02-13-2006, 03:45 AM
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Developer & Designer, News Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 12,959
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The MSFP Status Check
"Cingular Wireless, Orange, T-Mobile and Vodafone today announced free upgrades to the Messaging and Security Feature Pack (MSFP) for all their Windows Mobile 5.0 customers, enabling Direct Push functionality and providing enhanced device management and security for messaging applications. Palm Inc. and i-Mate also reaffirmed their commitment to free MSFP upgrades. In addition, new Windows Mobile-based devices were unveiled today, all of which will ship with Direct Push technology: the HP iPAQ hw6900 Mobile Messenger, the Gigabyte Communications g-Smart (offered by Chunghwa Telecom Co. Ltd. in Taiwan), the ASUS P305 3G-enabled smartphone, and the Fujitsu Siemens FS Pocket Loox. In addition, HTC Corp. has unveiled a new product portfolio of Windows Mobile-based devices that are Direct Push-enabled and will be made available globally to T-Mobile and other operators beginning in the second quarter of this year."
A number of operators and manufacturers have just announced free upgrades to the MSFP. T-Mobile Netherlands is expected to release it in the second quarter of 2006. Vodafone will unveil a range of MSFP-enabled devices from March. Cingular will roll out the MSFP for the newly-announced 2125 Smartphone and 8100 Pocket PCs this half year. Devices such as the HP iPAQ hw6900 series, the Gigabyte g-Smart, the Asus P305 Smartphone, and Fujitsu-Siemens' Pocket LOOX T800 series will all ship with the MSFP.
The MSFP, combined with Exchange Server 2003 SP2, will enable Microsoft's direct push e-mail solution. You can learn more about it here.
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02-13-2006, 04:51 AM
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Oracle
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 841
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..." second quarter of 2006"
..." this half year"
..." devices from March"
This has been a long wait. The 3GSM Congress would have been the perfect spot to say "Look, it's out now".
Back to the cave of eternal wait...
:roll:
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02-13-2006, 05:35 AM
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Pupil
Join Date: Oct 2005
Posts: 15
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This release is really saying nothing new that we haven't heard already. Other than some carriers saying they will provide the upgrades sometime this year and some new devices out later this year with it.
I remember hearing and seeing MSFP at TechEd in June of 2005. Its nearly March of 2006 and other than a leaked beta rom of MSFP for the Wizard on XDA Developers, we are still just talking about it. Not to mention, this is only supposed to be a feature pack not a whole release of Windows Mobile.
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02-13-2006, 05:41 AM
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Sage
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 621
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I see that dopod has yet to make an announcement... :roll: I'm really wondering if I made the right choice in getting a dopod...
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02-13-2006, 09:00 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 212
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Hey Sprint..... me and my 6700 are waiting! :!:
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02-13-2006, 12:20 PM
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Thoughts Media Review Team
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 599
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I'm currently trying to get confirmation from our Vodafone account manager as to when they are going to start introducing these new devices.
It could be argued that it has been better for Vodafone to wait until they could offer the complete deal, than for them to start selling WM05 devices without the update and then figure out how to get the update to the users.
The release is timely, though. I think I stand a pretty good chance of getting managers, etc, to look at these devices while the future of RIM is so publicly debated.
--Philip
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02-13-2006, 02:23 PM
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Thoughts Media Review Team
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 599
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Philip Colmer
I'm currently trying to get confirmation from our Vodafone account manager as to when they are going to start introducing these new devices.
It could be argued that it has been better for Vodafone to wait until they could offer the complete deal, than for them to start selling WM05 devices without the update and then figure out how to get the update to the users.
The release is timely, though. I think I stand a pretty good chance of getting managers, etc, to look at these devices while the future of RIM is so publicly debated.
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Just goes to show what a bad job our account manager is doing of keeping me informed ... they've already got the device out there - it is the Qtek v1640.
Still trying to find out about the MSFP availability.
Anyone know how the v1640 compares to other versions of the HTC Universal?
--Philip
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02-13-2006, 03:44 PM
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Magi
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 2,341
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So most of the OEMs still aren't commiting to any kind of date for the release of MSFP. Those that have mentioned a timeline, it appears to be mid year. MID YEAR FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!! I think this speaks huge volumes for the commitment that MS and their partners have to the Windows Mobile platform. It's going to be dangerously close to a year from the date that WM5.0 devices first started shipping before some see this feature pack...one that we all thought was included with the purchase price of our new WM5.0 devices.
Many people with Wizards are now using a beta version of AKU2 on their devices. It does not appear to have any major problems that would cause long delays. Pretty much everyone is happy with it. It was dated Dec. 5th, yet here we are almost half way through February and no mention of it from the OEMs till now and they are saying it will still be weeks or even months down the road before it gets to us, the consumer....the consumer who thought it was part of what he was paying for when we bought our WM5.0 devices back in the fall. Delays like this are just killing the platform.
