Wall Street Journal: Windows Mobile 7 coming next week

We pretty much knew that Windows Mobile 7 is coming next week at MWC, but the Wall Street Journal has a piece up confirming the announcement, along with a few other interesting details. As we'd heard, the new UI is a riff on the Zune HD interface, and the OS "reflects a much tighter focus" on hardware / software integration, all based around a "small number" of hardware chassis specs -- pretty much what we've known, but it's interesting that the Journal's source says the plan is to "limit the wild variation" that's typically been the hallmark of Windows Mobile. The WSJ also says that the long-rumored Pink project is a separate phone designed to replace the Sidekick -- which we also basically knew -- but that it won't make an appearance at MWC at all. Hmm, sounds like someone ought tell all those Twittering Danger employees. We'll see what happens -- it all goes down early on Monday.

[yulebellow Posted Feb 12th 2010 3:47PM]

@dcoke

Oh Blackjack and your fantastic keyboard and solid build. I LOVED that phone and therefore can't figure out where there is such a riot against WM

[aelder Posted Feb 12th 2010 3:40PM]

Did the rumors of the locked down app store and multitasking via app pausing ever clear out or is that still an unknown?

[thunderbollock Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:28PM]

@aelder
Wouldn't it be awful if they ditched the best things about WM and added the worst things about iPhone OS?

I would say as a happy WM user I am more nervous than excited.

[dreamer3kx Posted Feb 12th 2010 3:40PM]

Zune HD UI is great.

[DaHarder Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:10PM]

@dreamer3kx

Why Yes... Yes It Certainly Is.

My ZUNE HD has the smoothest, most informative, most visually pleasant GUI of any mobile device I've yet used (and I've used/owned many 100s).

[therodt Posted Feb 12th 2010 3:48PM]

BWAHHHAHHAHAHAH yeah right....Now where is my unicorn Pegasus. I need a MC DLT!

[zipp Posted Feb 12th 2010 3:51PM]

I'm pretty interested to see what MS brings to the table... although I pretty much expect to see the same stuff thats out there now just with the MS logo on it..

This is my problem with MS products... they had a chance to tear the smart phone market up but instead did what they always do. Bring a product to market that grabs a foot hold... and then sit back and be complacent. We can look at browsers, operating systems, phones ect. Nothing gets innovated or even thought about until someone else does it.. then MS becomes reactive and starts playing catch up.

Back in the Day companies reacted to what MS did and thats one of the many lucky and/or strategic things that made them the king of the hill.

The thing is that I dont want to use me-to products that are lagging behind the true innovators and only created because someone else showed them how to do it.. I want the products that are on the bleeding edge and pushing the entire categories forward.

Thank god for Windows 7.... that showed all of us that they are in the very least trying to remember what kind of company they once were.

[Sweet Dude Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:09PM]

@zipp

That's how I feel exactly. Well said.

[LAY Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:39PM]

@zipp

"Bring a product to market that grabs a foot hold... and then sit back and be complacent. "

MS did become masters of the "pump and dump".

They need to learn that brand maintenance is as important as the initial product launch.

[GEizm Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:01PM]

I hope that I will not need to trash my TouchHD. . .

[b2046806 Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:23PM]

@GEizm New UI is built for capacitive, so scrolling can get really frustrating when you get a cooked ROM from XDA..

[HerbieDerb Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:40PM]

@b2046806 I like my ROMs stir-fried

[GEizm Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:51PM]

@b2046806 yep, I got one , ( sorry for my english I am french, and sad of that ) I tired with winmo, and hardware limitation, I want a my HTC Tch HD whith great app, and I know that its impossible , XDA or not

[1 Infinite Loop Cupertino CA Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:04PM]

About time, I am actually interested to see what Microsoft does. The Zune HD UI is pretty impressive.

[kobioshi Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:07PM]

I used winmo for years simply because I didn't think there was anything better. I didn't like Palm and I hate RIM so winmo was it for me... Then the iPhone came out, and for all it's flaws and shortcomings it truly was a next gen smartphone. So I made the switch... Now I am entrenched with iTunes, and iPhone OS (even got me onto a MBP!) so I don't think I will change back, but I have a special place in my heart for winmo, and I am eager to see what a little competition has done to the design teams at Redmond. Here's hoping for something awesome!

[smooty Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:08PM]

It is very possible someone has already asked this but i would like to know if the HTC touch pro 2 winmo 6.5 from us cellular will be a phone i could upgrade to winmo 7? Something i would love to know before i go and buy this phone. Thanks

[LJKelley Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:15PM]

@smooty No, you can not upgrade that phone. The only currently upgradeable phone is the HTC HD2. I think you need atleast a 1Ghz processor and possibly capacitive display. The Touch Pro 2 has neither.

[arnavdesai Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:20PM]

What I am surprised about is not that its coming out on Monday but that Engadget scoop(er) extraordinaire dont have confirmed screenshots of the UI so far. If they break it on Sunday night, wouldnt be much of a scoop.

[ango Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:50PM]

Multi touch coming to WinMo7, we will see it

[masta vaan Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:57PM]

@ango
why does everyone care so much about multitouch? its only a novelty, and works just about as fast as zoom buttons... as for the keyboard, i dont care, because i only get phones with hard keyboard

[Mtmrob Posted Feb 12th 2010 4:54PM]

It will be nice to see some competition in the mobile world. But too bad when June comes around we'll see the iPhone stomp that competition AGAIN!!! Then it will take another couple years for phones to catch up!!! Apple iPhone FTW!!!

