125 REASONS NOT TO BUY A WINDOWS PHONE 7.5 WP7.5 (Mango) is already in its second generation but it still has many restrictions, limitations and serious usability issues. This is a list of its shortcomings as compared with other smartphone OS in the market. We are not comparing special features or abilities but those which have become the norm for all smartphones and even dumb phones. An Android, Symbian or MeeGo phone would have very few of these shortcomings. An iphone share some restrictions with WP7.5 but is still miles ahead. Even the Nokia N9 running the first generation MeeGo OS is far better with none of the disastrous issues which impact on the sheer usability of the phone. OS LIMITATIONS 1. No true multitasking - all apps are frozen in the background except for some built-in apps like Zune player. 2. No Divx/Xvid video codec support. Zune will convert with loss of quality. 3. No mass storage mode. 4. No micro-SD card support. 5. No filemanager. Directory system is totally opaque. 6. Need Zune to transfer files. Zune will only transfer photos, videos & music. All other files need to email/upload to yourself. 7. Your contact details are automatically uploaded to cloud service whether you like it or not. 8. Limited to 800x480 resolution. 9. Voice search is hardwired to Bing. 10. Need to edit an MP3 file with strict constraints to be used as a ringtone. 11. Cannot set static IP address. 12. No VPN support for this “corporate enterprise” phone. 13. Cannot sync directly with Outlook without syncing to Cloud 14. Totally closed OS, cannot sideload apps outside MS Marketplace. 15. System font size cannot be changed. 16. Images and photos cannot be renamed in the phone. 17. Windows Live ID account cannot change country once set. 18. No centralized notification page. 19. Alarm clock cannot work when phone is turned off. All Nokia Symbian and Meego phones can do this. 20. The idle screen is completely black and cannot display time or notifications. 21. Only photos allowed as email attachments, documents not allowed. 22. No rSAP Bluetooth profile for car audio streaming. This excludes many popular makes of cars. 23. Cannot stream audio from video to Bluetooth devices (No A2DP profile). 24. Tiles are fixed size and for many functions is a waste of space. 25. Cannot use Bluetooth keyboard. 26. Very limited customization option. 27. 3rd party apps cannot put notifications on the lockscreen 28. No over the air (OTA) firmware upgrade. All upgrades must be via PC installed Zune. 29. Zune can only be installed if you have an internet connection 30. Wifi- hotspot and internet tethering not integral features in the OS but need to be provided by manufacturer on a case by case basis. 31. No HDMI output (Lumia specific) 32. No support for lossless audio format like FLAC and WMA lossless 33. Generally force users to use IE, Bing and SkyDrive by shutting out competitors or tying OS features to them. 34. Compass gives wrong reading in Southern hemisphere. 35. Cannot be upgraded to WP8 (Apollo) USABILITY ISSUES 36. No always visible status bar for battery life, signal strength, carrier, 2G/3G wi-fi, Bluetooth status. 37. Taskmanager has no option to shut down apps you don’t want running in the background. 38. Search and Back button cannot be de-activated in apps or games and easily touched by accident. 39. Lockscreen need to be activated to show missed call/sms notification. 40. No way to close an app except pressing back button all the way to the first screen. 41. Tiny fonts in messages is very hard to read for those over 45. 42. Cannot create and save playlists on the phone. 43. Playlist can only be edited when you are playing it. 44. Cannot search your music collection on the phone, only in the Marketplace. 45. Cannot close music player, can only pause. Music player on lockscreen will stay until you reboot. 46. No draggable progress bar to set position for current track playing. 47. Cannot lock screen orientation. 48. Cannot save draft sms messages. 49. Cannot silence ringtone or alarm by flipping the phone. 50. Call history only show phone number type. If a contact has multiple phone nos. for a type the number used is unknown. 51. Cannot recognize phone numbers in sms or email to save or use as calling number. 52. Text messages can only be deleted one by one or the whole thread. 53. Cannot select multiple pictures for deleting, sending or uploading. They must be done one at a time. 54. No way to see photo details - dimensions, date/time taken, file size, etc 55. Apps are listed alphabetically with no way to group by category. Can be hard to find if you don’t remember the name. 56. Calendar scheduler has no weekly view and monthly view is non-zoomable. 57. No peak/off-peak scheduling for email downloads. 