Category: Mobile

[sc:mobile-category ]So I made some predictions on Monday about what would be unveiled today and so now it’s time to see how close I was.

First off, you can go here to get the highlights of the announcement.

What I got right, which includes anything that had a probability of less than 40%:

• New home screen details (more types of live tiles, maybe a horizontal view and groups) – 100%
• Demo of some Skype Integration – 80%
• Demo of FULL Skype Integration – 30%
• Dual core support – 100%
• multiple resolutions – 100%
• New hardware demo unit – %100
• Release date of Q4 – 80%
• Release date of Q3 – 19%
• Release date of Q1/13 – 1%
• New maps functionality – 75%
• New voice functionality – 60%
• Game demo – 100%
• NT Kernel in Apollo – 100%
• New camera functionality – 20%
• Upgradeability announcement for all WP7 devices – 0%
• Upgradeability announcement for most WP7 devices – 30%

What I got wrong:

• Quad core support – 5%
• Developers tools preview/beta/rc – 90%

What I was not right or wrong about:

• Upgradeability announcement for some Wp7 devices – 60%
• No upgradeability announcement – 30%

I’m including the “upgradability for some” in the not right/wrong category as they did announce no upgrades for Windows Phone 7 hardware but did announce Windows Phone 7.8 which will bring a lot of the features of WP8 to WP7 devices.

Overall, I was pretty close 🙂

I was very surprised they didn’t announce some developers tools, but I guess those are coming later in the summer so we’ll have to wait to see them.

They also announcement  a few other items that I didn’t predict, here are some of my first thoughts on them as well as on some of the ones I did predict:

• SD Card support: About friken time!  The didn’t say, but hopefully it will include cards greater than 32g.
• NFC Support: Meh, my phone won’t replace my wallet until government agencies accept it as ID and that doesn’t appear likely any time soon.
• IE10:10 better than 9!
• Wallet: See NFC above.
• Map upgrades: Turn by turn will be nice as well as offline support.
• New Start screen: My first impression was “My that looks busy!”.  I’m sure there were a lot of internal discussions on this as the simplistic design aesthetic of WP7 has given way to a much busier screen.
• WP 7.8: This should keep most 7.5 users happy and I expect a lot of the user experience improvements in WP8 that haven’t been announced but aren’t hardware/os dependent to be included in the update as well (like whatever changes they make to mail and messaging, etc.).
• Native Code: ’bout time MS.  Good move.
• In-app payments: Meh, just making developers lives easier so it’s a good thing.
• Integrated VOIP: YES! YES! YES! I want my SIP number to ring through to my WP and be able to make calls with it!
• Multitasking: Makes everything better.
• WP@Work: These upgrades are nice, bringing these features will make a definite difference to enterprise adoption.
• Languages: Good to have, no impact to me thought.
• OTA Updates: I know lots of people see this as important, but no one I know doesn’t have a PC of some kind…

 

[sc:mobile-category ]There has been a lot of speculation around Windows Phone 8 and it looks like we might be getting some actual details this week!

Microsoft has schedule it’s Windows Phone Summit for June 20th and included the tag line “A sneak peek at the future of Windows Phone.”

Now what this means is open for debate, but in general the consensus seems to be Apollo will get unveiled.  But might that be expecting too much from a “sneak peek”?  I think it is more likely we’ll see a quick demo of Apollo, some general new hardware details and then a general timeframe for release.

So here are my predictions on what we’ll get out of the sneak peek and their likelyhoods predicated on Apollo being what they are talking about:

• New home screen details (more types of live tiles, maybe a horizontal view and groups) – 100%
• Demo of some Skype Integration – 80%
• Demo of FULL Skype Integration – 30%
• Dual core support – 100%
• Quad core support – 5%
• multiple resolutions – 100%
• New hardware demo unit – %100
• Release date of Q4 – 80%
• Release date of Q3 – 19%
• Release date of Q1/13 – 1%
• Developers tools preview/beta/rc – 90%
• New maps functionality – 75%
• New camera functionality – 20%
• New voice functionality – 60%
• Game demo – 100%
• Upgradeability announcement for all WP7 devices – 0%
• Upgradeability announcement for most WP7 devices – 30%
• Upgradeability announcement for some Wp7 devices – 60%
• No upgradeability announcement – 30%
• NT Kernel in Apollo – 100%

 

[sc:mobile-category ]Welcome to a milestone here at JumbleCat, my 100th post!

