Database Users

I need pros/cons for buying a Touch Dual

I am going to swap cellular carriers and want to buy a Touch Dual. I already have a CDMA Touch and know its features well, but what are the main differences betwenn the touch and the touch dual. I know the dual has a slide out keyboard and a smaller screen, but what else is different. What are your like and dislikes?

I suppose you can easily find out about most of the good/bad features simply by reading one of many reviews available via Google search. So, perhaps I'll try to point out some things that are often left out of reviews.
Touchflo - This is over-hyped. The default Touchcube is quite useless because of the unintuitive choice of shortcuts. Prepare to have to mess around with registry and image files to get the Touchcube the way you want it. Grab-to-scroll is great, but it's nothing exciting nowadays.
The new photo viewer - Also over-hyped. The gestures take time to get used to. Performance is slow if your photo collection gets large. Most importantly, it doesn't allow you to organize your photos in directories. I've since ditched this for Resco's Photo Viewer.
The HTC Home plug-in - Arguably the best Today screen plug-in available.
WM6 - Will offer you limitless customization options if you are willing to take risks with registry and ROM files.
The camera - Almost unusable. Blurry photos unless you steady your hand against a solid object. This is either caused by an extremely slow shutter speed or it's a driver issue. The consensus is that it's the latter. Fortunately, HTC will be releasing proper drivers soon.
Internet Explorer - The default browser is useless. There's a bug that makes viewing large pages painful. The more you scroll away from the top, the more lag you experience with scrolling. Fortunately, there a fix for that here in this forum. Also, you will need to add PIE+ if you want any functionality out of the browser.
HTC Audio Manager - This is quite nice to use personally. Don't understand why some prefer WMP. But I suppose this is a personal preference thing. The sound skips every few minutes. But it's not a big deal.
As a phone, the Touch Dual is a dream come true. There are so many ways to dial. You can use your quick contacts. You can scroll through the contacts list. Or you can simply begin typing your contact's name or number and it will search through your contact list in real-time. This is simply great. Writing SMS and emails are great either with the touch screen or the keypad. Absolutely flawless as a phone.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=368144
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=361548
is it that hard to perform a search?

Stay away from the latest HTC phones until they've fixed that driver issue (www.htcclassaction.org).

DaVince said:
Stay away from the latest HTC phones until they've fixed that driver issue (www.htcclassaction.org).
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That's your choice, I like the Dual and feel that is as fast as I need.

bydandie said:
That's your choice, I like the Dual and feel that is as fast as I need.
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Agreed. It has it's flaws. But it is still a sweet device. After some tweaks, I'd it is a joy to use. And if HTC is going to release drivers as speculated, then it's just going to be that much better.

DaVince said:
Stay away from the latest HTC phones until they've fixed that driver issue (www.htcclassaction.org).
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Its only an issue if you're a serious gamer though. And a serious gamer would be more likely to use a different device?

Unfortunately, it's not just with games and video. It's the entire GUI itself. You can't even scroll without getting agitated! Imagine running your PC in safe mode.. Or running your PC with the default VGA drivers.
For those who insist on getting a Niki. Go ahead. you're the one getting screwed anyways.

x2 to be Android?

http://www.neowin.net/news/main/08/12/11/sony-ericsson-joins-the-open-handset-alliance
Having just released their very first Windows Mobile based device, the Xperia X1, it seems as though Sony Ericsson is not willing to rest on it's laurels, for too long. The company has just announced it's entry into the Open Handset Alliance. By doing so, Sony Ericsson has confirmed it's intention on developing a handset based on Google's Android mobile operating system.
Rikko Sakaguchi, Chief Vice President and head of Creation and Development at Sony Ericsson, in speaking of the move said, "We believe Sony Ericsson can bring a wealth of experience in making consumer focused multimedia handsets with new user experience to the Alliance." He continued, "Sony Ericsson is a strong supporter of open operating systems and we believe the Open Handset Alliance offers an exciting opportunity for a new and unique user experience only Sony Ericsson can deliver."
With support for Android picking up quickly, one has to wonder what will be done to make sure Windows Mobile and Symbian, Android's main rivals in the mobile operating system market, continue to hold or grow their market share.
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From my point of view, i guess at least 1 model of each must hit the market at the same time.
in other words, a new windows mobile will be released and a new device with Android during the same period.
this will give them an impression about which one is preferred by the end users. specially after this huge success of X1 (even though it's the first SE WM), i guess SE will not give up on Microsoft easily.

