Initial thoughts on Windows Phone 8.1?

[cw1988]

Good - Bad 1:2
I want to upload pictures to OneDrive app. I don't have any way to do so, even from the app. No Data connection for Notification center. Also Was hoping MS will open libraries, still locked

How do you switch between 2g 3g LTE I need for 928 on T-Mobile (SMS)

[TIP]thanks to Adretheon see the below
Create a Room and you can now upload to OneDrive by sharing to that Room.[/TIP]

for the 2g/3g/4g settins follow the below:
settings
mobile + sim
SIM settings
then you will see the highest connection speed drop down as per wp8.

 

[anon(123856)]

Re: Nokia Lumia 822 8.1 Update Question?

I already signed up for the developer program and can get the update. But I have a Lumia 822, and it's not a locked phone. I use it a lot. But I want to try 8.1, but unsure about the risk. I heard it voids my variety, and I still have it until December. Is it safe? Should I?

I have a Lumia 822 and just finished updating it. It was smooth. It can take awhile and you'll probably think your phone froze, but let it do it's thing and all *should* be good. I'm still exploring 8.1 but no ill effects so far.

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

I live in the US and the phone has all the regional stuff correct, but I still do not have Cortana... (I have a Samsung ATIV Neo).. Any thoughts.

I'm experiencing the same thing with my 1320. Clueless as to why.

 

[ajayden]

I'm experiencing the same thing with my 1320. Clueless as to why.

You need to check the language and keyboard settings. You must have only english (US). Then restart the phone and cortana will be available in Settings>Applications

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

You need to check the language and keyboard settings. You must have only english (US). Then restart the phone and cortana will be available in Settings>Applications

Brilliant! Since my 1320 shipped from China, the Chinese keyboard and languages were still installed, even though during the initial registration of my phone I installed the English language and keyboard. I followed your advice and Cortana showed up. Thanks a million!

 

[anon(123856)]

it happens when you don't unmount your SD Card before switching off and removing it. Because of not unmounting a copy of sd Card contents for fast access by OS remains in the other storage. And on top of that another copy of the same gets created again when you insert the micro SD Card.

So nnext time unmount the micro SD Card before removing it by going into the settings.

Unfortunately the duplicate copies can't be deleted. Now you need to reset your phone to correct it.

I've had this problem even though I never unmounted or removed my card. Just started happening. You are correct about having to reset the phone to fix it. I tried everything and that was the only thing that worked.

 

[tmac9127]

A cool feature for Windows Phone 8.1 would be to have quick media settings in the notification bar when you are playing music or other media.

 

[SAM 77]

Nice job MS 95% approval from me.

If these features were released at 8.0 launch I wonder if it would have gained a bigger marketshare.

 

[TiraTa13]

After the second set of spining gears load completely the phone restar itself and is now stuck on the black screen with the Nokia logo stays like that for like 20 secs and it restarts itself to get stuck again and again...what can I do? Can you guys help? Should I hard reset my phone? How do I do it?

 

[Durishin]

I am really liking the improved cursor function. Now, instead of placing the cursor and having it move as I removed my finger from its intended location, you place it, then slide it as you do the text selector. MUCH BETTER! Thanks MS!

 

[lajuane]

Makes the Samsung ativ s neo 10x better. No issues during installation. Everything seems to work perfectly. Nice upgrade. Been waiting for the quiet hours integration.

 

[chuey101]

Re: Nokia Lumia 822 8.1 Update Question?

Hey guys

I logged in to facebook via people hub and it f*cked up my contact list. All people have like 1 year old photos. How to turn it back on ?

this took me a while to figure out. you have to add the app now (it's an app no longer an email and account sign up, they created a diff category).

Also, don't forget to click above contacts where it says something like (only show contacts with emails). There you'll see a check list of all your linked accounts. My guess is facebook is unchecked for you like it was for me. check it again and your fb contacts should be up to date once more.

Oh, you can also force the facebook app to sync. tap on facebook under people -> settings -> add email. you should see a button saying "sync now" hit that too. may take a couple tries.

good luck!

 

[JaiMento]

I love using voice-to-text but find it is only an option when sending an sms, when I am in apps like facebook and am typing, the little microphone is not there.

Am I missing something?????

Voice to text must be implemented by the app developer.

However, it sounds like you could benefit from an app called Copy This. It's kind of a work around for implementing voice to text everywhere in the OS.

 

[GusterBuster]

Apps/Games that I've installed to class 4 SD card are working perfectly fine. So yey!

