Microsoft releases the Surface Duo on September 10th.

[Guest]

Just now, Skipple said:

I agree with your entire premise 

 

Can I just say I think I am in the 0.5% of people that actually LOVED their Windows Phone... I loved the UI, I loved everything about it. Unfortunately it just didn't have the third party development support to actually have any usability other than the baked in features.

 

It was a sad day for me when they finally killed it.. I had already moved on to Android at that point, but still... Man, I loved that thing. 

 

 

RIP My Samsung Focus S. 2011-2012...

There was a strong fan base! It was a nice OS, but it lacked focus from the people it needed focus from the most... Microsoft.

They saw their business heading another direction. I can't say focusing on cloud and enterprise ventures was the wrong move though.

[Nowak]

I legitimately can't think of any reason to buy this over any other Android phone.

[Commodus]

The Surface Duo stirkes me as a classic example of a problematic Microsoft product: it's aimed at user that doesn't really exist. The kind of person who wants to work primarily on their phone, is willing to sacrifice numerous features for the privilege... and of course, is immersed in the Microsoft ecosystem. Shades of Kin and Zune, albeit more practical than those.

 

It reminds me of the bad old pre-Nadella days of Microsoft, when Steve Ballmer was convinced all humans were biologically predisposed to love Microsoft as much as he does. Like the mere whiff of a Microsoft-blessed Surface phone will make you throw your iPhone or Galaxy against the wall and order a Duo on the spot. "You mean it improves functionality for Office? Sold!"

 

The truth, of course, is that you probably won't be remotely interested in this unless your phone is a major productivity tool and you depend heavily on Microsoft apps. I hope it sells well enough, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are steep discounts within a few months.

[Mad153]

I can't exactly put my finger on it, but there's something that makes me feel that this device isn't that great.

 

Maybe i would say the execution - two screens bolted together with hinges isn't that pretty or seamless and IMO it seems worse done than LG's attempt.

Coupled by the fact that Samsung + Microsoft integration announced this unpacked means they don't have many extra selling points over a more typical phone, say a note or S series.

[mr moose]

2 hours ago, Skipple said:

I agree with your entire premise 

 

Can I just say I think I am in the 0.5% of people that actually LOVED their Windows Phone... I loved the UI, I loved the simplicity, usability, snappyness, I loved everything about it. Unfortunately it just didn't have the third party development support to actually have any usability other than the baked in features.

 

It was a sad day for me when they finally killed it.. I had already moved on to Android at that point, but still... Man, I loved that thing and really wanted to see a third mobile OS on the scene. 

 

RIP My Samsung Focus S. 2011-2012...

me too, I had two of the most recent versions before they were canned,  with the exception of developer support they were awesome. 

[suicidalfranco]

2 hours ago, Skipple said:

I agree with your entire premise 

 

Can I just say I think I am in the 0.5% of people that actually LOVED their Windows Phone... I loved the UI, I loved the simplicity, usability, snappyness, I loved everything about it. Unfortunately it just didn't have the third party development support to actually have any usability other than the baked in features.

 

It was a sad day for me when they finally killed it.. I had already moved on to Android at that point, but still... Man, I loved that thing and really wanted to see a third mobile OS on the scene. 

 

RIP My Samsung Focus S. 2011-2012...

i liked windows mobile more. Windows phone always felt like a drawback in comparison

 

[dalekphalm]

56 minutes ago, suicidalfranco said:

i liked windows mobile more. Windows phone always felt like a drawback in comparison

 

Which Windows Mobile?

 

5.x was amazing and powerful by comparison its contemporary competitors at the time. When it came out in 2005, most phones were still feature phones with basic colour screens and 50/50 whether they could connect to the internet - and most that could could really only display those mobile specific pages. 
 

By the time 6.5 was around in 2009, Android and iOS had been out and just blew past it in terms of user experience and App support. 
 

By the time Windows Phone 7 was released, Windows Mobile 6.5 was obsolete in pretty much every way. 
 

I quite liked Windows Phone 7 - especially the final update: 7.8. The basic UI design was an excellent idea. It’s main failing was the codebase was too limiting I guess. It’s foundation needed rebuilding. App support was initially really good for a brand-new-from-nowhere app ecosystem. But it flagged and never recovered. 
 

Windows Phone 8 was supposed to fix all the problems from Windows Phone 7. It did, in many ways. But not all. There were still minor issues, particularly the kind of customizability that many users took for granted in Android. App support was better but still pretty bad. Granted, there were a lot of good third party apps.

 

Windows Phone 8, and ultimately M10, died because a few key app developers decided against porting their apps to the platform. Particularly Google, which refused to make a YouTube or Google Drive/Google Services app. That was a MASSIVE deal. Microsoft said okay and made their own YouTube app but Google revoked their API access, so all YouTube apps were ultimately just web wrappers for the YT mobile site. 
 