[LAY Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:01PM]

@Mtmrob

Can you please tell us what they did the last time to "stomp" the competition?

[Mtmrob Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:58PM]

@LAY Windows mobile 7 is gonna be a let down.

[masta vaan Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:58PM]

@Mtmrob
Are you trying to get downranked?

[DaHarder Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:03PM]

"As we'd heard, the new UI is a riff on the Zune HD interface,"

Hmm... What a strangely dismissive tone you have there...

Given that the ZUNE GUI is one of the most lauded in the history of mobile devices, why wouldn't they port such a successful effort to their other mobile devices?

[Nilay Patel Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:24PM]

@DaHarder ????? :(

[DaHarder Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:33PM]

@Nilay Patel

No Biggie...

I just found that the tone of tis sentence seemed somewhat 'dismissive', like 'here goes MS with the same old, same old'.

Nothing More... Nothing Less.

[zipp Posted Feb 12th 2010 6:49PM]

@DaHarder

"ZUNE GUI is one of the most lauded in the history of mobile devices"

Really? I mean I'm not at all saying that its a bad UI and I'm not gonna toss an "i" word in here to start a war......but really?.. Most.. lauded... history.. might be a bit to strong.. just say'n

[Naris Posted Feb 12th 2010 7:23PM]

@DaHarder

On one hand I agree with you completely.

On the other hand... it is fairly easy to make the comparison to the iPhone OS on the iPad: Wonderful OS for what it was originally designed for, lukewarm reception for a new product category.

[shifzr Posted Feb 13th 2010 7:29AM]

@DaHarder huh? maybe it's just because i don't know a single person that owns a zune, but i haven't been aware of any lauding of it's UI.

[jaxim Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:03PM]

I hope they release the WinPhone7 and Zune API next week, so developers can start creating apps.

[Musicman247 Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:45PM]

@jaxim
+1

[kukycross Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:24PM]

It will be called Windows Phone not Windows Mobile.

[thunderbollock Posted Feb 12th 2010 5:58PM]

An e-mail has been sent to confirm your e-mail address, as well as a password for you to use if you comment regularly. Click on the link within the e-mail to activate your comment and password.

What is going on? The email never arrives!

[DaHarder Posted Feb 12th 2010 8:33PM]

@thunderbollock

These forums have been rather 'hit and miss' all day for some reason.

[xconan Posted Feb 12th 2010 10:56PM]

@thunderbollock
did you mean gizmodo???

[Ed T Posted Feb 13th 2010 12:52PM]

@thunderbollock
It's Engadget's nice way of telling you to piss off. It seems the comment system won't allow successive posts from the same user - probably a good idea.

[thunderbollock Posted Feb 13th 2010 2:13PM]

@thunderbollock
That's what I thought but it actually wasn't a successive post. I also tried removing all of the profanity, flaimbait and generally insulting stuff and it still didn't go through! :)

Maybe their bad spelling bot picked it up and trashed it. That would make sense.

[mtnDewFTW Posted Feb 12th 2010 9:21PM]

lol WinMo.. What a joke.
They should just quit. No one cares.

[Mitch Posted Feb 12th 2010 9:22PM]

Isn't this like predicting that EA Sports will release a Madden game next year?

[shifzr Posted Feb 13th 2010 7:26AM]

now, if only i could get myself to care just the least bit ;)

[bluefisch200 Posted Feb 13th 2010 7:44AM]

only 2 days left...can not wait...fanatic...

[jgp Posted Feb 13th 2010 10:09AM]

The wild variation and openness are what I like about WinMo. I guess it's good that they're changing the name, as WinMo won't sullied by this abomination.

I wish HTC would halt development for windows phone seven and make their own OS. Sense OS has a nice ring to it.

[boe Posted Feb 13th 2010 10:20AM]

There are a lot of Android fanboys out there and it is good to have a choice. I think the iphone is one of the best phone OS's I've tried. I have WM 6.5.3 on my old vogue phone and it runs well but I'll admit it is missing the flashy interface of some of the other phone OS's.

I sincerely prefer WM over android for one significant reason - it is more business oriended than android. The nexus one does not natively sync Microsoft Exchange Calendars (no really, it doesn't). It also doesn't let you select what MS Exchange folders in your mailbox you can sync with. There is a program called touchdown which does a good job with those features but to me the native ability to sync with Exchange is about as important as any other feature of a phone (along with good coverage - the reason I don't have an iphone).

I'm hoping MS is smart and includes Voice Command with WM7. Some people don't know about adding software to their phone and VC is a must. I also hope that MS includes the ability to customize your home screen like you can do to a limited degree with HTC touchflo however SPB Pocket Plus ans SPB Phone Suite are fare more functional for displaying what you need to know and giving quick access to critical functions without having to swipe in an attempt to look cool.

I actually have hope for WM7 however I wouldn't complain if a CDMA/GSM version of the iphone was released this year as well. I have high hopes for Android as well as it is improving quickly however 2.1 isn't yet ready for business users I support. I have some clients with the nexus one as they have to try the latest and greatest - it shows tremendous promise but they went back to their old phones for now.

I support BB, Palm Pre's and Nokia phones as well but I'm not a big fan but my BB clients really like them although I've had a few more just go over to the TP2. I have several clients with Palm Pre's but none of them plan on buying another Palm device. Perhaps Web OS 2.0 will make them more inclined and some nicer hardware. The Nokias seem very durable but not well received by my US clients.