I think that the manufacturer that gives you the option of which OS you want to run will be the biggest successfull smartphone of recent times - you can choose which OS you want to run on a PC, why not a phone, pay the ms licence fee for windows mobile, and give the end user their own choice... that way MS are happy, the manufacturer is selling the phones, and we would be loving it!

rosebud said:
that way MS are happy...
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I don't think so!

I think in the mobile arena people are not concerned about the OS more the UI.
Unlike the PC market where the OS dictates what the UI look like. The mobile market is vastly different. Both with Android and WinMo you can alter what the UI looks like (Not so with iPhone)
As long as manufacturers of the hardware don't lock down the phone to a specific UI then I think they'll be on to a winner. (That's why i didn't want an iPhone)

They certainly haven't hit the sweet spot yet.
Windows Mobile is too PC like, its awkward to use without a stylus. Panels are no replacement for that either as we already need third-party apps for something.
Android from what I have seen (which is not much) seems to be more a traditional phone interface, which I suspect is not PC enough.
The problem is, you can't sacrifice the PC features for the sake of making it more thumb friendly otherwise you might as well have bought a normal phone. However WM is also far from the ease of use of a normal phone which gets annoying sometimes when all you want to do is make a call.
Is it even possible to solve both those problems? Panels certainly was an attempt which I am not so sure about yet. Its far too "stuck on top". I get not wanting it to take over the phone, I wouldn't want that either, but it would be helpful sometimes to have the X1 in "phone priority mode" where it imitates a phone keeping the PC stuff in the background. If I want to choose a contact, make a call, send a text, its overly complicated and time consuming in WM and having to wait for Panels to load makes it no faster either.

Alex Atkin UK said:
If I want to choose a contact, make a call, send a text, its overly complicated and time consuming in WM and having to wait for Panels to load makes it no faster either.
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To be honest, I don't find what you described here much different than other phone that I have used such as say Symbian....
I am not sure why you find it overly complicated and time consuming, but making a call and sending a message isn't harder to me at least... you just open contacts (or use the "Call button") type in the name (or number in the phone screen) and there you go........... I can't imagine it being any better really.

erichui said:
To be honest, I don't find what you described here much different than other phone that I have used such as say Symbian....
I am not sure why you find it overly complicated and time consuming, but making a call and sending a message isn't harder to me at least... you just open contacts (or use the "Call button") type in the name (or number in the phone screen) and there you go........... I can't imagine it being any better really.
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I agree.... coming from a iphone I just dont see any different to make a call between the 2 os.... I still have to click on the phone button, then click on the number to make a call... same thing on the sms.... or maybe Alex have a different approach or he doesnt know which button to click to make a call
in terms of "thumb friendly"... the only thing that I find that the x1 is not is that the screen size is small compare to the iphone. Otherwise while the x1's screen use pressure instead of capacitance, I dont find it a lot different than the iphone...

Well for a start, what is the quickest/easiest way to get to the messaging app?
I do it via the today screen which is REALLY easy to hit the wrong line.
Then there's editing your contacts. This is REALLY fiddly on WM because its a pure Windows interface so the best chance of not hitting the wrong line is to get the stylus out.
One problem is that I want small fonts so I can fit more text on the screen, but often the size of the area you click is related to the font size. So if you have small fonts its harder to use with your finger.
Panels on the other hand are great in theory, but they are so slow at loading due to being all separate apps. They need to load a LOT quicker.
It also does not help the lack of 2D/3D acceleration so the CPU gets hammered doing really basic things which can cause scrolling to stutter, apps to hang, etc. So its not all WM at fault here, the whole OpenGL not available to the OS on the Qualcomm chipsets is a big issue for usability.

