Nokia with WP7 is out, just not in U.S.

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Red Storm

Lifer
Oct 2, 2005
14,233
234
106
1) Tap-and-hold back button.
2) Swipe left/right over screen shots of "running" apps
3) Tap the one you want to open.

Yeah it's similar to how Android and iOS do it now, and I'm not enamored with that "hold" part for any of them (or double tap with iOS). It just adds that little bit of delay to the process that I find makes it seem quite slow. ICS looks like one quick tap to see what you've got and then another to jump to it.


except android uses saved states too just like iOS and WP7....

Yes, but I never said Android did it any better in its current state. :p
 

MrX8503

Diamond Member
Oct 23, 2005
4,529
0
0
I wish iOS multitasking would show a full grid of icons I stead of a strip at the bottom.
 

pantsaregood

Senior member
Feb 13, 2011
993
37
91
Game and multitask, just as you do on your PC.

Open a half-dozen tabs, stream music, update feeds, compose an email and text, while shuffling in and out of a game... Many, many people do these at the same time. The first one alone will choke a single core on broadband.

Opening six tabs is solely RAM-dependent.
Streaming music uses minimal CPU resources.
Updating feeds uses minimal CPU resources.
Composing an e-mail uses almost no CPU resources.
I would hope your games don't run in the background - if they do, your battery life will be terrible.

I open six tabs at a time on my HD7 frequently - it certainly doesn't "choke."

An iPhone 4 will similarly not "choke" on six tabs. The only reason a single core Android phone may "choke" is the presence of Flash. Running a bunch of Flash ads in the background (which they shouldn't be allowed to do, anyway) will make your phone lag; neither WP7 or iOS suffer from this issue, however.

Do you want to run a video in the background while playing a game? A dual-core may be useful.
Do you want to encode video? A dual-core may be useful.
Do you want to process images? A dual-core may be useful.

The tasks you mentioned, however, are (at their worst) RAM intensive.

Modern computers never utilize single cores because of marketing stigma against them, not because they are truly "obselete." A modern single-core (think Sempron 130-150) is absolutely capable of providing a smooth experience.
 

Puddle Jumper

Platinum Member
Nov 4, 2009
2,835
1
0
Opening six tabs is solely RAM-dependent.
Streaming music uses minimal CPU resources.
Updating feeds uses minimal CPU resources.
Composing an e-mail uses almost no CPU resources.
I would hope your games don't run in the background - if they do, your battery life will be terrible.

I open six tabs at a time on my HD7 frequently - it certainly doesn't "choke."

An iPhone 4 will similarly not "choke" on six tabs. The only reason a single core Android phone may "choke" is the presence of Flash. Running a bunch of Flash ads in the background (which they shouldn't be allowed to do, anyway) will make your phone lag; neither WP7 or iOS suffer from this issue, however.

Do you want to run a video in the background while playing a game? A dual-core may be useful.
Do you want to encode video? A dual-core may be useful.
Do you want to process images? A dual-core may be useful.

The tasks you mentioned, however, are (at their worst) RAM intensive.

Modern computers never utilize single cores because of marketing stigma against them, not because they are truly "obselete." A modern single-core (think Sempron 130-150) is absolutely capable of providing a smooth experience.

A Sempron 130 is hardly capable of providing a adequate experience for a power user. I can't imagine being forced to use such an obsolete processor in one of my systems.

I don't see any reason to settle for slow hardware just because some people think it is adequate. My year old Galaxy S is faster than all of the WP7 devices currently on the market and that certainly shows in its media capabilities. I can drag and drop any of my 720p videos onto it and it plays them flawlessly.
 

Deeko

Lifer
Jun 16, 2000
30,213
12
81
A Sempron 130 is hardly capable of providing a adequate experience for a power user. I can't imagine being forced to use such an obsolete processor in one of my systems.

I don't see any reason to settle for slow hardware just because some people think it is adequate. My year old Galaxy S is faster than all of the WP7 devices currently on the market and that certainly shows in its media capabilities. I can drag and drop any of my 720p videos onto it and it plays them flawlessly.

I own both a Galaxy S (Vibrant) and a 1st gen WP7 (Venue Pro).

There are certain things the Vibrant's extra horsepower allows it to excel at - for example, Fruit Ninja (the only game I have on both) runs quite a bit smoother on with the Hummingbird's much beefier GPU. I can't really compare media performance because I don't watch videos on my phone.

However, when it comes to navigating the OS, transition animiations, scrolling/zooming in the browser, even page loads in the browser - the Venue Pro isn't just better, its not even a comparison. If you didn't know better, you'd swear the VP was several generations ahead in hardware, not behind.

Having powerful hardware is a good thing - but the fact is, its not everything. Well written, optimized software can quite often make a much larger difference. And I don't just say that because I'm a software engineer :)
 

pantsaregood

Senior member
Feb 13, 2011
993
37
91
A Sempron 130 is hardly capable of providing a adequate experience for a power user. I can't imagine being forced to use such an obsolete processor in one of my systems.

