Microsoft, Samsung Take on Apple With New Smartphone Announcements

[QuixoticFable]

So? Who cares about stupid statements like these ?

And i am sure average customers (like my Mom 61 years old iPhone owner; my Dad 63 years iphone owner) will never consider a WiMo7 Phone ever. This seems aimed at 14 year olds which will have no money for the Dataplan.

Oh Apple, how you have fallen. What was once the bastion of hipster and techno-geek euphoria is now being defended by arguments such as, "It's great for kids and grandparents!"

Apple has mastered the idiot-proof device so well that they now have little room to innovate further, as anything that is less idiot-proof than the previous version will be decried as overly complex and unnecessarily confusing. Apple can no longer take the risks in design and development they once did. Instead they outsource that to developers (see: Apps) and assimilate the best ideas along the way.

 

[aristotle]

That looks impressive, maybe even makes the iPhone OS look a tad dated. I'm sure Apple will leap ahead again soon enough though.

Ok, explain to me how a Zune UI phone with square block icons mixed haphazardly with windows desktop style icons like the IE icon make the iPhone OS look dated. What does that even mean?

The showed a mash up of several UI styles and you are impressed with it?

 

[HiRez]

I know iPhone is not all about being in the race for hardware superiority, but Apple is definitely going to have to upgrade their screen in his next update. If they come out with the same 480x320 screen it's going to look really bad for them as all these new smart phones are coming out with high resolution OLED. But they do have to address the problem of fragmenting the platform for developers, and some decreased batery life. The easiest thing would be to get someone to make them a 960x640 screen. Existing apps written for the current screen size could run perfectly pixel-doubled, like on the iPad but even better since the aspect ratio would match. But that extra resolution could be put to good use when needed, especially for sharper text antialiasing.

 

[organerito]

Tell me you're joking.

You tell me you are joking!

It looks great. I am glad there is going to be more competition to Apple. It is better for all of us. Apple have to stop being lazy about their tiny updates.

At least Microsoft could eliminate the ugly borders.

 

[jman240]

I can look at my iPhone home screen and instantly see some things missing from the windows phone.

Camera interface (we haven't seen it yet, we've seen photos but that's not the same.)
Picture taking / video recording or is that up to the OEMs?
Youtube access or similar video site (are there any of that scale?)
Maps - is there a standard app for this or are we supposed to use bing somehow?
Clock / Alarm - didnt see a box for it. Maybe in settings
Voice memos - any voice recording software would be interesting. I think some people use this, somewhere.
Calculator - use my iphone's all the time
Compas.... yeah thats kind of useless but a nice thing for hikers i guess.

and thats just the home screen....

Yeah it can aggregate data nicely, if you're really that in to wasting your time on social networking. But what about useful stuff like getting directions or using a dedicated mapping application to route you around. What about the 140k apps apple has that are more than just cloud-data-display type applications like GPS (TomTom), weather radar ala weather bug, dropbox (love this one), AIM (hate this one but its necessary sometimes), shazam, pandora and others that I tend to use on an almost weekly basis at one point or another. Missing from this.

Yeah they have 8 months for this but it seems they are concentrating too much on cloud data that they forgot what other people (people who can afford smart phones) do with their phones. I could care less what people on facebook are doing, it's almost never interesting and always self absorbed. Why is everyone so excited about this when it is such a step backwards for functionality. It'll be great until you want to do that one thing you could do with your other phone and this one doesn't offer it. Maybe you can message a friend on facebook to do it for you =P

 

[e-coli]

And i am sure average customers (like my Mom 61 years old iPhone owner; my Dad 63 years iphone owner) will never consider a WiMo7 Phone ever. This seems aimed at 14 year olds which will have no money for the Dataplan.

Actually, yes, it is aimed at 14 year olds. Actually MS is targeting kids 7-14 with their products because they know they've lost the preceding generations to Apple and Google. I was in an innovation meeting with them and they're very informed and realistic about where they stand currently. Stunning, but refreshing as well.

 

[goobot]

it has xbox live

 

[Burger King]

Oh Apple, how you have fallen. What was once the bastion of hipster and techno-geek euphoria is now being defended by arguments such as, "It's great for kids and grandparents!"

Apple has mastered the idiot-proof device so well that they now have little room to innovate further, as anything that is less idiot-proof than the previous version will be decried as overly complex and unnecessarily confusing. Apple can no longer take the risks in design and development they once did. Instead they outsource that to developers (see: Apps) and assimilate the best ideas along the way.

What percentage of great companies don't outsource, 2%, 1%, 0%?
Why hire a 1000 developers plus pay associated benefits when you can have 1000 developers send their ideas to you for free to try before you buy? Genius!

 

[RMXO]

I prefer the KISS method but to each their own. Plus, the iPhone has the App Store. Until, I see something I like & better, I'm sticking with my iPhone.

