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 Smartphones have enabled almost PC-like access to social networks on the go. As it’s so popular, Microsoft has boosted their integration features within Windows Phone. Now Facebook™ is joined with built-in Twitter™ and LinkedIn™ support, so the People Hub offers updates from all three, all in one place. You can choose to just have updates from one, and the new Groups feature goes even further. Instead of having updates from people you don’t talk to much contaminating the news feeds, you can create groups with only your closest friends and family, and receive updates from only these people. You can even pin the Group Hub to the Start screen for instant access and easy to find updates. Further integration means that any updates on social networks will appear in the contacts folder, so when you ring a friend you know what they’ve been doing or thinking. It’s also great for planning things like a birthday party or big night out where you need to stay in contact with a lot of people. |
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 With smartphones being so, well, smart, and acting like mini PCs, users have begun to yearn for the ability to pause apps or keep them running in the background while they go and do something else. Windows Phone now supports this feature. You can pause games and take a call, surf the net while listening to an album or switch between apps. A nifty screen pops up with thumbnails of the apps you’ve got open when you hold the back button, so you can pick which app you want to use next. |
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 Gone are the days of sticking to single forms of communication. We email, text, message on Facebook™ and then switch to Windows Messenger. Well, to help you out, Windows Phone now gives you threads: the ability to pull text, Facebook chat and Windows® Live into one thread, so you can keep the conversation flowing. It’s a very neat feature that’ll definitely save time. There’s also linked inboxes, with a twist. Instead of only letting you link all of your accounts together, you can select which inboxes are linked, pretty handy for separating multiple business and personal accounts. There’s more. Should you have particularly long conversations with email contacts, a new feature automatically groups emails with the same subject together, including the ones you’ve sent in the thread, great for keeping track of discussions, or simply deleting irrelevant emails. |
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 Still sporting its distinctive user interface, Windows Phone is smooth, smart and easy to use. Touch the screen and tiles glide with a swipe and a satisfying spring and there are lots of little surprises to make you smile - you won’t want to put it down. Now, of course, the Live Tiles show and do a lot more, so you can bring your Start screen to life with glance and go updates not just from your favourite apps but also from your favourite people. You’ll see their latest messages and news right there in the Live Tiles - just tap to get in touch. Windows Phone has always had Live Tiles, but now more third party apps can take full advantage of them |
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 Bing itself has also been updated. Bing on Windows Phone has a new Local Scout service, which combines a search feature with mapping and location to show you nearby restaurants, shops and various other activities at the click of a button. It’s well laid out and easy to use, and can pull up useful details of the businesses you find. You can now also search by voice, music and vision. Like Shazam? You’ll love Bing Music, which is built in to Windows Phone. Place your phone next to a speaker playing music, turn on the music search feature, give it a few seconds to listen, and Bing will find the details of the song, including ways to listen to or buy it. Abroad, and want to know what a sign says - or what’s on the menu? Bing Vision can help. In one touch, scan the text and get a translation. Vision search uses your phone's camera to scan data you see and then uses the image to search for data on the web. You can scan QR Codes (Quick Response codes; they’re normally black and white with a matrix pattern and three smaller squares in all corners apart from the bottom right) and Microsoft Tags (like QR codes, but with bright colours and different patterns) that you see in magazines, online, on signs or anywhere else. Voice search has also come to Windows Phone too and it’s also built right in, so you can go hands free. Search, write and answer texts, make calls - all with just your voice. Bing Voice allows you to speak into your phone’s microphone, and Bing will translate the words into text and search the web. |
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 Windows Phone has also given the camera features a going over. Now the software includes an option to save the last settings you used on your camera, instead of it reverting to default. To take a picture you are no longer limited to a physical button; a tap on the screen will see your photo taken. (But the hard camera button is still there so you can go from pocket to picture to Facebook™ in seconds, even if your phone is locked.) There’s also a useful auto-fix feature that automatically adjusts settings such as contrast and colour balance for improved picture quality. The camera now supports more social network interaction. You can upload your snaps to Facebook™ or Twitter™ from either the photo gallery or built-in apps, and for Facebook™ you can now immediately tag your friends before you post your picture to Facebook™ thanks to Windows Phone’s new face tagging feature. Videos are also easier to share, with the ability to post them to Facebook™ or Windows® Live. |
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 Windows Phone sees a number of improvements to its calendar. Separate diaries are shown in one place, for easy viewing of all your events as well as your to-do items. They are of course still colour-coded so you know which calendar they’re from. Exchange syncing is still there, but has been joined by Facebook™ integration. Birthdays and events from the social network are automatically added to your calendar, so you never miss another event, and there’s even an option to filter out friends you don’t mingle with too often. |
