My frustrating attempt to move to Android.

[horseybob]

As an Enterprise business user, my first series of Smartphones were Windows based. Step forward in time and VZW no longer sold them. Alrighty then, Samsung s7 Edge it is. Install Arrow/Microsoft launcher, Cortana, OneDrive, OneNote and Office and within 4 hours, I'm rocking vs having a shattered, irreplaceable phone. Very little 'bloatware', in fact I also promptly installed Samsung's VR suite. Fantastic! I can cast directly to all of our Samsung TV's and anything else with Wi-Fi direct. With 802.11ac, am seeing ~140MB/second downloads. No regrets, and will be upgrading to either a Pixel XL or a Galaxy 8/+ next month. Stock Android? Meh. customize it to work for you

 

[L0n3N1nja]

As someone who hasn't used Cortana on a windows phone what does it have over Google Assistant or Bixby? I've used Cortana on Windows 10 but don't find it any more useful than competing voice assistants.

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

There are a couple of things that Cortana does better, but Google Assistant is far more useful for me in my opinion, mainly because it's more polished. For example regarding polish, yesterday a Cortana notification popped up on my screen saying The Team 891 lost, 9 - 2. Ha ha I have no idea what that was all about. It's a goofy example, but Google Assistant is just more thoroughly developed. Plus, it's connected to all of my smart devices. Cortana, while useful, just never took off. I rarely use her on my PC. I remember loving it back in the WP8 days, though.

 

[cool8man]

This is frightening the crap out of me. I was thinking about trying a used or cheap Galaxy S8 Plus to see what using Android is like. I jump between PC and phone all day long and not having the same apps or everything in sync is daunting to me. I don't think I can make this transition either. Does "Hey Cortana" work when the screen is off? If not that right there might be game over for me.

 

[Guytronic]

Google Assistant is far more useful for me in my opinion, mainly because it's more polished.

I agree!
Finding the Google assistant very useful the more I use it.
Some of it's features surprised me like using it with Textra and all the automation apps that tie to it.
I believe I can even use Google to snap a picture remotely with a connected Sony camera thru the Play-Memories Android app.

 

[cool8man]

As someone who hasn't used Cortana on a windows phone what does it have over Google Assistant or Bixby? I've used Cortana on Windows 10 but don't find it any more useful than competing voice assistants.

Well for starters Google Assistant and Bixby don't exist on my PCs and don't sync everything with my PCs. The Android stuff seems better for people who rarely use PCs anymore.​

 

[Mark Kaplan]

As someone who hasn't used Cortana on a windows phone what does it have over Google Assistant or Bixby? I've used Cortana on Windows 10 but don't find it any more useful than competing voice assistants.

My usage of Cortana by voice is mostly while driving, which I do a lot of. I've come rely heavily on her ability to read me my incoming texts, allow me to reply, answer & place calls, play music, or most any task. All via voice command without interacting with the screen at all. That is my idea of an effective personal assistant.

 

[Mark Kaplan]

There are a couple of things that Cortana does better, but Google Assistant is far more useful for me in my opinion, mainly because it's more polished. For example regarding polish, yesterday a Cortana notification popped up on my screen saying The Team 891 lost, 9 - 2. Ha ha I have no idea what that was all about. It's a goofy example, but Google Assistant is just more thoroughly developed. Plus, it's connected to all of my smart devices. Cortana, while useful, just never took off. I rarely use her on my PC. I remember loving it back in the WP8 days, though.

That's my point. If you havent used Cortana on a W10M device, you don't know how advanced her capabilities are. Far more than Google. Not the Android version yet. Its not there.

 

[Mark Kaplan]

I agree!
Finding the Google assistant very useful the more I use it.
Some of it's features surprised me like using it with Textra and all the automation apps that tie to it.
I believe I can even use Google to snap a picture remotely with a connected Sony camera thru the Play-Memories Android app.

This is funny. You all do realize Cortana on W10M has been doing all this for awhile know right?

 

[Mark Kaplan]

This is frightening the crap out of me. I was thinking about trying a used or cheap Galaxy S8 Plus to see what using Android is like. I jump between PC and phone all day long and not having the same apps or everything in sync is daunting to me. I don't think I can make this transition either. Does "Hey Cortana" work when the screen is off? If not that right there might be game over for me.

Hey Cortana works but if you use Cortana on W10M like I do, you will be sorely disappointed with the Android version.

 

[Guytronic]

You all do realize Cortana on W10M has been doing all this for awhile know right?

Yes I know...
Frankly didn't use Cortana a whole lot after a while On WP.
I realize it's always worked pretty well from the start, yet I just didn't continue using the feature regularly.

Now that I'm on the much hated platform a voice assistant has become a goto for some things.
I'm not trying sell anyone on anything here so I'll just move on...