New UI Shame its not real yet

Came across this in my day to day surfing, looks pretty promising
http://www.larvalabs.com/product_pages/intelligent_home_screen.html

Looks pretty, but looks limiting on what it can show IMHO. Would far rather have the 7 Home screens I already have

Kind of reminds me of WinMo 6.5's new Today screen plugin, which is sorta pretty, but yes, very limiting compared to HTC's TouchFlo. I agree with JoeMax. It's pretty, but I would feel restricted. I'd much rather see MOTOBLUR make its way to HTC devices, thus bringing all the information to the today screen, while still allowing multiple home screens.

It does borrow from 6.5/Zune in its look.
Sometimes though I do crave a simpler home screen without having to swipe.

I like the simplicity behind it. Its information driven and maximizes the use of screen space to show stuff that matters (as opposed to an icon or fancy-smancy graphics ) I would definitely use this when it comes out.

Biffert said:
I like the simplicity behind it. Its information driven and maximizes the use of screen space to show stuff that matters (as opposed to an icon or fancy-smancy graphics ) I would definitely use this when it comes out.
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They have posted info about the beta program for this app.
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dHlBNm5IYzlMYkJOam4tU2gxMWNJVnc6MA

I have had a try of this in beta form a few weeks ago, the concept is nice but it is very very buggy and wasnt very speedy either..
It does have some promise though

Good for communication junkies...for everything else it sucks.

it's good for those who don't need tons of their apps on homescreen
i have it on my hero (beta10 now), and it's very nice. fast in this version, not so many bugs, simple...
for me it's great. waitng for stable release

i don't like it, because its just a list and has no real structure, besides list sorting. I hated how wm 6.5 introduced something similar, just a text list. The most ugly text list i have ever seen was on wm 6.5...
I prefer a mixture of apps shortcuts and widgets like i'm having on my HTC Hero now. And a little bit spacing does help to get a better overview imo. On this list all the information is very cluttered together, but still somehow confusing because of the small font size and the lack of information on some rows.

Shahpur.Azizpour said:
i don't like it, because its just a list and has no real structure, besides list sorting. I hated how wm 6.5 introduced something similar, just a text list. The most ugly text list i have ever seen was on wm 6.5...
I prefer a mixture of apps shortcuts and widgets like i'm having on my HTC Hero now. And a little bit spacing does help to get a better overview imo. On this list all the information is very cluttered together, but still somehow confusing because of the small font size and the lack of information on some rows.
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i agree it looks like a cheap copy of titanium witch i dont like anyway lol

I've been playing around with it now for the last week & apart from a few little problems (It doesn't update itself with notifications dynamicly such as text messages, only periodically) I really like it.
It desperately needs to have a shortcuts function to my favourite applications & also to the wireless controls but other then that I think that this is a solid alternative to the typical widgets based interface that everyone is doing at the moment.

How would you change HD2 ?

Maybe HTC is reading this forum, so I start a thread for your changes and wishes for HD2. My changes are (wishes for HD3):
- Oled display
- display with capacitive sensors AND press sensitivity , for gloves, finger nails, stylus
- More battery power or less power consumption
- Hardware GPU support for ALL applications !!!
- TV - Out with adapter
- Hardware Buttons in better quality AND going inside (like iphone , Grr) , so you don´t press always any button if you just take the phone in your hand
- Maybe better CPU power or dualcore. I don´t need it right now, but 1 year is a long time and I want to avoid that htc use the same CPU for another 5 years as in the past
- Camera with 720 p video and better lenses.
- stronger WiFi connections
And my manila wishes are:
- manila style Task manger / switcher
- manila style task management tool instead of MS office old thing.
- manila style notes
- manila style counter and stopwatch, like it is in Android right now.
- manila style Email client !!
- better album application, with easy folders access.
- much better mp3 player ! : I want rate my music (and sync, of course), intelligent playlists for my own ( 4 stars, for example), I want to search for music with keyboard and switch fast though it with letters on the right side to jump to S for example. The last two wishes are already there, in the contact manager !! I want the same for music and video ! Better caching of thumbnails, there should be no reload every time I scroll. (same as contacts, there IS no reload !! right now )
- video player with folders and DETAILED view: I want an image AND the name of the movie ! Most time you can´t see what file it is, because it is just a small image . Rateing and playlists, too. And of course keyboard search and Jump to letter, just the same interface for contacts, music, videos, Footprints, weather cities with same slight modifications for each area.
- manila style google maps application with smooth !! multitouch.
- Opera 10 with multitouch, of course.
And : SAVE AND SNYC with ALL Manila and System settings with my desktop or in a file at least !!!!!
Imagine, you do a Rom Update or Hard Reset, just load this settings file and ALL your favorites and "make it mine" settings are back, without hours of tweaking again, your email is set up again, you weathers, your ringtone, ALL of it ! What a dream.......

edit - deleted until HansZimmer version 3 is released with a better humour chip.