I don't see any reason to settle for slow hardware just because some people think it is adequate. My year old Galaxy S is faster than all of the WP7 devices currently on the market and that certainly shows in its media capabilities. I can drag and drop any of my 720p videos onto it and it plays them flawlessly.

Sempron 130 will...

Play 1080p video flawlessly.
Play Youtube flawlessly.
Allow you to check e-mail flawlessly.
Allow use of office software flawlessly.

Can it efficiently encode 1080p video while simultaneously running Crysis 3 on ultra super mega turbo high settings? No. The average user, however, doesn't attempt to do such things.

Any WP7 device will run 720p videos fine, as well. Too bad neither tha Galaxy S nor WP7 support 720p.

It isn't "settling for slow hardware," either. The fact is, excessive hardware doesn't benefit anything. Not everyone needs to run a Core i7-990X or 2600K at 4.5 GHz. It just doesn't benefit typical tasks. Those CPUs won't provide a better user experience than a Sempron 130 or Celeron 440 will to the majority of users.
 

finbarqs

Diamond Member
Feb 16, 2005
3,617
2
81
My EVO only allowed me to see my last 8 apps I've used. iOS let's me at upward to 12 (and counting)
 

Strk

Lifer
Nov 23, 2003
10,197
4
76
I own both a Galaxy S (Vibrant) and a 1st gen WP7 (Venue Pro).

There are certain things the Vibrant's extra horsepower allows it to excel at - for example, Fruit Ninja (the only game I have on both) runs quite a bit smoother on with the Hummingbird's much beefier GPU. I can't really compare media performance because I don't watch videos on my phone.

However, when it comes to navigating the OS, transition animiations, scrolling/zooming in the browser, even page loads in the browser - the Venue Pro isn't just better, its not even a comparison. If you didn't know better, you'd swear the VP was several generations ahead in hardware, not behind.

Having powerful hardware is a good thing - but the fact is, its not everything. Well written, optimized software can quite often make a much larger difference. And I don't just say that because I'm a software engineer :)

To me, the frustrating part with the lack of next-gen hardware is the lack of power efficiencies. It would be nice if a company could finally compete better with the iphone on power consumption. Some phones are getting a lot better and WP7 is already decent.
 

Deeko

Lifer
Jun 16, 2000
30,213
12
81
For what its worth, the Venue Pro is the first phone I've had in a long time that easily lasts a full day even with heavier usage.
 

Puddle Jumper

Platinum Member
Nov 4, 2009
2,835
1
0
Sempron 130 will...

Play 1080p video flawlessly.
Play Youtube flawlessly.
Allow you to check e-mail flawlessly.
Allow use of office software flawlessly.

Can it efficiently encode 1080p video while simultaneously running Crysis 3 on ultra super mega turbo high settings? No. The average user, however, doesn't attempt to do such things.

Any WP7 device will run 720p videos fine, as well. Too bad neither tha Galaxy S nor WP7 support 720p.

It isn't "settling for slow hardware," either. The fact is, excessive hardware doesn't benefit anything. Not everyone needs to run a Core i7-990X or 2600K at 4.5 GHz. It just doesn't benefit typical tasks. Those CPUs won't provide a better user experience than a Sempron 130 or Celeron 440 will to the majority of users.

And all of that would make the Sempron a great choice for my grandmother but some of us require more than the basics. Will a Sempron handle a couple of vm's while simultaneously running Visual Studio, SQL Server 2008, 30 or so tabs in Firefox, and playing some flac files? I didn't think so.

So Windows Phone 7 can play back all of my 720p .mkv's without conversion like my Galaxy S can? If so thats a pretty hollow victory since a Galaxy S2 can playback all of my 1080p videos as well and even has a convenient MHL output for hooking it up to a tv.

I own both a Galaxy S (Vibrant) and a 1st gen WP7 (Venue Pro).

There are certain things the Vibrant's extra horsepower allows it to excel at - for example, Fruit Ninja (the only game I have on both) runs quite a bit smoother on with the Hummingbird's much beefier GPU. I can't really compare media performance because I don't watch videos on my phone.

However, when it comes to navigating the OS, transition animiations, scrolling/zooming in the browser, even page loads in the browser - the Venue Pro isn't just better, its not even a comparison. If you didn't know better, you'd swear the VP was several generations ahead in hardware, not behind.

Having powerful hardware is a good thing - but the fact is, its not everything. Well written, optimized software can quite often make a much larger difference. And I don't just say that because I'm a software engineer :)

What version of Android and rom was the Vibrant running? Stock on those phones was far from impressive but a good 2.2.1 or higher rom with a lagfix will put it much closer to the Venue Pro.