 

[L0n3N1nja]

Well for starters Google Assistant and Bixby don't exist on my PCs and don't sync everything with my PCs. The Android stuff seems better for people who rarely use PCs anymore.​

Thing is I've used Android for nearly 7 years, I considered a windows 8 phone but wanted the Wacom powered s pen of the galaxy note line. I also use windows 10 on a daily basis, both my desktop and a Surface Pro 3. I've never felt a need or desire to use Cortana on windows, I don't even use OK Google much.

As far as having things sync, I've never had an issue because Google services are on windows, most Microsoft services are on Android. My email, calendar, bookmarks, music, photos, documents, notes are all synced. Adobe handles my creative cloud, and Verizon handles my text messages.

Maybe I'm missing out.

 

[L0n3N1nja]

My usage of Cortana by voice is mostly while driving, which I do a lot of. I've come rely heavily on her ability to read me my incoming texts, allow me to reply, answer & place calls, play music, or most any task. All via voice command without interacting with the screen at all. That is my idea of an effective personal assistant.

Sounds like Cortana handles hands free operations better. I don't bother with voice commands enough to know if all that is even possible on Android. Thanks for explaining what Cortana does for you.

 

[OutlawFirebird]

you can get Cortana on android now https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft.cortana ill try it out fully when I get my pixel 2xl in.

 

[Timbre70]

It's not available in my region. How to fool my Android phone into believing my region is usa? It's quite messy in android, couldn't find it.

 

[N_LaRUE]

@OP

I can appreciate your frustration and I have to admit that Android is not without it's issues. However, I would probably steer clear of Cortana on Android until MS figures out how to make it work better. It's simply not the same.

You're better off to get GBoard and use Google Assistant. It's far better on Android. As I don't have a Samsung phone I have no idea how good Bixby is. Apparently you can remap it to Google Assistant.

Here's a good site that shows some of the commands available on Google Assistant - OK Google

I'm not sure how much it's kept up to date.

The other thing to know is how to set up Assistant to work through the lockscreen so you don't need to touch the phone. You need to setup a 'Trusted' voice and ensure it's enabled in Smartlock under security.

Hope that proves useful.

 

[Mark Richey]

They are many things I still miss after switching to a android,Such as the outlook mail and calender and keyboard. But still sometimes I boot up my 640XL and think what it would've been if Microsoft is still committed to mobile.

I switched to android in January. First thing I did was search for and install outlook, office apps, One drive. I use the Microsoft Launcher. Used it since it was Arrow beta. A found a site that allowed me to install Groove and Cortana. I do use lots of Google services, but also Firefox and Firefox Focus. I recently installed Edge, but don't use it often. With the move in December to Spotify, I am good to go, though it is an inferior app compared to Groove. I have 4 working Windows phones: HTC Titan, 920, 930 and 950. I have 4 Zunes and am charging one of my HDs now. Surface pro 3. But to be honest, other than live tiles, I am not, missing the crippled WM ecosystem. I cried when they dropped my beloved Band.

I now sport a ZTE Axon 7. Best sounding phone ever. And an LG Urbane watch. I get Outlook notices, Cortana messages on the watch. If you can't find Microsoft love in Android you aren't trying hard enough.

 

[aximtreo]

I think the bloatware issue is overblown. Anyone can change the launcher and disable any app they don't use. I don't see bloatware as problem. I'm on the S8 and I just disable what I don't want. There is so much to like about the phone the positives outweigh the negatives by a long shot

My guess is that you have used Android for a while. A new user probably doesn't realize that some of the bloat ware can be deleted, made inactive or even recognize most of it. I would have suggested starting with a pure Android phone where most of this stuff is not present.

 

[Wolfjt]

This is frightening the crap out of me. I was thinking about trying a used or cheap Galaxy S8 Plus to see what using Android is like. I jump between PC and phone all day long and not having the same apps or everything in sync is daunting to me. I don't think I can make this transition either. Does "Hey Cortana" work when the screen is off? If not that right there might be game over for me.

When you put Cortana on your S8 things will sync just fine. In fact you'll get text messages on your PC and can even reply to the messages.

 

[jeffchapik]

As someone who hasn't used Cortana on a windows phone what does it have over Google Assistant or Bixby? I've used Cortana on Windows 10 but don't find it any more useful than competing voice assistants.

In my car, Cortana announces whenever I receive a text, tells me who the sender is, and asks if I want her to read it or ignore it. If I choose to read it, I can then reply by voice. All of this without ever touching the phone. And the announcement comes regardless of what I am listening to on the radio, FM, CD or BT. It evens works with the head unit turned off.



Turn by turn navigation directions also come on regardless of the source selected on the head unit. By contrast, Android would only announce turn by turn if I had the phone selected as the current audio source via BT. If I was listening to FM radio, I got nothing. And incoming texts were only announced via a chime, and then again only over BT. I could ask Okay Google to read my last 5 messages, but not reply to them.



I was very surprised to learn how primative Android was compared to Cortana, and this was one of the major reasons I returned to W10M (along with Android repeatedly losing all my contacts, but that's a story for another time...)