Without that, adoption was slow and would not pick up. It became a self fulfilling prophecy - it was unpopular due to lack of third party apps. App developers don’t want to port their apps due to it being unpopular. One reinforcing the other. 
 

Windows Mobile 10 was by and large excellent at first, app support aside. But it got worse and worse and buggier and buggier as it received less developer time to fix problems. 

 

I still think it’s a shame that Microsoft ended up just using Android with an App launcher. 
 

I would have been happier had they started their own custom Linux distro and tried to add Android app sideloading support. It just makes Google that much closer to a monopoly. 

[Commodus]

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

Which Windows Mobile?

 

5.x was amazing and powerful by comparison its contemporary competitors at the time. When it came out in 2005, most phones were still feature phones with basic colour screens and 50/50 whether they could connect to the internet - and most that could could really only display those mobile specific pages. 
 

By the time 6.5 was around in 2009, Android and iOS had been out and just blew past it in terms of user experience and App support. 
 

By the time Windows Phone 7 was released, Windows Mobile 6.5 was obsolete in pretty much every way. 
 

I quite liked Windows Phone 7 - especially the final update: 7.8. The basic UI design was an excellent idea. It’s main failing was the codebase was too limiting I guess. It’s foundation needed rebuilding. App support was initially really good for a brand-new-from-nowhere app ecosystem. But it flagged and never recovered. 
 

Windows Phone 8 was supposed to fix all the problems from Windows Phone 7. It did, in many ways. But not all. There were still minor issues, particularly the kind of customizability that many users took for granted in Android. App support was better but still pretty bad. Granted, there were a lot of good third party apps.

 

Windows Phone 8, and ultimately M10, died because a few key app developers decided against porting their apps to the platform. Particularly Google, which refused to make a YouTube or Google Drive/Google Services app. That was a MASSIVE deal. Microsoft said okay and made their own YouTube app but Google revoked their API access, so all YouTube apps were ultimately just web wrappers for the YT mobile site. 
 

Without that, adoption was slow and would not pick up. It became a self fulfilling prophecy - it was unpopular due to lack of third party apps. App developers don’t want to port their apps due to it being unpopular. One reinforcing the other. 
 

Windows Mobile 10 was by and large excellent at first, app support aside. But it got worse and worse and buggier and buggier as it received less developer time to fix problems. 

 

I still think it’s a shame that Microsoft ended up just using Android with an App launcher. 
 

I would have been happier had they started their own custom Linux distro and tried to add Android app sideloading support. It just makes Google that much closer to a monopoly. 

 

Windows Phone/Mobile's overarching problem was really Steve Ballmer and the company culture under him.

 

Microsoft under Ballmer treated Windows on PCs as the crown jewel, and the entire company was organized around that -- he refused to shift priorities. And unfortunately, that meant Windows on phones was always going to be a satellite, always get less resources. It could've been a serious contender if Microsoft had reorganized to let its mobile OS shine, but that was never going to happen as long as Ballmer was in charge.

 

Contrast that with Apple. Part of why the iPhone did so well was that Apple was willing to devote whatever it took to making the product a success, rather than trying to protect an existing cash cow. It was willing to shunt the iPod and Mac to the background to help the iPhone thrive while Microsoft was busy starving Windows Phone/Mobile to death.

 

 

[dalekphalm]

2 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Windows Phone/Mobile's overarching problem was really Steve Ballmer and the company culture under him.

I don’t disagree that he was a negative force and contributed to the downfall. 
 

With that in mind, the product as released had a very real chance of long term success, had there been enough outside pressure to make Google release their apps there like they do with iOS. 

2 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Microsoft under Ballmer treated Windows on PCs as the crown jewel, and the entire company was organized around that -- he refused to shift priorities. And unfortunately, that meant Windows on phones was always going to be a satellite, always get less resources. It could've been a serious contender if Microsoft had reorganized to let its mobile OS shine, but that was never going to happen as long as Ballmer was in charge.

Honestly I think they should have focused on continuing the legacy of Windows 7 with future releases. The technical improvements of Windows 8 and 10 could have been rolled into the UI from 7 and tweaked/modernized without going overboard. 
 

And while doing that, the mobile OS should have become the main product development focus. 

2 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Contrast that with Apple. Part of why the iPhone did so well was that Apple was willing to devote whatever it took to making the product a success, rather than trying to protect an existing cash cow. It was willing to shunt the iPod and Mac to the background to help the iPhone thrive while Microsoft was busy starving Windows Phone/Mobile to death.

Apple saw the writing on the wall and realized the potential cashflow early on. They made some really good choices that are still benefitting them today. 

[GoodBytes]

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

With that in mind, the product as released had a very real chance of long term success, had there been enough outside pressure to make Google release their apps there like they do with iOS. 

