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Microsoft Has Run Out of Windows Phone Stock (venturebeat.com)

Posted by msmash on from the thanks-for-the-fish dept.

Even if you really wanted to buy a Windows phone, Microsoft has run out of Windows Phone devices to sell to you. From a report: I've been watching the number of Windows Phone options on the Microsoft Store website dwindle for over two years now. I was honestly expecting them to disappear completely more than six months ago. It's 2018, and there are still two remaining phones. Last night, they both flipped over to "out of stock." The HP Elite x3 with dock, normally $799 but on sale for $299, and the Alcatel Idol 4S, normally $299 but on sale for $99.99, are officially out of stock. The third option for $169, the Alcatel Idol 4S with VR Goggles, is of course also out of stock.

81 comments

  1. Oh no! by jimtheowl · · Score: 5, Funny

    Next Story: "This guy bought the last Windows phone!"

    1. Re:Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Story after that: Guy wonders why he bought a Windows Phone.

    2. Re:Oh no! by jellomizer · · Score: 2

      I expect it was some old guy where is current phone was broken. Perhaps a flip phone from the 1990's found these as a cheap phone for a replacement. With markdowns like that, it is a good price.

      If he is going to be using it to make phone calls, and perhaps some new fancy smart phone thinks like internet browsing, it is probably perfectly fine.

      Microsoft actually put some effort into the Windows Phone 8 and 10, vs the old Windows Phone powered by CE which just crammed the desktop UI onto a small phone. While I argue Windows 8 and 10 just crammed the phone interface on the desktop instead.

      --
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    3. Re:Oh no! by Tablizer · · Score: 2

      Last Post! (from Windows phone)

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    4. Re:Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      some old guy where is current phone was broken

      I hope English is not your first language.

    5. Re:Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only good price for a Windows Phone is one where Microsoft pays me to dispose of their piece of shit.

    6. Re:Oh no! by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 1

      It's not dead yet...
      https://www.google.com/

      --
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    7. Re:Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I doubt that someone who had a flipphone would buy a windows phone especially when some places offer a flipphone at prices as low as $25

    8. Re:Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That escalated quickly

    9. Re:Oh no! by thegarbz · · Score: 0

      Next Story: "This guy bought the last Windows phone!"

      I really hope it's like that story on the first guy who bought the first iPhone 3G and then proceeded to drop it while opening the box in front of the camera crew.

    10. Re:Oh no! by modmans2ndcoming · · Score: 0

      worse.....a 12 year old wants an iPhone like his friends....Clueless Dad sees 99 dollar Windows phone and buys it expecting to be a hero for his son......

    11. Re:Oh no! by youngone · · Score: 1

      Or... someone like my sister, who was conned by a slick sales guy who told her it was "the latest phone".
      Boy did she get pissy went I laughed at her.
      To be fair, it was not a bad phone for $150 (local money) nice camera.

    12. Re:Oh no! by rtb61 · · Score: 1

      What is dead though is https://www.computerworld.com/.... They could not even sell their own phone, blew $7.6 billion dollars not to mention destroying a company and unemploying it's staff . Now it's all Windows anal probe 10 and you have no right to privacy or the right to control what software is installed on your computer once you install windows anal probe 10. They are just a disgusting company.

      --
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    13. Re: Oh no! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's me, bought one a few weeks back. #stillthebest

  2. translation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    âoe: I've been watching the number of Windows Phone options on the Microsoft Store website dwindle for over two years now.â

    translation:

    âoeI have no lifeâ

  3. not surprising by swschrad · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    guess nobody wanted a mobile phone that required a nearby Xbox to work....

    --
    if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
    1. Re:not surprising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There were a lot of terrible things about Windows Phone. You don't need to make something up.

    2. Re:not surprising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Definitely expected a Zune joke to appear before XBox.

    3. Re: not surprising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I hear that a lot, it's total bs. Used to be true though...

      Sent from a Windows 10 mobile

  4. Wow! by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 4, Funny

    That means they finally found a vict^H^H^H^H buyer for the 10th Windows Phone! ;)

    --
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  5. I want my phone! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Where is my DANGER phone?!?

  6. So much for ... by CaptainDork · · Score: 1

    ... my 401(k) wherein invested it all in Windows fucking Phone!

