2 days with the Lumia 900 + WP7.5

[Deeko]

It will not happen again because MS has made critical mistakes and because the market is completely different now than it was in 2009. Android was released when its only real competitor was the iPhone, which was only available on ATT. The market is now saturated with Android and iOS phones at every price point on all the carriers.

Firstly, when Android came out, its certainly not true that the iPhone was its only competitor. The market was, at the time, "saturated" with BlackBerry and Symbian. The iPhone was getting bigger at the time, but it was hardly a new market with only a few players.

Added to that are MS's idiotic decisions to restrict the software and hardware decisions that handset makers can make. This has led to far fewer handsets being developed and released. And before you bring up the idiotic buzzword 'fragmentation,' I'll just say that fragmentation is a symptom of success. Android is so ubiquitous that it has been put on dozens and dozens of different handsets with different form factors and specs. This has led to Android's market share domination. MS should have been more concerned about succeeding than a non issue like fragmentation.

I didn't say fragmentation and I wasn't going to. The locked hardware model has its advantages and disadvantages, but I wouldn't say that's the biggest reason WP hasn't taken off.

What is your deal with supporting obviously failing products? You were a champion of BB far after it was clear to anyone with half a brain that they were dying. You're just as delusional about WP7.

I'm not a "champion" of anything. I just don't have the love/hate thing that the vast majority of AT posters have. Most of you have a fierce love for a certain platform, and a curious hatred for everything else. I don't. I have iOS devices, Android, Windows Phone, BlackBerry...they all have their advantages, they all have their disadvantages. I don't go out of my way to spew vitriol about products that aren't my current favorite, and I'll defend them when I feel they receive undue criticism. This, of course, gets spun by those doing the spewing as me being a "champion" of those other products.

 

[stormkroe]

I think the hardware is my only real concern with these phones, as the app problem could be fixed. Sure it's really smooth, but I need a better experience than smoothly loading up a slide show presentation of Shadowgun. I don't really game on my phone, but I like to have the power to if the mood strikes me. Maybe this will be fixed with W8 forward?

 

[notposting]

I think the app problem will change when W8/WP8 get released and you can have apps sharing most of the code between them. For me, WP7 isn't a failing product since it does what I need.

Deeko, I saw an update from the devs today regarding their app, it got rejected finally (mind you, this is an already established app, with existing screenshots etc, this a bug fix update) because they had pixelated the names on the contact list in the screenshots. Which are already up and approved. WTF....

Posted from my Windows Phone, of course.

 

[preslove]

Firstly, when Android came out, its certainly not true that the iPhone was its only competitor. The market was, at the time, "saturated" with BlackBerry and Symbian. The iPhone was getting bigger at the time, but it was hardly a new market with only a few players.

You forgot Windows 6.5...

Those were phones with previous generation OS's. So, no, they weren't competitors, as the market has borne out.

I didn't say fragmentation and I wasn't going to. The locked hardware model has its advantages and disadvantages, but I wouldn't say that's the biggest reason WP hasn't taken off.

The locked hardware model only has advantages when you build the hardware yourself (or contract it out). Independent hardware brands don't want a locked model on anything. They want to design their own hardware and layer their own UI on the core OS. If MS wanted to go forward with locked hardware/software, they should have just put out a MS phone.

Of course, WP7 has ruined Nokia's chances in the market and is going to decline pretty rapidly. They'll be in easy buy out position for MS pretty soon. Maybe Nokia will just be their phone hardware arm pretty soon...

I'm not a "champion" of anything. I just don't have the love/hate thing that the vast majority of AT posters have. Most of you have a fierce love for a certain platform, and a curious hatred for everything else. I don't. I have iOS devices, Android, Windows Phone, BlackBerry...they all have their advantages, they all have their disadvantages. I don't go out of my way to spew vitriol about products that aren't my current favorite, and I'll defend them when I feel they receive undue criticism. This, of course, gets spun by those doing the spewing as me being a "champion" of those other products.

You view saying cold hard facts as 'spewing vitriol.' People weren't saying that BB was in a death spiral because they hated BB. They were saying it because it was freaking obvious.

It's just as obvious that MS has failed in this round of the OS war.

Of course, not to fanboys...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection

 

[Deeko]

You forgot Windows 6.5...

Those were phones with previous generation OS's. So, no, they weren't competitors, as the market has borne out.

