All about the new Windows 7 phone

Coming this Christmas, according to Microsoft’s website is Microsoft’s frankenphone, the windows 7 phone. So, how did they build it? Well, to tell the truth, I doubt it’s actually finished yet. But, desperate to hold onto even a tiny portion of the smartphone marketplace, they’ve made the announcement that the Windows 7 phone is coming…so what is it?
First, Frankenphone is built with the muscles of the xbox live system to bring a growing library of XBox games to the phone. This is actually a pretty good idea. Microsoft bought their way into the marketplace with the X-Box, so they’re reaping what they’ve sewn there. Lots of games will probably have scaled down versions to run on the phone…outcome…also attacking the Nintendo DS and the PSP from Sony in the process.
Next, we add the skeleton of the Frankenphone…it does away with their lame miniature windows desktop…everything was always too darn small to quickly read anyway. They’ve essentially made the phone’s desktop one WIDE desktop that you scroll across iPhone or HTC touch-style. It isn’t too bad to look at either. This is a more novel concept than Microsoft’s previous efforts.
Predictably, Microsoft has put the musical talents of their Zune mp3 player into the phone…also to compete with iPhone’s iPod capability. I see nothing wrong here…as long Microsoft can put out a device that can hold more than 16 GB to start. Previous windows smartphones have been notorious until just recently of being skimpy on the storage space.
Fortunately (or unfortunately) the Windows 7 phone will feed the facebook/twitter/myspace habit of reporting your every move, to all those services at once. These form the eyes and ears. They of course are still begging you to try their own drug, Windows Live, which I think only about 40 people in Seattle actually use.
The Device shown has done away with as many buttons as possible, in favor of using the touch screen to text input, selections, etc. While they don’t show that the device’s screen orientates like the iPhone and HTC Touch series, it can sync wirelessly, through wi-fi, which means that you are going to want to have it in your home if you don’t already. For searching the phone as well as Internet, they continue to shove their behemoth Bing down our throats. I guess Microsoft still refuses to believe the search engine war is over.
The most important thing, APPS, seemed to be blatantly missing. Instead, Microsoft wants you to turn to the web to use maps, directions, and other information.
As my previous posts have said, if Microsoft makes the phone flash ready, outlook ready, and windows media and able to use quicktime/apple music-formatted files, it could be powerful competition to the almighty iPhone.
The other little thing missing from their presentation is, how do I say it, how good a phone is it? They showed no phone features or even a dial pad on their multimedia presentation. Did they forget about the phone part? This, from the company that brought you Vista. Kinda sad that they left that out, isn’t it?

Want to learn more? Check out http://www.windowsphone7series.com.

Observations/shortcomings of the iPhone

Well, we’ve had nearly a month to work out the kinks of the iPhone 3GS. I’ve got some common sense observations of what we like and what we don’t like.

First thing we like is the ease of use. It’s a very easy to use phone, and the visual voicemail is a plus. It’s truly a terrific phone. The next thing we like is how email is presented on the phone. The “virtual push” works nicely, as nice as Blackberry. Just turn off the new email notification and voila, no email addiction. E-Mail is easy to read on the iPhone, and you can enlarge the text quickly. We also like how well Safari works with the Web. It’s easy to surf pages that are not intended for mobile devices, and the ones that are, well, they look and work as clean as if they were apps, written for the Apple App Store.

The iPhone is billed as a smartphone. It does have a huge application library, so about whatever you can think of, “yes Virginia, they do have an app for that.” To have that kind of “buy-in” by developers makes iPhone the best device on the market.

However, business people like myself note a few very obvious shortcomings. The first shortcoming is with MS Outlook syncronization. All sync is done through iTunes. So, iTunes has clearly become Apple’s beachhead on the battle of the PC war. So, you would think that iphone email would sync up with the iPhone, right? Wrong, they only sync your ACCOUNT SETTINGS. But other than that, the POP3 email world has to be see double. Yup. Yup. Every email twice. Every email twice. One can clearly see how that would be counter-productive. So, while we can switch to IMAP, and put the sync problems to the mail server, all Microsoft Outlook’s collaboration efforts such as tasks, appointments, and calendar functions don’t work well in IMAP.

Second, Outlook users find that their task lists don’t come over to the iPhone. Why? Because Apple’s made in California, where employees don’t shave or cut our hair very often and like to wear socks with sandles when it gets cold. Don’t believe me? Go see the Apple store’s employees at the St. Louis Galleria. It’s their “corporate flair”.

The last thing we don’t like is how it handles, or should we say doesn’t handle flash or windows media files. Many people use flash. There’s a tremendous amount of Flash games out there. Apple’s support of Flash would truly kill the Blackberry dead, as RIM truly deserves to die. If the media viewer would support files other than Apple’s precious quicktime, the iPhone would also end the terrible Windows Mobile Smartphone altogether. Taking both rivals down seems easy, so I wonder what’s Apple’s problem?

Come on Apple…the World uses Microsoft Office. They use Outlook ’cause it’s a complete collaboration tool and iPhone at a MINIMUM should do everything outlook can do. I firmly believe this, because, Apple proves time and time again, that they can. Just get a haircut and look at the big picture.

-c-

You phone, we phone, iPhone

Well, after working with our new ATT FUZE phones from AT&T Wireless, for nearly a year, I had the following happen.

I was at my office all day one Friday, waiting for business, and catching up on paperwork. Disheartened, the phone did not ring at all that day. Over the weekend, Sunday morning, to be precise, I decided to reset my phone (those of you with Windows Mobile SmartPhones know what I’m talking about). I reset the phone, then lo and behold, I had two voicemail messages.

