Those "whoops!" moments

[Xaccers]

I've got a windows mobile phone, it synchronizes with Exchange, which has the option to remotely wipe the phone (you can see where this is going).
As more clients are asking about alternatives to blackberrys, one of the concerns is what happens if a phone is stolen/lost, or more importantly, the employee leaves under bad circumstances.
So, I installed SPB backup, a fab tool which takes a backup of the phone and saves it on the SD card.
I configured my phone to accept the exchange policies enabling the wipe, and then gave it a go.
Now from what I've read, it should just do a hard reset, ie set it back to how it was when it came out the box or last had a ROM installed.
Nowhere did it say it would unformat the SD card.
So I rebooted, and have no access to the card, and therefore no access to the backup I took.
Whoops.
Currently re-installing what I can remotely, off to a works do tonight so the rest will have to wait til tomorrow or the weekend.
Ho-hum.

[spider]

How about this:

Early version of Norton Ghost (win 9.x days, possibly the first version of Ghost) , used to image complete drive across.

Mixed up source and destination, so 'imaged' the blank raw new drive onto the data drive , fortunately I did have some backups, but I did not know until it had finished what it had done.

Later versions had a warning to stop you doing that.

[Sid_the_Squid]

Xac is that a windows mobile 6.x or the new windows mobile 7?
Quite interested in a windows mobile 7 device myself wanted some opinions for existing owners.

[Xaccers]

Xac is that a windows mobile 6.x or the new windows mobile 7?
Quite interested in a windows mobile 7 device myself wanted some opinions for existing owners.

WM6.5 on the HTC HD2
Wouldn't touch WP7 with a 20 foot barge pole. Fewer functions than the 1st iPhone, duplo brick interface, when I tried it out in the O2 shop doing everything felt not slow but long winded. The htc weather tab animation made me feel ill and I don't get travel sick. Massive backward step. Unless you need xbox live on your phone, get an iPhone if you don't want to have a say in what your phone can do or look, Desire HD if you want more control and plenty of games, and the HD2 if you want microsoft integration and full control over the phone.
I'm hoping by the time I'm ready for a new phone spb will have released mobile shell 5 for consumers and I'll jump ship to android.

[R9UKE]

Is the iPhone's reign over?

About time... I hate mine.

[Xaccers]

Is the iPhone's reign over?

About time... I hate mine.

Unfortunately not, there have been better devices out there for years but they've not got the "ooo it's apple it must be cool and the best" image.
This short (not safe for work or young ears) video explains why

[addo]

They're still worth quids - about £500+ here for an unused top spec one still in the box.

I put my hand up for one when taking on a new plan recently. Minute I receive that sealed package, it's hitting Fleabay for exactly the reason Xac articulated: ooo it's apple it must be cool and the best... I'll just bank the dosh and stick with what I have.

[Sid_the_Squid]

I don't get the iPhone hate, I've got a iphone 4 had it since launch (my first iPhone) I could not be happier with it. My friend is big in to Android I've given his one a try, I think its slow, clunky and ugly, it feels cheep (HTC Desire) compared to my iphone, every screen just seems fuzzy by comparison. Sure its got flash player and as he has rooted the device he can install anything he wants. Which you can also do to an iphone if you want its called jailbreaking same as rooting an android. Lack of flash is so far the only thing my iphone cant do that I wish it could, still a minor point as a majority of web based videos are via youtube which do play fine, everything else I've fancied there really is an app for.

I realize it sounds lame talking about user experience as thats such a jobsidian term, but for me using an iphone is simply a joy. Its fast, high resolution, and everything works very nicely, I could imagine an early iphone being annoying, lack of copy paste & multitasking would have driven me insane, but iOS is really good now.

I'm interested in a windows 7 phone as underneath it all I'm an MS fanboy and have heard windows 7 phone is basically Microsoft iphone. I've had windows 6.x phones in the past, dont like them pressure touch screens are nasty, as is having to use a stylus, sure their unlocked you can run anything on them, but that is not sufficient to make up for their shortfalls IMO.
I do really like apple stuff, its expensive sure, but its very good quality hardware, I also like OSX, not very practical but its a lovely os to use.

As for the iphone reign being over, love it or hate it, its the benchmark still, and if your a hater, do you just hate because its popular?

[addo]

Being keen on gizmos is actually quite depleting on funds (better seen as less money for petrol/travel).