This is utterly mindless drivel. Those platforms owned the smartphone market back then, to say they weren't competitors because of how it turned out doesn't change that fact. Its easy to say in hindsight "ha lol guyz look at that its s0 obvious that htey weren't competitorz!!!11!!" but that's not what the market looked like when Android was released (which came out in 2008, by the way - I had both a G1 and a Droid on launch day, I would know). There were tons of apps for Blackberry, Symbian, and Windows Mobile. Apple had just launched their app store, clearly they were a strong up-and-comer but they certainly weren't the only kid on the block.

You view saying cold hard facts as 'spewing vitriol.' People weren't saying that BB was in a death spiral because they hated BB. They were saying it because it was freaking obvious.

It's just as obvious that MS has failed in this round of the OS war.

Of course, not to fanboys...

You are spouting your opinion as a "cold hard fact" in vitriolic fashion - hence, you are spewing vitriol. And Its amusing that over the last couple of years I've been accused of being a fanboy of Windows Phone, Blackberry, Android, Kindle - pretty much everything but iOS. I don't think that's really possible. I guess when you refuse to hate a product, you become a fanboy of said product, and since I won't hate any of those, I must be a fanboy of all of them? I'll take that as a compliment, sport, I do consider myself a gadget enthusiast that likes them all, thanks!

Anyway, its clear that you have joined the ranks of a few other posters as people that have no intentions of having rational discussions, and simply want to rant and rave about the products they like or hate. As such, you can continue to rant and rave all you'd like, hopefully for your sake someone else will engage you in discussion. Enjoy your day.

 

[QueBert]

Ugh battery life on this thing suuuuuucks, I love the phone but my battery's down to 40% right now and I hardly used it today. It's treading on EVO 4G waters. I can deal with the whatever app store, but the battery life thing is something i don't think I can overlook. This is a beautiful phone and WP is freaking nice, but I dealt with the piss poor battery life of my EVO for over a year and I just don't think I can do it any more. I'm sure if I return it today Nokia will put out an update that'll boost it by 40%, but as it stands I'll be returning it and get something that can last me a day.

Perhaps if they fix it, or I see one on Craigslist for $200 I will pick it up as a 2nd phone.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Ugh battery life on this thing suuuuuucks, I love the phone but my battery's down to 40% right now and I hardly used it today. It's treading on EVO 4G waters. I can deal with the whatever app store, but the battery life thing is something i don't think I can overlook. This is a beautiful phone and WP is freaking nice, but I dealt with the piss poor battery life of my EVO for over a year and I just don't think I can do it any more. I'm sure if I return it today Nokia will put out an update that'll boost it by 40%, but as it stands I'll be returning it and get something that can last me a day.

Perhaps if they fix it, or I see one on Craigslist for $200 I will pick it up as a 2nd phone.

I'm surprised you find that many things to keep you occupied on WP7. I find the phone so useless I use it so little that the battery ends up being decent. LOL. I'm pretty sure my SGS2 with CM9 outdoes this, but since WP7 can't keep GChat connected forever, and it doesn't do latitude updates very often, my battery ends up being superb.

So in a sense I get decent battery because my phone sleeps so much doing nothing.

What have you been doing that causes so much drain?

 

[QueBert]

I'm surprised you find that many things to keep you occupied on WP7. I find the phone so useless I use it so little that the battery ends up being decent. LOL. I'm pretty sure my SGS2 with CM9 outdoes this, but since WP7 can't keep GChat connected forever, and it doesn't do latitude updates very often, my battery ends up being superb.

So in a sense I get decent battery because my phone sleeps so much doing nothing.

What have you been doing that causes so much drain?

texting mostly, even with it in my pocket I think I'm getting about a 5% an hour drain, maybe that's normal, maybe it isn't. But if it is, it's not acceptable. If it's not and I got a bunk phone I don't want to risk swapping it out for another. AT&T has a 1 swap policy and it's $35. So I'll go with a phone I like less, but that has outstanding battery life. In the end battery life > OS to me.

 

[notposting]

On my WP right now especially being at home most days, it's basically lots of browsing, texting + GV + Gtalk, twitter & facebook reading, email for wife and I, phone calls, some gaming, and maybe some shopping. Have both of our calendars shared so they are on there, any changes will go to her iPod Touch. Even more use when the wife has been taking the laptop so I will do everything from my phone. Shoot looking at today's battery log I was averaging 4-6% per hour drain USING my phone.

 

[Ryaxnb]

This is utterly mindless drivel. Those platforms owned the smartphone market back then, to say they weren't competitors because of how it turned out doesn't change that fact. Its easy to say in hindsight "ha lol guyz look at that its s0 obvious that htey weren't competitorz!!!11!!" but that's not what the market looked like when Android was released (which came out in 2008, by the way - I had both a G1 and a Droid on launch day, I would know). There were tons of apps for Blackberry, Symbian, and Windows Mobile. Apple had just launched their app store, clearly they were a strong up-and-comer but they certainly weren't the only kid on the block.