 

[conradwt]

So you can sync ALL of your movies/tv shows/music and apps that you BUY from itunes that cant FIT on your 32GB iphone.

I have 2+ TB media content on my desktop computer but I don't necessarily want to carry it all with me. Thus, I just need a subset of this information and a MicroSD slot isn't the solution when I have 32 GB built-in.

 

[*LTD*]

I mean across the board, not just this thread.

FWIW I think there are some things about WP7 that are pretty interesting, but I've already discussed them in previous posts.

I keep waiting for your avatar to load.

Clever!

 

[guzhogi]

@ the underlined

Why is that even a requirement? As with everything else in technology it will look dated in weeks as every company craps out as many products a year as they can. The real test is its usability after you've gotten over your eye candy lust.

Very true, eye candy tarnishes quickly. I'm also more interested in the usability stuff, too. I'd like to be able to have a higher res OLED screen. Don't OLED screens use less power, meaning longer battery life?

Also, I'd like a built-in SD or microSD card reader. I know a lot of people don't have (much less see) a reason for it, but for people like me who have large music & photo collections, it helps to have that extra storage. Plus, it might help people share files that are too big to e-mail & don't have a full computer handy w/ a USB flash drive or burnable DVD. There are many uses for it, I just don't know all the possibilities.

Sorry for ranting, I just get tired of people who think (or at least seem to think) we should only use what companies provide & the companies know what we want/need better than we do. [/rant]

 

[QuixoticFable]

I can look at my iPhone home screen and instantly see some things missing from the windows phone.

Camera interface (we haven't seen it yet, we've seen photos but that's not the same.)
Picture taking / video recording or is that up to the OEMs?
Youtube access or similar video site (are there any of that scale?)
Maps - is there a standard app for this or are we supposed to use bing somehow?
Clock / Alarm - didnt see a box for it. Maybe in settings
Voice memos - any voice recording software would be interesting. I think some people use this, somewhere.
Calculator - use my iphone's all the time
Compas.... yeah thats kind of useless but a nice thing for hikers i guess.

and thats just the home screen....

Yeah it can aggregate data nicely, if you're really that in to wasting your time on social networking. But what about useful stuff like getting directions or using a dedicated mapping application to route you around. What about the 140k apps apple has that are more than just cloud-data-display type applications like GPS (TomTom), weather radar ala weather bug, dropbox (love this one), AIM (hate this one but its necessary sometimes), shazam, pandora and others that I tend to use on an almost weekly basis at one point or another. Missing from this.

Yeah they have 8 months for this but it seems they are concentrating too much on cloud data that they forgot what other people (people who can afford smart phones) do with their phones. I could care less what people on facebook are doing, it's almost never interesting and always self absorbed. Why is everyone so excited about this when it is such a step backwards for functionality. It'll be great until you want to do that one thing you could do with your other phone and this one doesn't offer it. Maybe you can message a friend on facebook to do it for you =P

Did you totally overlook the pieces about the home screen being COMPLETELY customizable? Cut out what you don't want and put the stuff you use the most at the top.

Also, just because you didn't see it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
Camera -- The WP7 phones will all have high resolution cameras (what new smartphone doesn't?), so yes there will be a camera interface.
Youtube -- If youtube is so important to you, create a link to it and put it at the top.
Maps -- Bing is most likely the default, but will at have support for google maps through the browser
Clock/Alarm -- If you use it all the time, create a block(?) for it and put one at the top
Voice/memo -- No mention yet, but will most likely be available in some form, maybe through 3rd party.
Calculator -- See response to "clock/alarm"
Compass -- That would be up to the OEM, but WP7 should support it.

Read, then post.

 

[LagunaSol]

Very true, eye candy tarnishes quickly. I'm also more interested in the usability stuff, too.

People have been savaging iPhone OS for its sometimes-less-than-helpful home screen. Yet Windows Phone Series 7 takes up 1/8 of your preciously-limited screen real estate just to tell you you have 3 text messages? And a full 1/4 of your screen just to access your photos? And somehow this approach is getting a standing ovation from the tech press (and commenters on this board)? Really???

Apple gets skewered by these same people for form-over-function and Microsoft is all about utility. Then Microsoft goes form-over-function and it's a revelation. Bizarre.

This is either a mobile OS for people with fingers the size of Hickory Farms summer sausages, or it's pure UI deviation simply for the sake of.

 

[Mjmar]

I love the idea of having things integrated into "hubs". I just really don't like the UI. Why waste so much screen real estate to see 1/3 of a word? It makes everything seem so confusing. I'm going to wait to see how Apple responds to this because I feel like they can take this idea and make it feel more natural and simple. I'm looking forward to iPhone OS 4.0, but I have to give props to Microsoft for this.

 

[lex750]

What reviews, the thing isn't even out yet! What could they possibly review from the limited demo time?