I'm just not into gadgets that much, and being a tradesman something rugged is a necessity. I love silence at work, hence have no need for an iPod or similar.

Last two days have been bliss - just the sound of a crowbar and shovel.

[Xaccers]

Jailbreak an iphone and you invalidate the warranty.

Comparing an iphone4 with an older lower spec phone isn't exactly fair.
The HD2 has a capacitive screen which is much larger than the iphone's and is crystal clear. No need for a stylus at all. Installing SPB MS3.5 gives it an interface even better than HTC Sense.
The Desire HD is pretty much the same hardware, so again runs beautifully.

The iphone hate is part of apple hate, we hate that they're ripping people off and basically taking advantage of their lack of knowledge.
Apple gives the impression that they're the best and often the only product which can do things, when that isn't the case. Look at the "I'm a PC/I'm a mac" adverts where they got into trouble over it. Their treatment and lack of value to customers is shocking, look at the signal drop issue with the iphone 4, we had Jobs saying it's not the phone, you're just holding it wrong, and then when they admitted there was a problem, they claimed it was due to being over generous with the signal strength display. Their press conference showed if you give a death grip to some other phones, they too lose signal, but refused to answer when someone pointed out that on the iphone 4 you can acheive the same result with a single finger.
I object to any manufacturer abusing it's customer base.

Now, WP7, think of the iphone when it first came out, no cut and paste, no bluetooth transfer ability, then imagine it with a gloriously large and capable screen, but with an interface which looks like duplo bricks, a menu system which actually made me feel depressed to use.
Imagine not having the ability to listen to movies via bluetooth headphones, imagine a list of bugs as long as your arm and you have the WP7:

GENERAL
* Automatic reboot of the phone
* Automatic reboot of the phone and loss of all datas (rare)
* Pictures assigned to Live Tiles (people, pictures, etc) are very low resolution pictures
* Samely, very low resolution picture showing on the screen when a contact calls you
* Camera settings are not saved
* Email notifications sound laggy/distorded: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...0-d4f96edf42d9
* Game Hub: in the Game Hub most icons are zoomed in and pixelated (concerns mainly non-Xbox live games)
* Some annoying background hiss noise (right before a sound is played, which goes away shortly after that)
* WP7 media player: Media Player does not allow user to skip to the part of the video he wants to watch by sliding finger along the time bar until he reaches the target moment. User is forced to press a seek button instead
* Text: sometimes WP7 will capitalize the first letter of some words without any specific reason
* Weird icon appearing in the app list. See image: http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/5507/iconvbx.png
* Sound of Games will remain enabled even when phone is on Vibrate
* Camera-shutter sound will remain enabled even when phone is on vibrate
* Microphone may disable itself after use of bluetooth or plugging in headphones
* Contact: WP7 does not allow to search in People for company name
* Contact: Impossible to display company name or order by it
* Contact: No vcard support. Contacts cannot be forwarded by SMS or Email
* Alarms: Freezes when recurring alarm sounds and allowed to self quiet, when not plugged in. Does it everytime. Sometimes locks on dismiss screen, otherwise locks when dismissed
* Alarms: Phone may freeze on the passcode unlock screen when you dismiss the alarm (reboot necessary)
* Alarms: If the earphones are plugged then alarm will not ring (alarm not reverted to speaker)
* Alarms: Alarms will ring even during phone calls, and the other side of call can also hear the alarm tune (!)
* Alarms: Sound issues after alarm sounding: No sound after alarms, vibration still works but no sound
* Omission of French, Italian, Spanish, and German keyboard support on HD7/T-Mobile in the U.S.
* When an email contains a picture, it cannot be downloaded with Gmail on Windows Phone 7 (in HTML or RTF email format)
* Even when phone's passcode lock is activated the phone can still be turned off by holding down the power button
* The "Answer" button seems sometimes disabled when answering a call [rare]

CONNECTIVITY
* Wifi: WP7 sometimes unable to connect to password protected WiFi (WPA/WPA2 security)
* Wifi: WP7 unable to connect to hidden WiFi networks (known issue)
* Wifi: Issue with lockscreen: Wifi refuses to re-connect after it comes back from standby
* Wifi: After switching off Wifi, the phone will not connect over 3G (reboot necessary)
* Wifi: Wifi disconnects when phone is locked: absence of option to leave Wifi on even if phone is locked
* Bluetooth: Bluetooth works on Audio but fails on video (sound reverts to the speakers): http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...b-72f003fdeee9
* Bluetooth: Apparently Bluetooth not connecting well with all car systems: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...b-28ce0d561132
* Bluetooth: poor audio-quality when connecting the phone to various A2DP-capable devices
* Bluetooth: Bluetooth headset button long press and double press not supported (should allow voice commands via headset)
* Bluetooth: Bluetooth settings do not allow connection of headset as just a phone headset or just a stereo headphone (A2DP) set.

