So my 30 day return option is almost up and?

[Doug MacKay1]

I am seriously considering returning the Icon to Verizon. Sometimes I think the WP8 is the best phone in the world. Other times I think ?Have these guys ever even used a phone??.

I really wanted to love this device. And in some ways I do. The hardware is fantastic, the interface is fresh and clean.

My challenges are as follows:

1. Does not integrate with One Drive. Over the weekend, I received a work email where I needed to respond with a file attachment on my OneDrive. I was stunned that I could not do this. This was the whole point of going with WP8; the great productivity features of a complete end-to-end Windows ecosystem. Why they made this decision is a total head scratcher. Android has better Windows integration than Windows Phone 8.
2. Charger cannot keep up. I drive quite a bit. I put my Nokia phone in the Nokia CR-200 car charger. In a 4 hour trip, using GPS sparingly and streaming Audible, I went from 100% charge to 37% charge. The phone was so hot it was uncomfortable to hold at pit stops.
3. No way to fast forward in any audio program. Using the Xbox music app, you cannot skip to the middle of a song or go forward and back by little increments. It is the beginning or end of the track only. This issue is in the other 3rd party apps I tried as well. Same for Audible. It makes me think this is an OS limitation rather than an app issue.
4. Audible app is a mess. With the amount of driving I do, I use Audible quite a bit. The app is visually very nice as are most WP apps. But it just does not work well with Bluetooth. When I make pit stops, it loses track of where I was in the book. It usually goes back about 45 minutes or so. With no way to fast forward, you have to listen to everything all over again.
5. OneNote not as good as Android version. The interface is very nice, but it was much quicker and more reliable on my old Android device. Hard to describe really, but I expected to be really blown away by the windows app on the Windows OS. I kind of prefer the Android version.
6. Words With Friends app locks up phone every 2-3 days. This is not a huge deal, but it is a pain to have to randomly hard reboot.
7. Battery Life is great unless you use the phone for anything wireless. It seems like streaming Bluetooth music is a huge battery drain. I expected the GPS to be a drain, but that too, seems excessive. Using GPS, I can only get about 3 hours and the device turns into a toaster. Streaming BT, I get a battery drain of about 20% per hour.

So I really like the simplicity of the phone and the beautiful, clean interface. But what I expected was a productivity beast. The lack of integration among the various Windows services makes is a shiny empty box. It seems like all of my other gripes will be fixed with 8.1 which is fine. But the list above is becoming something of a deal killer. With only 5 days left to return the device, I just need some help to make sure I am not overlooking anything.

Am I missing something?

Thanks for any advice.

Doug M.

 

[N_LaRUE]

Most of the things here are more app and OEM related than actual WP.

1. I think you misunderstand how to use WP as it's quite different than Android. In WP its more about 'hubs' than a file system so things are done differently. When you want to send a link from OneDrive you simply open the app, long press the item, select 'share', get link, then email it. Simple. The same philosophy is used when sending Office docs from your phone.

2. I have to agree with this one. I own a L920 and have an issue just with the GPS. It wasn't always like this though. It used to charge.

3. An issue which is being corrected in WP8.1 I believe.

4. The app has needed an update for some time. This has nothing to do with WP but hopefully it gets corrected.

5. I guess that's preference but I have had no issues with it. Have you read up on it? Using OneNote Mobile on Windows Phone 8 | Windows Phone How-to (United Kingdom)

6. Again, a bad app implementation that needs an update.

7. I think most phones would suffer with any extended use. Smartphone batteries on any phone are not that great.

Some of your issues I think will be fixed with WP8.1. Unfortunately we can't push developers to fix their apps.

I can say that I think a lot the issues with apps has come from WP8 locked down nature and I think with WP8.1 we'll see better apps. So I guess it's up to you if you want to wait or not.

 

[Doug MacKay1]

Most of the things here are more app and OEM related than actual WP.

1. I think you misunderstand how to use WP as it's quite different than Android. In WP its more about 'hubs' than a file system so things are done differently. When you want to send a link from OneDrive you simply open the app, long press the item, select 'share', get link, then email it. Simple. The same philosophy is used when sending Office docs from your phone.

Thanks for the great reply.

I kind of understand the theory around OneDrive and sharing files. It just seems clumsy. For the email in question, it had 9 people included and the thread was about 7 messages deep. The only way to add the file to this email thread would be to create a whole new thread where I send the link from OneDrive. That would be a pain as several of the people in the thread were not in my contacts and even then, the whole history would be missing.

The only other option would be to email myself a link than copy and paste that into the original thread. Just seems unnecessary. I can add pictures from OneDrive right in the email app. I just seems really odd that I cannot add a file/link. Maybe this will be a change in 8.1 as well.

I suspect that I'll pack up the Icon and return it for now. I still have a spare 928 I can use when 8.1 is released to see if these issues are addressed.

Doug M.

 

[maflynn]

All things being equal, I thought the return period for Verizon was 14 days not 30.

 

[juanitoriv]

Doug, when you see the header on any audio, you know, when you press a volume button, hold/long press the FF or RW icon, and it'll do what you want. That's for #3

 

[tgp]

I kind of understand the theory around OneDrive and sharing files. It just seems clumsy. For the email in question, it had 9 people included and the thread was about 7 messages deep. The only way to add the file to this email thread would be to create a whole new thread where I send the link from OneDrive. That would be a pain as several of the people in the thread were not in my contacts and even then, the whole history would be missing.

Your scenario here is one of WP's weak spots. Unfortunately what you need to do here cannot be done. This is a common complaint among WP users. If you need to reply to emails and add attachments unfortunately you will need to use something other than WP.

I'm not sure it's been confirmed, but from what I've read this issue is not rectified in WP8.1. Can someone else confirm or say otherwise?

 

[juanitoriv]

Well from what I've read, it has but not sure if completely.. I understand we can pick more files to attach and also, we can upload to web in IE. So, even if the native option doesn't suffice, we can just use the web interface from or webmail provider and do it that way.

 

[california86]

The CR-200 wireless car charger unfortunately won't be able to keep up while the phone's being used with navigation. I use a wired charger (this one: Amazon.com: RIM ACC-48181-301 Blackberry Premium In-Vehicle Charger for Blackberry MicroUSB - Car Charger - Retail Packaging - Black: Cell Phones & Accessories) and it charges to full on longer drives, regardless of what's running on the phone.

 

[DavidinCT]

The CR-200 wireless car charger unfortunately won't be able to keep up while the phone's being used with navigation. I use a wired charger (this one: Amazon.com: RIM ACC-48181-301 Blackberry Premium In-Vehicle Charger for Blackberry MicroUSB - Car Charger - Retail Packaging - Black: Cell Phones & Accessories) and it charges to full on longer drives, regardless of what's running on the phone.

Yea, same here on my 928, I picked up a 2.1a USB charger from meritline ($6-8), and have about 3-4 of them, never had a problem with long GPS (Nokia drive and Garmin) trips, my battery is always fully charged after a 2-3 hour trip.

 

[cbreze]

All things being equal, I thought the return period for Verizon was 14 days not 30.

This is what the rep told me when I bought my icon. He was a wp user(icon) also and a very cool and helpful guy. He made sure I understood the return policy,(14days) restock fee etc before I left.

 

[ret18057]

Some corporate and government accounts still have a 30 day return...