Re: Lumia 520, 720, 920, 1020, 1320 Owners
Absolutely. What I hate is, they had a good start with WP8. But they left it half and started a fresh with WP8.1. Now again they left WP8.1 half and introduced W10. Again as per you and some other, they want to switch focus to to PC, netbooks and 2 in 1, redstone etc. If they keep doing the same, nothing will be conststant for any user. The system it self will be so fragmented, MS will never be able to provide for all flawlessly. And now android is already there on pads and 2 in 1s. I wonder why MS released outdated hardware in new phones when others were far ahead and now say it's old? As with W10 for PC, again they have introduced something like forced updates. It's there for mobiles too. If in home (after W10 on every device strategy), there are 4-5 W10 devices, each is getting forced update, how much bandwidth will be left for users? For most of the world where data (WiFi and 3G)is costly, it's a lot of burden to bear. I have 4 W10 PCs and laptops and they consume hell lot of a data every month that to for updates like .net etc. Again this is another extreme. What update we want should be out choice. They may make it available or not, its us who would decide to get it not. I do not know where its going to take us as well as MS.
A lot of tech companies are trying to solve the internet issue. Even Google is building their fiber and scaring companies like Comcast. I added a few bucks to my monthly bill recently so I can have unlimited due to all the netflix streaming and such. Cumulative updates for PC's aren't that big. With mobile obviously the initial branch is big but once it's set it in place the newer updates are all cumulative and much smaller. And you have to ask yourself whether it's worth it. These updates could keep you from getting a virus or having someone exploit a bug and get into your computer, it may be worth the extra bandwidth used up. Those who want to keep up with tech usually have better internet. Whether it's because they like to watch Netflix in HD or listen to music or anything else. So technology costs not only in the hardware sector but in the other sectors like internet etc..
Technology companies are jumping in on all areas of technology, including internet. The only reason internet prices are so ridiculous is because of monopolies that maintain the infrastructure. The more companies that jump in on it the cheaper things will get and the more choices consumers will get. Windows 10 actually has a lot of settings for metered internet connections as well to help manage bandwidt better.
I agreed most part from your post but just a quick reminder, the MSRP of iPhone 5/Lumia 920 are not far away from each other. They are both selling at flagship price so if they choose to use less capable hardware to increase profit then I think it's a bit unfair for the users to swallow the "performance issue" excuse especially when there's less capable but newer device (lumia 430/435) were officially supported by w10m.
I think by suggesting the outsider (old, unsupported WP8 user) into insider is a bit lose-lose situation for the user : they have to choose between rather stable OS but no app support or future app support in a rather unstable OS with no help from the company. We insider are aware the risk and choose to join but give this as the only option to the rest is just....meh.
--
I'm actually using a hack ATIV S to get the newest redstone build and it worked ok, some crash yes but I can see it's potential even in a hack device (not optimized OS, not optimized firmware) so I really think it's possible to give a ok version to all WP8.1/1GB device and cover them with UWP support.
I think the problem is the Krait architecture which was abandoned. Qualcomm likely doesn't want to deal with it. Keep in mind that MS is not the only one who works on drivers/firmware for these types of chipsets. They work with partners. For example Windows 10 was having an issue which required intel to update their drivers. There were issues with some laptops from Dell or something like that and it required driver updates from them before people could upgrade to Windows 10. So it's not just MS doing these things. PC OEMs/manufacturers are much better with keeping their tech supported. But even they would prefer to only deal with 1 OS. You ever go to a support page for an OEM and you see drivers, you have to pick the OS and then download it. That's all maintained by them in partnership with MS. So not sure how much they can do with Krait phones, and that includes the HTC M8. Powerful sure, but using an abandoned tech. And companies in the phone industry are not like PC companies. Once phone tech is old they are focusing on pushing the new stuff and drop the old. The people who want the latest and greatest are usually the ones who make these companies a lot of money.
And of course intel says their 10nm process will be ready 2017. And MS is due to release some hardware spring 2017. So it could coincide with that nm process which will create more power friendly x64 chips.
There's really 2 different types of scenarios in the phone world right now. Apple produces the software/hardware and maintains everything and because they are in control of the whole process it's quite easy for them.
Google provides an Open source OS for mobile, the OEMS produce their own drivers, skins or whatever and they maintain everything. And they drop support pretty quick as you have seen. And that's so they can focus on new stuff. The PC world is the only one where Manufacturers try to keep things up to date even on older hardware. But the difference is MS is kind of trying to build the Apple world where they control everything but in an environment where any OEM can join the party. And the OEM really only needs to maintain things for 1 OS. MS takes care of updating the OS itself and the OEM can focus on better drivers. In android, every time a new version of android comes out, the OEM has to do quite a lot of work to skin it and include proper drivers. It's a lot of work for them, and if they focus too much on older devices they may miss the next new phone wave which happens yearly. And it's really easy to lose your market share when there's so many OEMs out there pushing stuff out and cheap too. Samsung has the majority of android market share and they don't really update their older phones. So people in android are so used to it they don't care. And most apps still continue running. I've had issues with newer apps on my kit kat device, but for the most part things will work. Developers also don't always add new OS based features into their apps because such a small market of those users exist. With ios devs know it will be on most phones so they can take advantage of it. And I would guess that the same scenario could happen with Windows 10. Windows 10 does an update for new features. Devs know all devices are getting the update so they can include it in their apps.
Anyways, a lot of people talk about how MS has been doing this weird stuff since windows 6.5. But this is actually the first time MS has done something under a new CEO. And I think that the update was pretty ok given that 50% of users got updated. You wouldn't see that in android. And heck they were shooting for even higher. But now once these devices are on windows 10, they will always be up to date. And to progress in tech you sometimes have to leave the past behind.
When looking back at the whole windows phone 6.5+ fiasco, did any of the phones get updates at all? Did all phones get dropped? I wasn't really a part of it. But did at least 50% of phones get updated at any point? Is this actually a step up from the past?