Got a Windows Phone 8 mobe? It's now officially obsolete. Here's why... Microsoft has formally ended support for its Windows Phone platform. Tuesday's monthly software update release marked the official end of support for Windows Phone 8.1, Microsoft's last release under the Windows Phone moniker. This means an end to patches and technical support. "There will be no new security updates, non- …
Could it like, make calls and stuff just like a proper one?
Guess we'll never know now.
Every so often there's a great product in IT, whether it be a GUI from PARC, OS/2 from you-know-who, or a phone from somebody else. Or whatever.
Fumbling* the product badly will do it in, no matter how good or strong it is.
*Not recognizing an opportunity, departmental infighting, not listening to users, etc etc etc
The problem is that Android was the rushed junk. Microsoft had to do better to compete, and to some degree they succeeded.
But the push was lacklustre, and the constant changing of the development platforms (and them being late while the previous was already declared dead) added to the failure. You can't afford such slips when you are the underdog, and Microsoft is not good at being the underdog.
WinPhone was actually pretty good. That, and a true tablet, is the only proper place for the square UI full of tiles. You don't put a nail in with a screwdriver. That is essentially what Microsoft did by taking the ideas of WinPhone and putting that tool in a place it should be within 100 billion million miles: the desktop and laptop. And then when people rightly complained, their solution was to make a mini-Metro full screen and double-down on kicking customers in the shin. Our complaint wasn't the lack of a start menu; it was the lack of a logical, easy UI. That is still our complaint.
The real pity is that where WinPhone rightly belonged it was abandoned and where the ideas didn't belong it was reinforced.
You know Classic Shell has saved my sanity for so many years on so many Windows versions. People don't appreciate it enough. Without Classic Shell, Windows will be far more miserable than it is already is (forced bloated updates, unusable UI, dumbed down uncontrollable everything, updates wreaking havoc with your stable setup and junk processes eating your memory doing nothing important).
tied to very limited OS and an even more limited app store
But the obvious core market of business users only need to do a few things, and don't need all the apps that fill Apple and Google's app stores. Admittedly it would struggle in the consumer market space, but the obvious ploy for Windows Phone was to replace Blackberry as THE business phone. They should have even made sure there was a decent physical keyboard model just to make the point, and they needed to harden the security. I suspect that the limited choice of hardware made success in the consumer market near impossible, but corporate buyers don't care. Its all about security, compatibility, TCO and having ongoing support.
And I think that last one was the real killer for business buyers. MS have never seemed to have any clear direction or conviction in the phone market, no clear core purpose or rock steady proposition. All the corporate shenanigans around Nokia, the sad tale of multiple sunsetted variants of WinPho, handset makers having no conviction in MS's commitment (and therefore not releasing Windows handsets). Would you as a business IT buyer commit a large corporation to any Windows phone platform, knowing the history, and watching their ongoing fumbling over phones? Continuum was a great idea, but really needed to be much stronger and more PC-like. Two years after it was launched, it still can't replace a conventional PC for most users, and the user experience is still phone-like.
Now imagine the world that might have been. In this alternate world, Microsoft didn't buy Nokia and get distracted by hardware and corporate farting around, and worked hard to get Windows out amongst the volume handset makers; A clear focus on Continuum working properly as a desktop/laptop replacement but also support for those who do need a separate full fat PC; Rock solid security for the phone OS, apps and data (including mail); Full corporate integration; A promise (that they stick to) of continuing support for the life of Windows phone devices. They could still do this now because Android security and support is so outstandingly poor, MS have the money, but they simply don't understand the world from their customer's perspectives.
Question for you. My Lumia 735 is still on 8. How different (read worse) is 10? And is it worth the upgrade - which I've been ignoring for the last year?
I'd read that they'd changed bits of the nice simple UI, which is why I've not upgraded. And I've not checked into whether it's possible to downgrade again, if I don't like it. Something you can't do with Apple for example.
I upgraded my Lumia 735 to 10 a few months ago - rather apprehensively, it must be said. However, I was very pleasantly surprised. Generally the phone feels snappier, things work just fine and I've been delighted with the result as it feels like my phone has a new lease of life and should keep me going for a good while yet. There's a few things to adapt to such as the Maps app rather than the Here Drive/Here Maps/Here Transit threesome, but it's all pretty painless. YMMV tho'.
...there's a point, after a company has made big enough blunders often enough, that any new product they make is automatically considered shit by the public, regardless of its merits.
Add to that the way App developers have been treated in the past by MS, and that their most common answer when someone suggests to them to develop for MS products usually starts with "Hell will freeze over..."
Dear Microsoft: "You'll reap what you've sown."
Shame!