You are spouting your opinion as a "cold hard fact" in vitriolic fashion - hence, you are spewing vitriol. And Its amusing that over the last couple of years I've been accused of being a fanboy of Windows Phone, Blackberry, Android, Kindle - pretty much everything but iOS. I don't think that's really possible. I guess when you refuse to hate a product, you become a fanboy of said product, and since I won't hate any of those, I must be a fanboy of all of them? I'll take that as a compliment, sport, I do consider myself a gadget enthusiast that likes them all, thanks!
.

I'll take the third option... Symbian/WM6.5/BB were competitors, but they didn't have all-touch HVGA screens... and a lot of app types just couldn't be done well on them because the hardware was too different. Android had a accelerometer, proximity sensor, GPS, 3G, WiFi, HVGA capacitive, and slidable or no keyboard. This allows for iOS style apps not feasible on the other phones, which were competitors but less so SDK-wise since the app styles really differ between platforms. Also android is managed code, BB is featurephone (j2me) doesn't count, WM/Symbian is a mess to dev for.

 

[QueBert]

I found a way to disable LTE, I really don't care about it to be honest, so if having it set to 3G improves my battery life a lot I'll end up sticking with the phone.

Oh, and kudos for MS for making it so complex to add a damn custom ring tone lol.

 

[Xellos2099]

One of my major problem with wp 7.5 is... Where the hell is custom notification???

 

[WelshBloke]

I found a way to disable LTE, I really don't care about it to be honest, so if having it set to 3G improves my battery life a lot I'll end up sticking with the phone.

Oh, and kudos for MS for making it so complex to add a damn custom ring tone lol.

Whats the upload speed with LTE? I think the only times I miss it is when I want to upload a large file to cloud storage. Apart from that I cant see me taking advantage of it much (not that I have the choice with the UK regulator taking its time )

 

[trmiv]

Whats the upload speed with LTE? I think the only times I miss it is when I want to upload a large file to cloud storage. Apart from that I cant see me taking advantage of it much (not that I have the choice with the UK regulator taking its time )

I've seen 14-16 Mbps on my Nexus. Beats the hell out of my home internet connection's upload! Even when I get 2 bars of signal I can get 3-4 Mbps, which is still almost twice as fast upload as my home connection.

 

[Deeko]

Ugh battery life on this thing suuuuuucks, I love the phone but my battery's down to 40% right now and I hardly used it today. It's treading on EVO 4G waters. I can deal with the whatever app store, but the battery life thing is something i don't think I can overlook. This is a beautiful phone and WP is freaking nice, but I dealt with the piss poor battery life of my EVO for over a year and I just don't think I can do it any more. I'm sure if I return it today Nokia will put out an update that'll boost it by 40%, but as it stands I'll be returning it and get something that can last me a day.

Perhaps if they fix it, or I see one on Craigslist for $200 I will pick it up as a 2nd phone.

I'm surprised you are having such battery problems. The Lumia 900 is the first phone I've owned in years that actually got to the end of the day, and I use my phones pretty heavily. Maybe yours is defective or something?

 

[datalink7]

I'm surprised you are having such battery problems. The Lumia 900 is the first phone I've owned in years that actually got to the end of the day, and I use my phones pretty heavily. Maybe yours is defective or something?

I'd have to agree. I've had mine for about three weeks now and I've yet to run out of battery.

 

[QueBert]

I'm surprised you are having such battery problems. The Lumia 900 is the first phone I've owned in years that actually got to the end of the day, and I use my phones pretty heavily. Maybe yours is defective or something?

Maybe you're the one with a defective one? this is a battery chart I saw, it pretty much sums up the 900's battery life for me.

http://blog.gsmarena.com/nokia-lumia-900-att-battery-life-test-is-completed-results-inside

I did get much better life today with LTE turned off, and even though I don't care about it I'm urked that I have to disable something to get the phone to have barely half the battery life of the One X with LTE turned on.

 

[Deeko]

Windows Phones generally do better in "does the phone last all day" tests than "lets use it non stop until it dies" tests, but unfortunately there isn't really a controlled benchmark for that. I recall engadget's review being similar, it didn't do great in their rundown test but the author said it easily got them to the end of the day. What I gather from this is that while the phones may not always be the most power-thrifty while active or have the biggest batteries, the standby efficiency is very good.