[Alloyjane]

I'm not opposed to a KEYone but I'm not crazy about android. I have my doubts about their ability to replicate the hub experience so I'm keeping my passport for as long as possible.

I'd be curious about a Windows KEYone, regardless of the reality of its likelihood. Whatever works with MS Office best, so I might go poking around windows phones that actually exist.

If I can get a Huawei P10 at a decent price, that'd be nice but last I checked it won't be available in North America. The sensor function seems like it would be similar to the way BB10 works. Plus, you know, Leica lenses and all that.

But I seriously hate BlackBerry for not doing bb10 justice. Stack of clowns.

[Drael646464]

I guess there's always these, if you are a fan of apple:

https://www.igeeksblog.com/best-ipho...eyboard-cases/

Anyone know of any dope keyboard cases for non-ios phones?

[Fool Guy]

That's a common bug these days with lots of tablets and phones. Guess you could always go Bluetooth?

The said Bug is absent in Mi MAX China RoM.
Even after lots of discussion the team failed to resolve it & using Buetooth headphone is not a solution. (May be fixed in the latest global update 7.3.16 beta)
Mi MAX - Too LOW Audio output via headset - Xiaomi Mi Max/Prime - Xiaomi MIUI Official Forum
https://forum.xda-developers.com/mi-...blems-t3483760
And many others.

[Drael646464]

If I can get a Huawei P10 at a decent price, that'd be nice but last I checked it won't be available in North America. The sensor function seems like it would be similar to the way BB10 works. Plus, you know, Leica lenses and all that.

At last someone releases a premium phone that's actually a reasonable size, and pocketable. PPi isn't battery wasting level either. 4Gb is so wasted on android :P Nice looking phone though, comes in colours too..

[Wezard]

I just learnt that TCL, owns alcatel.

Actually TLC doesn't own Alcatel, at least not as of two weeks ago. At one time they converted a partnership into somewhere around 75% ownership, but then divested most of it. But they definitely do share the same bed quite often.

It's really good to see some people not writing Windows out of the cell phone game. The Win phone is on life support, and loosing money currently, MS wouldn't keep doing that if they didn't have something up their sleeve. Whatever it is, I think it's going to be a game changer. As in complete integration across all platforms. Don't know that it's going to happen as soon as some of you are predicting, but it's gonna happen.

[Drael646464]

Oh your right, looking at it, it appears as if its a little like nokia and Microsoft -"The Alcatel brand was licensed by Alcatel-Lucent to TCL for mobile phones and devices and this license expires at the end of 2024". It's not ownership, its a license.

I've been thinking about it, and I think win32 compatibility coming this year will be a pretty big commercial moat. When you factor in chrome extensions, and the growth of the windows store, for touch apps things are neutralising.

But the 4 million something windows applications available have a whole nother level of power.

Things like adobe illustrator, for an example. Sure, some of them won't run as well touch, but suddenly developers have a motive to produce those apps as scalable. Well beyond the growing hybrid tablet market, which will soon get cheaper with arm chips. Even a full desktop browser is a thing of beauty next to the scaled down mobile apps in the play store. When those same things start to come in a scalable release, new editions, and into the windows store...you have a development market that outprofits, and is outfunding the mobile app market - feature rich, powerful, clean, adless.

I know fruity loops is already scalable. Won't scale to a phone yet, but scales to a tablet nicely.

I mean apple and android are pretty much the same. Most phones are pretty much the same. Windows mobile has been too, just with less apps. But pretty soon, windows mobile will be the "device that does more", rather than "the vice that does the same, not as well".

I hope their UI changes, and other plans are as dramatic and clever as what we have seen so far with other recent developments and future plans.

[Troy Tiscareno]

If that were true, alcatel wouldn't be making windows phones, and it wouldn't have gotten carrier support WAY easier than the keyONE for said phones. Clearly a low priced high end windows phone for enterprise is an easier sell that a blackberry branded android on some level.

Huawei exec claims 'Nobody made any money in Windows Phone' | Windows Central

MS is almost certainly subsidizing TCL's WinPhones, as they did with Nokia and others. Still, most previous partners have fled, and marketshare has been crashing over the last 2 years and is still falling (with little room left to fall).

