[Coolaaron88]

So since the 1520 is one of the first Windows Phones to feature the new three column tile layout, this opens new ways to organize your start screen.


How do you plan on utilizing that space on your 1520?

Sent from my SM-N900V using Tapatalk

[Laura Knotek]

What are your plans?

[Coolaaron88]

We'll for myself, one of the first things I notice is that you can be more creative with dividing your start screen into sections. Like for example placing all of your email inboxes as three medium sized tiles next to each other.

I plan to have the first section be all social. The playing with double wide and medium title layouts will make my start screen really interesting.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[Laura Knotek]

We'll for myself, one of the first things I notice is that you can be more creative with dividing your start screen into sections. Like for example placing all of your email inboxes as three medium sized tiles next to each other.

I plan to have the first section be all social. The playing with double wide and medium title layouts will make my start screen really interesting.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

Please post some screenshots when you get your device. I'd like to see what your start screen looks like.

[Coolaaron88]

Please post some screenshots when you get your device. I'd like to see what your start screen looks like.

Haha of course. I'll be sure to report back Laura.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[jmerrey]

I think it will be much more useful for utilizing the "header" tiles I've seen people with. On the standard 2 column screen, these seem cool at first, but really take up space.

[Shockwave78]

I'm new to windows phones and this will be my first (if I end up keeping it)

With all theseive tiles, how does it effect battery life? Are they constantly updating when the phone is locked and not being used?

[manicottiK]

With all theseive tiles, how does it effect battery life? Are they constantly updating when the phone is locked and not being used?

Each of your "live" apps comes with a small companion program (bundled in, so there's nothing for you to do to get them) that does the tile updating every 30 minutes (plus or minus a few minutes). The updates can only use a little bit of memory and have to finish quickly (under 30 seconds), so they don't have a great impact on battery life.

You can see which apps have these "in the background" or "periodic" tasks by going in to Settings, swiping to the Applications panel, and opening the Background Tasks page. This is a list of the companion programs that we do work in the background. Note, a companion program can be active even if the app isn't pinned to the Start screen. (For example, you might want Weave to get new content regularly, but not have it pinned.) If you find an app that's annoying you, you can use this page to block the app's ability to even schedule the task to run periodically.

Two final notes that causes some confusion for some new users:
1) The main part of the app is what asks the operating system to schedule the periodic task to run. When the OS does that, the schedule is for every 30 minutes for two weeks. Usually, apps extend the schedule each time they start up. IF you have an app that works this way and you pin it so read information from its tile, but you don't ever tap the tile to go in to the app, the updating will stop within two weeks because the scheduled task will end.
2) If the periodic task is a bit buggy or slow, Windows Phone will unscheduled it -- these tasks are allowed to fail or be slow once in a while, but if they screw up two times in a row, the OS won't even try a third time. (Of course, the app itself can ask the OS to schedule the periodic task again, but that means that you have to go in to the app. Most apps don't tell you the "state" of their background task "subscription" so there's no way for you to know if the updates are running or not; Microsoft needs to do a bit of work in this area. (Mine reports "on", "off", "expired", "slow", "memory hog" or "crashed", but it's not a general-purpose app.)

[LeiChat]

placing all of your email inboxes as three medium sized tiles next to each other

Do you not like the linked inboxes feature?

[Coolaaron88]

Do you not like the linked inboxes feature?

I do, but having more screen real estate allows you to be more creative with layout.

Sent from my SM-N900V using Tapatalk

[SwimSwim]

I mostly envy the 1320 and 1520 for that third column layout, I want it so bad on my 1020!!! The new specs are nice too, but I'm mostly drooling over that third tile column (also, I don't want such an obnoxiously big screen, and if I switched, I'd have to sacrifice that beautiful 41MP camera).

Hopefully the rumors will be true, and a third column will be made optional on Windows Phone 8.1, I want it so bad!!!

[taymur]

Each of your "live" apps comes with a small companion program (bundled in, so there's nothing for you to do to get them) that does the tile updating every 30 minutes (plus or minus a few minutes). The updates can only use a little bit of memory and have to finish quickly (under 30 seconds), so they don't have a great impact on battery life.

You can see which apps have these "in the background" or "periodic" tasks by going in to Settings, swiping to the Applications panel, and opening the Background Tasks page. This is a list of the companion programs that we do work in the background. Note, a companion program can be active even if the app isn't pinned to the Start screen. (For example, you might want Weave to get new content regularly, but not have it pinned.) If you find an app that's annoying you, you can use this page to block the app's ability to even schedule the task to run periodically.

Two final notes that causes some confusion for some new users:
1) The main part of the app is what asks the operating system to schedule the periodic task to run. When the OS does that, the schedule is for every 30 minutes for two weeks. Usually, apps extend the schedule each time they start up. IF you have an app that works this way and you pin it so read information from its tile, but you don't ever tap the tile to go in to the app, the updating will stop within two weeks because the scheduled task will end.
2) If the periodic task is a bit buggy or slow, Windows Phone will unscheduled it -- these tasks are allowed to fail or be slow once in a while, but if they screw up two times in a row, the OS won't even try a third time. (Of course, the app itself can ask the OS to schedule the periodic task again, but that means that you have to go in to the app. Most apps don't tell you the "state" of their background task "subscription" so there's no way for you to know if the updates are running or not; Microsoft needs to do a bit of work in this area. (Mine reports "on", "off", "expired", "slow", "memory hog" or "crashed", but it's not a general-purpose app.)

most difficult explanation for Livetiles ever.

