Flashback: a decade of Microsoft's failed attempts to conquer the phone market

24 July 2022
The Kin phones were an odd experiment, but Windows Phone 7 was supposed to capture the phone market the same way that Window had the PC market.

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  • 24 Jul 2022

Sad they use Nokia - CEO of Nokia Elop was in Microsoft, then chose Windows Phone for main Nokia system.
With over 30% withSymbian, sales dropped to just a few from Windows Phone. He also deleted MeeGo OS. Nokia shares dropped, Nokia need to sell phone division to MS, Windows Phone was abandoned, users were left behind, not everyone got updates. Then Windows Mobile (the latter one) didnt change much, even the best phones will not help as the system does not have basic functions, there are no options that are available from the competition.
It is a pity because there is no competition today, but they unnecessarily pushed the window system from phones to the PC. In addition, the system on phones was limited and closed, many applications, options were missing.

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    • Anonymous
    • Kg%
    • 24 Jul 2022

    Bodygard, 24 Jul 2022I always said that microsoft was gonna fail vs android and ... moreyou're right but this partnership inspired a revolution in ui design nonetheless... i remember hearing a line
    from a video that says "windows phone walked so android and ios could run". here we are now

      We're living in the darkest timeline.
      Basically a monopoly with iOS on the high-end, and AndroidOS on the midrange and low-end.

      Here's the brightest timeline:
      - Apple continues innovating as per usual.
      - Microsoft is actually impressed with the iPhone 2G, and they take it seriously. They drop Windows CE, Mobile 6 PDA, and Kin project, to focus on a new architecture/platform that is unified between Phones and Desktops. To get the hardware out, and some extra help they make an acquisition of RIM, and make Blackberry devices.
      - Nokia drops Intel/Moblin, and retires Symbian to go with Maemo. They acquire Palm which spearheads this. We get webOS and MaemoOS combined to make something innovative (MerOS ?) based on a Full ARM-Linux distro.
      - Google's AndroidOS partners with HTC, LG, and Sony Ericsson. We also get Samsung and Motorola join the fray.
      - However, soon we get Samsung partnering with Nokia-Palm to make high-end and midrange Linux phones, as the Nokia brand takes care of midrange and low-end Linux phones. Whereas Motorola partners with Microsoft-RIM, and they also handle the low-end and midrange Windows phones, whilst under the Blackberry brand they handle the high-end Windows phones.
      - It becomes a four-horse race, with 2012 junction year; Mer 3.1, Android 4.0, Windows10 Mobile, and iOS 7.
      - Those who want to have an encrypted-corporate phone go with Motorola-Blackberry-Microsoft. Whilst the computer enthusiasts people who like open-source software take the side of Nokia-Palm-Samsung. Those who want a tight-nit ecosystem with iOS go with Apple. For the value orientated there is Android on the HTC, LG, Sony devices.
      - We get far more innovation from the previous competitors, that there never is a revolution from the Chinese market. In fact, this leads to foreign phones and foreign ecosystems entering that market, which facilitates the breakdown of the Chinese Controlled Intranet, and brings about the International Open Internet.

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        • Anonymous
        • 8N3
        • 24 Jul 2022

        Except 950, the rest were crap like samsung low midranges.

          I always said that microsoft was gonna fail vs android and iOS and that Nokia was making a big mistake going with microsoft while they should've jumped on Android since the start.

          There was a guy in the comments here that argued with me like...forever. He defended that windows mobile etc was gonna be a success and windows phones were going to thrive. I said he was wrong. Where's he now? haha

            My Lumia phones where the best smartphones I've ever used. If Windows Phone was still around, I wouldn't even had an Android phone. Apparently there's only room for 2 operating systems in this world.

              It feels more like they chose not to, as 950/XL was great and got capable camera even now.
              They went all-business, leaving no joy for media consumers. They could still make waves even now, considering how it is now, globally I mean.
              But I will enjoy Xbox stick tho, at least some fun from them.

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                • Anonymous
                • 3SI
                • 24 Jul 2022

                „Unsurprisingly, a long list of Lumias were announced as the first devices to be updated to 10. Microsoft wasn't going to repeat the same mistake and strand its users on an old OS while it starts from scratch.“

                Except for pretty much every phone with a „20“ at the end, like the powerful 920, the praised camera-centric 1020, and the – by far – most popular Windows Phone ever, the 520. And because of how swiftly old versions of Windows Phone stopped supporting apps, this was another in-your-face by Microsoft. Windows Phone really combined the worst of its competitors, short OS update support like Android, and short app update support for old OS versions, like iOS.

