Android and other phone gossip

[martindtanderson]

BBC LDN, you have good taste!

I have the Samsung Omnia 7, and this is an absolutely gorgeous phone, with a wonderful OS and UI.

Also if you do get this, make sure you get the London Travel app...
...

I made it!

[Nick Harvey]

Also if you do get this, make sure you get the London Travel app.

Errrrrrrrrrrr? Does it also give all the departure times for the Dundee Rapid Transport System?

[Pete]

Also if you do get this, make sure you get the London Travel app.

Errrrrrrrrrrr? Does it also give all the departure times for the Dundee Rapid Transport System?

Like I ever use public transport.

[marksi]

I don't think the iPhone is suitable for UK winters.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/01/11/frozen_iphone/

Apple has refused to repair an iPhone 4 on the grounds that it was used in an ambient temperature below zero, in breach of the specifications.

[BBC LDN]

Royal Mail finally deigned to deliver the 7 Mozart today, and I've got my grubby paws on it at long last. My first impression when I first held it was even more of a wow than when I picked up my Omnia 7 for the first time. The build quality is top notch, the materials are all grade-A. The larger Super-AMOLED screen of my Omnia 7 still makes it the winner in my book, though not by as much as I expected.

I think you should try to get down to an Orange store if you can, Pete - check out the 7 Mozart's gorgeous look and feel for yourself, and seize the opportunity to see the equally lovely Windows Phone 7 OS in action. I think that, for someone with perhaps a few doubts about both the hardware and software, this is a good example of a situation where both have to be seen in person to be fully appreciated, and before you can make an informed decision on whether or not to take the plunge, or to go with something on the Android front instead.

[Pete]

Regarding Windows Phone, and I appreciate there are likely to be apps that reverse this but still, is the default essentially tied in to Bing and it's (imo) inferior services?

It's one thing that is swaying me towards the Android thing atm as although I really love the look of WinPho's interface, the idea of being tied into Bing / Windows Live / The godawful thing it does to integrate with facebook that has infected MSN Messenger is rather offputting.

iPhone is now written off completely btw.

[BBC LDN]

Regarding Windows Phone, and I appreciate there are likely to be apps that reverse this but still, is the default essentially tied in to Bing and it's (imo) inferior services?

It's one thing that is swaying me towards the Android thing atm as although I really love the look of WinPho's interface, the idea of being tied into Bing / Windows Live / The godawful thing it does to integrate with facebook that has infected MSN Messenger is rather offputting.

iPhone is now written off completely btw.

It is indeed integrated with Bing. I hear what you're saying about Bing, although I've generally found it to be pretty decent. No, not the best thing in the world, but I see an awful lot of Bing-bashing on the interwebs, and a lot of it seems to come from fanboys who have obviously never used it. In the broad scheme of things, unless you do a search for "cheese" and get a load of results about pottery, spiders, Nietzsche and watchmaking, but nothing about cheddar or mozzarella, it's difficult to label a search engine as being seriously inferior to another.

That said, I have found myself using Bing a lot more on the desktop recently, as Google search results seem to be increasingly flooded with aggregation and meta-search sites that redirect me to a directory of searches, or a list of further results, before I actually get to a page that's got the information I'm looking for. Anyway, that's another pot of cheese entirely, so I won't get into that now. For now, I'll just say that Bing is that I'm not going to try and sell you the line that Bing is better than anything out there, but it's in no way the hindrance or arse-ache that some people paint it as. Also, you get the lovely Bing homepage images with a couple of random facts, just like you do on the desktop. Well, it pleases me at least.

Facebook integration on the phone is surprisingly effective and unintrusive.

I despise the new Windows Live Messenger desktop client for its frustrating and unnecessary Facebook integration. I have dipped my toe into the pool of Facebook, but I'm not one of these people who lives my life on it, and I too worried about being flooded with a torrent of banality at all hours. In practice, the Facebook stuff is integrated in fairly unintrusive but comprehensive ways. For example, everything from your news feed goes through to a "what's new" stream on your 'People' hub, which is a click and a flick away from your Start (home) screen. You can also view Facebook info and updates on individuals by seeing what's new for them through their contact zone - essentially, going into a contact's details and seeing their Facebook updates, in a similar way to viewing their Facebook profile page. If you want to be more proactively updated on individuals' updates (or, for example, if you want to keep up to date on the latest Facebook updates from Secret Cinema so you know when tickets go on sale), you can pin individual contacts or Facebook buddies onto your Start screen, and the Live Tile for that contact will be updated whenever new updates are posted.

It's all very nice, and far less of an assault on my senses than I expected.

Other than the need for a Windows Live ID for integrating things like SkyDrive back-up and synchronisation of contacts and data (for phone location, remote wiping and restoration services), you don't really need to worry about Windows Live. It's there, and it wants to play, but you can pretty much ignore it if you want to, and it won't really bother you.

Incidentally, there isn't currently a proper Windows Live Messenger client for Windows Phone, which is rather bizarre. There's a semi-official app for it (it's been referred to by various MS staff and reps, but it was developed by a third party), but it's not especially good.

It's also worth noting that although Windows Phone has plenty of Facebook integration, it's not intended to fully replicate all Facebook functions. For that, there is a dedicated Facebook app, which is pretty well designed and surprisingly nice to use.

[BBC LDN]

Not so much for Pete, but for other members who may also be on T-Mobile, they've 'clarified' their position on the fair usage policy changes, and have confirmed that the current contracts of existing customers will not be changed; the 500MB FUP will only affect new customers and those upgrading.

Additionally, the 500MB is essentially a 'multimedia' pool for things like music/video streaming and downloads. Website browsing and email services are not considered to be part of that pool, and are 'unlimited'. Exceeding the 500MB limit on multimedia activity will not attract additional charges, but the service will be throttled or limited in some way (they've been extremely ambiguous in defining what this means), but web browsing and email services will continue to be provided without limit.

So, for those with existing contracts, good news - your current 1GB or 3GB limits will be unaffected for the duration of your current contract, until you upgrade or extend... at which point, you can jump ship to another network anyway.

[Pete]

I HAVE DECIDED

to go with an HTC Desire on an 18 month contract.

This is based on the fact that tempting as WinPho looks, I'msimply wary of the rest of the MS stuff behind it, as is being so nicely discussed in the other thread on here. It does however look as if they are getting their act together so it very well might be the choice I go with for the next phone at the end of this contract however not quite yet.

Plus desire appears to be the one you can get a niceish 18 month contract on. Haven't yet phoned Orange though and will report back after my charm / threat offensive occurs.

[Gavin Scott]

OHMYGOD.

Me you and sput will *totally* look like Charlies Angels.

But with matching phones instead of tits.

[Sput]

IT'S GLANDULAR.