Home     Articles     SBS Show     Vladfire     About     Links     Contact     Wiki     RSS2 Feed    

AJAXify your Wordpress

Learn how I ajaxified my wordpress blog with these few steps...

SBS Show!

Listen to the latest episode of the SBS Show, Dave Sobel talks about process management...

Vladville Newsletter!

Looking for a more focused, exclusive insight into the world of SMB tech & business? Sign up for my newsletter!

Two more Windows Mobile phones you shouldn’t buy
Posted: 9:13 am
October 29th, 2007 		Post a comment
Exchange, Mobility, Vladville

This has been on my mind for a little while now and sometimes the fanboy eyeglaze needs to wear off before you evaluate things for what they are.

I will never buy another Windows Mobile phone until Microsoft stands behind its platform and here is why you shouldn’t either: It’s not Microsoft.

Microsoft has made its significant wealth by producing business tools that grew, scaled and upgraded. I have never owned a computer that I couldn’t upgrade to the next version of Windows. Our servers have scaled from Windows Server standard, to SBS, to Enterprise with clustering. We (and I) could afford to keep up with the technology and with Microsoft and realize the business and productivity benefits because we did not face a significant hardware charge every time we wanted to implement something new. The idea of Software Assurance further delivers on this promise.

But take that same strategy to Windows Mobile platform. Can you do the same? For a very large population of devices the answer is yes – albeit, illegally.

Want a legal way to upgrade your phone? $499 please. Wait, $499 is $400 more than you advertise a brand new phone for, how can an upgrade cost four times more? Oh! You’re not really upgrading my phone, which is perfectly capable of running the said software, you’re just replacing it with the brand new phone. Oh, and you want at least a two year contract on it too?

This is where the Microsoft – OEM – Telco menage a  trois infuriates the customer and makes them abandon Windows Mobile and crumbles the Exchange, Unified Communications, Windows Platform and the “connected” dream evaporates: They look elsewhere.

I cannot and will not recommend a Windows Mobile phone anymore until Microsoft starts offering upgrades for them, directly from Microsoft’s site. Please do not buy into the lie that only the OEM can write the drivers and only the carrier can publish it because thats a total copout. For literally everyone in my audience that has seen a Windows Mobile demo or a new release preview, just what do you think that demo ran on? Boiling pot of water? Of course not. Microsoft develops and tests this software on the Windows Mobile devices you own and use. Every developer that compiles of a piece of Windows Mobile code already has the architecture cabs as a part of their Visual Studio SDK for mobility so if we can roll out the new OS, if we can compile software for it – what are we waiting for the OEM and the carrier to do? Compile their garbage IM software and design a new theme?

Welcome_hero_20070927OEMs and carriers have the least incentive to implement any software upgrades because it means more support and more documentation work for them. They usually never relase them and you’re stuck buying a new phone. And in business, being forced to buy something new and abandon something functional is equivalent to theft.

Blackjack is my last Windows Mobile phone, even if I get a free one I will give it away.

If you are a business, avoid Windows Mobile until Microsoft chooses to stand behind its platform a little more than just releasing Haloween backgrounds and ringtones.

For those of you that don’t understand what I mean without using crude street language (all complaints should be sent to my PR firms: Tim Barrett & Co in USA and Susanne Dansey, LTD worldwide):

If I wanted to be fucked by a telco carrier and mislead into a product purchase of a toy that will be obsolete the moment I opened the box I would have bought an iPhone.

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

11 Comments

briwlls | October 29th, 2007 at 10:53 am

Vlad,

I completely agree with you.

I think I’ve heard you say more than a few times you have to select the battles you can actually win, this is one you’ll surely be fighting forever.

You’re not only fighting Microsoft, but AT&T, Verizon, Sprint then HTC, Pantech etc. etc.

We’re stuck in rut until congress does something about the carries milking these phone purchase/contract tie-ins.

Keep fighting if you’d like because I agree…but I’d rather see a sweet Shockey Monkey portal.

~ Brian



GWSmith | October 29th, 2007 at 1:01 pm

One reason I’ve liked the Palm devices – you *could* update them ; waiting to see if I’m going to get a WM6 update for my near-new Treo 700wx on Verizon Mobile.



vlad | October 29th, 2007 at 1:05 pm

Highly, highly unlikely..

