Samsung cross between Windows Phone and the Galaxy S3
Samsung was always a common OEM for Microsoft’s smartphones, producing the Focus and Omnia models for Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7. Following on from that, Samsung introduced the ATIV branding for their Windows 8 devices. ATIV is basically Vita spelt backwards and is Latin for Life, which was also used for the Sony PlayStation Vita, also released in 2012. Coincidence? Maybe
The ATIV branding was supposed to complement the Galaxy branding for Samsung’s Android smart phones, though it also extended to their Windows Laptops and hybrid tablets. The launch device for all this was the ATIV S, which was Samsung flagship Windows Phone for 2012, launching with version 8 of the OS. Windows Phone 8 looks similar to it’s predecessor Windows Phone 7, but under the hood it was practically are written operating system, making use of the Windows NT kernel instead of the Windows CE that WP7 had used. Due to the drastic changes, no WP7 smartphones could be upgraded to WP8, since it required a dual core processor that no WP7 device had supported (and its widely believed the WP7 core couldn’t support this, hence the need to reboot the OS with a new kernel) IDK Why they didn’t do this when they introduced WP7, maybe the hardware at the time didn’t support this? This is kind of why Windows Phone failed, there was no consistent stepping stone between major versions, and with Window’s Phone 8 they effectively reported the OS from scratch again, existing handsets could not upgrade to WP8
The ATIV S itself has very similar specifications to the Galaxy S3, both have a 4.8 inch 720p screen, both feature 1GB of RAM and 16GB of user storage and a dual core processor (the ATIV differs by using a Snapgradon processor whilst the Galaxy used Samsung’s own Exynos cores).
The user interface is pretty much Windows Phone, with its innovative live tiles and social media integration. Samsung did bundle their own exclusive apps and settings which are worth looking into.
Apps
NOW: Similar to what was seen in the Omnia W, this is Samsung’s News, Weather and Stock/Sports information app. News is provided by Yahoo news, who have since discontinued it’s integration but would have shown the latest news headlines for your area. This app supports both the live tile and the lock screen feature, weather information can be displayed on the locks screen itself.
Photo Editor: A simple image editor that can apply a wide range of filters and effect to captured photo’s, and also allows you to place stickers for novelty use. Cropping and zooming are also supported, although you can do this in the Windows stock image viewer.
Mini Diary: Lets you create a journal or a note where photos or drawings can be attached to them. You can also record a voice note for upto 10 minutes.
Settings
Samsung has included their owns settings applets that are located towards the bottom of the Settings app, these allow you to change features that are exclusive to the ATIV S
Additional call settings: Check the status and enable call forwarding and call waiting, if they are supported by your network operator
advanced text messages: Allows you to enable CB message reception for broadcast SMS messages, not something we have in the UK
call blocking: lets you enable and add phone numbers to the blocklist which the phone will prevent from contacting you. You can also set to block any callers that withhold their number.
Extra settings: other settings that don’t have their own category, you can change settings for haptic feedback if you want the phone to vibrate when the touch buttons are used.
Contacts import: import contacts from another phone via Bluetooth, which Windows Phone didn’t support for some reason.
apn: change access point settings, if the phone did not detect your SIM card provider. You need these settings to access the internet and to send or receive MMS messages. Typically you don’t have to do this unless you insert a SIM card that the handset cannot detect the correct settings for, or if they are outdated.
Conclusion
Whilst the ATIV S was the phone to get when Windows Phone 8 was released, it quickly was thrown to the wayside after Nokia started released their flagship handsets, along with their custom exclusive apps for the platform. The ATIV S, along with other Windows Phones didn’t really sell that well, and this caused Samsung to lose interest in the platform. The handset would be followed up by the ATIV S Neo. The ATIV S was well supported in terms of updates, with the 8.1 update being released in 2013 that introduced an updated boot screen, Cortana (RIP), new features for the Start screen and OS features thanks to Microsoft’s update policy.
The fact that the ATIV wasn’t a best seller, and that Microsoft had a strong partnership with Nokia at the time cause them to exit the Windows Phone platform. Samsung would follow-up with the ATIV Odyssey that was a cheaper low-end device and then the ATIV SE, No Windows 10 handsets were released from Samsung.
