Slashgear Gets Their Hands On Windows Phone 7 Series

[Jon Westfall]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.slashgear.com/windows-phone-7-series-hands-on-1573973/' target='_blank'>http://www.slashgear.com/windows-ph...nds-on-1573973/</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Microsoft have officially launched Windows Phone 7 and with it the Windows Phone Series, promising we'll see the first devices on the market in time for the holiday 2010 shopping season. Windows Phone 7 marks a new, more end-user aware phase for the platform, with Zune and Xbox integration, together with stricter controls over the overall end-user experience: third-party UIs, such as HTC Sense, will not be allowed (though OEMs will be able to add into the new WP7 UI), and while they're not yet revealing the details, Microsoft have a long technical specifications list for handset manufacturers that will better standardize the platform."</em></p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/wpt/auto/1266258431.usr7.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d2d2bb;" /></p><p>Slashgear got their hands on a Windows Phone 7 Series demo model at MWC and has some interesting initial observations on it. Interesting stuff! It's a good day to be a Windows Phone fan!</p>

[Macguy59]

One thing I've noticed in every video I've watched so far is that none of them show the device being used in landscape mode. Have they not baked in accelerometer support yet ? Mainstream media like CNN is not even talking about it. How does that happen ? Would seem like a logical way to help build excitement for it.

[RogueSpear]

The encrypting flash card thing makes this a non-starter for me right off the bat. They claim this is for speed? Please. Anyone should be able to see through this like a clear glass of distilled water. It's for DRM, anti-piracy, vendor lock-in, and control. Seems Microsoft has learned a thing or two from Apple. For all it's warts, at least WM had an accessible file system.

I'm sure you'll need at least Windows 7 in order to interface with this thing in any way shape or form (supporting my claim of vendor lock-in). And the only "app store" that will be allowed to work with it will be Microsoft's. It seems the further we advance, the more we regress.

At least we can hope Android and Maemo are successes as they'll be the last bastions of choice or ownership over one's own data.

[ptyork]

One thing I've noticed in every video I've watched so far is that none of them show the device being used in landscape mode. Have they not baked in accelerometer support yet ? Mainstream media like CNN is not even talking about it. How does that happen ? Would seem like a logical way to help build excitement for it.

There's a video showing the accelerometer in the Channel 9 video that Jason had to link to. Can't remember exactly what was shown, but he was bragging that the visual buttons rotated along with the screen. Anyway, it's there.

As for media, I'm just guessing that it isn't able to break through excitement of the Olympics, a major assault in Afghanistan, and some loud mouthed fat ass who can't fit on an airplane. ;) It is on CNN.com in the tech section, at least.

[ptyork]

I'm guessing we'll be waiting until MIX to find out for sure if this thing will support background processing. Sounds like it won't since they don't seem to be vehemently denying the nasty rumors. It truly is hard to imagine that they could move up from 6.5 to 7 and lose something that was baked in from the start. I'm okay with pausing the UI thread and disabling calls to UI API's while in the background, but man, if they disable it completely they will totally and forever lose the power users to Android. Maybe they don't care...

[Rob Alexander]

I don't know. There are certainly some slick things about it, but I'm looking at my WM6.5 device right now, with the SPB Mobile Shell interface. It is set up with the things I need right on the home page, with an attractive background and buttons for the things I do 80% of the time. Then I look at that demo and I find myself thinking, 'I don't need that. And that other thing takes up a lot of space and I wouldn't need it,' and so forth. Then they say that they won't let me change anything about it and they've taken multitasking away? It's like they took all the things that I hate about the iPhone and made sure to remove all the things they did better than Apple. I'm just not sure what it is about this that I'm supposed to like. Well, I guess it's good that Android is moving along well because I'm thinking that I'm probably headed that way when I buy my next phone.

