windows mobile 7

HTC Sound Enhancer App Review

December 6, 2010 | By Gretchen

The free Sound Enhancer App promises to “improve your listening experience with music and video.” I figured trying a free application is really no big risk, so I installed it. Sound Enhancer can help those of you looking for an equalizer on your phone- take note, this app is provided by the HTC corporation and is available to HTC phones via the HTC Hub. For audio and video, it provides Dolby Mobile and SRS Enhancement. For audio only there is an Equalizer with pre-sets for bass, treble, or vocal booster, as well as pre-sets for various genres, like rock, pop, or classical.

I found that the Sound Enhancer really did improve my music-listening. The touch-screen controls responded fairly quickly when I was jumping around the enhancement choices, meaning there was only a brief pause in the music as I tested out the different options. I found the enhancements to be fairly accurate, and they really improved my listening- especially with headphones on. For those of you with HTC phones, you have nothing to lose, and everything to gain by installing this app.

Images via: htc.com & 22shop.com

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Microsoft buying 3D gesture recognition company?–Update: Confirmed.

October 30, 2010 | By Surur

The New York Times reports on a rumour that Microsoft may be looking to acquire Canesta, a company which for the last 11 years have been develops chips which allow Kinect-type gesture detection at a low price and with minimal equipment.

Canesta’s latest chip allows 320×200 resolution, is about the size of a silver dollar, and can be built into mobile devices.

Microsoft’s Kinect technology is currently being powered by PrimeSense, a direct rival of Canesta.

Last year, Microsoft acquired 3DV systems, a company with similar gesture recognition technology, and Microsoft has said they plan to move gesture recognition well beyond just playing games. Long time readers may recall Windows Mobile 7 was originally rumoured to include a camera-based gesture interface.

With multiple purchases in this market segment Microsoft may be building up a collection of Natural User Interface patents which may help Microsoft keep the technology exclusive to its mobile and desktop ventures.

Read more about the rumour at New York Times here.

Edit: Purchase is now official. See the Press release after the break.

Continue reading →

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Touch-free UI demoed on Symbian phone, may come to Windows Phone eventually

September 10, 2010 | By Surur

eyeSight Mobile Technologies, a developer of Hand Gesture Interface solutions for mobile phones and consumer electronics devices, announced the successful launch of a unique new application which allows users to control a mobile phone MP3 player with simple hand gestures.

"Moove" MP3 Player , available only to the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic users has had more than half a million downloads from Nokia’s Ovi Store. "Moove" MP3 player allows users to play or stop tracks, as well as skip between songs by using simple hand gestures above the device’s frontal camera.

So, for instance, people who are running on a treadmill can simply place the device on the treadmill deck and skip songs while running without touching the device. Drivers can operate their smartphones with a wave of the hand, allowing them to control the music player or mobile phone navigation system without looking at the device to find its controls.

"The Hand Gesture Interface that offers interaction Beyond Touch, has been enthusiastically adopted by users of touch screen devices," said Itay Katz eyeSight’s founder & CEO. "We are in talks with mobile phone manufactures to license the Hand Gesture Interface to be integrated into new smartphones."

The Touch Free technology can be applied to any camera-enabled device, including mobile phones, navigation systems, netbooks, MP3 players and more.

Pocketlint notes that Microsoft suggested such Kinect-like technology may come to Windows Phone in the future also.

One cant also help but remember Microsoft has had such ambitions for Windows Mobile 7 in the past, as laid out here.

“Windows Mobile 7 will use motion gestures, something the iPhone does not. It will not use an intricate and complicated series of gyroscopes and accelerometers. Instead, it will use the camera on the phone to detect motions and create appropriate actions. You will be able to shake, twist and otherwise manipulate the phone and get things done. The phone will be able to perform actions when placed face down on a surface, and it will know when it is in your pocket or bag.”

Do our readers see a use for this technology? Let us know below.

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WP7: Does MS have developer support?

June 24, 2010 | By l3v5y

Mary-Jo Foley has been questioning developers about the WP7 developer platform, and the results are nothing if not interesting.

The enterprise/business developers are hesitant to support a new platform without any idea how it will survive in the future, though they’re willing to jump on board as soon as it makes more sense.