SYNC / EMAILS / PEOPLE / CALENDAR
* Sync: Exchange ActiveSync Error Code: 85010013 Security Policies
* Sync: Error code 86000206 when synchronizing to Hotmail account
* Sync: WP7's calendar refuses to push to Google calendar
* Sync: Having a calendar entry (Google), change in reminder (add a reminder, change time etc) does not sync with the phone
* Sync: iCal calendar appointments received by email are not recognized, and cannot be added to the calendar
Only if you change something like description of that item, then everything will be sync', including reminder info.
* Sync: Issue when sync'ing all calendar items from Windows Live Custom domains account. After copying the appointements from Outlook to WL calendar using the Connector, the non-recurring appointements appear in the web calendar BUT do not show up on the phone (recurring appts show up fine).
* Sync: Some Facebook contacts are missing from People's Hub
* Sync: Deleted people in Facebook still appear in the People Live Tile
* Sync: Hidden posts in Facebook still appear in the WP7 Facebook feed
* Video Sync: Error message when syncing a video from the phone to the collection "An unknown error occured. Error Code C00D11CD"
* YouTube videos embedded in Facebook cannot be played
* Sync: Office documents in Skydrive are not accessible from the WP7 device (absence of any integration in the WP7 Office Hub)
* Emails: bug in how WP7 connects with Exchange Server 2003 (which includes the service behind the Hotmail Exchange Activesync support). When email from such a server is forwarded the email is not included in an editable form, but rather as an .eml attachment
* Emails: Emails menu tends to start in 'landscape mode' by default (may be actually on purpose, many users find this annoying):
E.g. If the user takes the phone in his hand in portrait mode as the main tiled interface shows, and opens the messages or mail app, the content is in the landscape mode. User has to tilt the phone 45 degrees and wait for it to correctly switch to portrait.
* Emails: Emails will not automatically display included images.
* Emails: No way to save a picture included in an email (if the pic is included and not attached)
* Emails: Videos (even short ones) cannot be sent via Email
* Emails: Incorrect processing of Mailto URLs http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...5&postcount=57
* Emails: WP7 refuses to let you edit the content of an Email before you forward it.
* Emails: when a picture is attached. click on "download images" will come back "download incomplete", with no way to force the email to re-download (forward the email to urself may solve the issue)
* Skydrive server unable to upload folders of documents. Unbelievable.

ZUNE
* Zune crashes, then refuses to load (reboot necessary)
* Zune remains silent, even if the general volume is turned on (reboot necessary)
* Zune does not always display the artist as background (which remains black)
* [Also: sometimes, Zune displays the Artist background when navigating through the Artist's albums and songs, but does not display any background when listening a song of this Artist]
* Sometimes Zune's background displays the artist of the preceding song /or the next song
* Zune software on PC messes up some Artists' tags, by mistakenly replacing the Artist name by the composer name (e.g. Smog becomes Bill Callahan, Moose becomes Russel Yates, My Bloody Valentine becomes Kevins Shields, etc.)
* No Flv, Avi Xvid support
* Zune takes excessive time to convert some movies files
* The volume of Zune may vary (e.g. louder or quieter after receiving a phone call, or after a game)
* Zune sound quality: strangely there is always some background hiss noise
* No sound while Zune player is running, other sounds still working (reboot solves the problem)
* Turn off the sound of certain games may possibly also turn off the sound in Zune [to be confirmed. (e.g. RocketRiot, Bye Bye Brain, Bejeweled may cause this)]
* All letters are "greyed out" in the Zune alphabetic search menu [may concern mostly German devices]
* Volume missing feature: no separate volume control: Turn Zune's volume up will also turn up the general volume (ringtone, messaging alerts, keyboard sound)
* Absence of scrubbing controls in the Zune player
* Zune does not allow the user to create and save playlists on the device
* Zune player does not allow downloading podcasts over the air (non sense)