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 The Windows Phone Marketplace is accessible from three places; the Start screen, the Windows Phone website and Zune®, which can be installed on your PC. Like competitor application stores, Marketplace lets you find and download applications, games, music and podcasts, and have them installed automatically to your phone. Many of the apps are free and also many let you try before you buy. With some 30,000 apps already created in a year, and the company reporting 50,000 developers on board to design for Windows Phone, this is definitely one of the fastest expanding stores out there. There’s also an imaginative hidden app option, which will be useful for allowing businesses to secure private app downloads for employees. |
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 Windows Phone has taken on some interesting new features with regards to Office Mobile. You can now sync your Office documents between your phone and SkyDrive, making mobile editing much more practical regardless of whether it’s a Word or OneNote, PowerPoint or Excel document. Word itself has been overhauled, and now includes cut and paste functions, while Excel has been considerably beefed up: there’s cell selection and now AutoSum to save you valuable time. Exchange too has been improved, giving you options like setting out of office messages and multiple Exchange accounts. There’s also Internet Explorer® 9, which offers much wider support than its predecessor, including the latest HTML5 and XHTML formats. It’s also zippier, far more stable, more secure and creates more space in the screen thanks to tidier toolbars. |
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 Windows Phone includes a number of other smaller updates which make it that little bit more practical. There’s now the choice for custom ringtones, a number of speech commands to allow you to send a text with just your voice, as well as a visual voicemail service that’ll turn long messages into easy to skim text. A few internet features missing from the old version of Windows Phone have been rectified; you can now connect to hidden Wi-Fi networks and now share your phone’s internet connection with other devices such as laptops. Entertainment improvements have seen the expansion of the Games Hub with improved interaction with Xbox LIVE®, as well as a more in depth music and video experience with playlists and a Smart DJ option. |
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The latest devices featuring Windows Phone are the Nokia Lumia 800, the HTC TITAN and HTC Radar. They, of course, sport all of the above features, plus many more hardware benefits.
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The Nokia Lumia 800 offers a fresh new look for a smartphone. It has a smooth one piece body, with a cool 3.7" curved glass touchscreen. The curve gives photos and videos a neat, almost floating look. Nokia's Clear Black screen technology cuts down reflections and glare, and makes for easy use in bright light and on sunny days. Because of the seamless unibody design, it's also much hardier than a typical smartphone. The 1.4GHz processor keeps the new Windows Phone OS running smoothly, with multitasking proving quick and practical. For pictures and 720p HD video recording, the Nokia Lumia 800 is equipped with a high quality 8MP Carl Zeiss lens. Along with Zune, the Nokia Lumia 800 comes with Nokia radio, a great service that not only gives you access to millions of songs, but will actually learn the types of music you listen to and recommend new and upcoming artists that you might like. There's 16GB of memory for saving your media and apps, so there's plenty of space to expand your collection. And then there's built-in Nokia Maps. You'll have free voice guided navigation whether you're driving or walking, and live traffic rerouting and traffic visualisation to get you around road blocks. If you want, you can even preload maps so you can access them offline. Click here for full details of the Nokia Lumia 800 |
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The HTC TITAN offers a massive 4.7” touchscreen which is ideal for viewing pictures and videos. Because of the screen size, its virtual QWERTY keyboard is big-finger friendly, making typing easy. The fast 1.5GHz processor chip, acres of memory and Windows Phone mean multitasking is smooth, allowing you to jump from app to music to Office document seamlessly. The new camera features of Windows Phone are supported by an 8MP lens for cracking photos, while it can also record 720p HD recording. For full video calling support there’s a 1.3MP front facing camera too. It comes with 15GB of memory, meaning you can store plenty of media, and if you fancy sharing songs and videos, the TITAN includes SRS enhancement and 5.1 surround sound to take care of your audio needs. With a slim 9.9mm body it’s not bulky, and a powerful long life 1600 mAh battery makes the TITAN very portable. Click here for full details of the HTC TITAN |
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The HTC Radar, is a more compact and portable version of the TITAN, its' little brother if you like. The 3.8” touchscreen has very high resolution and is particularly bright, making it great for videos and pics. Unlike the TITAN, it has a premium metal chassis, and offers a more polished and rounded feel. Support for multitasking comes from a quick 1GHz processor and loads of memory; switching from apps is still as smooth as the TITAN. A 5MP wide angle lens takes care of photos, and it also supports 720p HD recording. A front facing camera keeps the option of video calls open. A decent amount of in-built memory (8GB) offers plenty of storage, and the Radar also features SRS enhancement and 5.1 surround sound to give sweet sounding music. Click here for full details of the HTC Radar |
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Windows Phone offers a real threat to its competitors, and with the number of smartphones running it expanding and an ever increasing number of apps being developed, there is a lot of optimism in the market.
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