I don´t understand your message. Do you think HTC is not going further anymore ? I don´t think so and just want to tell what for me as customer is important for the next device. And as far as I know htc is building the devices for us customers, so I let them know which areas are important for me. If you don´t have anything to tell about this subject, please let you opinion on another place. thank you.

How would I change HD2? I'd have it fulfill all the promises on the box and the specs: SMS without anguish, all notifications working as advertised, OS that worked out of the box and not needing constant hotfixes, a battery that doesn't have you constantly scoping out the next available wall plug...
Shall I go on?

Yes, please. This is the why I started this thread

Hardware: Nothing. I'd say it's perfect for now. No doubt it will be improved with faster processor, more memory, wimax in the future, but that's how it goes, and for its time it's just perfect.
Software: A "bigger" Sense. As in continue what has been done now, and "finish" putting that excellent layer over the old WM to hide it completely. But I'm pretty sure that's what WM7 will be. And don't forget to store a whole lot of settings in the registry so that we cant continue to tweak them to our own liking
Also, unified software and hardware specs to ensure inter-device compatibility, so we dont have software that works on some devices but not others, or miss support for hardware capabilities anymore, and a marketplace that goes with it. Also part of it as it seems.

longer battery, more than 3 alarms
that's it

imagine an HD2 with the same buttons on both side of the screen but the middle buttons are dpads/trackpads/touch screen maybe even track balls!

Audio Oblivion said:
imagine an HD2 with the same buttons on both side of the screen but the middle buttons are dpads/trackpads/touch screen maybe even track balls!
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I'd love that! It'd be like the HP iPAQ hx4700 (4" VGA display PDA), which I LOVE. Buttons on sides and trackpad in the middle. Though I wouldn't want to make it bigger or make the screen smaller...

Stereo speakers. Such a beautiful device needs beefy sound to complete the package.
Bigger internal storage.
Sense should BE the default UI for Windows Mobile... forever. It is the most beautiful UI on any Phone OS to date!

HTC Should build their own proprietary OS just for their phones so that it is tailored to work the best in terms of speed and stability. And not some overlay on another OS. Love my HD2 tho!

The HTC HD2 is almost perfect! What changes I would like to see...hmmm...easy
1- Remove the camera protrusion in the rear.
2- TV-out
3- More internal memory
4- Video Call feature
5- Built-in VoIP SIP
What I would "want" them to do...
a- capablity to install Xeon QuadCore processor chip
b- Twin Hyper cooling fans for the processor
c- Night vision with heat/UV vision camera
d- Direct Blu-Ray quality video recording
e- Capablity to Plugin a USB external HDD
...think I've oozed out too much greed....I'll just stop now!

athar13 said:
The HTC HD2 is almost perfect! What changes I would like to see...hmmm...easy
1- Remove the camera protrusion in the rear.
2- TV-out
3- More internal memory
4- Video Call feature
5- Built-in VoIP SIP
What I would "want" them to do...
a- capablity to install Xeon QuadCore processor chip
b- Twin Hyper cooling fans for the processor
c- Night vision with heat/UV vision camera
d- Direct Blu-Ray quality video recording
e- Capablity to Plugin a USB external HDD
...think I've oozed out too much greed....I'll just stop now!
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And don't forget this important aspect: purchase price!!
Putting the new HD3 on the market at $199 (€145, £127) would definitly be the best aspect of them all
And don't forget to give all accessories prices like: $27 for car charger, $ 25 for extended battery + cover etc..
Ah well... we'll have to keep dreaming, 'cause who knows what the 'evil' minds of HTC are up to next
Grtz,
Degake

santahtc,
yes, bring us good stereo speakers as my sharp 903 had.
and an always accessible SDhc card slot.
and a flat back, not that surfboard one!