    All gone, you say?

    --
    It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
  7. Which is really kind of sad by Xoc-S · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The Windows Phone was really well done. (We'll ignore Windows Phone 6 and before as if they never existed!) Much more coherent interface than either the iPhone or Android. And the battery life was way better. The problem with it was timing and apps. If it had come out before the iPhone, they would have ruled the market, and Apple would probably be suffering. But coming out after the iPhone and Android, they were continually playing catch up. They never got the app base, and without that it was chicken and egg...nobody bought it because it didn't have apps and no apps because nobody bought it.

    1. Re:Which is really kind of sad by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      I am not arguing your assessment of the quality of windows phone 8 and 10. I knew people who had them and loved them. But I doubt it would be like it is without the iPhone. Apple actually broke the mold with the original iPhone, multi-touch screen as a primary interface, Microsoft would had just made a blackberry clone. That said, By the time the iPhone was released Microsoft was getting a backlash of its dominance. The Zune wasn't bad, but people didn't want a Microsoft Zune, Their PC and Gaming Console was enough. And picking who you hated more Microsoft or Sony was a tough bet.

      If the Windows Phone came out before the iPhone, I don't think it would get the same love. Much of the iPhone sales were from Apple Fan Boys until the iPhone 3Gs where normal people started wanting them. There is a much smaller group of Microsoft Fan Boys back in 2007.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    2. Re:Which is really kind of sad by David_Hart · · Score: 1

      The Windows Phone was really well done. (We'll ignore Windows Phone 6 and before as if they never existed!) Much more coherent interface than either the iPhone or Android. And the battery life was way better. The problem with it was timing and apps. If it had come out before the iPhone, they would have ruled the market, and Apple would probably be suffering. But coming out after the iPhone and Android, they were continually playing catch up. They never got the app base, and without that it was chicken and egg...nobody bought it because it didn't have apps and no apps because nobody bought it.

      It's also why the Windows RT version of the Microsoft Surface failed. Microsoft tried to make an iPad but they just can't seem to get traction with mobile App developers.

    3. Re:Which is really kind of sad by ansizfark · · Score: 1

      They still could have caught up if they had bitten that bullet and turned the Windows phone into a "loss leader" kind of device. Cut the price down super low, and allow them to become the cheap device of choice, build up a market, gradually work up the ladder. It's not like Microsoft doesn't have the kind of cash to have done that very thing.

    4. Re:Which is really kind of sad by StormReaver · · Score: 0

      The Windows Phone was really well done.

      Let's assume this is true (whether it is or not doesn't matter much), and move on.

      The problem with it was timing and apps.

      I think timing here matters very little. I think there are two main reasons the Windows phone flopped:

      1) Microsoft was/is run by complete and utter assholes, whose main objective was sucking your bank account dry by hook or by crook. This catapulted them to dominance in the 90's, and kept them in dominance despite their hoards of customers wanting to leave. However, their abusive monopoly power and absolute control over most of the people who were forced to spend tons of money on the Microsoft treadmill kept them making billions of dollars a year.

      2) People remember the above.

    5. Re:Which is really kind of sad by IGnatius+T+Foobar · · Score: 1

      That's the problem. Microsoft couldn't have come out with a design like that before the iPhone, because Apple and Google had to show Microsoft what a usable smartphone should actually look like. Come on guys, this is Slashdot, we've known for decades that Microsoft isn't capable of coming up with good ideas by itself, they have to copy someone else. Unfortunately for Microsoft, the market was already saturated, so even if the product was better, it never stood a chance. It's the same problem the desktop Linux people have.

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    6. Re:Which is really kind of sad by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 1

      > Microsoft couldn't have come out with a design like that before the iPhone,

      /sarcasm What do you mean, man! They only had a ~11 year head start (from 1996 to 2007) and they STILL couldn't get it right with WinCE. Oh wait ...

      /Oblg. If MS designed the iPod packaging -- Ironically, the video was created internally by MS showing just how cluessless MS is/was in branding.

    7. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      The Windows Phone was really well done.

      Except that part where you’d buy a Windows Phone and your phone wouldn’t qualify for the next version? And then Microsoft did it again with the next major version? Yeah, that was really well done... NOT.