What are you talking about? The actual phone is available to the attendees at the mobile phone show. They are using the phone, and writing reviews on it right now. There are now tons of on hand videos and reviews online. Ever heard of Google?

Here is a 22 min, hands on video.

http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/LauraFoy/First-Look-Windows-Phone-7-Series-Hands-on-Demo/

 

[skyehill]

It's February now, Microsoft says we'll see this in the wild during the holiday season of 2010. The Apple iPad will be out there for three to six months before the first phone with this OS is sold. If you haven't noticed, the world moves awfully fast these days. This new OS will be very old news on the very day it is available to consumers.

Oh, and it doesn't sync to a Mac.

Google seems to be the one company that has juiced up its development to meet the times we live in. Microsoft is at the other extreme, with Apple somewhere in the middle.

The iPad isn't going to be denting the phone market. Hell, it won't be denting the ebook market.

 

[Masquerade]

i see you people in 5 years, when apple do the major overhaul to iphone.

 

[skyehill]

Please. Seriously.

Windows Phone 7 would be mildly impressive IF IT WERE SHIPPING BEFORE CHRISTMAS.

So they slap phone capabilities onto the Zune OS, take out Flash AND multitasking (aren't these the same things Apple haters rag on the iPad for?!?) create a UI only serious scroll-junkies could love, and Apple is supposed to be scared? Are you kidding me?

You do realize that by the time that Windows Mobile 7 ACTUALLY SHIPS, apple will have sold AT LEAST another 30 million+ iPhones, 20 million+ iPod touch and 5 - 10 million iPads.

I guess when you're on the bottom, the only way to go is up!

Kinda like Apple's PC business?

 

[mrochester]

First of all, please name another, so I can enlighten myself.

And second of all, facts need not be absolutely correct for opinions to be correct. If the iPhone is the first phone I know to have multitouch, it may just mean that it is the first widely known multitouch phone to the general public. Just because you, a tech follower, knows several obscure phones before the iPhone, doesn't mean the general public does.

I, as well as a tremendous population I know, believe the iPhone to be the first multitouch phone. Whether that is true is debatable, but if we believe so, Apple obviously did something right to make us believe so, since I can't think of another good one that came before it.

Que? What's multitouch got to do with multitasking? There's like, a gazillion phones out there that have multitasked long before the iPhone.

 

[HitchHykr]

Did you totally overlook the pieces about the home screen being COMPLETELY customizable? Cut out what you don't want and put the stuff you use the most at the top.

Also, just because you didn't see it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
Camera -- The WP7 phones will all have high resolution cameras (what new smartphone doesn't?), so yes there will be a camera interface.
Youtube -- If youtube is so important to you, create a link to it and put it at the top.
Maps -- Bing is most likely the default, but will at have support for google maps through the browser
Clock/Alarm -- If you use it all the time, create a block(?) for it and put one at the top
Voice/memo -- No mention yet, but will most likely be available in some form, maybe through 3rd party.
Calculator -- See response to "clock/alarm"
Compass -- That would be up to the OEM, but WP7 should support it.

Read, then post.

So, in other words, since the home screen is customizable anything is possible. Got it.

 

[Povilas]

You tell me you are joking!

It looks great. I am glad there is going to be more competition to Apple. It is better for all of us. Apple have to stop being lazy about their tiny updates.

At least Microsoft could eliminate the ugly borders.

A lot of fings look great at first glance, the useability is almost always a very different story. From my point of view it's a disaster.

i see you people in 5 years, when apple do the major overhaul to iphone.

Here's hoping I won't see you.

 

[mrochester]

It amuses me no end that, in what is actually really quite something from Microsoft, *LTD* and LagunaSol still criticise and deride at every turn. Seriously, you guys have a problem, and you need treatment! To make your comments actually worth a pinch of salt, you at least need to give credit where credit is due.

 

[QuixoticFable]

So, in other words, since the home screen is customizable anything is possible. Got it.

Is it a stretch of the imagination to think that a smartphone in 2010 would allow the user to create shortcuts to features on the phone? My LG EnV3 has 7 different user definable shortcuts to any feature/page on the phone. So, what? Smartphones dropped that feature?

 

[jman240]

Read, then post.

Actually i watched, 22 minutes of fluff and bore. I get the idea. Yay customize it, I love it, android does it better imo but that's another argument. What I was pointing out is they didn't mention these apps that everyone on a smart phone uses nowadays. All they seem to be excited about is the integration, which is great, but I maybe call 3 percent of the people I'm friends with on Facebook so it's not a big selling point.

I was more interested in whether it had capabilities similar to what these dedicated apps use, you know, the ones that were on most phones from version 1.0. Using a web browser for a map is stupid and a poor design choice no matter how great the javascript programming behind it is (Buzz on iPhone via safari vs Buzz on android via maps is no comparison for map view).