The HTC 10 is a well-rounded flagship smartphone with a focus on build quality, audio performance, and camera capabilities. It’s a solid choice for users who prioritize these aspects and prefer a near-stock Android experience since HTC dialled down their customisations with the launcher. The phone’s design is more similar to what you would see with a typical Samsung or Sony flagship handset.
There’s no doubting that the HTC10 is fast. The Snapdragon 820 processor is quadcore, running at 2.2GHz, and has a massive 4GB of RAM available. It’s a noticeable step-up from the slower 8-core processor of the One M9, but perhaps not quite as powerful as Samsung’s Exynos processor used in the Galaxy S7. The phone is equipped with 32GB of data storage, and can be upgraded with a microSD card.
The OS is Android 6 with the latest pared-down version of HTC Sense with fewer pre-installed apps, and has received upgraded to Android 7 and 8. HTC’s new Freestyle Layout frees up your creativity, allowing you to pin icons and widgets wherever you like. It’s a welcome change from the usual Android grid, but can get a little anarchic at times.
Ther setup wizard that appears when you power on the phone for the first time
The HTC home screen which used their own custom launcher, swiping to the left will show another screen which will display the time and weather which will be a widget that you can tap on to open the weather app
Customising the launcher, here you can select a different theme, change the background wallpaper and add additional widgets or app shortcuts. The edit page button lets you select which screen you want to appear as the home screen, or remove any vacant screens.
The HTC Sense settings, where you can adjust the notification settings. HTC would have sent notifications regarding new themes that had been released, and any offers and promotions. The settings screen can be triggered by holding your finger on an empty area of the launcher, which will popup the menu on the left.
The pull down notification bar which gives quick access to common phone functions.
The messaging app which incorporates Google’s material design. Messages can be backed up and protected with a password. You can also setup a block list to block specific numbers or spam. There are also message templates to quickly enter a message to send.
The phone app which is used to make calls, and to view saved contacts. Voice dialling is supported where you can speak the name of your contact, though a language pack must be downloaded first.
The camera viewfinder, The camera may just have 12 megapixels, but it does everything it can to capture light – using a 1.55μm pixel size, a huge f/1.8 aperture and Optical Image Stabilisation. A two-tone LED flash is also available, to get the very best night-time shots.
Perhaps even better is the front camera, which, although it has just 5 megapixels, is very good at capturing the best shots. It’s an autofocus camera and also features an f/1.8 aperture, auto HDR mode and (uniquely) Optical Image Stabilisation, making it one of the best selfie cameras you’ll find. The rear camera can capture 4K video, while the front camera sticks to 1080p.
HTC’s weather app which by default shows your local weather based on your location, and will show for the different major cities. Data is obtained from either Google, or Accuweather.
The Clock app, which also functions as a timer and a stopwatch
The voice recorder, which supports saving recorded audio in AMR or AAC format, AMR is lower quality but is more supported when sending to older devices
Scribble – A memo drawing app that can be used to create notes. These can contain text, or any drawing created by the touchscreen. Images taken from the camera can also be inserted into the memo, along with stickers.
The bundled keyboard which is a customised variant of the Touchpad keyboard. As with other android keyboards you can adjust the size, appearance and features of the keyboard such as emoji or GIF support.
HTC Mini is also supported, which is a compact device that links to your smartphone, kind of like a smartwatch.
A feature you will see in the settings menu is HTC Boomsound manipulates the phones speak to provide multichannel audio using the phone’s mono speaker. There are two modes, Music and Theater which will relelate to the type to content you are playing. Unlike the preious HTC flagships (M9,M8) the 10 only has a single speaker located at the bottom of the device.
Device storage screen, HTC are one of the few Android OEMs to support adoptable stage where the microSD card is merged with the internal phone storage. This has the benefit that larger apps (Games) can use both types of storage, but means the apps cannot be used should the microSD be removed.
Is that a GameCube controller?
Lastly we have a software update, even though the phone is around 8 years old.
A high end Android phone released in 2014, and put LG on the map against the Galaxy S5, The Sony Xperia Z2 and the HTC One M7. It’s sucsessor, the G4 is very similar but with the faster Snapdragon 808 processor.
Powered by a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor and 2GB or 3GB of RAM (depending on the variant), the LG G3 delivered smooth and responsive performance. Apps launched quickly, and multitasking was a breeze. The device handled everyday tasks with ease, including web browsing, gaming, and media consumption, even today with modern apps. With a 5.5 inch screen, it almost competed in the phablet market with the Galaxy Note 4
The phone also came with LG’s flavour of Android, original 4.4, it was updated to Android 6.
