Why WP isn't as popular as it should be.

[Mitlov]

its not always about looks either. sure you can make android look like whatever you want, but you cant make it work like what you want... i found too many times that apps dont work right, nothing is unified, and behaves like a stubborn child. where as wp seems to be more matured and fluent.

This. There's a "ICS launcher" mod for the Kindle Fire that makes it look in screen shots like it's running Ice Cream Sandwich. But I tried installing it and it turned an already-buggy device nearly unusable. Had to reset the device to factory defaults to get it running properly again. This is the downside of the limitless-mod-possibiities with Android...particularly for users like me who aren't comp sci majors and find this sort of thing difficult instead of fun.

 

[socialcarpet]

Exactly.

That is the problem with Android. You have to root your phone just so you can delete the carrier bloatware and begin cleaning up the mess they handed you to get it to run somewhat acceptably from day one.

They you may very easily hit the slippery slope of OCD Android customization that never ends.

The only other option I see, is get one of the Nexus "pure Google" phones that isn't all crapped up already. Even then, you aren't safe from Android's general lack of order when it comes to their apps market, the way apps are built and a dozen other things. No thanks.

 

[tekhna]

Exactly.

That is the problem with Android. You have to root your phone just so you can delete the carrier bloatware and begin cleaning up the mess they handed you to get it to run somewhat acceptably from day one.

Not anymore. Ice Cream Sandwich allows you to disable and hide any system app, including bloatware. It's a core functionality built into the OS, and there's nothing the OEMs and carriers can do about it.

 

[AngryNil]

That's the beauty of Android. Don't like the GUI? Change it.

Those who think that Windows Phone or iPhone themes on their Android devices are as good as the real thing are oblivious to the strengths of both platforms and hence should be on Android anyway. The stock experience isn't fully emulated, let alone the third-party app ecosystem.

Every time I hear about people totally re-skinning their phones, I wince. I don't see how people can see fragmenting the design languages present on their phones as a plus. You might have a launcher and a few apps that are Metro, but your search app isn't. How about weather, app store, browser, Facebook, Twitter, Office, Tumblr, Engadget, YouTube, Wikipedia, or RSS?

The list goes on. Emulation / imitation is always a step behind the real thing. Ultimately, I think it's wise to stick with stock Holo. It looks pretty darn good, and the apps are going to be themed after it. I hope manufacturers will stop with the skins, because they introduce the same design fragmentation that user customizations do.

I think people still bash Android's look because majority of devices out there are running Gingerbread (ugly already) with a manufacturer skin thrown on top (even worse). Also, ICS has a pretty bad home screen, but the rest of it is actually very good.

 

[Oridus]

its not always about looks either. sure you can make android look like whatever you want, but you cant make it work like what you want... i found too many times that apps dont work right, nothing is unified, and behaves like a stubborn child. where as wp seems to be more matured and fluent.

additonally , having the ability to over-customize your phone means you never truly get it. always flashing new roms, changing widgets, wallpapers, launchers... i agree with the fact people dont want to deeply customize their phones to make them work for them... too much time and effort required.
+1 to socialcarpets comments

i dunno, i get the idea behind android, and ive experienced on many deifferent high end devices.. just not for me. and man, my worst complaint on my last android device, bionic", was the keyboard was awful!!! even tried swift key, and go sms, nothing like wp keyboard

[Edit]
I'm really sorry for the badly constructed post ahead of time. I know I kind of fly through a couple topics really quick, but I just woke up -_-
[/edit]

Now, just be clear before I say anything: I have owned 3 windows phones, and many more android phones. I'm not bashing anything here, just simply commenting on my own experience.


On any of my Android phones, there were simply some applications I had to use... be it ESPN score center, phone my pc (or more often than not lately i've been using Splashtop), Tapatalk (Android's Board Express), Facebook, baby bump for info on my little one that's on the way... etc etc etc.

The one thing I see when it comes to a lot of those applications, is that they either A) offer more options than the WP7 counterpart or B) simply actually work a **** of a lot more smoothly because of maturity in the app developer world on Android as compared to WP7.

Tapatalk has always worked more smoothly for me when scrolling through posts and replying, and Board Express on my Lumia has problems on almost every page of threads I surf through. Not sure if it's due to more info being loaded or what, but it's annoying as ****.

Phone my PC and Splashtop are very important to me, and over 3g are the BEST remote pc applications i've ever used, and cannot find anything on WP7 that can come close (please feel free to direct me to one if there is one so I can try it, and thanks in advance).