    8. Re:Which is really kind of sad by iamhassi · · Score: 2

      Windows phones were out before iphone. They were called Windows Mobile. They were rather popular too, only real problem is they needed a stylus, some apps downloaded to PC and transferred to the phone, and the touchscreen keyboard was small and sucked, but that was the way things were back then so we didn't know any different. Apple came out with full touchscreen designed for fingers, not stylus, and a well designed App Store built into the device.

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    9. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Depends which version you were talking.

      Virtually every 7.0 device got upgraded to 7.5 (unless the manufacturer abandoned it), ditto on 8.0 devices getting upgraded to 8.1.

      There was unfortunately a good bit of hubris that thought it ok to leave 7.5 users stuck, and only allow upgrades to 10 from 8.1 as part of the insider program.

    10. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      The hubris in having that mock iPhone funeral is still funny as hell. That’ll go down as one of the dumber moments along with Ballmer saying no one would buy an iPhone because there was no physical keyboard.

    11. Re:Which is really kind of sad by kurkosdr · · Score: 0

      If Microsoft wanted more developer support they should have supported industry standard APIs such as OpenGL instead of forcing anyone to port their code to Direct X. Add to that that Metro was a widely different UI paradigm necessitating an GUI redesign, and I cannot blame developers for not supporting Windows Phone.

    12. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Stormwatch · · Score: 1

      I have some complements to that:

      3) Nokia had their own new system, MeeGo, under development at the time. Nokia users were hyped for it. App devs and phone carriers had sunk sweat and money preparing for it. Everyone who actually used it says it was excellent. So when that was killed in favor of WP, simply because the new CEO was a Microsoft puppet, you have tons of people - a very vocal fanbase and several big companies - furious and ready to jump ship to anything but WP.

      4) Like that hadn't angered carriers enough, Microsoft bought Skype, which was seen as trying to steal their bread and butter. You just can't win in this market without carrier support.

      5) WP was born osborned. Even before the first Lumia devices came out, it was known they would not be upgradable to the next version of WP, so everyone avoided them in a critical moment.

      --
      Circumcision is child abuse.
    13. Re:Which is really kind of sad by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      Virtually every 7.0 device got upgraded to 7.5 (unless the manufacturer abandoned it), ditto on 8.0 devices getting upgraded to 8.1.

      Which is not what the OP was talking about. He's talking about WP7 -> WP8. No device could be upgraded. Imagine not being able to upgrade a computer from Vista -> 7 or 7-> 8 or 8->10. We're not talking about a long time here. From XP -> Vista (5 years) might be tricky if the computer was really old but WP8 was released only 2 years after WP7.

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    14. Re:Which is really kind of sad by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      They never got the app base,

      Much of which I would blame on MS. From what I understand from the migration from WM6 -> WP7 -> WP8 required developers to write new apps each time. A developer would be lucky if it was as simple as opening the old app in Visual Studio and migrating, but often it would require re-writing different parts. With Android and iOS, your app would work for a few versions for the most part before you had to release a new version.

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    15. Re:Which is really kind of sad by TheFakeTimCook · · Score: 1

      Microsoft couldn't have come out with a design like that before the iPhone, because Apple HAD to show Everyone else what a usable smartphone should actually look like.

      FTFY.

    16. Re:Which is really kind of sad by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      The Zune wasn't bad, but people didn't want a Microsoft Zune

      The problem for MS was that the Zune was a severely crippled and mediocre competitor to iPods that was released when Apple was leaving the market for smartphones. If you are a new competitor to an established player, you have to have something that makes you better than the established player. The one actual defining feature "squirting" was so crippled as to be useless.

      Add to that problem was the nonsensical marketing and advertising that MS employed. It seemed like by being obscure and mysterious, MS thought that would generate buzz for their product. If you are new player to a market, you want everyone to know what you do. Compare that to the iPhone first commercials as Apple was trying to enter the cell phone market. Notice the difference. With the iPhone ads, you know it's 1) a cell phone, 2) called "iPhone", 3) made by Apple, 4) has other functions like music, email, web, media, maps, 5) how it works, 6) when it is available, and 7) where you can get it AT&T and Apple stores. With the Zune commercial, you would have no idea what it is or what it does. Vaguely it might be music related.