I work mostly on mobile business solutions. This segment takes a bit longer than the consumer segment to adopt a new device platform. I usually get more involved once a new platform starts to gain more momentum and demand to support it rises. New mobile platforms are popping up quickly these days so it is difficult to jump on every one early on. I try to keep a keen eye out on all the new platforms though. Mobility is fast paced, if you stop paying attention for 6 months, you will lose track of where things are going.

One of the more interesting questions was about the IDE and the code itself:

Microsoft is claiming there’s a low learning curve for WP7 because devs can use “tools they already know.” Is this true in your case? If not, how steep a learning curve have you encountered with C#/Silverlight/XNA?

As a C++/win32 developer, the learning curve is steeper than I would like, but it’s not at all bad, and since it’s .Net, there’s a lot of documentation for .Net and C# out there. It would be nice to have native code, but things work so I’m personally not fussed. A point the developers all stressed is that the VS2010 IDE is excellent, with the only complaint being a wish for support of OSs other than Windows.

The whole article is well worth a read, and has far too much for me to simply repost it all here. If you’re a developer interested in supporting WP7, definitely take a read!

Check it out here.

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Windows “Mobile” 7 – Photon screenshots

February 19, 2010 | By l3v5y

Some screenshots have just surface on XDA-Developers that are reportedly of Photon. As far as I can tell, they just look like WM6.5 with a new layer of paint on the top, and nothing as new as what we’ve actually got.

I for one prefer WP7 to “Photon” and from what I’ve seen, WM6.5.3 is also better to me than Photon. What do you think?

Edit: Here is a youtube video of the OS running on a HTC Universal.

From XDA-Developers.

Continue reading →

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MWC 10: Is this Windows Mobile 7?

February 15, 2010 | By Surur

Spotted under a poster, this Windows Mobile handset sports an interface unlike any other we have seen so far.

Quite simplistic, it bears some resemblance to the pinned albums in the ZuneHD user interface.

We should know more very soon.

See more pics at HTC-HD2.org

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MWC: Reminder – Microsoft Barcelona news conference to be live streamed today

February 15, 2010 | By Surur

Most of our readers probably do not need to be reminded, but for the few who have not been paying attention to the huge run up towards today’s event, remember that you can see a live stream of Microsoft’s press conference hosted my Steve Ballmer at Mobile World Congress streamed live by Microsoft here.

Windows Mobile 7 is widely expected to be announced there.

The conference will start streaming at these times below:

04:00AM – Hawaii, USA

06:00AM – Pacific Time, USA

07:00AM – Mountain Time, USA

08:00AM – Central Time, USA

09:00AM – Eastern Time, USA

02:00PM – London, UK

03:00PM – Paris, France

04:00PM – Cairo, Egypt

05:00PM – Moscow, Russia

07:30PM – New Delhi, India

10:00PM – Singapore

11:00PM – Tokyo, Japan

01:00AM – Sydney Australia

For the time in your time zone, see this web page here.

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Adobe confirms WM7, also confirms no flash in WM7 yet

February 14, 2010 | By Surur

Microsoft is still officially mum on your “next release of Windows Mobile”, but their partners have never been as tight-lipped as Microsoft has been recently.

Letting the cat out of the bag one day early, Adobe has released a statement confirming that Windows Mobile 7 will not initially support Flash in the browser, but they are working together with Microsoft to make this possible later:

Microsoft and Adobe are working closely together. While the newest version of Windows Phone won’t support Flash at initial availability, both companies are working to include a browser plug-in for the full Flash player in future versions of Windows Phone. More details will be shared at Microsoft MIX next month.

This also confirms leaks we have heard earlier that say much the same, but given that Windows Mobile 7 is not fully cooked yet, it is quite understandable. Hopefully this will not have any effect on Flash 10.1 on Windows Mobile 6.5.

Official Windows Phone 7 SERIES to be announced next week

February 13, 2010 | By Surur

Pity Microsoft. Despite their best attempts to keep the Windows Mobile 7 announcement next week a secret, they are just unable to keep a lid on it.

The latest confirmation comes from Engadget’s super spy cameras, which were able to see beneath white stickers Microsoft placed on their pervasive posters all around Barcelona. A short Photoshop filter later and the words 7 series were revealed.

The implication is that we will be seeing a variety of versions of Windows Mobile 7, presumably, Entertainment and Business as rumoured earlier.

Only 48 hours before we will know a lot more. I can hardly wait.