These voicemail messages were from new customers, and when I returned the calls on Sunday, they had already fufilled their business needs elsewhere.

Shoddy service, poor reception, dropped calls, these are all things we’ve come to expect from our wireless phones. However, missing business opportunities is simply not acceptable.

So, The following Monday I telephoned ATT about the situation and that it would not continue. They were going to have to “step up” or be “stepped on.” There’s no excuses. So, they reset my contract and gave us the new customer pricing on iPhones for Lolly and I. So, Once again, we’re into the mass confusion of mass communication with new telephones.

More to come.

-c-

Sneak Peek at our 2010 Yellow Pages Ad

2010 Yellow Pages Ad

Hey…how about some free software from Microsoft

The next incarnation of Microsoft Office, Office 2010, has now gone public in a freely downloadable beta version. Anyone can try out time-limited versions of the next generation of the Microsoft Office Suite. Here’s the skinny…if you’re on 2000 or 2003, time to upgrade, if you’re on 2007, not so much.

Here’s the Link: Office 2010 Beta

-Chris@SteelHorseComputers.com

Windows 7 = Vista - BS + Brains

Well, I’ve done my first full install of Windows 7. Yes, I knew about the beta, and yes, we’re part of Microsoft MAPS.  But, they only sent me 32 bit software and I needed 64, so I downloaded the 3 gb iso file and put it on a DVD and ran the upgrade.  Here’s my thoughts so far.

1.  Since when have you needed a bluetooth driver for a device?  I thought bluetooth was a communication method…yes the bluetooth device AKA dongle needs a driver…but not, say, a phone.  So, I got my phone connected again by old fashioned USB until I can find a solution.

2. Based on my experiences during install and running some programs, I think my company’s IT services are still going to be needed for a very long time.

Anyway, overall, 7 is much faster than Vista, once you get the hang of “put a pin in it” organizing and using the “meta data” collection of the new “libraries” feature you’re going to love it.

-c-

Yeah, we take ‘em

CEO of Steel Horse Computers

Starting October 1st 2009, in time for the holiday season, Steel Horse Computers will accept “plastic fantastic”. That’s right…Visa, MasterCard, and my very favorite, Discover are accepted. We’ll have a mobile terminal which connects via telephone or ethernet to swipe your card and pay on the spot. We’ll follow up with an email invoice…and it’s all “in the bag”

Steel Horse Computers is a full service Computer Repair Solution

We visit St. Louis Missouri and the metro-east area providing computer repair service for residential and commercial. We offer 24 hour emergency computer repair service and can help you with new computer equipment such as laptop computers, notebook computers, netbook computers, monitors, PC, and more. If you need PC or MAC computer service in St. Louis Missouri MO, Belleville, O’Fallon, Fairview Heights, Illinois or anywhere in the metro-east, call 618-698-6350 24 hours. You can speak with a live agent or leave a phone message for a return call ASAP.

We’re going to have you seeing Yellow!

Steel Horse Computers is now listed in the AT&T Yellow pages in under Computers.  Ok, too tired to go get your phone book and look?  That’s ok, I have included a link for you .  Steel Horse Computers Yellow pages Ad.

It’s Like Saying “goodbye” to an Old Friend

Well, it was the 261st time I dropped by Palm Treo 680 that was the time that the screen finally gave up the ghost.  And by that, i mean the screen cracked and the black, inky ghost oozed out of the screen.

So, I spent an agonizing 2 hours trying to 1.  Rip apart an old treo 650 that I had to see if i could replace the screen, and 2. try to get the other treo 650 battery to take a charge so I could transfer my backup data on the PC to it.  While the screen replacement was a success, there was no picture.  It seems that the screens are not forwards compatible.  I did get the other treo to take a charge, so I was back up and running in an hour.   Thank heavens for backups!

So, I gave my treo device a fitting burial in a drawer with our other older phones and began the quest for a new phone to run my business.  What to choose.  Iphone?  Oh please no.  The only thing i’m trading a keyboard for is voice command, and believe me, we’re not there yet.  I tried to stay with our current carrier, T-Mobile, but the three different agents I spoke with said, yeah, you’ll probably want to switch carriers.  So, who?  Well, I spoke with Glenn Carr of French Country Waterways, Ltd. who told me he was happy with the 3G service from AT&T Wireless.

You see, my wife Laurie and I have always had the same phone to ensure compatibility with each others tech.  Last time, her phone decided to take a swim, this time it seems was my turn to cause the need to upgrade our phones.

I researched online and at St. Clair Square, and I found several devices that might work.  When I went online, I found that most of those devices were the same phone, just with different names.  I won’t bore you with the details, but OMG what confusion.  Maybe I should start selling wireless!  But I digress.

So, we ended up choosing the AT&T Fuze. I found though htc online you could get the phone for $100 with a $100 rebate.  So, the price seemed right.  And AT&T was happy to match that price.  (Online they are $350 with a $100 rebate).

She and I went to the store together to purchase them and I have to tell you, it was like getting a new friend.  We hadn’t upgraded in several years, and frankly, I’d been using a palm since 1994 and a palm phone since 1996 so I we were all shock and awe over the fuze’s features, including a 3.2 mp camera WITH FLASH.  Here’s the first photo I took with it, in the store of Lolly.

Lolly Frillman at the AT&T Store

So, we’re open for business, but we’re feeling the same pain of new technology in our lives just like all of you.  And I’m here to tell you, it isn’t easy, but once you get it to click, man, it’s really awesome!

We’re ready to service you 24/7 at 618-698-6350.

-c-