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    17. Re:Which is really kind of sad by TheFakeTimCook · · Score: 1

      The hubris in having that mock iPhone funeral is still funny as hell. That’ll go down as one of the dumber moments along with Ballmer saying no one would buy an iPhone because there was no physical keyboard.

      Hey, a lot of Slashtards essentially agreed with him...

    18. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      Yep just like how the iPad was panned here (remember when people said no one would buy one since it sounded like maxipad?) as well and Apple has sold 100s of millions of them.

    19. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      Stop being dense. I was clearly talking about the move from 7 to 8 and then from 8 to 10. This wasn’t some obscure thing that happened. It was all over the Internet.

    20. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      After giving up my last Windows Mobile, a WM 6.5 Imagio for an Android Moto Bionic, I was not all that impressed, especially in having to give up the stylus for blunt instruments (my fingers), but I needed some apps for my job. Then I found a reasonably priced Lapdock, and was really stoked by the Linux-based WebTop OS it unleashed when the phone was docked (along with the keyboard).

      I could have been even happier if the next gen Moto Razr HD had gotten an upgrade to WebTop to keep working with that same dock, but all it could do was just blow up the phone UI onto a bigger screen. It seems this was about the time Google had bought Motorola Mobility, and dictated its future direction, which apparently meant no competition with its Chrome Books just starting to come out about then.

      Then, facing yet another round of Android upgrading by buying a new phone from Verizon, and looking for something to get my wife as her first smartphone after a decade or so on feature phones, I stumbled across good reviews of WP 8.1, and a decent Lumia 635 for $50 with AT&T, and decided its plans were a better deal than Verizon for our situation (no more kids on family plan for starters), so figured "why not" ?

      Helping her learn smartphone basics on WP 8.1 was far easier than previous attempts with Android when I tried to show her how to use mine. That experience with WP impressed me enough that I started looking for a WP 8.1 model to upgrade from my Razr HD (it could run on AT&T with its Verizon "World Phone" GSM radio, but not on LTE, just HSPA), and found a Lumia 640 with good mid-range specs that could do the job for $80 outright, then upgraded my wife to her own 640 for $70, and she was delighted.

      It worked out pretty well for the next couple years, but the ossification of the WP market, and the outright loss of apps when WP 10 came out, along with its forced updating, and even more intrusive "telemetry", discouraged me, and I started dabbling with Android, again, and switched back (most of the time...) when I got a comparable LG Phoenix 2 for $30 at Best Buy on Black Friday, 2016 (subsequent Phoenix 3 the next year actually has lower specs - go figure).

      I did still switch back and forth a bit when I got annoyed with Android-ish foibles, but would learn how to cope with them, and go back to the Google Darkness. I really got a nice upgrade with an LG Stylo 3+, and what sealed that deal was its stylus that let me be more precise on the (bigger) screen - back to precision pointing ;-} . Also, AT&T has been better about passing along Google's security updates the last couple years, so that helps.

      Still, my wife is no fan of tech updates, especially to the UI, so as long as she can do what she wants - i.e. calls, texts, photos, email, search/web - I am not about to disrupt her tech bubble. I do dread the days that phone, then its backup, my old 640 die...

    21. Re:Which is really kind of sad by greenwow · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Two friends of mine interviewed at Microsoft recently to work on Windows phones, so it sounds like they're trying again.

    22. Re:Which is really kind of sad by tazan · · Score: 1

      I was a windows mobile developer back then. I dropped out when they wanted me to learn a completely new tool set. If I'm going to do that, I might as well switch to Android.

    23. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Darkling-MHCN · · Score: 1

      The problem with it was timing and apps. .... and the fact apple had iTunes back in 2001... which made the iPod a huge success and a natural lead to a very successful launch of the iPhone in 2007.

      Microsoft sought a deal with the music industry for years and failed to broker it until 2004 and by that time the iPod craze was well underway. I believe it was Steve Jobs and the connections he brought with him from Pixar that helped catapult Apple into becoming the major player in the digital music and film industry.

      It was the access to content that was a key issue. What is the point of developing a platform for content you don't have access to?