MARKETPLACE
* WP7 freezes during Maketplace scrolling
* Marketplace crashes, then refuses to load (reboot necessary)
* In the Marketplace menu, pushing the 'back' button only leads to a black screen
* Error code c101a24b when trying to install or update applications (reboot necessary)
* App updates failing to download/install
* Update of some specific apps failing due to "licensing problems" (IMDB, foursquare, Touchnote, Wipolo, some HTC apps)
* Game downloading issue - "Attention required". Some install issues encountered
* When you browse the application list, check one app then go back, often it will bring you back to the very top of the list
* Marketplace Search: on the Marketplace Bing cannot filter between apps and music etc. If you search for an app, Bing will display a bunch of other stuffs like album, artist, song etc.

IE BROWSER
* No address bar in landscape mode
* IE will not delete URLs from history if they contain international characters
* IE favourites not syncing
* When you tap and hold a link that is represented by a picture, you only get the picture menu pop up, i.e. you get the save picture to phone but no option to open the link in a new tab
* End-user is unable to chose the default search engine (at the moment search engine is either set by the provider or imposed by MS, i.e. Bing)
* Bug when editing a Favorite: If you edit a favorite, and the change is limited to changing the case of the favorite but not the actual words (for example, changing Engadget to engadget), then you get an error with inaccurate details that states: "Your phone doesn't have enough memory to save this favorite. Free up space by deleting some files or apps and try again." http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...6-75ab1812828b

BING / BING MAPS / GPS
* Bing Maps not working properly in several non-US contries (loading time, inacurrate position, blurry maps)
* Vocal and local search not available in most European countries (missing feature)
* Localization without GPS not working fine on 3G networks (apparently works better under 2G coverage)
* Current location as indicated by Bing Maps is wrong (e.g. http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...4-895ae297ba9d )
* Absence of Bing Images, strangely left out (missing feature)

PODCASTS
* WP7 refuses to play most m4a podcasts (despite m4a is in the list of Windows Phone supported media codecs) [may apparently be caused by images embedded in some m4a podcasts - same problem encountered on the Zune HD]
* Zune does not allow to add or update podcasts directly from the phone (!)

VOICE COMMAND
* Once the audio jack is unplugged the Voice Command may not work (reboot necessary) [mostly noticed on the Focus]

[addo]

So - in a nutshell - if the WP7 were a car, what marque and model could it be?

[CitroJim]

So - in a nutshell - if the WP7 were a car, what marque and model could it be?

Easy C5 2.2HDi

I don't get these phones at all. Must be my age It seems that it being a phone is just an inconsequential side-line in a long list of functions that rightly belong on a laptop or netbook...

For now I'm happy with my basic Nokia that give me a phone, a picture of my girls on the screen, a clock, text messaging and Bluetooth to a box that clips on my sunvisor for hands-free in the car.

That's all I want of a device that slips in my pocket.

[Sid_the_Squid]

I have to give you kudos for doing a thorougher test on the WP7, those do sounds like some quite annoying issues and potential deal breakers. However in the WP7 defense this is the mk1, the first of any mobile operating system is going to have a fair few issues, Android and iOS were fairly broken on first version. It can only get better, I think Microsoft are on the right path with this phone, its not going to be for everyone, from the sound of it Xac your the kind of guy who likes to be able to change everything any anything in their phone in which case these locked down mobile os's are never going to sit well.

Whilst jalibreaking does void your warranty, you could always flash back to standard. Rooting your android also voids its warranty, the only open mobile os left are Symbian, WebOS* and win phone 6.x

*for the record I think WebOS is brilliant, but it just has no support

I agree that comparing an iphone to a lower spec phone is unfair, however one is usually forced into such as situation as there are not that many which can compare, there is no phone with a higher screen resolution, and few with similar cpu/gpu power, I would like a larger screen phone, but cant stand Android os.