Shortly after the first boot, the phone picks up a few updates
The home screen, showing the LG launcher with the default widget and icon layout.
The lock screen, which will display weather affects if you have your location enabled. here you can see raindrops that signify rain. I wonder what effect a hurricane or a blizzard would have?
Swiping to the left will reveal the Smart Bulletin section of the launcher. Smart Bulletin served as a central hub for aggregating and displaying relevant information from different sources and apps on the device. This included things like upcoming calendar events, weather forecasts, recent photos, and LG Health data. You can customize Smart Bulletin by adding or removing different cards based on their preferences and needs.
There is integration with the LG Health app, which will show you your current step count and the amount of calories burnt. You can also launches the music player, and control your TV if you have the QuickRemote configured. Ina. Way it’s similar to the live tiles feature on Windows Phone and It think this was what LG was attempting to replicate.
The weather app, which pulls data from Accuweather. You can let it detect your location, or manually add a city.
The Clock app, of which you can set alarms and stuff. The navigation bar near the top can be swiped to move to the next item, similar to the Windows Phone interface.
LG’s internet browser which is based on Chrome 38 that was released in 2014. That’s quite out of date and LG papers to have not released further updated that apply to the handset. At least a more modern browser can be installed through the Play Store, like Brave 1.31.90 (Chrome 95) which the latest supported for Android 6.
This might be using the Android embedded browser, which might explain
The App drawer which will display App’s and Widgets, along with the Home Screen Settings that lets you change the icon size. You can also organise the apps by name, download date or in a custom order.
The pull down notification section. You can swipe the icons to reveal more quick settings and add additional icons and reorder the existing set. Some additional options are for the extra features LG have included, but aren’t enabled by default as to not intimidate users.
The calculator which can function in a simple or scientific mode.
I should mention the Slide feature that appears on multiple LG apps, this lets you multitask the apps as they appear, mimicking a desktop user interface. You can drag to move the window and a slider lets you make the app transparent. This makes good use of the G3’s Hughe screen and give you a Samsung Note-like experience.
The contacts app which also serves as the phones dialer. Contacts can be pulled from the phones memory, the Sim card or sync’d from your Google account. Each contact can have a custom ringtone, a photo assigned to it and a custom notification colour. Favourite contacts can be set, for frequently used contacts.
The file manager, which is used to display various files that are present on the internal, external SD storage and any supported cloud storage services. Supported services are Google Drive, Box, Dropbox and OneDrive. Of all the services, only Google Drive appears to still be functional as of 2024.
The SMS app, with a spam feature that lets you block SMS messages based on keywords. Flagged messages are immediacy stored in a dedicated spam folder. There are a few template messages that can be selected and sent for quick messaging. The attachment icon lets you add media, which will convert to an MMS message.
The music player, which can play back files stored locally or from the (Google) cloud. Additional effect’s can be applied such as adjusting the pitch and speed.
McAfee comes included with adds an anti-virus scanner. It also comes with a backup utility with requires you to subscribe to McAfee;s cloud service
The voice recorder app
QuickMemo which lets you create a journal consisting of either text, freeform drawing or pictures imported from apps. You can also add supplementary information like the weather and location which can be done by tapping on its respective icon at the bottom. It’s kinda useful if you want to capture and record an outing or event.
LG Health app lets you monitor the amount of steps walked in a day, along with settings fitness goals and targets.
A look at the settings page
Media sharing is where the phone will act as a DLNA media server, so you can stream content to a supported TV or console.
The stock ringtones that come with the phone
Different fonts can be set also
The navigation bar that appears at the bottom of the screen can have additional icons at the bottom,. The Android Back, Home, Task buttons can’t be removed but can be rearranged.
Daydreams are essentially screensavers and will appear if the phone is docked or is charging.
The SmartCleaning app helps to delete files that consume space
And a look at the stock keyboard, along with LG’s emoji set
LG EasyHome
This was a feature that make the device’s user interface much more simplified, at least for the launcher. This is meant to appeal to basic users, or users that have come from iOS or a feature phone that are new to Android smartphones. .
