Windows Phone 7 dials up success - BostonHerald.com
June 13--Windows Phone 7, where have you been all my life? Or at least for the past five years, and a struggle between moderate satisfaction with Blackberrys and the constant lure of an iPhone.
I've tested the HTC Trophy, available from Verizon, for the last couple weeks. At first, it's a little weird to look at a "desktop" that isn't a screen filled with icons and programs that you need to open and close constantly. After a short while, the WP7 "live tiles" pinned to the screen make so much sense that you wonder why you ever toiled away with those pesky desktop icons.
This type of interface is fluid, not static. So as the information coming into your phone changes -- like e-mails, friends' status updates and calendar appointments -- so do the little windows on the screen, making it less necessary to constantly open and close applications.
The subtle design choices by Microsoft are intuitive without sacrificing any aesthetic appeal. For instance, every key press on the on-screen keyboard makes a slightly different sound. Over time, users almost subconsciously use these cues to help type accurately.
There are features so convenient about this phone that it seems like most other platforms (cough, iPhone), have simply been building on popular features without ever stopping to think whether there's a wholesale better way to do things.
For instance, WP7 was the first to launch a one-touch camera that allows the user to take a photo by pressing a dedicated camera button that allows you to snap a pic even while the rest of the phone is locked, a feature that Apple has now commandeered.
Facing the phone downward on a table during a call will automatically trigger speaker mode. If the phone's ringing, placing it face-down will trigger silence. If it's in your pocket, it will ring louder, with the sound decreasing as you pull it to your ear. Those features are thanks to HTC, and are available on the brand's Android phones as well.
WP7 currently has over 20,000 applications, and this is growing faster than the Android marketplace did at this point in its life cycle. The overall quality of the applications is typically a lot higher than the corresponding Android apps, and on-par with the iPhone equivalents. Shopsavvy, Netflix, Bank of America, Kindle, Shazam, Yelp, and Slacker Radio are some of the most popular apps, and they're all available on the WP7 platform.
Your contacts are not organized in the simple address book fashion. They pool information aggregated from Facebook and other social media apps, displaying it within your contacts folder. In the next update of the phone, which is dubbed "Mango," the latest emails and text messages sent by your contacts will be included in that central clearinghouse, dubbed the "people hub," as well.
In terms of music, you can stream a nearly unlimited repertoire of music after signing up for Microsoft's Zune pass, anywhere from $12 to $15 a month, which also includes a free album download each month. The deal is so much cheaper than iTunes that you wonder why it hasn't taken off.
Reception is crisp and clear, and battery life is better than most Android devices, though probably still lagging behind the latest iPhone. You can easily get through a full day of activity without having to re-charge, a surprising advantage for a phone that packs so many features. Bottom line: After much searching for a phone to replace my clunky Blackberry, I'm pretty sure I'll be purchasing the WP7 from Microsoft's online store in the near future
June 13--Windows Phone 7, where have you been all my life? Or at least for the past five years, and a struggle between moderate satisfaction with Blackberrys and the constant lure of an iPhone.
I've tested the HTC Trophy, available from Verizon, for the last couple weeks. At first, it's a little weird to look at a "desktop" that isn't a screen filled with icons and programs that you need to open and close constantly. After a short while, the WP7 "live tiles" pinned to the screen make so much sense that you wonder why you ever toiled away with those pesky desktop icons.
This type of interface is fluid, not static. So as the information coming into your phone changes -- like e-mails, friends' status updates and calendar appointments -- so do the little windows on the screen, making it less necessary to constantly open and close applications.
The subtle design choices by Microsoft are intuitive without sacrificing any aesthetic appeal. For instance, every key press on the on-screen keyboard makes a slightly different sound. Over time, users almost subconsciously use these cues to help type accurately.
There are features so convenient about this phone that it seems like most other platforms (cough, iPhone), have simply been building on popular features without ever stopping to think whether there's a wholesale better way to do things.
For instance, WP7 was the first to launch a one-touch camera that allows the user to take a photo by pressing a dedicated camera button that allows you to snap a pic even while the rest of the phone is locked, a feature that Apple has now commandeered.
Facing the phone downward on a table during a call will automatically trigger speaker mode. If the phone's ringing, placing it face-down will trigger silence. If it's in your pocket, it will ring louder, with the sound decreasing as you pull it to your ear. Those features are thanks to HTC, and are available on the brand's Android phones as well.
WP7 currently has over 20,000 applications, and this is growing faster than the Android marketplace did at this point in its life cycle. The overall quality of the applications is typically a lot higher than the corresponding Android apps, and on-par with the iPhone equivalents. Shopsavvy, Netflix, Bank of America, Kindle, Shazam, Yelp, and Slacker Radio are some of the most popular apps, and they're all available on the WP7 platform.
Your contacts are not organized in the simple address book fashion. They pool information aggregated from Facebook and other social media apps, displaying it within your contacts folder. In the next update of the phone, which is dubbed "Mango," the latest emails and text messages sent by your contacts will be included in that central clearinghouse, dubbed the "people hub," as well.
In terms of music, you can stream a nearly unlimited repertoire of music after signing up for Microsoft's Zune pass, anywhere from $12 to $15 a month, which also includes a free album download each month. The deal is so much cheaper than iTunes that you wonder why it hasn't taken off.
Reception is crisp and clear, and battery life is better than most Android devices, though probably still lagging behind the latest iPhone. You can easily get through a full day of activity without having to re-charge, a surprising advantage for a phone that packs so many features. Bottom line: After much searching for a phone to replace my clunky Blackberry, I'm pretty sure I'll be purchasing the WP7 from Microsoft's online store in the near future
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