I'd like the HD2 to have a more constructive forum on xda, where there's less trolls and flamers. Other than that, I can't fault it.

A touchscreen that enables typing would be nice. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=595655

See what I mean

johncmolyneux said:
See what I mean
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lol I was expecting just that.
There is nothing wrong in pointing the good and the bad stuff.. I happen to be one who has those problems... Shouldn't I be looking for solutions?
Cheers mate! Peace!

Is it just me, or are people wanting a quad core laptop in a smartphone...
The reason I got the HD2 was to combine my phone, PDA and media player, and it does
My pockets are so light now.
One thing, I wish I could lock the screen during music/video playback I want to see the screen and not pause the playback accidentally

USB host
Video Out
Better battery performance
IrDa to control my TV

Win 8 Metro Poll and discussion - No FUD aloud!!

Righty folks, heres a quick poll, I think the results will be very interesting, anyone is welcome to vote
The discussion however is for objective views and opinions from people who have actually used and tested the OS for a reasonable amount of time, that's to say more than a hand full of days!
Views like "ive read" Ive heard" "Its crap" mean precisely bugger all and are not welcome. Anyone who binned it after 5 min or couldn't be bothered to understand it because it didn't have a start button need not bother to grace us with your presence.
This is not a place to spread FUD, start flame fests or simply come on to moan about it.
Im not saying we all must agree, im saying we need to be able to support that opinion with evidence, we are after all, Microsoft testers, it would be good to support one another and share what we have learnt and help others out.
Let the fun and games commence!

After using consumer preview since its release i have grown to love the interface. I have to use windows 7 on my college's computers and the start button feels so counter intuitive. All of the old functionality still remains if anyone wants to use it. Also, the os as a whole is much faster than 7. My two biggest complaints about windows 8 are the random crashes when exiting sleep and the general lack of drivers, both of which are expected during a beta stage.
Sent from my handheld Linux computer using electromagnetic radiation.

I installed windows 8 the day the consumer preview came out and overall I have to say it’s been a positive experience. There was a slight learning curve, nothing that a few hours and reading the proper documentation could not fix. Although I feel this was slightly due to the fact the charm bar does not seem to respond very well with two monitors, but in all fairness Ctrl + c works fine and I am more comfortable with shortcuts.
A few things I did the metro icons were not very crisp on a large display which is something that I am very nitpicky about. I also wish there was more of a windows phone influence with regards to the metro apps, currently a lot of the apps are just a long horizontal scrolling applications. I would of much preferred titled sections on a continuous loop that when clicked the title you are moved to that section like in wp7.
Currently scrolling around looks ugly and a little clumsy for instance the weather app to me looks horrible. All in all not really that much has changed its is still really just windows with an addition screen that doubles as a start screen and a way to communicate more information then there previously has been in windows.

indeed, ive got a few driver issues as well, but as you say, that is to be expected in its current form.
multi monitor setups are a big issue, trying to get the "zones" can be a bit of a pain, I dare say you'd get used to it but I think this could be easily overcome and is a design fault that needs fixed
Ideally id like to see metro being transferable to different monitors, whilst maintaining the primary monitor else where.
Something else I agree on is the Windows Phone influence, there needs to be more of it, I realise this is beta still but the people tile is terrible when compared to WP, id presume you would allow groups as well...
Something else id like to see imported to this idea is the ability to sync text messages in to the people tile as well, making the Metro UI an extension of WP, their half way there already and would also provide a convent backup solution for WP. The size of txt messages could easily be transferred when your live account syncs every now and then, meaning you would be able to get home, put your WP down, fire up Windows and instantly be able to work with metro containing all the info available on your phone.
In my opinion, if there going to join the platforms then they may as well do it propperly.

I have used it for about 3 weeks now but i am still unsure whether it should be released along with the desktop OS when the RC comes out. tbh I see what they're trying to do, but it's a very bad move for desktop / laptops (unless touchscreen). Compatibility to older windows programs is limited and it's more of an annoyance than anything helpful. They tried to emulate the launch control in Mac with extra features, but i fail to see how this is revolutionary to desktop pcs and such. It just gave you two desktops, one of which you'll rarely use. Of course there are many other things I can complain about, but don't want to rant up this thread lol. Sure it looks pretty and all, but it's more limited than win7 and I don't see how that's a plus.

