Upon release, the Windows phone 8 was showered with various praises even from its core critics. Various gadgets and Electronic magazines applauded it for the astonishing improvements it made from its predecessor; the windows phone 7 and the improvements it made to catch up with the IOS and the Android operating systems. A Windows phone 8 mobile won the tag for the best readers choice smartphone of the year in 2012 (Engadget, 2012) other technology critic say it has a easier and bold interface (cnet, 2012), others called it unique (Wired, 2012), others looked at the camera of the phones; Gizmodo called the Nokia Lumia 920 the best smartphone camera over all the existing iphone and android phones. Microsoft finally got it right even to its critics.
No doubt the new features and improvements made on the OS provides a better platform than its other rivals; IOS and Android OS for Nigerians whom just want to have all the fancy features their phones will give them and they would be able to use it all. Among the features are
Hardware
As it has done to its predecessors, Microsoft has offered a minimum hardware requirement for windows phone 8 devices. They include;
- Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 dual-core processor
- Minimum 512MB RAM for WVGA phones; minimum 1GB RAM for 720p / WXGA
- Minimum 4GB flash memory
- GPS and A-GNSS; GLONASS is supported if OEMs decide to include it
- Support for micro-USB 2.0
- 3.5mm stereo headphone jack with three-button detection support
- Rear-facing AF camera with LED or Xenon flash, optional front-facing camera (both need to be VGA or better) and dedicated camera button
- Accelerometer, proximity and ambient light sensors, as well as vibration motor (magnetometer and gyroscope are optional)
- 802.11b/g and Bluetooth (802.11n is optional)
- DirectX graphics hardware support with hardware acceleration for Direct3D using programmable GPU
- Multi-touch capacitive touch screen with minimum of four simultaneous points
- All Windows Phone 8 devices must include the same standard set of buttons: each one needs to have Start, back, search, power, camera and volume up / down keys.
Synchronization
This is one feature they have made tremendous improvement. On its predecessor you will have to install Zune to transfer your files. Windows Phone 8 offers numerous ways to sync your phone and PC, so that you don’t have to go through Zune to get access to your music, videos, photos and files. Devices on the platform now utilize MTP, which means you can access the phone as an external hard drive. All you have to do is to drag and drop the files you want on the phone as it is on android phones. You can go to Windows Media Player or itunes and sync up songs and playlists the same way we’ve been able to do for Android phones.
Data Sense
As the name implies, the program monitors your data usage, which can be tracked through a Live Tile, and will even warn you with a pop-up notification if you’re approaching your monthly allotment. Data Sense will start out by asking you about your data plan and the end date of your monthly billing cycle. Additionally, it helps you find nearby WiFi hotspots and then, once you’re connected to one, it’ll automatically switch internet-loving background tasks to go off of that connection. Lastly, it also uses IE10 to compress web pages in an effort to limit how much data is coming through your pipeline (Engadget, 2012).
Maps
The mapping technology for the windows phone 8 has been switched from Bing maps (Owned by Microsoft) to Nokia maps (Engadget, 2012). Nokia’s mapping prowess is impressive and is known to have covered most of Nigeria. It also offers a 3D design of most of Nigerian structures like Transcorp Hilton; Abuja, CBN; Abuja, National Mosque; Abuja, etc. It also offers a full download of the Nigerian map for just 20MB compared to androids 20mb which only covers a handful of some places in Abuja.
Phone
The fundamental addition here is support for VoIP integration. This is possible thanks to a set of Rich Communication Suite APIs that have been included in the SDK, enabling third-party developers to step up and grasp the opportunity. This means we can look forward to companies like Tango, Qik and Skype putting out applications with this capability in the near future. You will be able to receive VoIP calls just like you would with any normal call. Windows Phone 8 can handle cellular and VoIP calls at the same time. You’ll even be able to answer Skype calls the same way you normally would with an inbound cellular call (Engadget, 2012).
Apps
Disparaged by its critics for its lack of apps, Windows phone now boasts of 170,000 apps (WindowsPhone, 2013). But even at that when it comes to the quality apps, the windows phone 8 catches up with its competitors and plus it also has the full Microsoft mobile office. There are still some famous apps that are expected to arrive in November like Flipboard but currently there are much better alternatives to the apps that are unavailable. For example Bing News is a good alternative before the arrival of Flipboard.
Below are some few apps that I have selected and used and some are available on other platforms (Andriod and IOS) as well. They usually have an impressive interface when compared to the other OS platform.
- Music, Video and Entertainment: Pandora, Youtube, Tunein Radio, Shazam, Vevo, Spotify
- Tools and Productivity: Adobe reader, Skydrive, UC Browser, PDF Reader, Call Recorder, Snanner, Teamviewer, Tether-x, Lync 2012, Evernote, dropbox
- Lifestyle: Fresh Paint, ebay, Allrecipes, Groupon,
- News and Weather: Bing News, Bing Weather, NBC News, CNN, NYTimes, Engadget, Aljazeera, AP Mobile.
- Social: Facebook, Skype, Whatsapp, twitter, LinkedIn, Viber, Line, IM+, KakoaTalk, Nimbuzz
- Books and reference: Advanced English Dictionary, Overdrive, Bookviser, Wikipedia, Audible.
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