Kantar's latest smartphone market share report sees Windows Phone dip below 1% in the U.S. | Windows Central

But your right, if they have to license the keyboard that might be a killer. Still IDK why blackberry wouldn't want to get into windows, if TCL thought it was a good move. Android is a very crowded market space, existing BB customers are often reluctant to move to android. Windows is bound to grow, given the app gap is inevitably going to close.

A relative few BB customers are reluctant to move to Android (or iOS), but most corporations have no such issues. Even the US government is virtually all iOS and Android, and so are US banks and financial companies, large retailers, military contractors, etc.

There's absolutely no evidence that Windows Mobile is "bound to grow" - BB10 users said exactly the same thing in 2013-2014, and we saw how that went. WinMo is in a death spiral, and has almost zero mindshare, despite absolutely everyone knowing who Microsoft is and what Windows is. That's BAD for WinMo.

And its not like the market isn't littered with failed android manufacturers, or most of them don't struggle to turn a decent buck. Xiaomi is probably doing a lot better that LG or HTC for example. Low profits is a reason atm not to try on take on Samsung as much as it is for is for not making windows phones.

That's a normal part of commoditization of a product. Look at HDTV manufacturers. In 2005, there were over 100 manufacturers of them, and at least 15 big, well-known brand names in the US. Today, there are less than a dozen manufacturers worldwide. A few companies did almost everything right, and they're still around, and everyone else, whose business models and corporate strategy were flawed got acquired or crushed. We'll see the same kind of consolidation in the smartphone business - where right now there are over 200 companies making smartphones. I expect there to be about 20-30 companies left a decade from now. I doubt HTC will be one of them, despite being a fan of the company - they've simply made too many poor decisions and didn't learn from them fast enough. That's not going to change the OS balance, though.

Windows computer manufacturers make tiny margins, and there are only a few left, but it hasn't driven them away from Windows, because Windows has the app and service ecosystem that users require. That's also true of Android.

The budget sector is a safer bet, if your talking android. Indeed that's why its the most popular OS, because of cheap petrol station smartphones, not because of premium devices. And with impending market saturation, that would be the better place to position oneself, somewhere in the midmarket.

That's a backhanded compliment. The strength of Android is that it serves ALL levels of the market, from high-end flagships down to mid-range down to entry-level - just like Windows on the desktop.

Nokia is smart. When they got the license to their name back, that's immediately where they started.

Nokia didn't get anything back. An entirely new entity licensed the name from Microsoft for making smartphones. The former Nokia smartphone company no longer exists - only the cellular/network side of the old company still exists.

A premium priced android phone, branded blackberry, probably has less chance of success than a mid priced windows phone, a far less dominated space. You are taking on the s8, and the next google pixel, after all. Or at least, trying to be generous to BB despite all failures so far, we are hardly talking "wildly successful proposition" and "uncertain idea". These are success propositions that are at least in the same ballpark, commercially.

I disagree. I think BB has a better chance with Android than anyone does with WinMo. If for no other reason than this one:

On any connected device you buy, and on every ad for apps you see (which are everywhere), you will see this:



Those logos alone, which have been around nearly a decade, have ensured that iOS and Android have almost total mindshare in mobile, and it's going to take something truly massive to change that. I don't believe in MS enough to trust that they've got something that massive anytime in the near future. I could be wrong - but MS's track record certainly isn't very compelling.

[richdb]

Then it will be Windows or SailfishOS. Windows 10 is getting there more and more. SailfishOS we have to wait. On this moment it is not on the leven of BB10. It is not going to be Android or IOS, that is for sure.

Posted via CB10

[lever2000]

I went away from bb10 go a LG G5 couldn't be happier so far, good to be back on Android I must say.

[jope28]

A relative few BB customers are reluctant to move to Android (or iOS), but most corporations have no such issues. Even the US government is virtually all iOS and Android, and so are US banks and financial companies, large retailers, military contractors, etc.

There's absolutely no evidence that Windows Mobile is "bound to grow" - BB10 users said exactly the same thing in 2013-2014, and we saw how that went. WinMo is in a death spiral, and has almost zero mindshare, despite absolutely everyone knowing who Microsoft is and what Windows is. That's BAD for WinMo.

It seems to be a given that the sentiment on this thread is clearly describing those of us "relatively few BlackBerry customers" that you describe.
Most others are now happy with Android or iOS now.

But Microsoft seems to have put all their eggs in the basket to where Windows Mobile, Xbox OS and Windows will become essentially the same thing plus become the center for iOT products.
That's the stuff Nadella has been saying along with also having their apps and services on the other platforms.

In a decade, It shall be the return of the Sith! lol

Blurring the lines between devices.
Blurring the lines between tablets and laptops and then blurring from tablet to smartphone seems like their long term strategy.


Which, I'm guessing, means Windows on mobile devices will never disappear unless any and all versions of Windows disappear.

[Kryngle]

I think I would stick with the BlackBerry brand Android if and when I decide to move on. After playing around with this Android Auto, I must say it very much impressed me. The mobile market to me is kinda boring with just two OS's available. We all will son have no choice but to choose between these two crappie OS.

Posted via CB10

[Drael646464]

MS is almost certainly subsidizing TCL's WinPhones, as they did with Nokia and others. Still, most previous partners have fled, and marketshare has been crashing over the last 2 years and is still falling (with little room left to fall).

Kantar's latest smartphone market share report sees Windows Phone dip below 1% in the U.S. | Windows Central

That's pretty silly. No, Microsoft is not sending Chinese company TCL money to make windows phones. They haven't licensed the name like with nokia either. And they aren't paying HP, nor cube, nor any of the others.

Its simply smart business sense, to compete in an emerging niche, rather than in a crowded established market. The carrier that gave support to the idol, isn't taking money either - that's a marketplace decision.

This is pretty much conspiracy thinking right here, sorry to say man.

[Drael646464]

There's absolutely no evidence that Windows Mobile is "bound to grow" - BB10 users said exactly the same thing in 2013-2014, and we saw how that went. WinMo is in a death spiral, and has almost zero mindshare, despite absolutely everyone knowing who Microsoft is and what Windows is. That's BAD for WinMo.

Windows store grows regardless of mobile market share. Which is a fair bit different from bb10. Apples and oranges.

If windows mobile were dead, they wouldn't be receiving the most major software update any mobile platform has ever this year - the power to run desktop software.

Besides, tablets will take over phones when foldable screens come in. And windows has the strongest growth in that segment (tablets). People don't want thin OSes and limited software as much when it comes to bigger screens. That would be like wanting a chromebook over a proper laptop.

[conite]

Windows store grows regardless of mobile market share. Which is a fair bit different from bb10. Apples and oranges.

If windows mobile were dead, they wouldn't be receiving the most major software update any mobile platform has ever this year - the power to run desktop software.

The number of people buying Windows phones number in the hundreds of thousands per quarter globally. Dead as a door nail.

[Ment]

Windows store grows regardless of mobile market share. Which is a fair bit different from bb10. Apples and oranges.

If windows mobile were dead, they wouldn't be receiving the most major software update any mobile platform has ever this year - the power to run desktop software.

Besides, tablets will take over phones when foldable screens come in. And windows has the strongest growth in that segment (tablets). People don't want thin OSes and limited software as much when it comes to bigger screens. That would be like wanting a chromebook over a proper laptop.

MS keeps dropping eligible phones with each WinMo update enraging its dwindling loyal fans. It's dead Jim.

The Windows 10 Mobile Creators Update is only coming to 13 eligible handsets | Windows Central

The next Surface mobile if it comes won't be a phone anyway but some mini-tablet with LTE with docking software so you can use existing desktop accessories. With the efforts to make MS apps on Android/IOS robust there is no reason to put billions into phones again.

[Powdah]

I would like to see Sailfish on the Mate 9. Maybe Jolla will start looking at other manufactures like the Sony alliance.

[Laura Knotek]

The number of people buying Windows phones number in the hundreds of thousands per quarter globally. Dead as a door nail.

The latest attempt is a crowd funding effort to produce a Windows 10 Mobile device. https://www.google.com/amp/amp.windo...-windows-phone

Another company NuAns tried this last year, but the campaign failed.

[anon(6038817)]

Alas, I'm using an iPhone SE as my daily driver now. And you know what? I like it.

My thumbs are still mourning the loss of a BlackBerry physical keyboard, but the lack of apps and OS support in general finally drove me away from BB10.

I must sadly admit that iOS does more of what I want in a smartphone than BB10.

Android is off the table. I understand why BlackBerry had to try to put lipstick on that pig, but I'm not buying it.

Windows Mobile suffers from the same general problems as BB10. Lack of apps and general lack of interest and support from the company that sells it. I am considering getting a Windows Phone as a second device to tinker with, though. I had a Lumia 950 in the past and I thought it was a pretty good device. Continuum is fun, too.

