It's unrealistic for people to say these phones should be under $500.
Spec wise, 950/950xl are on par with any flagships out there. Plus continuum, Windows Hello, SD card slot, exchangeable battery, dual SIM, and the expected superior camera they are truly strong competitors.
Strategy wise, MS won't want these two phones comparable with Nexus. Nexus has always been the representative of the best budget phone, while 950/950xl aim at premium business and WP fans markets. They will be charged similar to Galaxy S6 and iphone, but a little bit lower to compete.
My guess is $579 for 950, and $659 for 950xl.
I'd beg to differ on the nexus. The nexus has never represented budget devices, two models (and the new two as yet unreleased) have been subsidized by Google to have budget device like pricing. There aren't areas being skimped on in terms of hardware... it may be a challenge to find something that beats the Nexus 6P on the spec sheet. All Metal, 128 GB storage option, SD 810v2.1, 3 GB RAM, Camera (not as good as Z5 according to tests but on par with or better than all other tested flagships this year), 5.7" 1440p AMOLED screen, gigantic battery, USB-C, Fingerprint scanner, etc, etc. This is not a budget device, but it is $500. The budget devices on Android are the Moto G, ZenFone 2, etc. They're usually sub $200-300 and you're paying for less and getting less in terms of hardware.
Historically the Nexus 4 left LTE absent. Otherwise they have all been flagship devices and most were at flagship prices.
These new Lumias definitely sound like the Nexus devices in terms of specs and if priced similarly, MS will likely sell more and take a loss. Selling at Sony, Samsung and Apple prices seems dangerous however that is probably close to the right amount to turn a profit on each unit.
For me it would be hard to justify the 950XL over the Nexus 6P if the 950 is more than $300-350. The specs are so similar that what we are really boiling down to are aesthetics, ecosystem, software experience and value of those for any price difference. Now I know Nexus isn't playing fair by undercutting pricing, but that doesn't change the price. At $300-350, the 950XL can potentially beat the Nexus 5X and may be enough of a value to settle from the 6P. But above that, it seems hard to explain why I wouldn't go nexus.
Keep in mind, 100% of the growth will need to come from people who 1: dont already love windows mobile 2: are probably invested in apple or Android 3: probably don't know anyone with Windows who is going to push them to try it.
Overcoming systemic unawareness while at the same time overpricing the market won't go well. That said, I'd I price for MS I'd price the XL under Samsung at $550 and the other with Moto at $400. This puts both slightly above nexus but the savings vs apple and Samsung are obvious.
sent via Nexus Assassin Edition. Gonfaloniere.