Here in Canada, most cell phone contracts are 3 years long to get the best price on a phone.  This is just the way things are and my three year lock in is just about up.

When I started the contract in 2009, the phone I bought was the Samsung Omnia II, a fine little Windows Mobile 6.5 device that now seems incredibly antiquated by todays standards.  I replace that phone with my current HD7 back in March of 2011.  And in March of 2012 I started to receive texts from Bell along the lines of “Your eligible for an upgrade!  Visit your Bell store for details!”.

Now that’s a full 8 months before the end of my contract and I’ve been receiving similar texts every month and I have two issues with it:

• 8 months early, really?
• I have to go to the store to get details… what is this the 80’s?

Now I know Bell REALLY wants to keep me as a customer and lock me in for another 3 years, but in the next 8 months the number of new phones that will be coming out, it would seems silly to get locked in now, let alone the fact that they don’t have a new Windows Phone device for me to upgrade to anyway 😉

Let’s recap what’s coming before November:

• Windows Phone 8
• Blackberry 10
• iPhone 5
• Probably at least one new major Android version

Now as for having to go to the store, they do realize that the Internet has been around for a while now, right?

Even if I go to my Bell homepage they don’t provide any details on what I’m eligible for, instead all I get is:

To learn if you are eligible for a credit towards a new phone, please contact us.

In this day and age, that’s pretty much a detour that no one is looking to take.

My current thoughts are that I’ll be moving to a different provide in November, one of the new entrants in the mobile market here in Canada, like Wind.

In general, every time bell contacts me they seem more and more desperate to either get or retain my business.  Perhaps if they started providing a good product at a reasonable price they might even do it.

[sc:mobile-category ]There has been a lot of posts recently talking about the hardware upgradeablity of first generation Windows Phone 7 devices to the upcoming Windows Phone 8 release, but does it really matter?

Looking at all the rumors around about WP8, it would seem like the real question is, is MS going with the NT kernel or not?

If they are not, then it would make sense that all WP7 devices would be a pretty easy upgrade to WP8 and it would then just be a simple task for the hardware makers to implement the upgrade on their hardware.

However if MS does go with the NT kernel (and in my opinion they should, they get all kinds of benefits like the standard driver model, true multitasking, etc.), then it seems unlikely any WP7 phones will be upgradeable as the amount of effort to create new drivers for the NT kernel would not have enough return on investment.

So lets assume the worst case for a moment, no WP7 hardware will be upgradeable to WP8.  First generation devices, like my HD7, will not be upgradeable, however they will have been out for over 2 years by the time WP8 ships.  For most users this will be at the end of their contracts and they will be looking to upgrade to new hardware anyway.

For the second gen WP7 devices it gets a little murky, for most of these users who upgraded from a gen 1 device, they probably had to purchase the new device while still in the middle of their contract, s0 they may very well be eligible for a new device by the time WP8 gets to market.

Where it gets ugly is for the people who just picked up their shiny new Titan II or Lumia 900, these users, if no upgrade is available, are likely going to be stuck with WP7.

But when I say “stuck”, perhaps “stick” would be a better term.  Let’s face it, WP7 is great and no matter what WP8 is, that won’t change.  WP8 is going to be all about bringing new users to the fold and as such they are not going to have WP7 devices that need upgrading.

So yes, there may be some disappointment about when a user can upgrade to a WP8 device, but that is just life in the fast moving world of mobile phones.

And don’t forget, that’s the WORST case.  The best case is of course that all WP7 phones are upgradeable to WP8, but even if that’s not true, there seems likely to be a middle ground, where some WP7 devices are upgradeable.  I would think Nokia would want the 800 and 900 upgradeable, even if it means having to invest resources in device drivers for them.

That’s why I think MS has been quiet on the upgradeability front.  They don’t know who’s going to invest in writing device drivers for the new kernel and who isn’t.

One thing is for sure though, all signs point to an early fall release for Windows 8 and that means Windows Phone 8 will likely be along for the ride.  And what a ride it’s going to be!