I bought a Lumia 800 back when they first released, tired of iPhone and Android and wanting something different. I remember it was the first to have a proper turn by turn satnav (nokia maps), google drive followed pretty closely. I have to say i loved the simplicity of it. Clean, fast and just worked well as a communication device.
Since then i've swapped between iPhone, Android and Windows a few times, I'm tired of iphone, it feels like a kids bikes with too many tassels, bells and whistles bolted on as an after thought. Not to mention the speaker and bluetooth is rubbish, and thumbprint scanner is useless in my line of work.
As for the android, I'm tired of google nagging me to review and share photos of every building I enter. The news feed is nice, and there's a million pointless apps for it, but every update I find my privacy settings are all set to wide open. No i don't want the photos of my kids on the McDonalds playground posted in this review. Fk off.
I like my windows 10 phone. It actually works well as a phone, doesn't nag me, doesn't burn up the battery when it's supposedly idle, generally does what it's told and the UI is consistent and simple.
Or maybe i'm just getting old.
"speaker and bluetooth is rubbish"
ok. You could buy a bigger iphone with better speaker.
"I'm tired of google nagging me to review and share photos of every building I enter"
You do know the benefit of android right? Flexibility in Customization. With the right device, you can flash to a different rom with only apps you want or if you are lazy you can just uninstall / disable / root remove apps. In fact, google shouldn't be nagging you to review at all (did you install an app without knowing?)
Also "every update"
There are few to no updates for android (unless you use the Google Nexus/ Pixel line). Are you talking about apps update? You can disable them from auto-update if you want.
Bashing other mobile OS and apps without knowing their full extent just proves a shallow experience you had. You should have just stated what you like about windows phone.
I always laugh when I see people post stuff like this. It applies to maybe 1% of people who are willing to do this, and while it might be a solution for a Reg reader who likes to tinker and doesn't care about warranty/support, it is not a meaningful rebuttal to objections for ordinary people.
"There are few to no updates for android (unless you use the Google Nexus/ Pixel line)."
Speak for your own brand / carrier. My Samsung on Vodafone gets monthly security updates and a phone that started on Android 5.0 is now on Android 7.0. Whether I'll get 7.1 or 8.0 I don't know but at 2 years old I'm ready to replaceme this phone anyway.
@Anonymous Coward: "With the right device, you can flash to a different rom with only apps you want or if you are lazy you can just uninstall / disable / root remove apps."
lol, what a numpty. Yeah I'll tell my nan to flash Cyanogenmod (or whatever it's called these days) on her HTC to cut down on bloat. If she can't handle that, she can just unlock the boot loader, stick on TWRP and root it.
Get out in the real world for a while, eh?
The only Google apps I've got on my phone are Play Store, Play Services, and Translate. In those three, settings are set to the most private possible (not very much I know, this is Google) and the fewest notifications possible. I use a dedicated Google account for that one phone.
So I don't get nagged to review businesses or upload photos or whatever they want to crowdsource today.
You know you can opt out of google services on any android phone, even a nexus. You press cancel at first boot.
If you is apps,you can install fdroid and still have tens of thousands of more apps than windows phone, but with no google nag.
I personally don't have google nag, I worked put how to stop it nagging me, its not hard, unless you are a cretin
"As for the android, I'm tired of google nagging me to review and share photos of every building I enter. The news feed is nice, and there's a million pointless apps for it, but every update I find my privacy settings are all set to wide open."
I don't know what apps you've installed but they are the culprit behind this behaviour, not Android. I've been using Android since Froyo and never once have I seen it nag me to share photos of anything with anyone. I'm not on Facebook, G+, Instagram, etc so where it would share them is a good question. Also updates have never changed my privacy settings even when updating the major OS version and I have them all set firmly closed.
I considered Windows Phone the last time I bought a new phone, I like the UI and felt like a change but the lack of Windows versions of most of the apps I use and the need to buy another copy of the few that were available put me off.
" ...can upgrade from Windows Phone 8.1 to Windows 10 Mobile, which Microsoft has assured us will not be going away anywhere any time soon."
Windows 10 Mobile not going anywhere any time soon?
Yah, your Phones past history kind of made that clear already!
And that includes Windows 10 Mobile.
Freeloading on Nokia's carcass** didn't help to establish the 'turd ecosystem', did it Mr Elop?
**Even Nokia is making a comeback this year via HMD Global by releasing Android phones. It's a miracle unto itself to emerge from Microsoft's dark shadow. Nokia could use a bit of support... better late than never.
I very much doubt Nokia are interested in getting back into selling phones. They're making plenty of money in their network and software businesses.
They've got a good name in mobile, and they're going to license that to other companies to use.