LG PC Sync
LG’s version of iTunes, that lets you back up the data on your phone, transfeer content to and from your PC in a user friendly manor. You can aos performs oftware updateds and enable SmartShare – where the Suite software acts as a DLNA server for over devices on your network.
Music, photo and Videos can also be transferred, though its a bit limited compared to iTunes or Windows Media Player. For one you cannot sync and convert music to a lwoer bit rate and there’s no support for smart playlist’s.
Still you can use Windows Media Player to transfer music, as long as the phone is conencted in MTP mode.
Another software update, looks like LG kepp supporting the handset until 2018.
HTC’s 2015 flagship which continues on the HTC One M8 design, featuring a premium unibody metal design, giving off a stylish look.
Most notable for the appearance is the Front-facing stereo speakers which was a standout feature of the phone. Offering clear audio from the phone, It was like a little concert in your pocket. That was an awesome design choice and HTC have managed to blend the speaker design into the phone. Powering the phone is the Snapdragon 810 processor with 3GB of RAM, originally running Android 5, later updates introduced Android 7. 32Gb of storage is included, and it can be expanded using a microSD card.
The M9 had some issues with getting hot under the collar. That shiny, beautiful metal body had a downside: it sometimes turned into a portable oven. Now, don’t get me wrong, a bit of warmth is okay, but overheating can be a deal-breaker, especially if the phone heats up when you’re not doing anything too taxing. I hate to think how hot this phone gets when under full use with a plastic case attached.
Launcher + Notifications
HTC Sense is the default user interface for the handset, You’ve got this neat home screen with customizable widgets and themes. The themes can give your phone a whole new look and feel, and if you’re into making your phone truly yours, this is a big win. HTC Sense Home is supposed to be smart and intuitive, changing your apps based on your location and habits. It’s like your phone’s playing mind reader. It’s a cool concept, but it doesn’t always nail it. Sometimes, you just want your apps right where you put ’em, right? And having to search for them kind of defeats the purpose of it.
The lock screen with a row of shortcut icons at the bottom. YOu can swipe up from these icons to go directly to them when the phone is unlocked, allowing for easy access to the app. You can also customize the layout and which app icons appear on this screen.
Blinkfeed also makes an appearance, but I have mixed feelings about it. It’s a news aggregation feature right on your home screen. It’s nice to have all that info at your fingertips, but sometimes, I just want a clean slate when I unlock my phone. Maybe it’s my inner control freak, but I want to decide when and where I consume my news. But hey, it’s there for those who want to stay on top of things and it can be disabled.
The notification drop down, which also provided access to phone functions
List of apps that are installed on the handset.
Shows any recently open apps that you can quickly switch back to, or apps that are currently running in the background. You can choose from a card or a grid view layout as seen below. Screen pinning can also be enabled from here.
Lastly some shots of the initial setup application
Oh look, a system update for Android 7. I guess this handset hasn’t been used for a few years.
Applications
HTC had created their own set of applications for common phone functions and preinstalled a few third-party apps.
Music: A fully featured music player is included which can playback your standard music formats. There is also an option to playback from a DLNA server, provided you are connected to a Wi-Fi network. This had no problems playing back from a WDMycloud NAS, but album art was missing and it would play the same track again, there was no sequential playback unless you manually skipped to the next track. There is also a trippy visualizer, but this only works for locally stored music files, DLNA tracks have no visualizer. Still, HTC went to a lot of effort for their music player, though you can’t change the pitch like in the LG G4’s music player.
Kid Mode: HTC’s answer to Windows Phones’s Kid’s corner. Here you can pin specific apps to restrict access to the phone.
News Republic: A news aggregation app that used to come pre-installed on some Android devices, including some HTC smartphones. It was developed by a company called News Republic, which aimed to provide users with a comprehensive and personalized news reading experience.
HTC Print Studio: HTC Print Studio was to enable users to create physical prints of photos and images directly from their HTC device, kinda like Snapfish. In addition to standard photo prints, HTC Print Studio sometimes offered the option to order various print products, such as photo books, greeting cards, calendars, and posters.
HTC Help: This app provides troubleshooting and hardware testing to see if there are any faults with the device. You can also view the power usage of individual apps. There are also How-to guides on how to use various features of the phone.
HTC Dot View: This is a special case that’s attached to the phone that adds a protective front cover with a bunch of holes. By using the dot view app, you can customize the standby screen and patterns, which would show the current time and if there are any notifications.
