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The Reason a Surface Phone Won't Fix Microsoft's Mobile Problem (windows10update.com)

Posted by samzenpus on from the looking-for-life dept.

Ammalgam writes: Microsoft's CMO recently admitted that Microsoft was behind in the mobile arena and needed time to build a competitive phone. In the Windows community however, some feel that the Windows Phone platform is out of time. On Windows10Update.com, the author discusses some of the reasons why a "Surface Phone" might not be enough to fundamentally change public perception about Microsoft mobile phones.

8 of 154 comments (clear)

  1. Huh? by BradleyUffner · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What is a "Surface Phone", and how is it different from a "Window 10 Phone", other than the name?

    1. Re:Huh? by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Surface Phone::Windows 10 For Phones = Nexus Phone::Android

      Basically it's a phone from Microsoft, intended to show off its operating system as it imagines it should be implemented, rather than just one that runs a Microsoft Operating System.

      And yeah, I appreciate that Lumia phones are designed by a division of Microsoft, but I suspect the former Nokia division is still run to a certain extent at arm's length.

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    2. Re: Huh? by TheReaperD · · Score: 4, Informative

      Except that, unless Microsoft has made vast strides in x86 hardware with a hardware division we don't know about, current low power x86 chips have no business in a smartphone chassis. They are too large, consume too much power and generate too much heat. Even trying to keep them in a tablet format has been troublesome for Microsoft and they had to accept compromises to make it work. So an x86 smartphone is just unrealistic at this time. They've tried a few times and it never worked so they've been forced to work with a crappy ARM port of Windows that no previous generation software works with or anything current built around win32s (which is almost all Windows software). The only reason Windows is still a market force is because of their backwards-compatability model and resulting market lock-in. Without this compatibility, any "Windows" product is a non-starter. I think Microsoft knows this but, tries anyway because the smartphone market is so important to future revenue and they refuse to simplify cede this important market to Apple and Google. I think they are hoping to hang on by their fingernails in the market until it is viable to run an x86 chipset in a smartphone.

      --
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  2. Oh good. by MachineShedFred · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The only reason that the Surface tablets are getting any traction at all, is because they can run native x64 Windows apps. When they tried an ARM version, it failed so badly that Microsoft ended up writing off almost a billion dollars of inventory that nobody would buy, even at loss-leader pricing.

    Almost nobody* wants a phone that can run x64 Windows apps, so the same trick is unlikely to work in that space.

    * I said almost nobody, because immediately below this comment will be a reply from some corner case or another where someone will want that, but they will be a very small exception to my statement. The massive majority of the market will not want such a product, and will happily continue buying Android or iOS for the foreseeable future.

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    1. Re:Oh good. by BitZtream · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I know I'm being an example of what you pointed out as the follow up comment ... but ... bear with me anyway, please.

      My wife is the perfect example of someone who would want a Surface Phone (excepted she'd really want an OSXiOS phone since she's a mac person). She RARELY uses her MBA, but when she does its because a phone just isn't the right input/display device, its pretty much never due to lack of CPU power.

      If should could simply take that phone, and plug it in with Thunderbolt and it instantly becomes a very low powered but fully featured laptop ... with say 256GB of storage? She'd never own another laptop.

      99% of the time, the phone is perfect. The other 1% doesn't require a desktop PC, it requires a big display and a real keyboard/mouse. Having all her data, always being connected, and only needing essentially a KVM to turn it into a practical 'desktop pc'? Awesome-sauce.

      I want the exact same thing, but I require more CPU power so its not going to work for me for a few more years, but I do dev work on her MBA on occasion and its really not that bad for most things if you can keep your working set small enough. You aren't going to want to run freebsd's 'make world' on an MBA as a regular thing, but rebuilding init or sshd is certainly tolerable.

      Again, I may be a corner case, but I don't think she is. She's a vet, so being able to do almost everything on her phone (with a different UI than full desktop mode!, same apps) and then just plugging in a keyboard or display for the rest? Wherever she is because her phone is ALWAYS with her ...

      I think that would be the death of 'PCs' much like cell phones killed off the low end film and digital camera market entirely.

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  3. Developers Developers Developers Developers by StandardCell · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You hit the nail on the head - it's all about the app ecosystem. What killer Windows phone apps ever made any waves? None. Even BlackBerry got the message about Android apps though far too late to save them. If the developers aren't there, the apps won't be there and the customers won't use your platform.

  4. Like that scene from The Princess Bride... by Stormwatch · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Offer me apps."
    "Yes!"
    "Accessories, too, promise me that."
    "All that I have and more. Please..."
    "Offer me everything I ask for."
    "Anything you want..."

    *stab*

    "I want MeeGo back, you son of a bitch!"

    --
    Circumcision is child abuse.
  5. Microsoft could TAKE OVER the smartphone market.. by realmolo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    All they need are these features:

    A phone that can be fully-managed with Group Policy/Active Directory

    A phone that has a fully-functional Outlook client, with ALL the features of desktop Outlook that are practical to cram into a phone

    That's IT. Most businesses would jump at the chance for those. Mobile security is a big issue, and there *still* isn't a truly good Exchange client for any phone (though some are close).

    The fact that MS hasn't realized this stuff is mystifying. What are they thinking?