ESPN app on Lumia, I realize there are two that are available. One ships with the phone, the other you can download. Both load very slowly, and one takes you do a website. Why why WHY WHY WHY do quite a few apps on WP7 simply take you to some mobile website? The youtube does this as well. (I know "Youtube Pro" is a standalone application, but has issues playing lots of the HQ videos. I've never once had issues playing HQ video on my android phones.) This is one thing that bugs the crap out of me as well about some WP7 apps.

Facebook... where do I start. I give the "edge" of facebook to WP7 intergration. I love that I can get a lot of the quick info that I need without using an application... so WP7 wins in that area, but the actual application is slow to load, and lacks some of the functionality that the Android app has. Now, that's not to say that Android's app has always been that way, because it hasn't. Only in the last 5 months has Androids app really wowed me with everything they've done to improve it. But out of base uses for facebook, i'll still give WP7 the edge.

And the baby bump reference.... i simply bring that up because this thread is partly why "wp7 isn't popular" or something like that, right? I think a lot of the issues I see is that people who have an android or iphone already have apps that they use on a daily basis that they just have gotten used to using on a daily basis. When you take that away, they feel like their phone just doesn't work for them. I know it's because the OS is young, and possibly some day down the line their favorite apps MAY come to WP7, but it's not here now, so why move away from something that already has what they want/need.

I recently gave up an android as my daily driver and have been using a Lumia for a month now, but I just find myself not enjoying my phone as thoroughly as I used to when I had my android as a daily driver. It does a lot of stuff well, and I think it does a great job at being a unified experience, and making social networking on facebook a breeze. But in terms of applications, that is enough of a reason alone to make me stick with Android for now, until Wp7 can provide for me in that area.

I have pre-ordered an HTC One X from AT&T and will have it next friday. I'll be using that as my daily driver personal phone, and will be keeping my Lumia for my work phone. I'll have the best of both worlds, and hopefully will be able to watch WP7 mature.

Once I get my one X though, i'll make a comparison video and post it over in the lumia forum. I'll go over what I like best about both operating systems and show why BOTH can work for me....

 

[socialcarpet]

Not anymore. Ice Cream Sandwich allows you to disable and hide any system app, including bloatware. It's a core functionality built into the OS, and there's nothing the OEMs and carriers can do about it.

Realllly.... That is awesome! I'm glad they finally did that. Long overdue!

That definitely puts some more points in the Android column as far as I'm concerned.

 

[socialcarpet]

Those who think that Windows Phone or iPhone themes on their Android devices are as good as the real thing are oblivious to the strengths of both platforms and hence should be on Android anyway. The stock experience isn't fully emulated, let alone the third-party app ecosystem.

Every time I hear about people totally re-skinning their phones, I wince. I don't see how people can see fragmenting the design languages present on their phones as a plus. You might have a launcher and a few apps that are Metro, but your search app isn't. How about weather, app store, browser, Facebook, Twitter, Office, Tumblr, Engadget, YouTube, Wikipedia, or RSS?

The list goes on. Emulation / imitation is always a step behind the real thing. Ultimately, I think it's wise to stick with stock Holo. It looks pretty darn good, and the apps are going to be themed after it. I hope manufacturers will stop with the skins, because they introduce the same design fragmentation that user customizations do.

I think people still bash Android's look because majority of devices out there are running Gingerbread (ugly already) with a manufacturer skin thrown on top (even worse). Also, ICS has a pretty bad home screen, but the rest of it is actually very good.

The UI and the continuity between it and all the apps is probably the single thing that I like most about WP7 and what won me over.

It's a difficult thing to quantify, but using WP7 just felt more natural and easy than any other smartphone I've used. Only the Palm phones (both the old Palm OS and WebOS) came close for me. The old Palm OS was dated, but it was very good at keeping it simple and essential rather than trying to do too many things at once.

I always found moving from app to app in Android kind of jarring, because you have to adapt to a different UI, button and color scheme and behaviors for almost every app and a lot of the apps are just terrible. Note Everything is a good example. It works well, but the UI looks like crap and it doesn't act or look anything like any other app. Different fonts, different color scheme. It may be a small point for some, but it just drove me nuts.

 

[cckgz4]

The UI and the continuity between it and all the apps is probably the single thing that I like most about WP7 and what won me over.

It's a difficult thing to quantify, but using WP7 just felt more natural and easy than any other smartphone I've used. Only the Palm phones (both the old Palm OS and WebOS) came close for me. The old Palm OS was dated, but it was very good at keeping it simple and essential rather than trying to do too many things at once.