Hmm no. I don't think so. I mean I would agree but Microsoft biggest problem is that they were selling their OS to phone manufactures at a price that was a lot higher than Android. In the end, this made phone manufcature not be able to provide interesting (or any) incentive/commissions to cellphone providers sales rep and stores bonuses. This made Windows Phone devices not put into displays (as there is no money to made), not presented to people looking to buy a new phone, and people who asked, the sales rep will trash it by saying false things like "Oh it has blue screen all the time! I don't recommend it", because they get nothing from selling it.

 

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

Honestly I think they should have focused on continuing the legacy of Windows 7 with future releases. The technical improvements of Windows 8 and 10 could have been rolled into the UI from 7 and tweaked/modernized without going overboard. 

Well you can say that for any version of Windows, and earlier version of MacOS. But  they are doing it with Windows 10. Unless you meant Windows Phone 7. Yes I agree.

 

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

And while doing that, the mobile OS should have become the main product development focus. 

Apple saw the writing on the wall and realized the potential cashflow early on. They made some really good choices that are still benefitting them today. 

I fully agree.

 

Let's not forget also that Microsoft royally screwed up Windows Phone 7 development as well. Due to poor management, the OS was planned to use Windows NT kernel based off Windows 7. But it turned out that they switch in the OS development back to Windows CE again (same kernel as Windows Mobile 6 and older), a kernel that could not meet the needs of a modern OS. This lead to multiple delays which made the company release a phone with missing basic features that consumers wanted, for example: custom ringtones.

 

With Windows Phone 8 they switch back to Windows NT kernel, and this time based of Windows 8. But doing so, killed backward compatibility of Windows Phone 7 apps. Not helped by the fact that Windows Phone 7 apps relied on Silverlight, Microsoft answer to Flash, which as you can guess it, got killed off. Both of these ensured that Microsoft really could not realistically bring any sort of app backward compatibility what's so ever. (Long live miss management!) So teh few devs that made apps for the Windows Phone 7, had to not only re-write their entire apps for Windows Phone 8, but also be angry that they spend time and energy learning something for nothing. And that is not helped, as mentioned, the low user based. This made many developers/company just give up on the OS. 

 

Another factor is that Microsoft, despite charging for the OS to manufactures didn't do any advertising (well, extremally limited). Microsoft was betting that manufacture will do the job for them.  This made people unaware that Windows Phone was a thing.

 

Lastly, Microosft didn't allow any customization of the OS, and the supported hardware was very limited. This made all phone manufcature devices be identical in specs, even screen resolution (720p for Windows Phone 7, as it didn't support anything else, until later on.. again, part of the "basic features missing"). This did not improve much with Windows Phone 8. It did so with Windows 10 Mobile, but that was too late. So now, the only thing manufcature could compete was looks and  the device cameras, which created a race to the bottom on the device price.

[Arika]

waaaay to expensive.

 

but still prefer the "split" screens over the folding screens in the Galaxy Fold and similar devices. 

[RedRound2]

6 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Particularly Google, which refused to make a YouTube or Google Drive/Google Services app. That was a MASSIVE deal. Microsoft said okay and made their own YouTube app but Google revoked their API access, so all YouTube apps were ultimately just web wrappers for the YT mobile site. 

Yeah, I remeber that now. I wasn't a huge fan of WIndows Phone (mostly because i hadn't used it as much I guess) but it's Google that really killed them. They should've really brought this up in the anti trust lawsuit on how Google used their dominace to pretty much kill a potential competitor. And I woudn't doubt for a second that they would do the same should someone ballsy enough actually try to make a third mobile OS to bring to the market.

 

Back to the topic, pretty underwhelming product, as expected from Microosft

- I genuinelly dont see the use case of a dual screen on a phone apart from "it's nice to have in two three instances". If you're ging to argue for buisness use and productivity, bigger screen has always been more convinect, so a tablet or a regular laptop with proper OS is a much better choice than trying to adjust with this device. Part of the folds appeal was the bigger screen, not the dual screen config.

- Underwhelming specs (particulary the processor, screen and RAM) but no wireless charging and NFC (NFC? mobile payments is a thing in many countries Microsoft!!!)

- Definitely too wide of a device to hold it comfortably

- Then it's microsoft. They will most likely have plenty of issues and it's just die a quiet death in 1-2 generations

[Results45]

Here's the link to pre-order (not recommended): https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-duo

 

Didn't see it posted in the OP 

[suicidalfranco]

7 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Which Windows Mobile?

 

5.x was amazing and powerful by comparison its contemporary competitors at the time. When it came out in 2005, most phones were still feature phones with basic colour screens and 50/50 whether they could connect to the internet - and most that could could really only display those mobile specific pages. 
 

By the time 6.5 was around in 2009, Android and iOS had been out and just blew past it in terms of user experience and App support. 
 