Nokia didn't get out of mobiles due to some evil plot my Microsoft. Nokia were incredibly glad to get out of mobile phones with a big heap of Microsoft cash because they'd utterly fucked up their dominant position in the market due to massive management incompetence. They had all technology they needed, they were just unable to stop infighting long enough to pick one and actually bring it to the market.
As a Symbian user from back in 2003 (Sony Ericsson P800), it was already clear they'd knackered Symbian by deliberately encouraging the development of two incompatible versions (S60 and UIQ). Which is why Windows CE was able to get 50% of the smartphone market, even though Symbian was probably way better. I still remember the frustration of finding a shiny new app, only to find it wouldn't work with my UIQ phone.
Nokia continued downhill from there sadly.
Apparently they spent a BEEELLION dollars marketing Windows phone. But surely the sensible thing to do would be to take a tenth of that money and use it to pay the makers of the 100 most popular apps on Android and iPhone to remake their apps on Windows phone. That would have solved the 'empty app store' problem that Microsoft had.
I know, it's all history now but I am sad. I liked my 720, and I like my 640 XL.
They already did that, paying developers to develop apps. It didn't work out as no-one bought the apps, and each update of WP made the apps obsolete and they had to be redeveloped. Developers got sick of developing on a platform made of shifting sand. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.
Yup we got some for work for field engineers, and the Nokia phones were nice, typical build quality you'd expect, good phone reasonable price.
Now if MS had gone and put some effort into it integrating really well with 0365 and such added a few decent apps, they probably would have had a killer business mid level smart phone.
You can't fill the app store because developers and users were already heavily invested in iOS and Android. There was a point in time when Microsoft had to BRIBE developers to make Windows mobile apps. Ballmer then ranted about how Windows phones were 'enterprise-friendly' with the full suite of Office apps etc. Nobody cared.
Microsoft also made a lot of snarky attack ads bashing iPhones and Android phones. Microsoft made attack ads for virtually all its products, from 'The Browser You Love to Hate' to 'Googlighting Stranger' to 'Gmail Man'. Utter cringe from a toxic company culture.
Apple and Samsung, for the most part, focused on the merits of their own products. Doing political ads for tech products is a major turn-off to consumers.
And Windows Phone OS looked horrible with those Fisherprice tiles. First impression matters, and the market has spoken.
can upgrade from Windows Phone 8.1 to Windows 10 Mobile, which Microsoft has assured us will not be going away anywhere any time soon.
not going anywhere soon can also mean that it is also a dead duck but they haven't the balls to kill it just yet.
Why keep up this charade MS? We (and you) know that it is a dead Os walking. It was too late, too resource heavy and there were no apps etc etc etc
Just put the poor thing out of its misery and while you are at it, get rid of those tiles on non touch systems.
You may just win a few defectors back. Sadly I think the odds of that happening to be next to impossible.
It's not fair to say it was too resource heavy. Windows Phone actually did really well on battery life and price because it was so resource light it could get away with using less memory and less powerful chips. The downside being it had less RAM and processor power available, and was therefore less good for apps.
My 2 year old Lumia 735 still does 2 days on a charge easily, with email a bit of light internet a few texts and usually at least an hour's calls a day. It doesn't get used for apps much, but then neither did the iPhone it replaced, as I prefer a tablet for that.
The lack of management committment, any kind of strategy (or even vague plan), and the lack of apps that followed from that obvious lack of committment killed it off. The OS itself is fine. Much better than Android or iPhone as a phone, though a worse mobile computer and the browser still sucks.
I still have my Lumia 800 in a drawer for precisely the reason that it is very frugal on battery power when travelling. It's also tough as old boots, it's been dropped on various continents and is still working with barely a scratch.
The downloadable maps and that sensational interface designed for fat fingers were something I really miss on iOS or Android.
I used to recommend Windows Phone to friends and family who want the basic features of a modern smartphone but without the complexity of Android or the cost of iOS.
Shame as I genuinely thought it was a really rather good mobile platform. Shame the app store never took off.
At least Android has become easier to use over the last few years.
Was still holding onto my 950 XL with WM10 but once that packs in I'm going to have to face reality. Sad times.
Yeah, my Mum's Lumia is coming up for replacement. Having only had to sort out problems with her sat-nav, and it only taking half an hour to show her how to use it, I don't know what to recommend next. For my own convenience, as well as hers...
If she gets an Android, that's hours of set-up and headaches showing her how it works. And I reckon I'll be fixing some problem every 6 months or so. Not sure she'll be willing to blow £600 on an iPhone.