Peel Smart Remote: The M9 has a built-in IR transmitter that allows the phone to control a TV or Set-top Box, similar to what the LG G4 had featured.
Photo Editor: basic editing tools such as cropping, rotating, and straightening images to adjust their composition, plus a variety of filters and effects. You can also change the brightness and colour balance.
Polaris Office 5: View and open documents and spreadsheets on the phone itself. This also has compatibility with Microsoft Office formats.
Zoe Video Editor: Zoe is a video editor and social media app created by HTC, the smartphone manufacturer. It’s designed to allow users to easily create and share short video clips with various visual effects and music. Zoe was initially introduced as a feature on some HTC smartphones and later became a standalone app available for download on various Android devices. You can edit and enhance video clips with a range of editing tools. Users can trim, splice, and arrange clips to create a cohesive video. The app offers various visual effects and filters that can be applied to video clips. These effects can change the look and mood of the video, adding creative and artistic touches.
Voice Recorder: Simple voice recorder app that supports recording in a variety of audio formats from AMR to ACC. Most phones should support both of these formats.
HTC Power To Give: Some sort of distributed computing app that downloads small workloads to process. Very similar to Folding@Home for the PS3 and PC.
Scribble: A scrapbook-like app that allows for drawing and freehand text. You can drag with your finger, or a stylus (Which isn’t included with the phone) for more accuracy. Samsung and LG have included similar apps in their Android handsets for sharing created images.
Emergency Alerts: Displays any emergency alerts, not much to say since we hardly get any natural emergencies over here. I would imagine this would notify of any disasters or riots of peace nearby.
FM Radio: Simple FM radio that supports auto-tuning and RDS. Radio stations can be saved by tapping on the heart button for easy access.
Gallery: Where photos and videos captured by the camera reside, here you can easily edit or share, or organize into an album.
Flashlight: Turns on the LED flashlight, with a nice skeuomorphic torch on screen,
Clock: View different timezones, set an alarm or 5, and access the stopwatch or a lap/countdown timer.
Car: Enabled Car mode which allows earlier access to phone functions when you are driving
File Manager: Browse and access files on both the internal memory or the SD card.
Weather: Shots of the weather app, which uses the Accuweather API
Widgets
A few custom widgets come with the phone, many are linked to the bundled apps.
The music widget will either show the currently playing track, or any recently played tracks.
The Peel app can also be set as a widget, allowing for quick control without having to open the app.
People widgets let you set quick access contacts to easily call or send a message, similar to how contacts could be pinned to the Windows Phone home screen.
The Sense widgets will show you frequently or recently used apps that the phone will learn over time
A weather clock widget that come with a variety of clock faces, tapping on it will open the app to access the stopwatch or set an alarm. A variant of the widget will display multiple clocks for different time zones.
Data dashboard lets you quickly enable and disable certain phone features like the wifi, this is redundant since the notification bar can be used for this
Settings
A view of the main settings screen
HTC Connect lets you share content via DLNA or screen mirroring. A variety of protocols are supported including Apple’s Airplay, Chromecast, Miracast and Blackfire.
HTC Mini+ was a compact device that linked to the phone for easier access, kind of like a smartwatch. It’s marketed as an easy way to get access to the core features of the phone without having to use the actual handset, like if you wish to make a quick phone call or send a text message.
The personalize section lets you change the appearance of the phone and the notifications that it sounds. Themes can be downloaded and applied to the phone which changes the sound, wallpaper and menu fonts. Like the LG G4, the bottom navigation bar can be customized with additional icons being added in addition to the Home, Back and Tasks buttons.
The phone comes with a variety of gestures, in response to the Galaxy S4. You can enable and disable specific gestures that can be used to trigger phone functions. Glove mode increases the sensitivity of the screen to allow it to pick up input from users wearing gloves.
Lastly a look of the themes and wallpapers that shipped with the phone.
This can happen if you charge the phone whilst connected to a USB 2.0 port. The device needs more than 500mA for optimized charging.
Conclusion
Overall, the HTC One M9 was a looker, no doubt about it. It had that premium feel, it oozed style, and it was like holding a piece of art in your hand. But it did have some quirks, like the heat issue and the button placement. Nevertheless, it was a solid design for its time. HTC knew how to make a phone that was both functional and easy on the eyes.
Shutting down the One M9, done by holding the power/lock button.
The Sony Xperia Z2 was a flagship smartphone released by Sony Mobile in April 2014. It was part of Sony’s Xperia Z series and was designed to be a high-end device with a focus on water and dust resistance, camera capabilities, and premium design which set it aside from competing handsets of its time.
Competing smartphones of its time was the Samsung Galaxy S5. The HTC One M8 compared favourably but had perceived better audio quality owing to its front facing speakers.The LG G3 also beat it in the display department, offering a Quad HD display. However the Xperia offered more memory, a better camera and generally a larger display.
The Xperia Z2’s design – it’s unmistakably Sony. Glass on the front and back, sandwiched with a solid metal frame. The overall aesthetic screams premium, no doubt. But be ready to deal with some smudges and fingerprints, because this thing attracts them like a moth to a flame. One standout feature was the water and dust resistance, with the handset offering cover flaps for both the charging and card slots which set it apart from other handsets, but its glass back frame was a source of weakness, with owners reporting broken or cracked backs from minor drops. It was imperative to use a third party case, which detracted from the appearance of the phone.
The Xperia’s main menu, very close to the stock Android interface few a few Sony enhancements. Also note the Sackboy from LittleBigPlanet and what I assume is the main character from Medieval, two of Sony’s game franchises.
Still theres a distinct lack of Kratos from God Of War.
Swiping right takes you to another home screen, here you can see the clock, Google search box (which is a widget that can be changed to any search engine that you like) and shortcuts to Google’s services.
The lock screen, which provides shortcuts to the camera when you swipe up in that direction. A common design you will see are waves, which were similar to what was seen on the PS3 XMB and the PS4 home menu, I guess its Sony’s thing
Included Apps
Xperia Lounge: It was designed to offer Xperia users a variety of exclusive content, offers, and experiences that were tailored to their devices and interests. The app aimed to provide a unique and personalised experience for Xperia smartphone owners, offering access to a range of content and perks that were not available to users of other devices. Mainly this was ringtones, themes and wallpapers, though some offers were promoted, mainly for obscure services/products that no one would ever use like vegan chocolate.
PlayStation: Should need no introduction, this was Sony’s app to manage and view your PlayStation trophies and friends. You could also access the PSN store.
Music: Sony’s music player, though I’m a little disappointed with the lack of Walkman branding, considering at one point Sony had Walkman phones.
Music can be sorted by Artist, Album, Genres or the entire list of songs can be displayed. If album art is saved it will be displayed also. Podcasts also have their own category.
Music can also be streamed directly from Google Drive.
Album: Photo viewer, photos captured with the camera will appear here.
Camera: Both still images and videos can be captured, and Sony have offered additional customizable settings to fine-tune the image before it’s captured. Sony also offers additional apps for specific effects like panorama, timeshift video and 4K capture. Since these are separate apps you will need to go through the permissions malarky the first time you launch these apps.
The Xperia Z2 has a dedicated analog camera button that helps control the focus when capturing an image, similar to the two-stage camera button that was common on Windows Phones.
Support: A help center where users could get more information on how how to use the phone, or how to perform specific features. You can also find out detailed information of the handset itself such as memory usage, or perform hardware tests if you are experiencing issues with the handset.
You can also set an automated backup, which can use the SD card, USB storage or an online service
The STAMINA feature lets you prolong battery life by reducing power usage when the battery hits a certain threshold, very similar to the battery saver feature of Windows Phone. There is also an ultra STAMINA feature, which reduces the phone to a feature phone, ideal if you’re going on a camping trip for the weekend and need to conserve battery power. Though why not just bring a power bank?
Email: A basic email client to connect to email services that didn’t offer their own mobile app. As long as POP3/IMAP is supported, the amp and connect and synchronize with your provider. Most users would typically use either Outlook/Gmail or Yahoo Mail.
Microsoft Exchange was also supported.
Weather: Sony’s stock weather app, powered by Accuweather. Surprisingly this still works well and is able to bring up weather information from my local area.
Calendar: Your standard calander app
Newsfrom Socialife: Sony’s news app. The app aimed to curate news articles, blog posts, and other online content based on users’ interests, allowing them to stay informed about topics they cared about. The app would aggregate news articles, blog posts, and other content from various sources across the internet and present them in a personalized news feed. The content displayed would be based on the user’s selected interests and preferences.