    24. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      Before the iphone they were selling windows mobile (the 6.x versions and below), had the iphone and android not come out they never would have developed windows phone 7+, they would have continued selling 6.x until they got bored of it.

      Development stagnates without competition, the reason windows mobile 6 was so terrible you'd like to forget it ever existed is because the competition wasn't much better at the time.

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    25. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      The problem was also with the branding...

      If they brand it windows, people will assume its compatible with what they know as windows - ie desktops... When it's incompatible they become disappointed.
      The brand is also tarnished, windows is associated with crashing and malware but people put up with it because they now think computers are inherently unreliable and insecure, just look at all the movies and tv shows featuring "hackers" who gain access to anything they want at the drop of a hat. People have become to expect this as the norm and tolerate it on desktop computers, but they don't expect the same from other products.

      Apple made it very clear that the iphone and ipad were separate products, not compatible with existing macos software. Their marketing did not give users incorrect expectations, so they weren't disappointed with the product.

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    26. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      They did, a lot of windows mobile devices were dirt cheap and most of the people who bought them did so for precisely that reason.
      But most of those users were replacing dumb or feature phones, and didn't make use of many of the features, or they always felt frustrated because they wanted an iphone but couldnt afford one.
      But as the dirt cheap chinese androids improved, windows phone becomes less and less attractive even at a low price.

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    27. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Two friends of mine interviewed at Microsoft recently to work on Windows phones, so it sounds like they're trying again.

      Actually, with how siloed MS is, they probably didn't get the memo yet.

    28. Re:Which is really kind of sad by sonicmerlin · · Score: 2

      No, Metro UI sucks. Tiles are useless. It's ugly. It's cluttered. That's why it failed.

    29. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Darkling-MHCN · · Score: 1

      You've never used it right?

      The last thing anyone would say about the metro ui is that it's cluttered... especially compared to Android and iPhone. The UI is actually quite beautiful and I would describe it as very clean. Windows Phone failed despite it's UI... not because of it

    30. Re:Which is really kind of sad by Darkling-MHCN · · Score: 1

      It was terrible because it was designed for devices around in the 90s. It wasn't designed to be used with fingers, it was intended to be used with a stylus, and this was because the technology to operate a touch screen hand held mobile device with a finger just wasn't practical at the time. Plus the processing power was such that the interface had to be minimal, with no fancy transitions or animations. The issue was they had to rebuild the Windows Mobile OS from nearly the ground up and it took Microsoft way too long to bite the bullet, get it built and get it to market.

    31. Re: Which is really kind of sad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The main objective of any corporation is to get all of ur money. Don't hate the player, hate the game.

    32. Re:Which is really kind of sad by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      Reminds me of the OS/2 Warp vs Windows 95 Advertising.

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    33. Re:Which is really kind of sad by TheFakeTimCook · · Score: 1

      Yep just like how the iPad was panned here (remember when people said no one would buy one since it sounded like maxipad?) as well and Apple has sold 100s of millions of them.

      No WiFi. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.

      Isn't that how it goes? ;-)

    34. Re:Which is really kind of sad by toddestan · · Score: 1

      What they really needed to was just stick with it. They kept on coming out with some new attempt at mobile, and when it didn't completely set the world on fire, they killed it off and replaced with some new, incompatible, hotness. Eventually, the Microsoft faithful, the early adopters, and the app developers had been burned enough times that they no longer took any of Microsoft's platforms seriously no matter how good they might have been. Microsoft never gave any of their platforms a chance to gain momentum - sure, maybe the user base initially was small and they were losing money, but eventually they may have managed to carve out a chunk of market.

      Really, it's kind of sad as we really need another player to help break up the Apple/Google duopoly, even if it is Microsoft.

  8. great but unsupported by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That Alcatel phone had great potential but utterly useless since there's no apps for it whatsoever.
    Also loaded with locked bloatware, chinese-only applications and *no support* from Alcatel.
    Deploying UWP apps was incredibly easy though.

  9. And probably was not by a person by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I think that most people who bought them were companies, I met 2 sales reps that use Windows phone and those are the only Windows phones I have ever seen.

    1. Re:And probably was not by a person by PPH · · Score: 2

      2 sales reps

      What were they selling? The last two Windows phones?