HaVoKeR said:
Compatibility to older windows programs is limited and it's more of an annoyance than anything helpful.
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Hows that? im unsure where your coming from on this one as it runs anything ive tried that worked on Win 7 so how is it Limited and annoying?
HaVoKeR said:
It just gave you two desktops, one of which you'll rarely use.
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I presume you mean the Metro UI is rarely used? From what ive seen the key to getting the most out of Metro is to set it up, at the moment there are limited "apps" which make use of the full live tile function but it will get there, the email, messaging , photos, calendar, Music all work fine (all be it we cant use music properly outside of the US just now)
HaVoKeR said:
Sure it looks pretty and all, but it's more limited than win7 and I don't see how that's a plus.
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I don't see how its more limited? can you explain that? Metro is just a layer on top of the desktop, personally I cant see any less functionality.

HaVoKeR said:
I have used it for about 3 weeks now but i am still unsure whether it should be released along with the desktop OS when the RC comes out. tbh I see what they're trying to do, but it's a very bad move for desktop / laptops (unless touchscreen). Compatibility to older windows programs is limited and it's more of an annoyance than anything helpful. They tried to emulate the launch control in Mac with extra features, but i fail to see how this is revolutionary to desktop pcs and such. It just gave you two desktops, one of which you'll rarely use. Of course there are many other things I can complain about, but don't want to rant up this thread lol. Sure it looks pretty and all, but it's more limited than win7 and I don't see how that's a plus.
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Howso? I use all the older programs that I've always used, It's not limited and it's not an annoyance. How are they trying to emulate Launch Control when the Metro UI dates back to before Launch Control (It's been there since WP7's release which was before Lion's)? I actually use both desktops fairly equally.
Edit: I actually have a correction to that Metro UI has been there since Microsoft released the Zune Player software for PC and Zune devices. So it's effectively been around before Launch Control and Lion.
Answering the poll:
Over 2 weeks and Overall Like. I love being able to see everything at a glance when I start Windows, I love the Metro Applications (Especially the Live Communication Applications). It truly is a step forward from the old, dated menu based interface and a step forward that I welcome. I used to switch OSes every few months because I'd get bored with how Windows looked and how limited I was with customizing it, but 8's changes give me the integration and customization that I like I love the Google Calendar sync, I finally have one calendar across all my devices ^_^, Can't wait to see what changes in RC. I just hope they don't bring back the Start Orb/Menu.
Edit: I would love to at least be able to post status changes to social networks in people though and I'm especially hoping for a Windows 8 Google Voice client so I don't have to open my web browser or look at my phone (especially if my phone's dead) to continue sending/receiving messages. I was going to make one in Developer's Preview but I couldn't find a suitable third-party API that supported receiving messages and I couldn't figure out XAML or the Metro Designer...
Also Dazza: I agree, I don't see any less functionality. Rather I see an increase of productivity and functionality.

I couldn't agree more,
The People Hub on here is pretty bad, course its a preview app so I would hope there will be some significant changes. In fact to make it easy for them, I want WP7 People hub on Windows 8, simple as that.
The challenge would be horizontal scrolling as apposed to vertical given that most of us have wide screen, at the moment its a huge waste of space and not very useful.
The messenger app could do with being linked in to FB in much the same way as WP7, in fact once again, just bring it all over, The people, messaging, email etc are probable some of the most efficient designs ive ever seen on a phone, given that Metro is supposed to be a quick efficient way of doing stuff they would do well to keep that the same and let outlook etc take care of the nitty gritty side to things.
edit:
Looks like that results stacking up, by an large the biggest portion of folk like it, and out of those that don't most of those in % terms haven't used it for very long at all. Just goes to show!

