Got a chance to go to the Microsoft store today to look at the 950 XL.
Overall I was really impressed with the phone. It looks very nice in person. I was thinking I was going to like white the best but after seeing it in person I prefer the black because it looks sharp with the silver around the camera and the buttons. The button placement wasn't as bad as I thought but I would have liked the volume up and down buttons to be larger, they seemed too small.
I was concerned that the size of the phone was going to be overwhelming but it was not. The phone is thin and light. Coming from a 928, reaching the whole screen is definitely more challenging. No more walking and using it with one hand like I do with my 928. Not that this is a bad thing but just something new to get used to. I know having the option to shrink the screen by holding the windows key will help alleviate this. The phone is pretty wide also. I had a hard time when holding it in one hand and trying to press the back button with my thumb (it doesn't help that the input region for the buttons seems small- have to hit them dead on). Guess I would get used to the onscreen buttons eventually.
Speed was good. I was testing loading times for apps and comparing it to my 928. Being honest here, things weren't opening that much faster on the 950 XL. My messaging app loaded faster the first time than it did on the XL (I am running the latest version of 8.1 on my 928). I know that this is not final software on the XL, just my observations. Once they get 10 optimized and ready to ship I am sure it will be great. My 928 runs great still (got it soon after it was released) so I wouldn't be worried about speed on the XL or 950 for that matter.
Hard to speak about the software since I know it is not done yet. Once again I understand that this is not final software, just giving my observations! I played with the photos app a lot . Wasn't impressed. It was pretty slow. I would take a picture and go look for it in the photos app and they wouldn't appear. Took a while for it to show up sometimes. Also when opening the photos app, occasionally the images wouldn't load and they would just be all gray squares. Used the camera app also. Speed of the camera was good and opening the app was fast. For the most part I was able to take multiple photos quickly but sometimes it would do that thing where the circle pops up on the screen indicating that it was focusing and then it took a little longer. Of the two models on display, I noticed that on one of them when I took a picture and wanted to go preview it by the button on the camera app itself the photo would not load. I would have to exit out of the camera and find it in the photos app. This didn't seem to be a problem on the other device though.
Now to some of the bad things. First complaint is not against the phone. I just wished they would of had the 950 on display so I could see the size of it and play around with it. Now on to the phone. First thing I noticed was that the phone was very warm. I am not joking about this at all. Yes I know that the phones have been on all day, plugged in, and being used, but still I was not happy at all. When I first got there one of the two phones was very warm, the other one not so bad. Someone else even mentioned that to a person working there. I mostly used the one that wasn't too warm. Even with this said after playing around with it and testing out the apps and camera etc., the phone heated up very quickly. I came back to the store after at least an hour and played with the phones once again. I went back to the phone I was using before (the one that wasn't very warm when I first got there) and noticed it wasn't warm at all. I wanted to put the phone to the test and see how much it would take to make it warm up and let's just say it didn't take much. I opened the maps app and used the aerial view with 3D and that was easily able to make it start heating it up (yes I know that app is pretty 'heavy' but I was still surprised how fast it warmed up). I do not believe that this heating issue was from too many people using the phone because I was there for a while and not many people were looking at them.
The only other 'issue' I had with the phone was the camera quality. Coming from the 928 I have no doubt that the 950 and 950 XL will take better photos. Once again I know that the software and algorithms for the camera are not complete! I took a photo of the display area that the new phones were sitting on. It was no longer than an arm's reach away. Without zooming in the photo looked fine but after zooming in things were definitely blurry. I thought they would have a lot more detail especially since the object of focus was close. Taking a photo of the store and zooming in on things like other people you could tell that the photos were not very sharp. And yes I did check to make sure the photos were being taken at the highest resolution possible. I was a little disappointed because after seeing the video Windows Central did with Juha Alakarhu I was blown away. The images he showed were amazing. I wonder if he was using a more polished version of the camera software, I can't remember if that was said or not.
That was my impression with using the phone. They definitely have things to work on but I know they will turn out great. I am looking forward to getting one. I am torn between the 950 and 950 XL. I would like to get the XL but the issue about heat concerns me. Guess I will be switching to At&t.
. Big disappointment. But I think I just might purchase this anyway. Really liked the camera.
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