Nice UI, good social networking integration but...
Hi all,
Don't post on El Reg very often, but will do this time seeing as I've owned a Samsung Omnia 7 for about 6 months now.
On the whole, I love the UI, it seems they've really thought about how to differentiate it from the standard grid of icons - it's very smooth and slick, the live tiles are a neat idea, and Mango will really develop the concept further.
I haven't missed USB syncing as much as I thought I would (considering how much I was used to this on the old Windows Mobile 6.x series for about 3 years, and I bought an Android phone for my other half last year which is also a very accessible and customisable device). Having said that, just because I don't have a use for it, I don't mean to dismiss other peoples concerns about this.
Zune player (and media syncing) is great, and I find myself dipping into Facebook very often as it's just there and I don't have to go into a separate app. I'm also using Twitter far more frequently since buying this phone, but suspect I may have done on any other platform due to the availability of various apps?
Battery life is fair (for me) - this will vary massively according to how you want to use it. I get a day out of it with a fair few hours on Twitter/Facebook/browsing. I'm able to top up at work via USB cable, so I can't say I've ever had to go more than a couple of days without a recharge.
The downside is that I do miss being able to bluetooth photos to friends and family, and although in the current version (NoDo) there are rudimentary cloud services, I would like to see a more natural/integrated/intuitive interface to SkyDrive or a native Dropbox app. Office functionality seems a bit hampered at the moment, but I don't use it much so it's not currently at the top of my gripes. I've recently discovered EverNote and wonder why OneNote doesn't do as much (love being able to sync notes between my phone and various computers).
The other thing is, as much as the app marketplace has grown, there are still lots of apps I've used previously in WM6.x or are available on my friends iPhones or Androids that I'd like to see. BBC iPlayer, banking apps, a decent SatNav app, Flash player ... hopefully these will be on the way but I understand that developers will want a good chance of getting a return on the time/money it takes to build the apps, and its far easier to make that decision when the platform you're aiming at has 20%+ of the market!
Some of the decisions just seem odd - MS not having implemented full Bing Maps functionality, when they are the creators of this and it was available on their previous mobile platform, and yet one can find it on the competitor's devices.
Mango, from what I've read, seems like a good step forward to bringing it more up to date, and I'm hoping Nokia can bring out a phone with some outstanding hardware specs.... esp with regard to being able to add additonal memory - am struggling with the 8Gb limit on my Omnia 7.
To conclude, I consider it to be a really promising system, and have high hopes for the future, but also recognise that maybe it'll never break more than 10% of the market. The main downside is that in its current form, it feels unfinished. Like a really good idea that wasn't completely implemented, I'm hoping this is offset by regular updates such as the imminent Mango release to add lots of desired functionality.
Hope this helps?