I like it alot. I'd be using it as my main OS already if drivers were available for a couple of my devices.
I've always loved the WP7 UI so Metro is great for me. A little bit more work needs doing on the integration of the desktop with Metro though. Just to make things a little more fluid.
I've got Windows 8 installed on both my main PC and my HP TM2 laptop so have given the touch gestures a go too which work really well.

adamwebb28 said:
I like it alot. I'd be using it as my main OS already if drivers were available for a couple of my devices.
I've always loved the WP7 UI so Metro is great for me. A little bit more work needs doing on the integration of the desktop with Metro though. Just to make things a little more fluid.
I've got Windows 8 installed on both my main PC and my HP TM2 laptop so have given the touch gestures a go too which work really well.
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i was reading on the MS blog that whilst it will run on win7 touch hardware, win 8 hardware has been tweeked even further, have you noticed any issues, especially around fingers moving on to the screen from the sides to quickly? and tap lag (typing to quick an missing letters!)?

dazza9075 said:
i was reading on the MS blog that whilst it will run on win7 touch hardware, win 8 hardware has been tweeked even further, have you noticed any issues, especially around fingers moving on to the screen from the sides to quickly? and tap lag (typing to quick an missing letters!)?
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I'll be honest, I haven't done much with using the on screen keyboard. But certainly not had any problems with swiping onto the screen.
The couple of times I have used the on screen keyboard it hasn't felt much better than the old touch keyboard in windows 7.

For tablet: like it very very much.
For desktop: dislike.
I will never use metro on my desktop PC. Why ? Because it cant display more than 1 app ( nope, 1/4 sized app pinned to left or right side does not count for me ). I will never use metro apps on desktop pc, and i think most people wont...so what is it there for ?
I have nothing against metro, and i like the tiles design. But using it on a desktop PC is just not practical for me.

Akiainavas said:
For tablet: like it very very much.
For desktop: dislike.
I will never use metro on my desktop PC. Why ? Because it cant display more than 1 app ( nope, 1/4 sized app pinned to left or right side does not count for me ). I will never use metro apps on desktop pc, and i think most people wont...so what is it there for ?
I have nothing against metro, and i like the tiles design. But using it on a desktop PC is just not practical for me.
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I see what your saying, but I question your expectation of it.
potentially it displays dozens of "informative apps" opening each app separately then gives you more detail. Consider Metro to be similar to your mobile phone, can you display several windows at once on your phone? unless your using WM probably not but what your phone does is displays you lots of bits of information usually very well. Metro takes this idea and gives it to your PC, a single key press will give you access to stacks of information at a glance, another key press gives you multi windowed windows, or if the metro app is any good you can fire it up in full screen.
Metro is a tool that on the desktop actually works great with impressive levels of productivity, metro on a tablet allows you a great level of finger friendly UI, desktop remains there all be it in a slightly less finger friendly fashion (bumping up the DPI can help here tho!)

dazza9075 said:
what your phone does is displays you lots of bits of information usually very well. Metro takes this idea and gives it to your PC, a single key press will give you access to stacks of information at a glance,
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Well, yeah that's actually pretty useful. Would be great if desktop apps could create and maintain a Live Tile as well, so i could check my mail count etc with Windows key, but not necessarily read it in full-screen metro mode. They can't do that at the moment, but who knows, maybe later.

Akiainavas said:
Well, yeah that's actually pretty useful. Would be great if desktop apps could create and maintain a Live Tile as well, so i could check my mail count etc with Windows key, but not necessarily read it in full-screen metro mode. They can't do that at the moment, but who knows, maybe later.
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do you mean getting your mail program to display on the icon information about whats going on? wouldnt think there is much space to get any real info but if you pin your mail program (for the purpose of all my posts ill say that all desktop programs are programs and metro programs are apps) to your task bar then if the program has been designed correctly then it will display some limited info, outlook works great for me, and tells me how many emails i have sitting there.