[Deslock]

It's a good day to be a Windows Phone fan!
A good day to be a fan of Microsoft? Definitely. Or a fan of mobile devices in general? Certainly (having another decent platform to choose from is always a good thing).

But this appears to be a clean break from WinMo much like webOS was from PalmOS. So if this is the end of the existing WinMo line, wouldn't it be a bad day to be a Windows Phone fan?

[martin_ayton]

It's like they took all the things that I hate about the iPhone and made sure to remove all the things they did better than Apple. I'm just not sure what it is about this that I'm supposed to like. Well, I guess it's good that Android is moving along well because I'm thinking that I'm probably headed that way when I buy my next phone.

Yup. I can't agree more. What's with a device that switches the SatNav off in the middle of a journey because it has to handle an incoming call? The fact that I can play music, run TomTom and take calls all at the same time is the one thing that makes my iPhone loving friends shut up and start to look askance at their devices.

I'm happy with my Compact V right now. When it's out of warranty I'll customise the ROM, and when its ready to go to pasture, if the Windows 7 phone is as locked down as it looks to be, I will be following Rob Alexander.

It's a good day to be a Windows Phone fan!
I have to disagree, Jon; I'm pretty sad about it all. Microsoft 'phones need to be better than the Cupertino product - different and better - not "me too" 'phones.

[landswipe]

I don't think this is necessarily game changing... What I do think is cool is that Microsoft are game enough to change... This is a radical departure from the desktop, probably a little too far - searching for differentiation.

I wonder about all those developers who invested in Windows Mobile, all indications are they've been burnt.

To be honest though, the UI looks like an art project. I don't get the text being cut, and the squares are a little overly simple.

Android looks like it hit the sweet spot...

[Oleander]

I have to disagree, Jon; I'm pretty sad about it all. Microsoft 'phones need to be better than the Cupertino product - different and better - not "me too" 'phones.

I couldn't agree more. If I wanted an iPhone I would have bought the friggin thing a long time ago!
Trying to compete in that market share and at the same time abandoning their legacy and apparently business users as well, is to me, a loose, loose situation. :(

I use multitasking extensively and everyone mentions thats probably one of the things that got sacrificed.

I'm the handheld supporter at work and have a series of homebaked .cab's i carry on a µ-sd card so I can run out to ppl and do the setup of their devices. Most people here can't use a dataplan and just want to sync their calendar to their phone when they have changes.

Might be a good time to find out what Android is offering..

[Deslock]

The fact that I can play music, run TomTom and take calls all at the same time is the one thing that makes my iPhone loving friends shut up and start to look askance at their devices.

?

I run a navigation app called CoPilot while listening to music, podcasts, etc. When a call comes in, the music fades and the phone GUI comes to the foreground. When I'm done on the call, the music fades back in and CoPilot automatically comes back to the foreground (and it resumes with my route).

If I want to use CoPilot while I'm on the call, I simply hit the home button and tap the CoPilot icon (I mount my phone on the dashboard so that the occasional tap isn't distracting).

There are a few annoyances due to the iPhone's multitasking limitations (for example: no Pandora while doing other stuff, unless you jailbreak), but taking a call and listening to music while using my navigation app isn't one of them.

[Craig Horlacher]

Requiring the built in UI seems like a questionable "feature" to me. I don't understand what they're thinking. I'm pretty sure 3rd party interfaces are the only reason WinMo isn't completely dead.

Also, it seems like a good way to make enemy's with companies like HTC and SPB. Right now, I'm not sure Microsoft can afford any more enemy's in the mobile devices space, especially from some of their largest hardware and software developers.

They better hope people really like their interface.

