Windows Phone 7 launched – has neither Flash nor multitasking

23rd February, 2010 by adina
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Microsoft has launched the new Windows Phone 7 series at Mobile World Congress. This is the first major revision of the mobile operating system in about five years but is also considered as a partial step back. The platform is heavily influenced by Zune design, with a home screen showing tiles. Users can pin applications, playlists, contacts and other elements to the home screen. The Zune media player is integrated and includes Zune software synchronization, as well as Xbox Live’s avatars and friends.

Most of the features are organized in hubs, some of them, like Pictures and Music+video, being very similar to the Zune. A People hub integrating phone contacts with Facebook shows what is new, independently of the source. The Office hub allows users creating and sharing of documents, including over Sharepoint. The Marketplace hub provides a central application store, while the Games hub is able to handle all Xbox Live tasks. Internet Explorer is based on the desktop version of browser, but is more advanced, providing multi-touch and high-performance sub-pixel rendering. There is also Zune-style e-mail, but integrated with Exchange and carrying features similar to the iPhone, like easy mass-deletion of unwanted messages. Multi-touch and accelerometers, as well as fast hardware would probably be common to all devices, as Microsoft claims.

The business model for partners is also changed by Microsoft. It will take more control over the whole experience, promising a baseline for hardware, drivers included, and not letting companies to directly replace user interface components. Usually, only tiles and some of the services will be extensible, although the companies will get phones to market faster.

Several patterns will be included in the launch, such as Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Vodafone, T-Mobile, Orange, T-Mobile USA, Sprint, Deutsche Telekom, Telecom Italia, SFR, Telefónica and Telstra. Manufacturers like Dell, HTC, HP, Garmin-ASUS, Samsung, LG, Qualcomm, Sony Ericsson and Toshiba are also included. Phones launching in the series should be ready by the holidays.

The operating system has, however, a number of important steps backwards, as Microsoft confirmed it would not have Flash out of the box and the interface has a design that does not support multitasking. The interface is potentially simpler and faster but concedes one of the primary advantages of Microsoft with Windows Mobile. The company said it would continue to invest in Windows Mobile 6.5 and did not say clearly how easily third-party applications would reach Windows Phone 7. However, CEO Steve Ballmer said Microsoft would have no objection to adding Flash.

Lately, Microsoft has steadily lost market share, many of its partners abandoning Windows Mobile in favour of other operating systems like Android or Symbian. As for Palm, it has created an entirely new platform instead of using Microsoft’s system. Companies that are vertically integrated, such as Apple and Research in Motion, despite of being a shorter time on the market, have taken away much of Microsoft’s influence by adding new features in the beginning and afterwards overshadowing it in applications. Windows Mobile has been disadvantaged by a lack of support for a number of features that are now considered critical, such as including capacitive touchscreens, as well as an accurate web browsing and also modern media playback.


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