HaVoKeR said:
I have used it for about 3 weeks now but i am still unsure whether it should be released along with the desktop OS when the RC comes out. tbh I see what they're trying to do, but it's a very bad move for desktop / laptops (unless touchscreen). Compatibility to older windows programs is limited and it's more of an annoyance than anything helpful. They tried to emulate the launch control in Mac with extra features, but i fail to see how this is revolutionary to desktop pcs and such. It just gave you two desktops, one of which you'll rarely use. Of course there are many other things I can complain about, but don't want to rant up this thread lol. Sure it looks pretty and all, but it's more limited than win7 and I don't see how that's a plus.
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The UI is very different from the Mac and doesn't even work the same. Not sure where you got that - other than all touch interfaces use Icons....
Compatibility is outstanding. I was shocked at how many of my normal use applications ran perfect. For a Beta of a major OS change, the compatibility is excellent.
It's Win 7 AND more new features.
Win 8 will win you over (unless your an Apple fan) once you see how people utilize the OS enhancements.
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Akiainavas said:
For tablet: like it very very much.
For desktop: dislike.
I will never use metro on my desktop PC. Why ? Because it cant display more than 1 app ( nope, 1/4 sized app pinned to left or right side does not count for me ). I will never use metro apps on desktop pc, and i think most people wont...so what is it there for ?
I have nothing against metro, and i like the tiles design. But using it on a desktop PC is just not practical for me.
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I'm not sure what you are talking about. You use the term "app" which to me is one of the little micro applications we use on tablets. Or, are you talking about applications like Streets and Trips, Excel, etc... If you're talking about Metro specifically, then maybe I see what you mean, but I've had multiple ones displayed and running on my laptop although in Metro the sizing is set to 1/3. I did some work with multiple windows between IRFan and Excel and used the old desktop to customize the sizing of the windows. So, again, not sure why you say you can't do it.???

Those same under the hood enhancements could have been made to Windows 7 while keeping and enhancing the Windows 7 UI and called Windows 8 on release (or even a Service pack FFS, look how big XP SP2 was).
It has nothing to do with Apple. It has nothing to do with under the hood improvements that could have been made to 7, anyways (like going from Vista to 7, hello...). It has to do with the jarring and otherwise terrible user experience this release has on non-touch PCs and also for multile monitor users (who are becoming more prevelant with budget graphics cards allowing this and LCD monitors being so cheap nowadays).
I've ran the beta on its own PC. It's terrible for desktop use and will deserve the reviews I'm almost sure it will get when it releases to non-touch users later this year.
Compatibility is always excellent because the Win32 API is forward compatible. There's nothing great, exciting, or unforseen about that. Solaris is UNIX and it has the same backward and forward API compatibility very similar to Windows.
They destroyed Multi-Tasking and generally destroyed the way people use their computers for the sold purpose of pushing their own dumb-down UI metaphor down people's throats. Metro wastes a ton of screen real estate. Look bow big the banners are in many of those apps, and how much odd whitespace is in some of them (Email app, Pictures app, etc.).
Then they throw a highly curated/bastardized version of the explorer shell in as an app and tell us "see, the desktop is still there" even though only Metro apps will be sold directly (and updated directly) via the Windows Store and they're basically deprecating Win32/MFC development, among other things.
I have a hard time calling this a multi-tasking OS, especially if you sit in Metro most of the time.
Sorry, but I'm not sure what YOU'RE talking about.

oh, your here as well, thanks for the constructive feedback, I trust you are using the feedback options within Win 8 to provide MS with your deep insights in to the workings of their BETA product that you asked to test for them
Oh, and Desktop isn't an app, its the desktop, its no different than before and ive not found anything that doesn't work yet strangely enough as i said on the other thread, multi tasking works fine
But anyhow, im not going to bother replying to it all as you seem to have completely made your mind up without really understanding what its all about

dazza9075 said:
oh, your here as well, thanks for the constructive feedback, I trust you are using the feedback options within Win 8 to provide MS with your deep insights in to the workings of their BETA product that you asked to test for them
Oh, and Desktop isn't an app, its the desktop, its no different than before and ive not found anything that doesn't work yet strangely enough as i said on the other thread, multi tasking works fine
But anyhow, im not going to bother replying to it all as you seem to have completely made your mind up without really understanding what its all about
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I stopped giving feedback when they stopped listening to and implementing the most trivial QoL changes in their products.
The Desktop doesn't even have a functioning start menu comparable to Windows Vista or 7 yet you somehow feel compelled to believe it's functionally identical.
Fine is in the eye of the beholder. Being thrown from Desktop to full screen metro apps and only being able to multi-task Metro apps by pinning one to 1/4the screen is a terrible compromise bordering on laughable.
Oh, and have you tried using Windows 8 on a non-touch laptop with only a Trackpad? Laughable...

N8ter said:
I stopped giving feedback when they stopped listening to and implementing the most trivial QoL changes in their products.
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Then why bother downloading it, its for testing purposes only
you have this so unbelievably wrong