By the time Windows Phone 7 was released, Windows Mobile 6.5 was obsolete in pretty much every way. 
 

I quite liked Windows Phone 7 - especially the final update: 7.8. The basic UI design was an excellent idea. It’s main failing was the codebase was too limiting I guess. It’s foundation needed rebuilding. App support was initially really good for a brand-new-from-nowhere app ecosystem. But it flagged and never recovered. 
 

Windows Phone 8 was supposed to fix all the problems from Windows Phone 7. It did, in many ways. But not all. There were still minor issues, particularly the kind of customizability that many users took for granted in Android. App support was better but still pretty bad. Granted, there were a lot of good third party apps.

 

Windows Phone 8, and ultimately M10, died because a few key app developers decided against porting their apps to the platform. Particularly Google, which refused to make a YouTube or Google Drive/Google Services app. That was a MASSIVE deal. Microsoft said okay and made their own YouTube app but Google revoked their API access, so all YouTube apps were ultimately just web wrappers for the YT mobile site. 
 

Without that, adoption was slow and would not pick up. It became a self fulfilling prophecy - it was unpopular due to lack of third party apps. App developers don’t want to port their apps due to it being unpopular. One reinforcing the other. 
 

Windows Mobile 10 was by and large excellent at first, app support aside. But it got worse and worse and buggier and buggier as it received less developer time to fix problems. 

 

I still think it’s a shame that Microsoft ended up just using Android with an App launcher. 
 

I would have been happier had they started their own custom Linux distro and tried to add Android app sideloading support. It just makes Google that much closer to a monopoly. 

Windows Mobile 5.0, and this is what i had back then

loved that little thing. Still have it somewhere in my drawer, jst needs a battery and a mini usb port 

[Vishera]

Welcome to 2014! (that outdated design)

A cheap phone for a premium price,those bezels are huge.

The design resembles a Nintendo DS,and the device really looks like a DS when it's closed.

When it's opened it looks like Galaxy Tab 4 Siamese twins.

[HenrySalayne]

2 hours ago, Vishera said:

Welcome to 2014! (that outdated design)

iPhone 4 is calling. It wants its outdated design back!

[Vishera]

1 hour ago, HenrySalayne said:

iPhone 4 is calling. It wants its outdated design back!

The design of the iPhone 4 is phenomenal,this device is really good and actually last long,

I have one laying around in my house.

[HenrySalayne]

42 minutes ago, Vishera said:

The design of the iPhone 4 is phenomenal,this device is really good and actually last long,

The design of the iPhone 4 was maybe phenomenal back in 2010. I don't think it it was necessary to bring it back in 2020 in a dual display phone with 2018 hardware.

 

[Results45]

Dave 2D hands-on:

.

[Nowak]

15 minutes ago, Results45 said:

Dave 2D hands-on:

.

Wait, it's glass backed but doesn't have wireless charging???

[Results45]

45 minutes ago, Nowak said:

Wait, it's glass backed but doesn't have wireless charging???

 

Yep cuZ it needs to "fold", but not not be much thicker than an ROG Phone with a case.

[imreloadin]

On 8/12/2020 at 10:04 AM, GoodBytes said:

That is the thinnest phone you can get. So no, there is no room for NFC and wireless charging. It would add 0.5mm at the very least, if not 1mm, and only work on 1 side of the device.

Ahh...so they went the Apple route and decided to remove features for the sake of "design"

[LAwLz]

27 minutes ago, Results45 said:

Yep cuZ it needs to "fold", but not not be much thicker than an ROG Phone with a case.

Wireless charging adds next to no thickness so I kind of doubt the whole "it is too thin for wireless charging" argument that gets thrown around.

 

They probably just didn't want to add it because this is not suppose to be a good product to entice everyone to get it. Microsoft are super focused on the software and displays of this device. Everything else is not seen as important. I see this as a prototype or concept device, that Microsoft are for some reason selling.

[Nowak]

52 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Wireless charging adds next to no thickness so I kind of doubt the whole "it is too thin for wireless charging" argument that gets thrown around.

 

They probably just didn't want to add it because this is not suppose to be a good product to entice everyone to get it. Microsoft are super focused on the software and displays of this device. Everything else is not seen as important. I see this as a prototype or concept device, that Microsoft are for some reason selling.

I guess they decided business users don't need it? But considering how higher-end desks are starting to have Qi pads built in I'd imagine there are quite a few who would want such a feature on their phone.

 

The biggest problem I see from Dave2D's video is it's too wide in phone mode, due to the 3:4 displays.

[Results45]

7 minutes ago, Nowak said:

I guess they decided business users don't need it? But considering how higher-end desks are starting to have Qi pads built in I'd imagine there are quite a few who would want such a feature on their phone.

 

The biggest problem I see from Dave2D's video is it's too wide in phone mode, due to the 3:4 displays.

That's the point: