survey after survey of Xbox 360 failure rates in the 55 to 75 percent range. The largest and most reliable of those is the 65 percent failure rate that most people use as the best estimate.
XBox isn't a monopoly. Windows Live isn't a monopoly. Zune is about as far from a monopoly as you can get. The online office apps that it works with are free to all. MS of 2010 isn't the MS of 2000.
I see what you did there. Neat fallacy, but let's make things honest (and more in line with GP's point):
* There are 23 million XBox gamers with XBox Live subscriptions
* meanwhile, there are roughly 1.5 - 2 billion human beings who could be reasonably considered as "consumers" out there.
But, you were busily counting one phone's potential pool, versus the paid result of the other. See the problem?
Now, to be perfectly fair, out of the 23m XBox gamers, you're going to have to remove the under-18 demographic, and a reasonable percentage of folks who can afford an XBox, but not an ongoing smartphone plan. The leftover folks may or may not consider a console-phone semi-link to be a factor, let alone a deciding one.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?