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    2. Re:And probably was not by a person by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Strangely enough also the first two. We apparently found both of the Windows Phone users in one spot!

  10. Only LUDDITES use Windows Phone. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Modern app appers use Appdows Phone with Appdows 10 S!

    Apps!

  11. Does it run Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If the hardware is on sale so cheap, it might be cool to put Android on it.

    Is it possible?

    1. Re:Does it run Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Check XDA Developers - interesting projects along those lines.

      RO

    2. Re:Does it run Linux? by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      The phones aren’t for sale anymore. That’s the whole point of the submission...

  12. Really? by old_skul · · Score: 1

    They still sell Windows Phones? I thought that was a done deal years ago. Or was that Zune? /smh

    1. Re:Really? by fredgiblet · · Score: 1

      Nah, it's Zune. They stopped making Zunes a long-ass time ago. Got contacted by a customer with a 5 year old Zune that was broken and she wanted a replacement and it was like..."We haven't made ANY Zunes for years, that model for even longer and your warranty ran out 4 years ago."

      "But I never dropped it!"

      *sigh*

    2. Re:Really? by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      Under UK law you can claim for up to 6 years from the date of purchase against a manufacturing defect which caused a device to stop working, assuming the type of device in questionable is generally expected to last that long.

      Aside from reduced battery life, it's reasonable to expect a portable music player to continue working for much longer than 6 years so if that customer had bought the device in the UK they'd have a reasonable claim under consumer law.
      There are many ipods out there much older than this which still work. I still have an ipod mini which i bought in 2005 and it still works fine now.

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    3. Re:Really? by fredgiblet · · Score: 1

      Here in the US items have warranties, if you're out of warranty you're out of luck.

  13. Plenty of Zunes by jfdavis668 · · Score: 0

    Don't worry, they still have plenty of Zunes in stock.

  14. It's 2018, and there are still two remaining phone by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 1

    "It's 2018, and there are still two remaining phones."

    Literally.

    --
    Do you have ESP?
  15. Small wonder by nospam007 · · Score: 1

    Since there were only 2 of them in stock.

  16. Bet there are some bargains on ebay mind by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If you just want a cheap decent screen as a video player or something they could be ideal for a price...

    Long ago I bought one of the last windows mobile 6.5 phones, an htc tytn 11 I think. Very Cheap.

    Great push email thanks to google gmail which supported activesynch.
    Great sat nav thanks to google maps
    Great web browsing thanks to Opera

    Everything to do with microsoft on it was crap or abandoned crap. The microsoft web browser could not even load the microsoft website...
    I'm not surprised they never got going with that philosophy,

  17. THIS IS GREAT NEWS! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Now if they would only run out of discs.

  18. This is funny by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What is really funny is it took this long to sell them out!

  19. They sold BOTH of them by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Holy shit!

  20. Well, I'm also surprised it took this long. by filesiteguy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Being a Windows Mobile fan, especially Windows 10, I really liked where the devices were going. Microsoft even sent me a 950xl, which I mostly loved. (I very much disliked the power button placement, but the phone and camera were top-notch.)

    Since I abandoned Android after they dumbed it down in Jellybean, I decided to move on to an Iphone and have both a 7+ and a X. Great phones and the Microsoft apps like Office, OneNote, OneDrive, OfficeLens, Skype for Business, and Office 365 Admin work better on Ios than on Windows Mobile.

    Go figure.

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  21. You never go wrong with buying Microsoft by eclectro · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There's probably a lot of corporations stocking up on this phone who developed in-house applications that run on Windows phones and not Android. Part of the reason for this is that they could have much better control over the phone/environment once it was in a worker's hand. There are inventory tracking companies that still use it.

    --
    Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
    1. Re:You never go wrong with buying Microsoft by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Do they track the inventory of the business’ buggy whips?

  22. Did support for a couple years by fredgiblet · · Score: 1

    Surprised it took this long.

  23. It's Slashdot, so here everebody's anti-Microsoft by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dunno....

    I had a Nokia Windows phone (Lumia). Very good, really. Not too many apps, but the phone itself was very good. Great sound, very good battery, very good photos, light and very thin.

    Too bad I it was stolen from me.

    I really loved that phone.