58. Forwarded emails cannot be edited 59. If both wi-fi and data connection are available which one it chooses to use is unpredictable. 60. Option to output FM radio to speaker is cleverly hidden. 61. Cannot add or update podcasts directly from the phone. 62. No global search button for phone content. 63. Hardware search button is of limited use as it is hardwired to Bing. 64. Unable to read long names in audio and video playlist as they get cut off. 65. Alarm does not revert to speaker if headphones are plugged in. 66. If the phone is set to vibrate for incoming calls it will only vibrate once and may lead to missed calls. 67. Silent option for ringer is buried in Settings. FEATURE LIMITATIONS 68. No live wallpaper, no widgets, no themes 69. No haptic feedback for keyboard. 70. No Swype. 71. No flashplayer support. 72. No Silverlight support. 73. No support for Java apps. 74. No call recording or app to do it. 75. No call blocking or app to do it. 76. No screenshots or app to do it. 77. No data monitor and no app to do it. 78. No auto wallpaper changer and no app to do it. 79. Totally locked down os means apps which interact directly with hardware not allowed. This excludes a whole range of useful apps. 80. No equalizer for Zune music player. 81. IE browser has no text reflow, no offline reading and will not download any file it does not recognize. 82. No 3rd party browsers allowed except those based on IE. 83. Volume up/down buttons cannot be used to zoom in camera (sign of an immature os) 84. Cannot open zip or rar files received as email attachment. 85. Cannot send or receive video by MMS. 86. Office Mobile has much less features than 3rd party Office editors like SmartOffice, QuickOffice and Polaris. Shame on you, Microsoft! 87. Mobile Office cannot edit Office 97-2003 documents to force users to upgrade. 88. No native Google maps and Bing maps is useless for most countries outside U.S. 89. Email time stamp does not show the year. 90. Wide difference in apps availability in different markets and users locked to one market. 91. Not all Bing features available outside U.S. especially Local Scout. 92. Cannot reject a call with a sms – a downgrade from Symbian. 93. Cannot set all contacts offline (no calls) except for a designated list – a downgrade from Symbian. DUMB AND DUMBER 94. One volume control for all functions including media playback, ringtones, alarms, notifications. 95. Wi-fi disconnects when screen sleeps. 96. Volume of text message alerts do not automatically reduce when using headphones or when talking on the phone which may cause your ears to be blasted. 97. Can only enter one mobile phone no. for each contact. Mobile nos. entered in other fields will not accept sms. 98. Cannot send/receive MMS without enabling 3G data connection. MMS does not use 3G data. 99. Phone cannot be charged when off. 100. Need to be plugged in to wall charger to sync wirelessly with Zune (a funny definition of wireless). 101. Oversized fonts for headings waste screen space and result in low information density 102. Phone will wake up and display sms content on lockscreen when locked – a privacy violation. 103. Phone can be rebooted without entering security code 104. Internet Explorer has no Forward button for page views 105. Cannot be charged up when battery is flat. (Lumia specific) 106. Bing maps need to tap to get voice direction for next turn. 107. If you transfer HD videos to your phone Zune will forcibly reduce its resolution. If you want to view it on a DLNA enabled TV you are out of luck. 108. If you are below 18 years old and you enter your real birthday when you set up the phone you will not be allowed to download any apps, not even free ones. 109. Very limited support of Asian languages and unable to add new language. No support for any Indian language. FEATURES EVEN DUMB PHONES HAVE BUT WP7.5 DOESN’T 110. No bluetooth file transfer. 111. Cannot handle USSD codes necessary for prepaid users to obtain services. 112. Cannot filter call history into Missed Calls, Received Calls, Dialled Calls, Recent Calls, etc 113. No way to backup or export call history 114. Does not show call duration in call history. 115. No way to edit MMS profile for Operators in the OS. Need an app which is not available in all markets 116. Call history does not group calls by contact. 117. Call history does not show the time of call for calls older than current day. 118. Cannot set custom sounds for different types of notifications. 119. No ringer profiles. 120 Cannot send/receive contact as a csv file. 121. Cannot backup contacts to PC, only to SkyDrive 122. Cannot backup sms at all, not even to SkyDrive 123. Cannot save contact to SIM card. 124. Cannot change alarm ring tone or use a MP3 file. 125. Cannot set alarm snooze interval.
Posted on: Tue, 30 Jul 2013 18:01:27 +0000
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