[LMZR]

Well, i hope to spice things up a little bit, as i cannot really do much on my 520 that i'll be completely satisfied.

[wilsey]

Each of your "live" apps comes with a small companion program (bundled in, so there's nothing for you to do to get them) that does the tile updating every 30 minutes (plus or minus a few minutes). The updates can only use a little bit of memory and have to finish quickly (under 30 seconds), so they don't have a great impact on battery life.

You can see which apps have these "in the background" or "periodic" tasks by going in to Settings, swiping to the Applications panel, and opening the Background Tasks page. This is a list of the companion programs that we do work in the background. Note, a companion program can be active even if the app isn't pinned to the Start screen. (For example, you might want Weave to get new content regularly, but not have it pinned.) If you find an app that's annoying you, you can use this page to block the app's ability to even schedule the task to run periodically.

Two final notes that causes some confusion for some new users:
1) The main part of the app is what asks the operating system to schedule the periodic task to run. When the OS does that, the schedule is for every 30 minutes for two weeks. Usually, apps extend the schedule each time they start up. IF you have an app that works this way and you pin it so read information from its tile, but you don't ever tap the tile to go in to the app, the updating will stop within two weeks because the scheduled task will end.
2) If the periodic task is a bit buggy or slow, Windows Phone will unscheduled it -- these tasks are allowed to fail or be slow once in a while, but if they screw up two times in a row, the OS won't even try a third time. (Of course, the app itself can ask the OS to schedule the periodic task again, but that means that you have to go in to the app. Most apps don't tell you the "state" of their background task "subscription" so there's no way for you to know if the updates are running or not; Microsoft needs to do a bit of work in this area. (Mine reports "on", "off", "expired", "slow", "memory hog" or "crashed", but it's not a general-purpose app.)

Thanks a lot for the detail explanation. Do you have any idea how to fix the dead tile? Is there any limit on how many apps that can run in the background?

[tjwheels]

I'm thinking I will keep most of the apps I open frequently in the right side column just in case I can hold and operate with one hand and scroll with my thumb. The left side and middle is going to be out of reach for one hand operation (I think). That is where I'll try and keep apps that I primarily just use the live tile, weather, scoreboard, those type of things.

[Chief_Adu]

I mostly envy the 1320 and 1520 for that third column layout, I want it so bad on my 1020!!! The new specs are nice too, but I'm mostly drooling over that third tile column (also, I don't want such an obnoxiously big screen, and if I switched, I'd have to sacrifice that beautiful 41MP camera).

Hopefully the rumors will be true, and a third column will be made optional on Windows Phone 8.1, I want it so bad!!!

I'd like to see this on my HTC 8X as well! We just have to wait for new rumors :P

However, I'd really like to see some screenshots of the device :)

[MyNL822]

Will the 1520 lag when scrolling down? Actually, I don't think I'm using the right word, but let me try and make and example, I have my game tiles at the bottom of the screen, way down there, and when I want to get to a game fast, I scroll down fast, but sometimes instead of showing my tiles it will show black screen because I went down too fast, I don't know why it does this but will the 1520 do this since it contains more tiles?

[manicottiK]

Do you have any idea how to fix the dead tile?

Just some general suggestions. If a tile seems dead, tap it to go in to the app. If the app has its own setting for tile updates, turn it off, quit the app (in case it only saves the settings change when exiting), restart the app, and turn the settings back on. If the tile was pinned from inside the app, I'd also consider unpinning it, starting the app, and re-pinning from inside the app. Of course, all of this is geared toward trying to get the app to resubmit its request to have a periodic task run.

Is there any limit on how many apps that can run in the background?

There was in earlier releases and I suspect that there now, but I don't recall it. However, the app should get an error when trying to schedule the periodic task and should tell you about the error. Also note that there was (and may still be) a different limit for devices that have only 512MB of memory.

[wilsey]

Just some general suggestions. If a tile seems dead, tap it to go in to the app. If the app has its own setting for tile updates, turn it off, quit the app (in case it only saves the settings change when exiting), restart the app, and turn the settings back on. If the tile was pinned from inside the app, I'd also consider unpinning it, starting the app, and re-pinning from inside the app. Of course, all of this is geared toward trying to get the app to resubmit its request to have a periodic task run.

There was in earlier releases and I suspect that there now, but I don't recall it. However, the app should get an error when trying to schedule the periodic task and should tell you about the error. Also note that there was (and may still be) a different limit for devices that have only 512MB of memory.

Tried the suggestion and the "Live Tile" is still dead.

[krisguy]

Here's my home screen.



Sent from my Nokia Lumia 1520 using Tapatalk

[Gunpwdr]

Here's my home screen after the first real attempt at laying it out how I think I'll most benefit from tile placement. All the extra real estate makes me wonder if I should place my "core edge" tiles closer to the middle section vs the top where I had them on my 920.

[giantenemybird]

[Benny Vallejo]

This is my layout with Skinery Tiles Pro. They don't support 3 Columns yet so i had to make my own tedious little layout...Enjoy!

[cgooge14]

It has been a challenge figuring out what to do with all of the extra real estate...here is my effort so far.

[Greywolf1967]

Wow.....

Is that a Black update or GDR3 that lets you group tiles and name them?????