I always found moving from app to app in Android kind of jarring, because you have to adapt to a different UI, button and color scheme and behaviors for almost every app and a lot of the apps are just terrible. Note Everything is a good example. It works well, but the UI looks like crap and it doesn't act or look anything like any other app. Different fonts, different color scheme. It may be a small point for some, but it just drove me nuts.

Yes I miss the old palm Os even though it was outdated

 

[N8ter]

WP7 social integration was copied from Android. Any TW or Sense Android has had this for like 1.5 years before WP7 was released. I didn't use it there, I don't use it here. Good apps are always superior.

Live Tiles = Badges in 90% of cases, Widgets in the other 10%.

WP7 still only has 1/3rd the Notification system of Android/iOS and even then it isn't really consistent even among stock apps (like no Toasts for eMails).

Personally, I think most WP7 device owners are light smartphone users (actually it's pretty obvious at least on the various forums by observing what they tend to not care about in threads addressing the gaps in the platform). As a heavy user (or was, until the HD7 became my daily driver), it's a frustrating time-wasting platform to use and it requires way too many compromises. This is even in comparison to iOS, which shares many of the same limitations and is arguably more locked down than WP7.

A lot of people are moving a lot of activities to their smart devices so they're going from being light users (who can get by with a feature phone, so WP7 is probably a good initial step for them) to heavy users who do a ton of tasks and communications (in different forms) on their devices. I think that's why Android has such a higher "first smartphone" adoption rate, and marketshare as a result.

The only thing refreshing about WP7 is the way the UI is put together, at least at the beginning until you realize the Live Tiles offer basically nothing new that a Badge or Widget couldn't offer and you have to scroll twice as much in applications to digest the same information as on other platforms.

Microsoft needs to do some real usability studies that involve more than them making assumptions or tracking the key presses and activities of fanbois who were ignorant enough to waste battery sending their information from the phone to their data centers (something I almost always turn off immediately when I get a new phone - irregardless of the platform).

 

[jdd77]

but how useless is a background when your live tiles take up all the space???

this is why a background is USELESS for WP...
and for your smart people out there thinking TRANSPARENT tiles would work.. well it wouldn't cause then you couldn't see your live tiles get updated properly and it would become a MESS.

Click to view quoted image

wallpaper is the blue , tiles the black... sorry im not a Painter artist.

this is why I think there should be a third home screen. 1st being a wallpaper w/ dialer and contacts.. and the 2nd being the Metro ui as something you swipe to.

 

[selfcreation]

this is why I think there should be a third home screen. 1st being a wallpaper w/ dialer and contacts.. and the 2nd being the Metro ui as something you swipe to.

then we gona get sued by Google for copying the multti screen thing. lol maybe not...

honestly i dunno if id like 2-3 extra home screen... I dint really like it on Android.


that's what i like about WP is the HUBS --> click on 1 live tiles and all you need on the subject is in there.

People HUB: contacts , Facebook/twitter etc...
Xbox HUB: games + marketplace+ friends+msg

if anything id like to see MORE HUBs or CUSTOM HUBS witch would become your custom UI in a way. click on 1 tiles and all your stuff is there. ( you can add backgrounds to HUBS )

compare to android and Ios where you have a separate APP or section for each of does functions. and Folders are or would in NO WAY be as cool and functional as a CUSTOM HUB could be.

I hope we get custom HUBS considering W8 is all about hubs on a PC .. they better let us creat our own Custom HUB or as I like to call them advance folders lol

 

[jdd77]

After reading through this thread, I have a couple questions:

1. Why would having limitless customization (in reference to android) turn someone into a rom-flashing, phone rooting, time waster... downloading everything they can just because its there? Maybe if your that kind of person..but I think its just the opposite. When I had an android phone, it took me ten minutes to set it up the way I liked, then I was done.

2. How could theme colors be a minor issue? Its 100% of what you see when you use the phone, and its integrated throughout most of the functionality. I personaly think the color schemes are awlful and I waste more time trying to stick to a color that doesnt hurt my eyes or annoy the crap out of me, than I would if there was more customization to find something I like. But my 3 year old neice loves the colors and to touch the big squares to see what happens.. and I have to laugh because the colors really do make it look like a child's toy.

 

[N8ter]

BB10 looks FIERCE. Don't think it's release later this year will help Microsoft's efforts, especially since Nokia has been releasing a flurry of buggy WP7 devices and even their cameras have been worse than HTC or Samsung phones.

 

[tekhna]

WP7 social integration was copied from Android. Any TW or Sense Android has had this for like 1.5 years before WP7 was released. I didn't use it there, I don't use it here. Good apps are always superior.