 

[Matthew Teo]

I think the UI on the whole has improved but I just have one problem.
They didn't add cellular data in the quick actions in action centre. Why??(

 

[malih]

very good, especially action center and six tile rows

also data connection and thus push notification seems more reliable than before, although will have to test longer to be sure

 

[mobilejk]

Awesome, fantastic, tremendous, excellent all come to mind. Just very happy tonight with my Nok 1520's running the latest greatest WP 8.1
Honestly I haven't been this stoked about my smartphone since I got my HD2 on T-Mo back in 2010 with WM 6.5 and before that my very first smartphone the Pocket PC Phone Edition by HTC back in 2002. Between the power of the 1520 and the spectacular HD screen together now with the WP software coming together just makes it an awesome experience. Can't wait to show my friends my phones tomorrow. Right now though I'm headed out to record video of the blood red moon tonight that is going to be fully featured here on the west coast of America.

 

[oakworth]

Hi' running a 920 and managed to install Cortana by changing language etc and love ❤ the extra small tiles. Noticed a drainage in battery and dropped from 89% to 26% after a glance update,switch a few things off and restarted and the battery jumped back upto 86%

 

[Kram Sacul]

It's almost as good as I expected it to be but some of the changes and design decisions made in 8.1 are seriously bugging me and actually detracting from all the positives.

Games now show in the app list
Who thought this was a good idea? This is so dumb and backwards thinking I can't believe this would be intentional.

System tray icons don't auto-hide
Should be an option. Again we're going backwards.

New Photo Hub
Big visual downgrade here. No easy access to 3rd party editing apps.

Music hub
No comment.

Removed Facebook and Twitter functions in Me and People hubs
It's just never good to remove features.


Then there's things that were removed/screwed with for no good reason:

No more carousel effect when pinching out in gallery
A great feature that made browsing through the gallery smooth and easy. Gone.

Different charging sound/chime
Not sure if this is a mistake or a dumb decision. It used alert #3 before which sounded much more pleasing. The sound that it makes now is like a barely noticeable error message.

Press/hold to activate cursor when editing text removed
Not a big deal but I liked the old way better.

Installing an app from the Store no longer takes you to the app list
This was a nice touch in that it would show you where you could find the app being installed. Now it does nothing and you have to exit the store and hunt for the app in the app list.

Volume Up+Power to take a screenshot instead of Power+Start button
Changed because of devices with on screen buttons. Not a big deal but it's still annoying. They still could've kept it.

New animations
Some of the new animations are kind of weird/wonky and not as elegant or smooth as in 8.0. The springy bounce effect when you reach the top and end of the start screen is very weak now and they took out the nice animation from the task switcher when you tapped a X to close an app.

Everything else seems great and promising (Action Center, Cortana, keyboard shape writing, background tile customization, new Store features, apps on the sd card, new options in settings). It's the stuff that was changed or removed that has me feeling disheartened and disappointed. Hopefully most of these issues will get fixed/polished in time but right now I'm missing a lot of the nice little touches and the overall WP feeling that I liked in 8.0.

 

[Roderick Aspiras]

It's almost as good as I expected it to be but some of the changes and design decisions made in 8.1 are seriously bugging me and actually detracting from all the positives.
Just wanted to ask, what do you mean by system tray icons? I thought this is only for desktop? Correct me if I'm wrong.

Yap the FB Integration is surely missed, Photohub, why do you have to change it to this lame, boring looking layout? MS don't change everything!

Will all said and done, the biggest thing here is Cortana. I don't mind the notification center/action center.


Games now show in the app list
Who thought this was a good idea? This is so dumb and backwards thinking I can't believe this would be intentional.

System tray icons don't auto-hide
Should be an option. Again we're going backwards.

New Photo Hub
Big visual downgrade here. No easy access to 3rd party editing apps.

Music hub
No comment.

Removed Facebook and Twitter functions in Me and People hubs
It's just never good to remove features.


Then there's things that were removed/screwed with for no good reason:

No more carousel effect when pinching out in gallery
A great feature that made browsing through the gallery smooth and easy. Gone.

Different charging sound/chime
Not sure if this is a mistake or a dumb decision. It used alert #3 before which sounded much more pleasing. The sound that it makes now is like a barely noticeable error message.

Press/hold to activate cursor when editing text removed
Not a big deal but I liked the old way better.

Installing an app from the Store no longer takes you to the app list
This was a nice touch in that it would show you where you could find the app being installed. Now it does nothing and you have to exit the store and hunt for the app in the app list.

Volume Up+Power to take a screenshot instead of Power+Start button
Changed because of devices with on screen buttons. Not a big deal but it's still annoying. They still could've kept it.

New animations
Some of the new animations are kind of weird/wonky and not as elegant or smooth as in 8.0. The springy bounce effect when you reach the top and end of the start screen is very weak now and they took out the nice animation from the task switcher when you tapped a X to close an app.

Everything else seems great and promising (Action Center, Cortana, keyboard shape writing, background tile customization, new Store features, apps on the sd card, new options in settings). It's the stuff that was changed or removed that has me feeling disheartened and disappointed. Hopefully most of these issues will get fixed/polished in time but right now I'm missing a lot of the nice little touches and the overall WP feeling that I liked in 8.0.