[Troy Tiscareno]

Which, I'm guessing, means Windows on mobile devices will never disappear unless any and all versions of Windows disappear.

They might not disappear, but they won't be viable for most people anytime in the near future. Of course, in the distant future things could change, but it's rarely a good idea to make tech predictions more than a couple of years in advance. It's also a bad idea to buy a product based on promises of future functionality, rather than the functionality at the time of purchase, because all too often, the promises aren't kept.

[Drael646464]

The number of people buying Windows phones number in the hundreds of thousands per quarter globally. Dead as a door nail.

Meh, you always have the same one sentence "arguments". The same notion that economies and technology are all locked in amber. Frozen in time for ever. If this was the 1990s, you'd be telling us apple was dead.

Heck, you quote the part where I point out, the growth of the app ecosystem doesn't rely on current market share, which pretty much contradicts what you said anyway.

[Drael646464]

Besides smartphones are a time limited form factor. They'll be the thing of the past in a decade, replaced by folding tablets. A form factor that is poorly suited to thin OSs. and low powered, simplisitic software.

[Drael646464]

The latest attempt is a crowd funding effort to produce a Windows 10 Mobile device. https://www.google.com/amp/amp.windo...-windows-phone

Another company NuAns tried this last year, but the campaign failed.

NuAns have a phone. It is successful in japan. They were crowdfunding the international production.

[Drael646464]

MS keeps dropping eligible phones with each WinMo update enraging its dwindling loyal fans. It's dead Jim.

The Windows 10 Mobile Creators Update is only coming to 13 eligible handsets | Windows Central

The next Surface mobile if it comes won't be a phone anyway but some mini-tablet with LTE with docking software so you can use existing desktop accessories. With the efforts to make MS apps on Android/IOS robust there is no reason to put billions into phones again.

Microsoft has literally just made a large investment into windows mobile, developing the revolutionary win32 on ARM emu with Qualcomm. Which is something else no other smart phone can touch - full browsers, extensions, 4 million windows applications.

Most likely most phones after the rollout of flexible OLED screens will be tablets. That will be IMO, in I'd say roughly six years the first "book" devices. The prototype was developed years ago, its just the production methods we are waiting for. And Samsung and Microsoft own the patent.

At that point, as with tablets, or any larger screen, software that seems satisfying on a small screen becomes seemingly simple and shallow. Much like getting the mobile version of a website on your desktop, or playing a game developed for bored bus stop smartphone users on a console.

IMO there is every reason to keep developing Windows for small screen devices. Not only because the app platform is growing so fast, nor because when win32 hits, it makes windows "mobile pc" stand out as a phone that can do many things others can't - but because form factors and technology, and also markets, are always shifting.

In business, nothing is entirely undoable. Or a given. Its all risk and strategy. Like chess and poker. Your gambit is, to better anticipate where technology or markets may go. Regardless of where you stood to begin with.

In theory, if BB had re-branded, re-oriented, and made the right gambles, it could be still successful. In a way, by shifting to auto, they did. Simarly IBM, with its focus on consoles and AI. Apple made a gamble on the ipod, and it was a smart one, they went all in with something, they knew would become popular.

That gut instinct, and sense of what, in some ways is obvious about human thinking, about the future - the courage to think differently, not many people have it, is sort of a key to success. Current Microsoft CEO has it in spades. His vision makes steve jobs look idle and listless.

[conite]

That gut instinct, and sense of what, in some ways is obvious about human thinking, about the future - the courage to think differently, not many people have it, is sort of a key to success. Current Microsoft CEO has it in spades. His vision makes steve jobs look idle and listless.

Are you willing to back up your enthusiasm with a huge investment in their stock? Microsoft has a long history of not delivering on their "visions" for mobile.

[Drael646464]

Are you willing to back up your enthusiasm with a huge investment in their stock? Microsoft has a long history of not delivering on their "visions" for mobile.

I guess peoples scepticism makes it an even better investment. The less people know of any opportunity the better. Take the housing bubble burst as an example. No one believed that would happen, people made a tidy profit for knowing it would.

I can think of better ways to cash in myself, on microsoft, but my financial attentions are not really in the direction of investing in others right now.

Although I can see several strong likelyhoods and inevitables in the next little while (maybe 10 years), that most seem not to (not like I am the only one however), and I intend on capitalizing if I am able. Some of them fall in microsofts area.