[Cattle-Dog]

I have to admit, that I am not overly excited either. I like the underlying UI, but the start screen is very utilitarian. For as much work as they put into simplifying the UI, they seem to have lacked in elegance. You just cannot use the words 'light blue tiles' and sleek in the same sentence. ;)<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
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I am hoping there is a yet to be announced professional version. One that is less focused on social integration and gracefully handles multitasking.<o:p></o:p>

[Rob Alexander]

I am hoping there is a yet to be announced professional version. One that is less focused on social integration and gracefully handles multitasking.<O:p></O:p>

Oh yeah, that reminds me. When I look up a contact to make a call or send an email, I do NOT want to see their latest Facebook "I had juice for breakfast" inanity. A solid Facebook app (as opposed to the one MS currently has out) is a good thing, but I want to use Facebook when I decide to, and not every time I send an email.

I'm sorry to have ended up so negative about it. I've been anticipating this with growing excitement as we approached the date of the trade show, but I don't buy the argument that you can't build a really great OS and also give people some control over their devices at the same time.

[martin_ayton]

I run a navigation app called CoPilot while listening to music, podcasts, etc. When a call comes in, the music fades and the phone GUI comes to the foreground. When I'm done on the call, the music fades back in and CoPilot automatically comes back to the foreground (and it resumes with my route).

If I want to use CoPilot while I'm on the call, I simply hit the home button and tap the CoPilot icon (I mount my phone on the dashboard so that the occasional tap isn't distracting)

I'm very happy to be corrected. The button push sequence is pretty much the same on my Compact V. I don't have an iPhone, so I was just repeating what my iPhone-owning friends and colleagues have said, and their reaction to the Windows Phone's multi-tasking (in the exact scenario I described). I had written the iPhone off as an option precisely because of this, so it's very good to know that my information was wrong.

[Cattle-Dog]

Being a current iPhone owner, I can tell you that there is little in the way multitasking and a lot of "tricks" to mimick multitasking. Pretty much, only a select few built in apps will multitask, like iPod and phone. Co-Pilot does not. So yes, you can bring up the phone, call some one, and while on the call launch Co-Pilot. But what if you are in Co-Pilot and would like to make a call? Not going to happen (with the small exception of dialing numbers from a POI). If you hit the home button, Co-Pilot exits. Pandora or last.fm and anything else, nope. RSS reader that periodically updates it's feeds? Nope. Weather running in the background to keep itself up to date. Nope.

I like my iPhone, but I miss many features of a Windows mobile. Unfortunately, it appears that many of the features I miss are being moth-balled anyway.

We'll see. It doesn't launch for several more months. I'm sure there is a lot more to learn. *cough*needprofessionaledition*cough*

[Dyvim]

Very bold move on Microsoft's part. I like the look. If they'd released this in 2007, I'd never have gone over to the dark side. But now that I'm there, I think it will take more than this to bring me back.

As far as professional edition, there's always 6.5.3. Didn't Ballmer say a while back that they were going to be maintaining both phone lines? With 6.5.3 you have complete control and a wide variety of UI skins to choose from.

[Rob Alexander]

As far as professional edition, there's always 6.5.3. Didn't Ballmer say a while back that they were going to be maintaining both phone lines? With 6.5.3 you have complete control and a wide variety of UI skins to choose from.

There was some talk along those lines, and if they would continue to improve the pro ed, then I'd be okay with it. But the greater likelihood is that it would just sit there stagnant until it became too obsolete to use.

On the positive side, I watched a 20 minute long video last night at PocketNow.com by the Series 7 design team director and it was quite interesting to see it while hearing him talk about what they were trying to accomplish. It took me from a 'what were they thinking' state of mind to one of thinking that they've designed a pretty cool phone for the right people.

The idea of being task-centric makes lots of sense to me. The only thing is that the tasks that they synthesize are all about keeping you in touch with your Facebook and Flicker and stuff like that. If I could redesign it to integrate the things that I need in a similar manner, then I would probably be very interested.

And who knows. If enough smart developers came up with just the right products, and if I could get used to that ugly tiled home screen, I might be able to see myself using it. I'm still thinking 70-30 that I'll move to Android, but it was 90-10 yesterday. I'll try to keep an open mind.