Having been in almost from the very start (my first game release was about 8 months after WP7launched), WinPhone was a fun little platform to develop for. Yes, in the beginning there was no IAP mechanism, ad fill rates were virtually zero and the support site was up and down more regularly than a manic-depressive kangaroo, but XNA (and later Monogame) were great and ultimately what got me interested in mobile development as a whole.
True, it never got the market share I had hoped might happen in those early days (Microsoft doing their usual thing), and the marketplace has collapsed into a similar cess-pit as Play and the App store (a few titles dominant due to big marketing budgets plus a flood of shiteware), but it still remains the mobile platform I got the most downloads and best return from - and had the most fun developing for.
I got out of making mobile games a few years back - largely due to the aforementioned state of the markets on all platforms - but it was fun while it lasted, and the first platform I've developed for seriously since my Atari ST days. Guess I've always had a soft spot for the underdog... guess that means I should start looking at the Switch for my next development platform...
You were not in it from the start if you began at 7
CE then 6.x Win mobile came before mobile 7.
As a hint of things to come, 6.x (and earelier) code needed rewrite for Mobile 7 - MS provided no tools to convert code.
I stopped writing new stuff for windows mobile at that point (only win mobile work after taht was a bit of legacy 6.x app support / enhancement)
(caveat, these were logisitcs apps, not games)
Customers now use apps written for android instead (android devices locked down, about the one good thing to be said for win mobile was MS made it easy to lock down a phone, whereas we use 3rd party specialist software to lock down android)
I'll keep using my Nokia 735 until it dies.
I bought and tried a phone with Windows 10, but ended up giving it to the missus: didn't have Kid's Corner (yes, I use it) and the alternative was crap. Also, Windows 10 just had way too many options/settings: feature creep.
When my Nokia dies, not sure what I'll do.
I'm actually surprised Windows Phone 8 was supported this long, given that it was released in 2012.
Apple were still selling the 4S back then - last update for that was iOS 9.3.5 in 2016.
Wikipedia tells me Android was on version 4.1 back then. I doubt anybody's updating that anymore either.
TL:DR Phones are disposable, and I don't think many people are still running a phone from 2012...
>anybody who disagrees with you is just doing it to be contrary.
It's a free country (sort of) and I'm entitled to express my opinion just as you are, I'm not asking you to agree with mine as I don't have to agree with yours. I'm an atheist but people are free to blindly follow a dead end if they so choose and waste a lot of Sundays/Saturdays etc which could be used more productively or for a two day bender, personally I prefer the two day bender.
Support for my *Nokia* Lumia 520 ended years ago. Yes, I kept getting the (occasional) Microsoft updates... but it's arguable whether that could in any way whatsoever be considered support.
One by one, the decent Nokia stuff it came with was disabled because - horror of horrors - I don't have a Microsoft account. The stuff that remains is useless Microsoft shit - Office, ffs, on a device with a 4" screen? All it can do now is act as a dumb phone - and camera, though the ergonomics on the 520 are so bad you can't get a decent photo out of it.
So MS "support" has consisted entirely of disabling perfectly good Nokia apps. Glad it's finished now.
When I worked for a charity we had to use Windows and of course Windows phones. Enter the craptastic Nokia 420 the phone that didn't keep giving.
Funny how the IT team used Android phones but we mere mortals had to cope with something that even a Galapagos Tortoise could outrun.
Windows Phone is dead? How did it take so long to die?
User picks up supported gadget. Device wakes up. User trie... BARGE!!!! EXCUSE ME!!!! BARGING IN HERE. BEEN SLEEPING FOR THREE DAYS, BUT HERE WE GO... CHECKING FOR UPDATES. User tries t... CHECKING FOR UPDATES. User would like to check th... UPDATES FOUND. STANDBY. ...the weather. User... DOWNLOADING UPDATES. Weath... DOWNLOADING 1 or 17 FILES. Weathe... DOWNLOADING 2 of 17 FILES. "Weather Not Available - Timeout Error." PLEASE REBOOT YOUR DEVICE. DO NOT REBOOT YOUR DEVICE. PLEASE REBOOT YOUR DEVICE. DOWNLOADING 3 of 17 FILES. User is still curious about the weather. Trie... DOWNLOADING 4 of 17 FILES. Weathe... DOWNLOADING 5 of 17 FILES. MANDATORY REBOOT. PLEASE JUST STAND THERE - HOLDING ME GENTLY. DO NOT BOTHER ME WITH YOUR SILLY WEATHER INQUIRY. REBOOTING. .... GOOD MORNING. Weathe... NO YOU DON'T SUNSHINE. DOWNLOADING 6 of 75 FILES. ...etc.
I like my Surface 2 with Windows RT. It's unsupported, which is nice.
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