And before anyone think they can grab the domain name quickly, it seems Microsoft has that covered already, with Windowsphone7series.com safely registered already.

Windows Mobile 7 screen shots from 2006 leaked, HTC Universal could run it after all

February 13, 2010 | By Surur

Pocketnow have published some pictures claimed to be from taken from a Windows Mobile 7 emulator image. The image dates to around 2006, and likely bears little resemblance to what we can expect to see in two days time.

While the UI is clearly dated, Windows Mobile 6.5 still has to catch up to the use of transparency and gradients as demonstrated in the images above.

Interestingly these screen shots do lend credence to this picture of the HTC Universal which Eldar Murtazin claimed was running Windows Mobile 7 and which were dismissed out of hand at the time. It is now clear that this was in fact the case, again demonstrating how long Microsoft has been working on the OS.

See more screenshots at Pocketnow here.

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Project Pink Turtle Phone Passes Through FCC

February 13, 2010 | By Surur

FCC certification have always been a major barrier to keeping a phone secret, forcing companies to announce phones well before they actually become available.

It seems Microsoft’s rumoured Project Pink Turtle phone has suffered the same fate a few days before its suspected public announcement in 2 days, as ZuneBoards has noticed a Sharp CDMA slider trying to slip through the FCC unnoticed.

The Sharp filing with the FCC for a "CDMA Slide Phone with WLAN & BT," will remain mostly confidential until March 29th.

Zuneboards were quick to notice the FCC label profile matched the shape of the leaked device pretty well, confirming most of the leaks rumoured by the Wall Street Journal yesterday.

Those leaks suggested the Project Pink phone will be released in the Spring, on Verizon and Vodafone and will be manufactured by Sharp, who currently makes the Sidekick.

In many ways the purported Zune phone is a diversion from Windows Mobile as we know it, and is certainly not directed at the same market as currently supports the OS. The Turtle phone, according to Wall Street Journal, is aimed at teens, which may very well explain the restrictions we have heard of recently.

Via istartedsomething.com

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Wall Street Journal confirms Windows Mobile 7 for Mobile World Congress, Pink phone for later

February 12, 2010 | By Surur

According to Wall Street Journal, Microsoft plans to publicly show a new version of its cellphone operating system, Windows Mobile 7, for the first time, at Mobile World Congress at Barcelona on Monday, according to people familiar with the matter.

The same “people familiar with the matter” said “the operating system sports a revamped user interface that resembles the look of Microsoft’s Zune HD music player”.

Apparently a separate Microsoft mobile project, unlikely to be announced next week, to design a mobile phone aimed at teenagers, is also in the works. The device, code-named Pink, will be a successor to the T-Mobile Sidekick, and will be a youth-oriented smart phone powered by software and services from Danger and will heavily emphasize social-networking applications.

The Pink phone is being manufactured by Japan’s Sharp Corp. and is expected to be sold internationally by Verizon Wireless and Vodafone Group PLC as early as this spring.

Hopefully the soon to arrive Pink phone is the source of all the rumours of a rather crippled OS we have been hearing about recently.

Windows Mobile 7 development, roadmap to be discussed at Tech-days 10 in Geneva

February 11, 2010 | By Surur

Want to learn more about Windows Mobile 7 development and happen to be around Geneva, Switzerland on April 14th? Microsoft will be discussing development tools and software for the new OS at it tech-days 1- event.

Academic tech·days 10 is a Microsoft tech·days track organized specifically for technically focused students and faculty members. The Academic tech·days are free of charge half-day event that gives introductory level information for academic audience interested in software development on Microsoft platform and technologies.

Windows Mobile 7 will be discussed in the Mobility-V session hosted my Microsoft evangelist Sascha Corti. The event is free to all student card holders and faculty, but does require registration.

Read the details of the session below:

14:45 – 15:45 Mobility V-Next (professional tech · days session)
Sascha Corti, Developer Evangelist, Microsoft Switzerland
Speaker Biography
Presentation Details
Front Switzerland, you will see the next generation
Windows Mobile platform, the code-named "Windows 7 Phone". After an overview of the platform and the roadmap, the development tools for creating your own applications the new generation of smartphones will be announced. The content depends on information available at the overview.

To learn more visit this Microsoft page here.

Thanks Sirleamont for the tip.

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