First reviews of Windows Phone 7 find it lacking - Page 4

To be fair, most posters here are Apple fans/users like myself. I doubt that many follow the blogs for MS or other competitors products -- I know I don't.

What I do is follow rumors leading up to announcements -- to see what to expect! Then I try to watch or listen to the announcement event. I try to watch closely and form my own opinions.

Leading up to the WP7 event there were rumors on what set it apart from other smart phones -- including Office, XBox/Zune, and Marketplace integration.

Unfortunately, none of those were demonstrated -- and I believe they are key features.

So, we cannot evaluate how well or badly these are implemented-- if at all.

One video showed a MS rep demoing a phone. He was asked to show a Zune app (whatever). He said he couldn't because none of the MS reps at the demo had access to a Zune account-- yeah, sure! Did you forget to brush your teeth before coming to the demo?

It would have been acceptable if he had said: "That's not available, yet" or somesuch. Instead, I distrusted everything else he said and showed.

It was good that they showed working devices, working navigation and a few working apps.


Most people will give someone the benefit the doubt, unless they feel they are being deliberately mislead -- especially in response to a direct question or request.


I don't think WP7 is complete... yet. I suspect will be sometime next year, and it will have all the things that are now, in various stages of completion.

It is too early to judge WP7 or write them off.

But, you can't expect Apple fans/users to actively search the blogs for positive reactions to, and pictures of, things that MS couldn't/didn't show in their event

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Geeze some people really like there copy and paste, you would think the world was going to end if you didn't have it. As for people thinking the ui is a complete failure, I kinda like it, not everyones the same. I've stared at a liitle grid of icons on my phone for almost a decade, time for a change.

One thing that hasn't been mentioned though is this now completes microsofts cloud based services. All you photos, contacts, calendars, emails, office files etc now sync. You can edit office docs on your phone, pc, web even direct in hotmail. Then there's the xbox intergration stuff.

People talk about apple and the cloud and going into your living room. But Microsoft now seem to have jumped right passed them and linked everything together. While apples spending months trying to get Facebook integrated with ping on the simplest level, ms have it at the heart of their phone!

Not everyones going to like the phone, but then not everyone likes the iPhone, doesn't make it bad.

I just reread the article!

I did not (and have not) read any of the links,

IMO, the article is negative, but not biased.

It did not attempt to present any favorable evaluations (unless some were in the links).

Likely, the author has found a plurality of reviews that support the headline, and went with it.

I don't expect any articles on a site like this to be written to journalistic standards or ethics (whatever they are in today''s world).


I would expect similar reporting at an Android or Microsoft site.


That said, there are certain authors (some publish here) who have an irrational hatred of Android, Microsoft, Adobe -- anyone currently considered anti-Apple.

It's blatantly obvious when you read an article by one of these authors.


If I were an Android or Microsoft fan/user and I came to a site like this, I would expect most of the articles to be presented similar to this one. It is a site for Apple fans/users, after all.

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I'm not thinking about feature summaries, screenshots or marketing spin, but in-depth experiences and a breakdown of what you can and can't do with it. Remember that Microsoft promised a lot initially and they used every opportunity available to flash their Office and xbox brands. If it turns out now that office for WP7 is just a glorified notepad that can display and maybe even edit a few simple word or excel files, and the xbox live integration really isn't much more than openfeint or game center, that's hugely disappointing. My main point was that I want to see comparisons, reviews that break down the features wp7 has right now and compares them directly to iOS or Android. All I read right now is that the UI is so different. That doesn't bode well for microsoft.

Isn't that pretty much like asking "Who's going to buy Android phone?" this time last year? Android 1.5 and 1.6 were way behind iPhone - OS, apps and hardware wise. And no-one was considering them capable to compete with RIM on corporate level. Google is associated to Internet and advertising, hardly first things to pop up in your mind when you think of security (which is a big deal in corporate world).

And look at them now.

WP7 is good launch problem, lacking some features but with well done core that MS can build upon. Yes, RIM is strong with corporate users but RIM is charging more than decent money for Blackberry Server licensing, something that many IT departments will gladly ditch for native Exchange support. There is more than decent saving there, and I am expecting that Exchange support for WP7 - if it isn't already - will grow to be more reliable than BB Server piggy-back on top of Exchange.

Even with it's first appearance, Office for WP7 seems to be better than existing mobile Office suites (according to AnandTech); another strong point for business users.

What MS is doing here is based on notes they took from Apple - integration, integration, integration. And with their existing ecosystem - Windows Servers and desktops, Exchange, Office, SharePoint, CRM... possibilities are much bigger than anyone else can do in the same environment. Will MS manage to achieve all that is possible is another question, but potential is there.

I have a strong feeling first steps of WP7 growth will be achieved in corporate segment (damaging RIM more than any other player)... but if WP7 UI is as sleek as advertised (and reviewed), exposure to WP7 in working environment can bring them a lot of consumers/home users as well, maybe not initially, but in time.

I think this platform will do well. It will not mega-explode into the market, but in a year or two it will have decent share to guarantee profit and stability. Is it going (and when) to overtake RIM, Apple, Android... at this point really isn't crucial.