Users could choose their favorite topics, categories, and sources to tailor their news feed to their interests. This allowed users to receive updates about subjects that mattered to them. The app also supported offline reading so that articles could be read in the event they no longer had access to date, ideal if you travel the underground subway/railway.
As of 2023 the app is now dead but was replaced by News Suite, which is still a thing on modern Xperia smartphones, at least on my Xperia 1 IV.
Calculator: Your standard calculator, appears to license some code from SGI (Silicon Graphics) which was a major workstation vendor.
Clock: Standard clock application that is similar to other apps of this type. Includes a stopwatch, alarm clock, clock that supports multiple time zones and a timer.
Lifelog: This was designed to help users track and record various aspects of their daily activities and experiences, creating a digital “lifelog” of their interactions, movements, and habits. The app aimed to provide users with insights into their daily routines and behaviors, with a focus on health, fitness & entertainment. The main features of this app were Activity Tracking, The app used sensors like the phone’s accelerometer and GPS to track physical activities, such as walking, running, and cycling. It could also monitor your movements throughout the day. Additional features were sleep tracking, health insights, goals and social integration. In many ways it was similar to the FitBit app.
Sketch: Sony’s own version of MSPaint, allows you to freehand draw using either the brush, pencil or sticker tools. Shaps can also be added and there’s various image manipulation tools like smudging
The background can also be changed to give the appearance of writing or graph paper, which can also be customized.
There is also an option to place stickers onto your drawing, of which Panda themed stickers are included by default. At one point you could download additional sticks from Sony online, but has since been discontinued.
TrackID: Sony’s own version of Shazam, which has access to the Gracenote database. The app was designed to quickly identify the title, artist, and album of a song playing in the background, which was particularly useful for discovering new music or identifying tracks you encountered in various settings.
AVG protection: Virus protection was a thing on Android, and Xperia’s were commonly bundled with AVG which offered basic protection. With the option to upgrade to a paid version which offered better support.
Well at least it’s not McAfee or Norton.
PS Video: A video-on-demand store where you could purchase movies and TV series boxsets to own, which could then be played on the PS3 or PS4, or if you had a smart Bravia TV. Not to be confused with PlayStation Vue, which was an OTT streaming service limited to the US.
File Commander: A third-party file manager application funded with the phone, and one of the few apps that has adverts. Files can be browsed on both the internal storage, and the SD card if one is inserted. This appears to be a limited trial that requires a license to be unlocked.
Smart Connect: Lets you setup and enable certain events to trigger when you connect an accessory, like a headset or charger. For headsets you can set the phone to automatically open the music app and set it to only happen within set time period. You can also use this for timed profiles, where you can set the phone to go on silent mode between a set time period.
Kobo eBooks: A bookstore that competes with Amazon’s Kindle, preloaded partly as Sony had discontinued their own bookstore for their eReader series.
Navigation: A rebranded Garmin client, servers as an alternative to Google Maps and makes use of the assisted GPS feature of the phone.
TV SideView: TV SideView was designed to serve as a companion app for Sony’s BRAVIA line of smart televisions. It allowed users to control and interact with their Sony smart TVs using their Xperia smartphones. It can be used as a remote control (requires the TV to be connected to the same network) a program guide powered by Gracenote, and content recommendations for upcoming TV programs. This still works with modern BRAVIA Android TV’s and will pull the current channel list along with TV listings.
Messages: Supports SMS and MMS, with custom stickers.
Notification & Launcher
Sony’s launcher is very similar to what you would find on a stock Android handset, complete with multiple home screens. The home screens can be customized with custom icons or widgets.
Xperia Keyboard, Sony would later switch to the Switfkey keyboard, additional skins can be selected to customize the keyboard
One-handed mode is a feature to make the phone easier to use.
Sony have their own set of emoji’s that can be used over the stock Android ones
The task switcher, the bar along the bottom appears to be some soft of quick launch bar. The default options are Internet Browser, Timer, Calculator and Screen capture (Which allows you to capture the window itself, like the Windows snipping tool)
Settings
The settings menu is divided into different sections for easier navigation:
Wireless & Networks: Connect to a WiFI network, Bluetooth. In the Device Connections menu, you can ‘Throw’ media onto an external display using either screen mirroring or DLNA, if the TV supports either of these. The Throw feature integrates with Sony’s media apps, giving a unified experience. There are separate options for casting and screen mirroring which are managed by Android.