                  I've been into phones since 2004 thanks to websites like this and PhoneScoop. It was actually PhoneScoop that got me into checking phones online first. The Motorola V600 was my first phone crush. But I ended up using GSM Arena only a couple months after using PhoneScoop and haven't used a different site ever since. GSM Arena shows more international devices.

                  From 2004-2022, I believe the best creativity for phones came between 2007 starting with the iPhone and ending around 2014 with the HTC One M8, Xperia Z3/Z3 Compact, Galaxy S5, and so on. You can argue it ended sooner like around 2011 when Nokia and Microsoft merged, Palm died, and Motorola was bought by Google.

                  My favorite sizes for phones happened between 2004 with the RAZR V3 and ending about 2011 with the likes of the Nokia N9. The HTC One M7 in 2013 was a huge jump for me coming from 2010's iPhone 4 and Nexus One. We'll never really have the same feelings about phones like we did over a decade ago when a revolution was happening.

                  The Class of 2011, 2013, 2014, and 2016 had one of the strongest class of phones released those years.

                    I still have a perfectly working Samsung Ativ SE with Windows Phone 8.1, and honestly even today I consider WP a better OS than Android and Ios. The main problem is/was the apps.

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                      • DMX
                      • 8xX
                      • 24 Jul 2022

                      I had several Windows phone, my unforgettable favorite is the Lumia 930 with its excellent camera and the Nokia camera application ufff what a delight, I still have photos and videos from that device!! I also liked how different iOS and Android WP devices looked like.

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                        • Anonymous
                        • 8N3
                        • 24 Jul 2022

                        Many apps were not available.
                        Obviously mobile windows would never survive.
                        Using through browser is not good.

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                          • Anonymous
                          • YUU
                          • 24 Jul 2022

                          I had Lumia 430 in 2015. Really nice compact phone. The keyboard are awesome. Smooth GUI, no lag even though using SD 200 series (I'm guessing here. Don't remembered) Sadly, its lack of Apps. If not, I wouldn't use Android 😎

                            travis999, 24 Jul 2022No,customers rapidly dropped using windows anything,they sh... moreDuring wp8 and wp8.1 end of 2012 up to 2014 windowe phone had lof fans just check sales on how sales grew, it was like 100% or more every quarter, Nokia made really good hardware, all lumia had krait cores even lowend, people were happy to live with less app but could run everything you throw at it.

                            So people didnt drop when Nokia was there, they increased every quarter, when Nokia left and Microsoft was in Charge people started to Abandon that project.

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                              • akay
                              • uuP
                              • 24 Jul 2022

                              window phone are the best

                                Owned three Windows Phone smartphones.

                                Samsung Focus
                                Nokia Lumia 635
                                Microsoft Lumia 640

                                I thought the UI was pretty cool. Just didn't have enough apps I needed to use. The Metro UI came from the Zune HD in 2009. That to me had the best UI I had ever seen on a portable media player. The Metro UI on the Windows Phone was a little bit toned down.

                                  I had a Microsoft Lumia 535, I never touched a worse phone.

                                    One of HTC's biggest mistake,allowing Microsoft to determine hardware spec,so we got the crap hd7,where as what their cast numbers of loyal customers wanted and had repeatedly begged for was just an up graded HD2,a simple upgrade to HD3 would have sold as well as the HD2 did.
                                    HD2 was the best ever winmo or Windows phone device,later nokias had a few nice buts but as an overall device,the HD2 was it,a winmo 6 device that was THE android developers phone for 4 years,far more capable than any true android only device,and no other device since has been able to boot and run so many different Os's,some of them slowly,but they would run,and Windows XP embeded on an HD2 hooked up to a networking,external powered USB ports hub and you had a slow full desktop,long before samsung and dect.

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                                      • Anonymous
                                      • t7F
                                      • 24 Jul 2022

                                      I remember I switched from a Galaxy S2 to a Lumia 920... but the lack of app support made me switch to a Galaxy S4. I remember everyone was impressed with my Lumia 920’s camera low light performance.

                                        Hemedans, 24 Jul 2022Nokia Made foundation for Microsoft success, Q3 2013 when M... moreNo,customers rapidly dropped using windows anything,they showed far too often you could not believe a word they said about anything.

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