Anandtech has the most complete review I've seen, you should read it.

I think the balance of Office and Xbox features and usability is actually really good. The old Microsoft would have just 1. kept adding features until the deadline, then called it a day and released it or 2. delayed until they have crammed all of the features in.

Instead they have included the features most people use most of the time, then really focused on the user experience aspect of how they all fit together. This is something Apple have been doing successfully for years and it's nice to see Microsoft follow their lead.

Well, there are over 40 million Xbox 360 sold in the world. Even if, say, 10 million are replacements for RROD failures, it is still nice number of potential buyers. Not to mention there are households with more than one user on Xbox, thus potentially more than one WP7 buyer per Xbox...

That doesn't make much sense.

WP7 is completely breaking with software and hardware compatibility with previous Windows Mobile platform(s), thus it is brand new.

Microsoft does have/had other mobile platforms in the past, but WP7 is not continuation of any - it is brand new start. Just like iOS wasn't continuation of Newton, but completely new platform when it was released.

Yup, in 7 years up till just now Windows on mobile still sucked and much better alternatives sprung up. In Microsoft's case, nothing changed much in 7 years. We shall see if WP7 bucks the trend.

They will buck the trend, problem is this? Will they return to their old foolish ways when they succeed?

Of course it has, but that's not what we're talking about. As several people have noted, the challenge for MS is very different from the what the challenge was for Apple.

Apple introduced the iPhone into a world that didn't have the iPhone. They literally got to write the book on how a modern smart phone ought to be done. Sure they got shit for things like multitasking and copy and paste, but as first movers they got a lot of leeway to work things out gradually to their liking.

Android had the advantage of learning from the iPhone, Google's deep pockets, and a business model that allows them to give it away.

MS isn't really in a great position to get something out there and improve it gradually. A lot of air in the room has already been sucked up. You don't have to look any further than the Zune-- by all accounts very nice entrant into the PMP field that went nowhere at all, because the iPod had already become far too entrenched. Maybe if the Zune had offered something genuinely extraordinary, but being real nice and all wasn't nearly enough.

Now MS has a vital interest in getting a dog in this hunt, and they're not going to take no for an answer, so whether or not they have much success in the market they'll be flogging Windows phones just as hard as they can for as long as it takes. But it remains to be seen if "very nice with some shortcomings that no doubt they'll address at some point" is going to be enough when iOS and Android are already so far along.

To their credit they've apparently done a good job of coming up with a catchy, different UI, although it remains to be seen how some of those design decisions will play out over the long haul. Some stuff that looks neat at first blush can get pretty old pretty fast if it gets in the way.

It really is pathetic how MSFT has to stoop to paying trolls like yourself to try to put a positive spin on another one of their halfast efforts. These idiots have been in the mobile arena for so many years and the best they can do is put a pretty face, designed by someone with attention deficit disorder, on their UI thinking "that will fool them". This company does not deserve our business!

Anandtech is pretty even, considering that they cater to the 1337 BYO PC hardware crowd: the more complex and difficult a piece of technology is to use, the more 1337 these guys feel. Apple is the antithesis of their values, so I think it tends to color their perception, but I think they tend to be pretty fair to Apple for a PC site. Certainly compared to the clowns at DailyTech who are far, far more openly anti-Apple.

I don't think there is such a thing as an unbiased site. Slashdot is pro-GNU/Linux. This site is pretty pro-Apple, and that's fine by me

But they did come out ahead in some areas, for example music, video play back and viewing photos is better than apple or android. It also has a better UI.

Microsoft is DOOMED

It has better UI? Why? Because reviewers said so?

Damn straight it was groundbreaking. Just ask Palm, Google, Microsoft, Symbian. They know the score.

That and the fact that I have tried it myself and compared it to apple's UI.

Why is Apple's UI better? Because reviewers said so? Because AppleInsider says so? I mean give me a break dude pretty much everyone that says Apple interface is better cite reviews that say Apple's UI is better. Is it so wrong that I cite reviews that say Microsft's window 7 phone UI is better. Fine Anandtech says its better, Cnet says its better. Is your pride in Apple products so great that your not willing to at least accept the idea that maybe Microsoft has actually a better UI at something than Apple?

Look just accept the fact that Microsoft has a winner when it comes to the UI for its windows 7 phone.

1) How many apps (tiles) were in the start screen?

2) How many apps were in the alphabetic list of all the apps?


I like the concept of the Active Tiles!

My concern is that when you have a lot of tiles and/or a lot of apps -- you must do a lot of scrolling to go between apps. Especially, since: when you exit an app it returns you to the top of the tile list or the top of the alpha list.

The back button takes you sequentially backwards through the recent apps -- one app at a time. There is no way to go back and forward or randomly select from recent apps.

In other words, there is no fast app switching.

Looking at the various demo videos, my conclusion is that it is a good start, but needs fleshing out.

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Read the first three pages of this review, I believe it will address all your concerns on the UI that Microsoft has developed.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3982/w...one-7-review/1