For example, Samsung BlackJack and Palm 750 has been on the Windows Mobile 6 deck for months now, even Samsung has made the upgrade available in every flavor and language… sans AT&T.

Meanwhile AT&T has been pushing these back while introducing new products featuring WM6, like BlackJack II. Supposedly you will see Palm 750 with WM6 upgrade on Oct 30, Blackjack a few days later.

Of note, November 14th is when they will launch new WM6 phones as the “first smartphones to have WM6 on them” so I am not sure if that speels doom and gloom.

Either way, AT&T forums have 100+ post threads on the consumer outrage over these things, I do not believe they are concerned about that at all.

-Vlad



julesw | October 29th, 2007 at 1:31 pm

So, can I ask, what would you do for the mobile email solution?

Or just cling on to your Blackjack for the moment??

I know over here in the UK the networks are screwing us over a bit with things re: upgrades.
TMobile wont give me WM6 for my MDA 2, as it wants to sell me the MDA3 instead, but because I am out of my upgrade loop they want to do me hard for the price of the handset.

And in the case of someone else I know, they wont even let him buy it sim free…

Ahoy ebay I say!

What do you make of Blackberries / BES then as competiion? something for MS to be wary of? Or just not unified enough to be a significant threat?



vlad | October 29th, 2007 at 1:51 pm

I do not know that I would eliminate Exchange and replace with Blackberry, I am just adjusting our risk here by not recommending Windows Mobile anymore and presenting the facts that the costs are going to be at the rate of about $500 a year or so in order to keep the latest feature set and that the feature set dies with the mobile with no upgrades to be expected.

On the flip site, if only dumb email is needed Blackberry has proven itself there but will require additional server and $100 per device to sync with Microsoft Exchange.

Any lead that Microsoft had on Blackberry, which at least in my opinion was astronomical, has all but vanished with the latest carrier restrictions, lack of handset upgrades and interest in other platforms.

Internally, this is a painful item because this means we now need to be capable of supporting multiple platforms which means paying more out of my pocket for training and specializations and another partner in the mix.

All I know is, I will not recommend Windows Mobile over any other platform anymore until Microsoft does something about it. They will not, but since the 2.5 people that actually face the customer don’t have any way to make a difference hopefully this gets escalated upwards and gives a business case to equal support of platform components.

-Vlad



StaceyCochran | October 29th, 2007 at 3:42 pm

At least AT&T has said they plan on offering updates, Sprint and Verizon have said no.



vlad | October 29th, 2007 at 4:08 pm

Stacey,

That seems worse to me. Imagine telling a business they can have a feature set in Q2 when AT&T is set to release WM6 for Blackjack and Palm 750. Then that same story in Q3. Then the same story in August, September, October and still nothing. Then the business owner asks you in November, seeing how the OEM released the damn thing for every language under the sun…… why don’t we have it yet?

“Uhhhh…. Because you made a poor choice of telco provider?”

Telling people they are on the wrong network is like selling bibles in the whorehouse.

-Vlad



Susan | October 30th, 2007 at 3:20 am

It’s funny how AU has the update and the USA doesn’t.

I thought we were the free country and they came from the penal colony?

Once again that OEM relationship is making the hurt.



vlad | October 30th, 2007 at 8:39 am

Eh, someone has to throw those poor suckers a bone, they pay a lot more than you and me for bandwidth.



GWSmith | October 30th, 2007 at 10:23 pm

Hm. Generic Treo 750s now get WM5 -> WM6

http://blogs.msdn.com/jasonlan/archive/2007/10/30/treo-750-and-treo-750v-windows-mobile-6-upgrade.aspx

Somehow, I’m not too confident that the 700wx will get an update, but this is a step in the right direction…



Welcome to the Blogosphere | Netlink IT | September 8th, 2009 at 9:02 am

[...] in nature (how to install SSL Certificates on SBS 2003, for instance), they can give glowing or scathing reviews of the latest Vendor offerings, they may provide information on an industry story, or sometimes they may provide a big blue [...]



Leave a Reply

Whats on Vlad's Mind?

Sponsors:
This blog is made possible by Own Web Now Corp and ExchangeDefender. If you like this blog and are in the need of products we offer I hope you give us some consideration.

Get The Newsletter

Twitter

Vladfire Vlog

Divider


SBS Show Podcast
 

Categories

  

Archives

  

About
Divider Divider