Live Tiles = Badges in 90% of cases, Widgets in the other 10%.

WP7 still only has 1/3rd the Notification system of Android/iOS and even then it isn't really consistent even among stock apps (like no Toasts for eMails).

Personally, I think most WP7 device owners are light smartphone users (actually it's pretty obvious at least on the various forums by observing what they tend to not care about in threads addressing the gaps in the platform). As a heavy user (or was, until the HD7 became my daily driver), it's a frustrating time-wasting platform to use and it requires way too many compromises. This is even in comparison to iOS, which shares many of the same limitations and is arguably more locked down than WP7.

A lot of people are moving a lot of activities to their smart devices so they're going from being light users (who can get by with a feature phone, so WP7 is probably a good initial step for them) to heavy users who do a ton of tasks and communications (in different forms) on their devices. I think that's why Android has such a higher "first smartphone" adoption rate, and marketshare as a result.

The only thing refreshing about WP7 is the way the UI is put together, at least at the beginning until you realize the Live Tiles offer basically nothing new that a Badge or Widget couldn't offer and you have to scroll twice as much in applications to digest the same information as on other platforms.

Microsoft needs to do some real usability studies that involve more than them making assumptions or tracking the key presses and activities of fanbois who were ignorant enough to waste battery sending their information from the phone to their data centers (something I almost always turn off immediately when I get a new phone - irregardless of the platform).

I agree with everything you're saying, but watch out, there's a pretty fierce cadre of loyalists here who think live tiles are the most innovative thing ever, and totally not a widget or a badge. Nevermind that's exactly what they are.

 

[smapor]

Android got its push because of 2 things.

1. Apple basically said our way or no product

2. No other viable phone OS at that time that was free.


Hence why Verizon and AT&T wants a 3rd player.

Android - right place, right time, free and had google brand name.

I fully expect WP8 to make a huge dent into the market as a legit 3rd player. They may never be #1,but that doesn't mean its bad. It gives users more choice.

Lastly whoever made that comment about light users for WP 7.5.......that is false.

 

[smapor]

WP7 social integration was copied from Android.

Apparently the late Steve Job accused Google stealing/copying ideas from Apple, when Google had people on Apple's board of directors.

 

[TonyDedrick]

I would sell the ecosystem rather than the phone itself. So for example before somebody buys I phone I ask them what he/she uses on a daily basis
- Do you have a MAC or a PC
- Do you use Microsoft Office on a daily basis
- Do you have an Xbox
- Do you use Microsoft services such as Hotmail etc
- Are you into social networking

And best on the answers the end user provides me I come up with the best possible phone that will tie their entire technology experience together.

Isn't this what MS has been trying to do anyways? Most of their ads involving WP tend to be more generic "It all starts with W7." Personally, I don't really know how effective selling an ecosystem to the average consumer is. Not to say it wouldn't be effective to everyone. Just most people I know have a hodgepodge of different devices. They might have a PS3, iPhone and a PC running Windows or whatever combinations of the three. I base my products on what I think gives me the best bang for my buck. And if there happens to be some measure of connectivity there, so be it. But I don't really want to base my phone purchase on whether or not I have an Xbox or use Hotmail.

 

[TonyDedrick]

but how useless is a background when your live tiles take up all the space???

this is why a background is USELESS for WP...
and for your smart people out there thinking TRANSPARENT tiles would work.. well it wouldn't cause then you couldn't see your live tiles get updated properly and it would become a MESS.

Click to view quoted image

wallpaper is the blue , tiles the black... sorry im not a Painter artist.

I'm looking at my phone right now and there is bit more room to see a background image than your picture is indicating where a different theme wouldn't be totally useless. A background image (or even just a pattern theme) would be nice to change up even just for the app list screen. But your point is certainly well taken.

And let me make it clear that for myself, WP having an option for some kind of image as the background or lack thereof is in no way a deal breaker. I don't necessarily need it. But would not be angry if the option were there

 

[selfcreation]

I'm looking at my phone right now and there is bit more room to see a background image than your picture is indicating where a different theme wouldn't be totally useless. A background image (or even just a pattern theme) would be nice to change up even just for the app list screen. But your point is certainly well taken.

And let me make it clear that for myself, WP having an option for some kind of image as the background or lack thereof is in no way a deal breaker. I don't necessarily need it. But would not be angry if the option were there

yeah a bit more room , but not much lol! I like the Idea of having THEMES that would be cool! it would make it that much more dinamic and interactive .

 

[bear_lx]

i cant believe this thread has gone this far....