You mention the whole "Death grip", or "antennagate", its the only real fault anyone can pick with the iphone 4, the problem is really over hyped, I agree it was foolish of jobs to initially deny it existed.
It is a problem with the iphone 4 design, but not half as bad as initially thought, as in part it really was due to stupid reporting of signal strength, check this link.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3821/ipho ... signal-fix
It is a minor blemish, seriously use an iPhone 4, even if you have to jailbreak to get the functionality you want, one you do you'll be in no doubt about the quality of the hardware, the antenna issues are defiantly not as serious as some would have you believe, I have had the iphone 4 since launch its never dropped a call on me no matter how I hold it, and to be fair to apple they did give every iPhone 4 owner a free case removing the possibility of accidental antenna bridging.
I disagree with your statement that apple mislead and rip off their customers, they are expensive there is no doubt, but for the money you get very well built items, an excellent operating system, and very good support, the guys at the genius bar in MK are very helpful more so than any other supplier/manufacture I have had to deal with. For an expert epically in a Microsoft field there is not much if anything in OSX, however for a novice OSX is so user friendly and easy, I would recommend to anyone.

To guys like us there's nothing magic or secret to PC's but to the average person its all greek, I really think apple makes personal computing accessible to people who would otherwise be completely left out.
If your budget conscious apple will never be for you, however you do get what you pay for, no matter how much you hate apple you cant deny their products are esthetically very beautiful and very well built, coupled with ease of use and very good support most of the time its worth the really high price.

[Xaccers]

Yeah the rule of thumb with any MS OS is never rush in, always wait until the first service pack

At the moment, WP7 is a joke, they've had nearly half a decade to come up with it, but through false starts and mismanagement it's still not finished, several of the missing features may be installed in the future such as cut and paste and maybe bluetooth file transfer.

As for customising, to be honest, the only change I've made to my phones are to install SPB MS 3.5 as I prefer it as an interface, and a registry tweak to change "Reply to all" to just "Reply" when reading an email.
I like WM devices because they are so versatile, I can use it like a USB drive to transfer files, I can use it as a mobile broadband router to get computers online, I can sit in my car when at airsoft and watch a movie while the sound comes out the car's speakers via bluetooth.
If my phone is locked and I get a text message or email, it doesn't display it on the lock screen for everyone to see.
I can tell the album program to not show images in a specific folder, so when I'm showing my boss photos of server rooms, a holiday snap doesn't pop up amongst them.
For a home user they're great, they sync with outlook via a USB lead, so if you live in a poor signal area you can still update your emails on the device and transfer files to it.
I'm not tied into using MS's online file services, the same ones which lost a load of user's data and had no backups, the same ones that are screaming to be hacked.

If you're part of the target audience, ie a teenager who can't live without facebook or twitter and don't care too much about your privacy, then the WP7 will eventually be fine, but it's not versatile enough to use as a business phone.

There are just too many features that I currently use and frankly should be available in a basic phone that the WP7 doesn't have.

Now if you try it out and like it, then I'd suggest the HTC HD7, it's basically a HD2 but with fewer buttons. At the moment there are people working at getting WP7 going on the HD2 (although without things like xbox live) as they've already got android running on it.

I find the iphone 4 too small, and the interface quite clunky, it's not the best phone out there, but it does what it does reasonably well so for most people it's the one to go for.
Once android phones start coming out with SPB MS5 thought I would expect android to get another sales burst (they're already out selling iphones in the US I believe).


The iphone signal being a software issue is a smokescreen, they've now just dropped it down so when you have 2 bars you may actually have the equivalent signal strength of 3 bars.
Apple have also stopped giving out covers in the US at least.
Careful you don't drop the iphone 4 either, the back glass isn't as tough as the front and can easily crack, although there are many websites explaining how to replace it with other materials, the wood version was quite good

I can't see WP7 making much inroads into the other companies' share of the market, it's really down to apple and android, and with google now giving minimum specs for android phones it's going to improve user experience and help them gain more market share.

As things stand at the moment, when I'm due an upgrade, I'll probably get another HD2 and just keep it as a spare, or at least give android a go on it and dual boot.

[Sid_the_Squid]

Yeah the rule of thumb with any MS OS is never rush in, always wait until the first service pack

That's the sad truth

That said I do think Microsoft get a lot of unfair flack about their operating systems being rubbish, personally I love windows 2000/XP and a windows 7 (lets not mention vista). I really want the WP7 to be a good phone, I've read some reviews which sounded promising, if MS can iron the bugs out quickly I think it will be a great platform.

I have a theory about the cut & paste missing, at the time of designing the spec for WP7, the iphone did not have copy & paste, its pretty obvious that MS have copied apple with the WP7, I guess they though apple dosent have it we woun't, then when iOS 4 came along it was to far in the dev schedule to add to the WP7, I've heard its coming soon