This is a perfect example of the typical delays we see in this platform. I know someone is going to speak up and say it's not Microsoft's fault. They hand it over to the OEMs and they handle it from there. What an over used pile of crud, for an excuse that is. It is Microsoft's platform. It is their OS. It is their licensing ageement. They DO have influence over the platform.
Personally I've had it. This coming from a guy who has thousands of posts in Windows Mobile forums promoting it, and was an MVP for a year. Imagine how the average user, or the newly recruited Palm, Symbian, or Blackberry user must feel. They see long delays to receive fundamental changes an updates, that for some they had already and had to give up to become a Windows Mobile user.
The unfortunate thing with this delay, is that it is nothing new. We have become accustom to long delays in bug fixes, and feature upgrades. In fact, with WM5.0 we have become used to loosing features, and see a reversal in any ground that was gained in stability. With Activesync we lost the ability to sync over Wifi. A feature that many lived by. We lost the ability to do backups. So, for months we had to go with no backup insurance until third party developers could play catch up. Activesync was becoming fairly reliable in 3.8, but now with 4.X there are problems galore. I can't tell you how many posts I have read where people simply can not sync. They either can't connect at all, or if they do it just sits forever on "connecting" and goes no further. Again, imagine how the new user feels when this happens.
It's the final straw Microsoft and Windows Mobile. Get your act together. You've lost my support.
Dave
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02-13-2006, 04:52 PM
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Oracle
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 974
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Well written Dave!
I had always hoped that sometime in the near future, MS will start creating a relationship with the HARDWARE vendors and not the carriers. I am a big advocate for using the carriers just like we use ISP's in the desktop world.
I do have to argue the point that there is another level (and pretty major and political one at that) in between the OS and what we see on the street. Becuase of how things have traditionally operated in the carrier world MS needs the carriers and that adds a huge range of complexity to the marketing world - I would argue that MS realizes that it is only now starting to come up the pack against other, more established (and cheaper) OS products. MS could not throw their weight around like they can on the HArdware side with PC vendors. They OWN that market - they are just starting to play in this one. I know they have been trying to penetrate this for a while - you might say several years - but only until recently have they started to make an impact (look at the sales).
Now your argument against quality is spot on. What in the blazing he## happened with activesync? Such a small program but such a huge impact. We can both point to other areas and those items are in now way carrier specific - those are 100% in MS' lap. something changed over the past couple of years that effected the release quality of their MS Mobile products which I was very disspaointed in seeing. I can only hope they get their act together post-haste as what they do has a prfound effect for their ablity to sway the carriers to get on their bandwagon.
What carrier wants to spend a ton of extra cash supporting a platform full of bugs or over complex for the average user (refer to comments from many people saying that the OS often got in the way of it - the device - being a phone).
Ah - enough... I'm not going to give up the ship, but I will agree with you that I am dissapointed that MS hasn't hit this hard enough (in quality) that it certainly should have. I will also beat the carriers up for delaying releases and limiting features to no end. I can't wait until we get them out of the middle.
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02-14-2006, 04:10 AM
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Magi
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 2,341
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by possmann
I do have to argue the point that there is another level (and pretty major and political one at that) in between the OS and what we see on the street. Becuase of how things have traditionally operated in the carrier world MS needs the carriers and that adds a huge range of complexity to the marketing world - I would argue that MS realizes that it is only now starting to come up the pack against other, more established (and cheaper) OS products. MS could not throw their weight around like they can on the HArdware side with PC vendors. They OWN that market - they are just starting to play in this one. I know they have been trying to penetrate this for a while - you might say several years - but only until recently have they started to make an impact (look at the sales).
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I do understand your argument here, possmann. I have made the same argument in the past. I can give MS some room on this point....to a point. The problem really lies in how this whole push email thing has gone down. Microsoft has been very misleading with this whole issue from the beginning. First we were told that Push email and A2DP would be part of WM5.0 devices. We waited. Then just as the new devices were about to come out we found out that Exchange servers would have to be updated to SP2. We waited. Then just as that was released to users we found out that we would also need to have the MSFP update applied to our devices before it would work. We still wait. What's really annoying is the fact that most of that news came from places such as Jason Landridges blog. Imagine...the world has to find out important information like this from one of MS's employee's personal blogs. Microsoft couldn't be straight about the issue from the beginning.
A2DP which is part of AKU2, I have running on my old 4150 Ipaq by installing a patch downloaded from HPs site. A three year old device has an important feature like that and almost every WM5.0 Phone Edition device on the market is still waiting for this update....Geez Microsoft......get with it!! We are all tired of waiting for updates like this, and I don't take kindly to having the wool pulled over my eyes.
I said this in my prior post, and I'll say it again...if someone like myself who has been a staunch supporter of the platform from it's inception feels this way, imagine how the newly converted, Palm, Symbian, and Blackberry users must feel. I doubt they would exhibit the patiences that some of us long time users have, especially when many gave up features such as push email to come over to Windows Mobile
I'm tired of the long delays, and the lack of attention that is paid to long standing bugs, and problem issues. And I only need to say two words to bring that point home...alarms and Activesync.
Dave
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