Plus it is worth mentioning that the Galaxy S is much slower than a modern Android phone while the Venue Pro is only slightly slower than the best WP7 devices out there.
 

ponyo

Lifer
Feb 14, 2002
19,688
2,811
126
What version of Android and rom was the Vibrant running? Stock on those phones was far from impressive but a good 2.2.1 or higher rom with a lagfix will put it much closer to the Venue Pro.

Plus it is worth mentioning that the Galaxy S is much slower than a modern Android phone while the Venue Pro is only slightly slower than the best WP7 devices out there.

lol. Vibrant could be running IceCream Sandwich and it wouldn't get close to Venue Pro smooth. WP7 is smoother than iOS. Enough said.
 

Bryf50

Golden Member
Nov 11, 2006
1,429
51
91
Sempron 130 will...

Play 1080p video flawlessly.
Play Youtube flawlessly.
Allow you to check e-mail flawlessly.
Allow use of office software flawlessly.
No it can't. At least not without a gpu supporting it. My 2.4ghz Core 2 Duo couldn't play back decent bitrate 1080p h.264 videos on a single core. It wasn't until multithreaded decoders came out it got better. Same thing with some 720p and all 1080p videos on Youtube. I wouldn't even try 1080p youtube videos because they would all stutter.
 

pantsaregood

Senior member
Feb 13, 2011
993
37
91
If you have not tried the latest iOS and Android devices you have no way of knowing that WP7 is smoother and your claim is therefore meaningless.

iOS on current generation hardware generally doesn't have any issues being "smooth," other than poorly coded apps.

The Galaxy Nexus, however, (according to XDA) actually still experiences the same lag issues that many Android handsets suffer.

When compared to the Galaxy S2, the HTC Titan was said to be smoother than the Galaxy S2. The Galaxy S2 loaded pages faster, but the Titan managed to perform more smoothly with pinch to zoom and rerendering while scrolling.
 

VashHT

Diamond Member
Feb 1, 2007
3,359
1,439
136
iOS on current generation hardware generally doesn't have any issues being "smooth," other than poorly coded apps.

The Galaxy Nexus, however, (according to XDA) actually still experiences the same lag issues that many Android handsets suffer.

When compared to the Galaxy S2, the HTC Titan was said to be smoother than the Galaxy S2. The Galaxy S2 loaded pages faster, but the Titan managed to perform more smoothly with pinch to zoom and rerendering while scrolling.

I disagree there, I've owned a GS2 and an iphone 4(I have the ip4 right now) and anyone saying the GS2 is laggy or slow is being really anal. Android definitely has a different touch response from iOS, but it isn't laggy at all. The browser on my GS2 was incredibly smooth, but it feels like you're dragging the screen whereas in iOS and WP7 it follows your finger really closely. That doesn't mean it isn't smooth though, the scrolling on my GS2 was incredibly smooth. People say lag for different things, the GS2 didn't lag at all for me, but the touch experience is different for sure.

EDIT:I also disagree that iOS is "always smooth", that is BS. I see my ip4 slow down all the time in default apps. If a calender meeting has too many participants, or when a text conversation first opens the phone will slow down and stutter while typing. Even on certain websites my phone still stutters, i check out privateer press's site often and it sutters really badly on my ip4 with ios5 on it. iOS is definitely smoother than android but it's not perfect.
 
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Deeko

Lifer
Jun 16, 2000
30,213
12
81
What version of Android and rom was the Vibrant running? Stock on those phones was far from impressive but a good 2.2.1 or higher rom with a lagfix will put it much closer to the Venue Pro.

Plus it is worth mentioning that the Galaxy S is much slower than a modern Android phone while the Venue Pro is only slightly slower than the best WP7 devices out there.

The Vibrant has CM7 on it. However, the fact that you're even bringing that up (different version of software impacting performance) completely proves my point that software has as big or bigger an impact on device performance as hardware. We have enough OS pissing matches on this board, and I'm really not trying to have another one here.
 

Dominato3r

Diamond Member
Aug 15, 2008
5,109
1
0
lol. Vibrant could be running IceCream Sandwich and it wouldn't get close to Venue Pro smooth. WP7 is smoother than iOS. Enough said.

It does have its issues. My Nexus S hiccups doing simple stuff like loading up facebook pictures or browsing the web. I constantly have to go to running services to terminate shit and allocate memory, something IMO I should not have to do. It's also a2.3 release phone:\


Why?

IMHO phones need to be independent of PC's to be popular.

If there is good integration with services namely Office and Cloud Services AND Microsoft does a good job of showing that, I think it will do well.
 
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darkewaffle

Diamond Member
Oct 7, 2005
8,152
1
81
Do people actually use their phone as output to a TV that much? That seems like it'd be a very niche scenario to me.

And for those that watch videos on your phone, I think you would have a pretty hard time telling the difference between 720p and 1080p on it, hell when I was buying a TV the general consensus was that you would have to be quite close (with in a couple feet) to even a 32 inch screen to tell the difference between them. And a phone's going to have much higher PPI, making it even more difficult to discern.