I picked up an HTC Arrive last week and nearly immediately took the steps to install the "beta" Mango version of WP7 on the phone. After spending several days with it testing various things out, I thought I'd just offer my thoughts.
As background I'm coming from using a Palm Pre + on Sprint (Frankenpre!) and am a HUGE fan of WebOS. I'm also very familiar with Android (had an Android work phone at one point, also have an Asus Tranformer tablet now), and had an iPhone 3GS for about 6 months.
As for WP7 Mango, it's really pretty slick. The UI is as smooth as could be (something neither WebOS or Android can claim) and once you get accustomed to the differences between it and other mobile OS', most of those differences begin to make a fair amount of sense.
The biggest new features of Mango are multitasking and changes to the messaging system. As for multitasking, it's there, but it's hard to say just how well it works as none of the 3rd party apps are really designed to work with it yet. For example, while listening to Slacker radio, I can background it within the OS, but the app still stops playing. I would assume an update will come out for it (and many other apps) around the time Mango phones are actually released, but for now it's more or less a feature in waiting.
The new messaging app takes a WebOS approach in tying all of your conversations with people into the same window (texts & IMs). Unfortunately, the only IM services tied into this are Windows Live Messenger and Facebook chat, neither of which I really use. I'm REALLY hoping they add support for Google Talk and Yahoo IM at some point prior to release as without those, you're neglecting the vast majority of IM users.
The App marketplace is nicely organized, though compared especially to the Apple and Android markets it's very sparsely populated. Most of the major needs are covered however, including a Netflix app that includes streaming video to your phone that works quite well.
Another nice feature of WP7 phones is the camera app. There's a dedicated camera button on the phone that you can press to immediatley launch the camera, which is quick and responsive. Press the button halfway to focus, press it all the way to take the picture. Results were fairly good, but obviously this will depend on large part to the specific phone you're running WP7 on.
Mango also brings a new IE9 browser which, in a word, is FAST. I compared it with browsers on my Pre Plus (Universe browser), as well as several Android browsers, and IE9 was pulling pages up faster than any of them. Navigating within web pages was always smooth as well, again something I couldn't say about any of the other browsers.
All in all, I'm happy with the phone and the Mango based OS. At times I found myself missing some of the WebOS features, but by in large it has been working well for me. Once Mango is actually released and all of the apps are designed to take advantage of it, I think Microsoft will have a VERY competitive mobile OS on their hands, and it sounds like they have some great hardware partners ready to launch a whole lot of new phones (really interested to see what Nokia comes up with).
Anyway, just sharing my thoughts. If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask.
As background I'm coming from using a Palm Pre + on Sprint (Frankenpre!) and am a HUGE fan of WebOS. I'm also very familiar with Android (had an Android work phone at one point, also have an Asus Tranformer tablet now), and had an iPhone 3GS for about 6 months.
As for WP7 Mango, it's really pretty slick. The UI is as smooth as could be (something neither WebOS or Android can claim) and once you get accustomed to the differences between it and other mobile OS', most of those differences begin to make a fair amount of sense.
The biggest new features of Mango are multitasking and changes to the messaging system. As for multitasking, it's there, but it's hard to say just how well it works as none of the 3rd party apps are really designed to work with it yet. For example, while listening to Slacker radio, I can background it within the OS, but the app still stops playing. I would assume an update will come out for it (and many other apps) around the time Mango phones are actually released, but for now it's more or less a feature in waiting.
The new messaging app takes a WebOS approach in tying all of your conversations with people into the same window (texts & IMs). Unfortunately, the only IM services tied into this are Windows Live Messenger and Facebook chat, neither of which I really use. I'm REALLY hoping they add support for Google Talk and Yahoo IM at some point prior to release as without those, you're neglecting the vast majority of IM users.
The App marketplace is nicely organized, though compared especially to the Apple and Android markets it's very sparsely populated. Most of the major needs are covered however, including a Netflix app that includes streaming video to your phone that works quite well.
Another nice feature of WP7 phones is the camera app. There's a dedicated camera button on the phone that you can press to immediatley launch the camera, which is quick and responsive. Press the button halfway to focus, press it all the way to take the picture. Results were fairly good, but obviously this will depend on large part to the specific phone you're running WP7 on.
Mango also brings a new IE9 browser which, in a word, is FAST. I compared it with browsers on my Pre Plus (Universe browser), as well as several Android browsers, and IE9 was pulling pages up faster than any of them. Navigating within web pages was always smooth as well, again something I couldn't say about any of the other browsers.
All in all, I'm happy with the phone and the Mango based OS. At times I found myself missing some of the WebOS features, but by in large it has been working well for me. Once Mango is actually released and all of the apps are designed to take advantage of it, I think Microsoft will have a VERY competitive mobile OS on their hands, and it sounds like they have some great hardware partners ready to launch a whole lot of new phones (really interested to see what Nokia comes up with).
Anyway, just sharing my thoughts. If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask.
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