Microsoft announces the death of their consumer phones

[Albuquerque]

Microsoft announced today they're cutting a bit less than 2000 jobs and taking nearly a billion dollar write-down to essentially nuke their "consumer" phone line from orbit.

ZDNet article link

Reportedly, this isn't the end of the MS phone, just their consumer line. I have to assume the only thing left is the strongly rumored "Surface Phone." Those same rumors suggest the "Surface Phone" would use an atom-based x86 processor (kaby lake?) thus making it a phablet form-factor PC with 4G radio integration.

Anyway, I know there's a tiny handful of Lumia users here who might join me in pouring out a drink I really like mine...

 

[AzBat]

Lumia 640 user here. Sad day.

Tommy McClain

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Those same rumors suggest the "Surface Phone" would use an atom-based x86 processor (kaby lake?) thus making it a phablet form-factor PC with 4G radio integration.

I think Kaby Lake would still be too big and power-hungry even for a phablet. If they do a full-windows Surface Phone, it'll be either Apollo Lake or a future chip from Intel.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Anyway, I know there's a tiny handful of Lumia users here who might join me in pouring out a drink I really like mine...

I'll join you in that. I've been a Lumia user for the past few years. The latest being the amazingly cheap Lumia 640 that you've been able to get for around 30 USD for the past year. The Lumia 640 is an amazingly good phone with hardware being significantly better than the closest Nexus competitor.

Regards,
SB

 

[eastmen]

there is still the surface phone in development. So all is not lost yet. The latest rumor I heard is that it will be part of the new xbox as services push starting at e3 but the phone might not come until fall.

 

[loekf]

Then I wonder how big this enterprise market is, assuming that market wants a phone capable of running desktop apps when you hook it up to a monitor.

"Enterprise" is fuzzy these days, lots of companies just give sim cards to their employees and allow them to use their own phone/tablet etc.

Then I wonder what's the life expectancy of Windows 10 "Phone" is as a seperate branch in the Windows family. Okay, it's an ARM and small display version. If the rumored Surface Phablet is x86, they might drop Windows 10 Phone completely.

 

[Albuquerque]

Part of me wonders if WP10 really isn't just WinRT10. I can't know for sure, but naively it's "just" an ARM-port of Windows right? Why can't Microsoft continue using WP10 as a low-end tablet OS powered by ARM?

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Part of me wonders if WP10 really isn't just WinRT10. I can't know for sure, but naively it's "just" an ARM-port of Windows right? Why can't Microsoft continue using WP10 as a low-end tablet OS powered by ARM?

Why would microsoft want to tarnish their brand by releasing a low-end tablet that can't run full windows, when there are chinese vendors out there who are selling BayTrail tablets with full windows for $100 and less?

Scratch that. Even before getting into the competition factor, why would microsoft create a tablet with an OS that no one wants? You read the part where WP10 got less than 1% marketshare, right?

 

[Albuquerque]

I was mostly commenting on Microsoft's updating W10 requirements, in the last week, which included this novel part about Windows Phone 10 OS:

The final change is an expansion of the screen sizes for each operating system variant. Previously, Windows 10 Mobile was specced for devices with up to a 7.9 inch screen, while anything above that used full Windows 10. Now, Windows 10 Mobile can ship on anything with a display smaller than nine inches, while full Windows 10 can ship on a 7-inch device.

Here's a question: which phone-OS-based device type would use a 9" display?

Is it A: the biggest phablet ever created?

Or is it B: an ARM-based tablet?

 

[liolio]

Pretty unhappy about it but I saw this coming in the distance. The truth is it is not salvageable, I bought a lumia 435 60$ (with a nice rebate) as I needed a cheap replacement for a phone. The honeymoon did not last a week, pretty fast I went with the insider program as Win8 was not cutting it for me. From there it has been all over the place in term of battery performances, I was unhappy with the late to find out by leaving the program that I had the prod version.
Next step is their Windows Store, which won't survive such a loss.

 

[warmi]

Yeah, Windows phones were pretty good just not exceptional enough to make a dent in Adroid/iOS markets.

 

[BadTB25]

As long as my Lumia is supported until the Surface phone releases I guess it'll be OK. I've had mine for nearly 3 years and it still performs like a champ. If windows phones really do die out, I may switch to Android.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Yeah, I'm not sure what I'll do if my Lumia's die. Then again I have 3 of them at the moment. I have a 635 in addition to an older 420 that served me well for quite a long time. I love that they are rock solid.

If I had to go with Android I'm not sure what I'd go with. It seems with all my friends it's a bit of a crapshoot whether you get a really solid Android device or one that needs constant rebooting, even within the same brand and line. A few of my friends got so sick of it that they just started buying iPhones instead.

iPhones just aren't an option for me as I'm not interesting in paying over 100-150 USD for a phone. Maybe I'll just go back to using a feature phone.

Regards,
SB

 

[liolio]

Yeah, I'm not sure what I'll do if my Lumia's die. Then again I have 3 of them at the moment. I have a 635 in addition to an older 420 that served me well for quite a long time. I love that they are rock solid.

If I had to go with Android I'm not sure what I'd go with. It seems with all my friends it's a bit of a crapshoot whether you get a really solid Android device or one that needs constant rebooting, even within the same brand and line. A few of my friends got so sick of it that they just started buying iPhones instead.

iPhones just aren't an option for me as I'm not interesting in paying over 100-150 USD for a phone. Maybe I'll just go back to using a feature phone.

Regards,
SB

NOt sure what your friend are buying but I never had those issue with the cheap Android devices I bought within the last years: my Huawei worked great till I fried it stupidly, the 99€ I just bought is in a completely different league than tbth the Huawei and lumia 435I bough last year. My wife Moto G (yes the original) still does great best 200€ (with the flip cover) spent on a phone ever.
My Lumia is the biggest let down of smartphone I ever met and that taking the price I paid for it (60€), they were supposed to do great in the low end, "Windows is smooth, etc;" I bought my mom a cheap Acer one year before I bought the lumia and on many account it still piss on it in thing like browsing speed and overall snappiness.
How fast their shares eroded in the low is pretty well explained, since the moto G hit the road years ago and then the Android One, Android which was already a lot more stable that in its early phone (when pretty much everything but iOS and BB sucked) is in a completely different league than what MSFT managed to offer. I had pretty reasonable hope for Windows 10 they undershot that by a lot.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

NOt sure what your friend are buying but I never had those issue with the cheap Android devices I bought within the last years: my Huawei worked great till I fried it stupidly, the 99€ I just bought is in a completely different league than tbth the Huawei and lumia 435I bough last year. My wife Moto G (yes the original) still does great best 200€ (with the flip cover) spent on a phone ever.
My Lumia is the biggest let down of smartphone I ever met and that taking the price I paid for it (60€), they were supposed to do great in the low end, "Windows is smooth, etc;" I bought my mom a cheap Acer one year before I bought the lumia and on many account it still piss on it in thing like browsing speed and overall snappiness.
How fast their shares eroded in the low is pretty well explained, since the moto G hit the road years ago and then the Android One, Android which was already a lot more stable that in its early phone (when pretty much everything but iOS and BB sucked) is in a completely different league than what MSFT managed to offer. I had pretty reasonable hope for Windows 10 they undershot that by a lot.

Not sure but in over 2 years of use, I never once had to restart the Lumia 420. I haven't had the 640 for that long, but so far it's been rock solid as well.

My friends buy a variety of Android phones. LG, HTC, Xiaomi, Huawei, Samsung, Sony, "Nexus" devices, etc. Many still love their Android devices, but like I said some have switched to iPhone because they got sick of all the hassle. And that's despite them having invested years into the Android ecosystem. And a few others are considering switching as well.

Regards,
SB

 

[Albuquerque]

Stability hasn't been fantastic under WP10 for me, however it seems highly correlated to my use (abuse?) of the Continuum function. I use my phone basically ALL day at work connected to the Continuum dock, a 22" widescreen monitor, and a Logitech wireless keyboard + mouse combo. What invariably happens is I'll connect, use, disconnect, go to meeting, come back, reconnect, use, disconnect, go to meeting <repeat...>

By the end of the third day of this, it starts to get confused because I'll have opened a dozen apps on the continuum interface along with running Pandora on the phone itself. If I don't use continuum, it's stable for ever.

 

[liolio]

Not sure but in over 2 years of use, I never once had to restart the Lumia 420. I haven't had the 640 for that long, but so far it's been rock solid as well

I never try try not to reboot any devices, so I can't comment, but the experience I've had with Android is quite decent on that front. And it is not the issue I faced with my Lumia either.

My friends buy a variety of Android phones. LG, HTC, Xiaomi, Huawei, Samsung, Sony, "Nexus" devices, etc. Many still love their Android devices, but like I said some have switched to iPhone because they got sick of all the hassle. And that's despite them having invested years into the Android ecosystem. And a few others are considering switching as well.

Regards,
SB

I think Android is a bit more troublesome in the high end, people buy really expensive phones and then support is quite iffy, either you don't get update or other time you get one but you get an immature junk of ROM. In the low-end (edited I wrongly wrote high end) the computer savy person goes pretty solid version knowing it will do the job and that is it, the last versions of 4.2 and 4.4 are both super stable, my device is 5.1.1 and super nice, I'm fine with it.
Though depending on the device the jump from 4.4.4 to 5.1.1 has been really smooth and some may be stuck in the middle. If I take that good old moto G as ref, the first 5;0 rom was a letdown, but Motorola reacted pretty.
Overall If you want support Android may not be the place, but lets not confuse support with a viable OS version. Updating is overrated [/QUOTE]

 

[eastmen]

Stability hasn't been fantastic under WP10 for me, however it seems highly correlated to my use (abuse?) of the Continuum function. I use my phone basically ALL day at work connected to the Continuum dock, a 22" widescreen monitor, and a Logitech wireless keyboard + mouse combo. What invariably happens is I'll connect, use, disconnect, go to meeting, come back, reconnect, use, disconnect, go to meeting <repeat...>

By the end of the third day of this, it starts to get confused because I'll have opened a dozen apps on the continuum interface along with running Pandora on the phone itself. If I don't use continuum, it's stable for ever.

Windows phone is great at this.

That is why I really want a surface phone which I still believe is happening but not until next year.


MS needs to get the app problem under control. I think if they go amd/intel for the surface phone they may have a chance if it will run apps for the xbox one on it.

They also need to support all the carriers in the states. I don't have a windows phone currently because they aren't on sprint.

 

[wco81]

Well MS is releasing an anniversary update which will support mobile payments and other features. I don't know what other features but it seems mobile payments got the most attention.

But with poor sales, how much longer are they going to develop mobile features and fixes?

 

[eastmen]

Well MS is releasing an anniversary update which will support mobile payments and other features. I don't know what other features but it seems mobile payments got the most attention.

But with poor sales, how much longer are they going to develop mobile features and fixes?

I don't think they will stop. I'm still hearing that surface phone is alive and working towards a release. So I would assume the work they are doing for windows phone is just going to make the surface release more complete