Gadgetblurb

It has been an interesting couple of years in the smart phone space, especially for Microsoft.  The iPhone continues to soar, Android came out of nowhere and Microsoft, a bit late to the party, finally has a decent mobile OS.  While Microsoft may have been first to the scene with version 6.x, it was a pretty unsatisfying user experience.  Windows Phone 7 (WP7) makes up for what version 6.x really lacked, a touch screen based UI.  The iPhone really is the OS to be copied and Microsoft seems to have taken pages out of both Apple and Google’s playbook in their latest mobile OS.  For this review I am not really going to talk much about hardware.  Most of the WP7 phones out there are pretty similar due to Microsoft’s extreme constraint on manufacturing approval specs.  Generally, they are are about the same and screen resolution/brightness, battery and materials are all that are different.

So, lets start with the recommendation.  I like WP7!  I like it more than Android to be honest.  Here is why:  WP7 takes what makes the iPhone great; easy to navigate UI and combines it with the useful widgets of Android.  They call them live tiles.  Some are not so live to be honest, but many are.  At a glance you can easily get to your essential apps, and the tiles update dynamically to let you know which apps need attention.  As Steve Ballmer said in their presentation of the OS, it is really easy to get in and get out.  The phone doesn’t get in the way.  On the Android OS, it sometimes takes me 30 seconds to get something done.  A swipe here, a button press or 4 there and you finally get what you need.  The iPhone is a bit too dumb, no real dynamic updating of app icons or widgets (don’t get me started on notifications).  With WP7, it is a very quick button press, then a back press or home press to get back out.  Notification are unobtrusive and get the job done, but could be improved.

The UI is absolutely gorgeous.  The Metro interface is stunning.  I personally LOVE the font scheme and how emails render on the device.  It is by far my favorite device for email look and feel.  It and easy and you can do everything you want with one exception.  No unified inbox.  Maybe in an update.  The calendar interface is pretty decent with one exception.  You cannot have multiple calendars for a single account and that is a problem for me.  I have 3 calendars I keep in Google and WP7 only displays the main calendar.  Microsoft, if you are reading this, please fix this.  Android and iPhone have no problem with this.  A pretty bad oversight if you ask me.

The marketplace for WP7 leaves something to be desired.  When you run a search, it is global and brings back apps, music, movies, etc.  It is really annoying to search for an app with a common word in it as it will return hundreds of results.   They REALLY need to work that one out.  Otherwise, as of this writing, the marketplace for apps is about 20,000 strong.  That ain’t saying much since the Apple App store just passed 500,000.  That being said, most of your more popular apps are going to be found for WP7; Twitter, Facebook, Last.fm, Kindle, ESPN, Seesmic, Groupon, Yelp, OpenTable, Foursquare, etc.

Of course, the Verizon network is rock solid and the signal is as strong as the other phones I have tested for their network.   I have yet to have a dropped call on the Trophy, so that is good?  One of the interesting things that Microsoft did was to auto-hide the top information bar which includes the cell strength and network info, the battery info and any reminders.  The time is always displayed and if you want to see the info again, just a quick swipe-down will bring it back.  The lock screen is pretty decent, with a notification area and a swipe up, it gets the job done.

My company unfortunately doesn’t support Activesync, so I was unable to test the Outlook integration, but I am assuming since it is MS, it will be pretty great.  The email uses the same Metro UI and if my company ever decides to get with the 2000′s, I will like to see how Outlook on WP7 looks.  HTC includes some apps, including the HTC hub.  This is a sort of Sense UI built into WP7 and is launched as an app and shows the animated weather and has access to other HTC apps I really didn’t find all that impressive.  Those who are used to the Android Sense UI will feel at home and the live tile is pretty cool!

Ok for the bad.  The battery life is pretty bad.  The Trophy is shipped with a 1300mah battery and to be honest, they could have done with a few extra hundred mah.  With light to moderate use, I ran out of battery by late afternoon.  It doesn’t have multitasking, but I couldn’t imagine the battery life supporting any more strain to be honest.  The Mango update, due this fall, should cure the ill of no multitasking.  It will be interesting to see how Microsoft executes their plan for multitasking.

I really love the WP7.  The Trophy is ok.  I personally would get the Samsung Focus if  I were not dead set on Verizon and I didn’t hate AT&T enough to swear them off forever.  Since the Trophy is the only Verizon WP7, I would not hesitate to get it, especially over any Android phone.  Even without multitasking!

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