This might be because screen mirroring was included as standard in later Android versions/updates, but was not at the phone’s release.
Alternatively you can set the phone to be a media server, and have your devices connect to it instead.
Another feature is the ability to pair a DualShock 4 controller, which is the standard PS4 controller. This is useful for playing games that support the Android controller API. This didn’t work on three of my controllers (CUH-ZCT2E) the first couple of attempts, but after closing and resetting the Bluetooth I eventually got it to pair, as it would attempt to pair but would then fail.
Once paired you can controller the phone via the controller and can navigate base menus.
The Device section gives you settings for personalization, such as themes, display, notifications & sound. Theme in particular can be downloaded and applied. to the phone and can change the colour scheme, icons and background wallpaper.
A mid-range smartphone released in 2011 and part of the second generation of Windows Phone 7 devices which see an increase in the processing power and shipping with the Mango update by default.
The Omnia W has a sleek and stylish design with a 3.7-inch AMOLED display. It has a solid build quality and feels comfortable to hold, though its plastic feels a tad on the cheap side.
Powered by a 1.4 GHz single-core processor and comes with 512MB of RAM along with a Adreno 205 GPU which gave it better performance. Even with stock apps the performance increase is noticeable with the Xbox Avatar app having a much smoother framerate compared to Adreno 200 devices like the LG Optimus 7. Out of the box the smartphone runs on Windows Phone 7.5 Mango OS, which is a stable and reliable operating system. The phone performs well for basic tasks like web browsing, email, and social media though at the time it had access to the Windows Phone store which has now since been discontinued.
Storage is where the Omnia W falls, as it comes with 8GB of internal storage, which is non-expandable. Compared to the Optimus 7 that had 16GB, its a step backward for those that want to store more. Microsoft had launched the Zune music pass at around this time, which would as stream music rather than have it saved locally on the handset itself. Like other Windows Phone devices, the Zune software is used to sync media to the phone.
Applications
There were some exclusive apps available for the Samsung Omnia W that were not available on other devices running on Windows Phone 7.5.
AllShare: This app allowed users to stream media from their phone to other compatible devices, such as a TV or a computer. This uses the DLNA protocol to share to a supported device on the same network. As Windows Phone did not have native support for DLNA, many manufacturers would bundle their own media player apps that supported it. Also screen casting/mirroring wasn’t a thing back then, or was very uncommonly supported so DLNA acted as a good workaround to push content onto an external screen or device. Several Android handsets would do the same, at least until Miracast became standard.
The app is able to pull music from an external source or server, and push it to another DLNA-compatible device, in this example I was able to stream from my MyCloud DLNA server, and cast it to a Panasonic smart speaker.
Not all devices were supported, my PS3 and Sony Android smart TV did not appear in the device list, the HDHomeRun appeared but nothing could be done with it.
Family Story: This app allowed users to share photos, videos, and messages with family members and friends who were using a Samsung device.
Fun Shot: This app provided users with a variety of camera effects and filters to enhance their photos, example effects are bulge, pinch, twirl, twist and stretch. Many of these were not supported in the stock Windows Phone camera app.
Mini Diary: This app allowed users to create and save notes, photos, and other information in a digital diary. Kind of like a digital scrap book.
Now: This app provided users with information about the weather, news, and other updates in real-time. Information like news bulletins and weather are displayed on the live tile. Weather information was done using the Accuweather protocol whilst the news & stocks is provided by Yahoo! News. Lastly there is also a top tweets section that would shows you the popular tweets of the week.
I don’t recall Windows Phone having a built-in News application (MSN News was an optional download Microsoft offered) so this would have been an essential addition.
The services for the app appear to have stopped working around 2021, with December 2020 being the last time I was able to sync the app.
Wireless Manager: You would think this was to do with WiFI-related settings, but is really where you can configure mobile network settings that the standard Windows Phone OS does not let you directly configure. Options such as Call forwarding, call waiting and APN configuration can be set here. The APN is typically set automatically by Windows Phone, but in some circumstances, you may have to manually enter settings if Windows Phone does not have any for your mobile operator.
RSS Times: A RSS reader that allows you to subscribe and update your RSS feeds. This requires use of a Google account, of which it’s no longer possible to sign into.
Video Call: Lets you make a video call over the 3G UMTS network protocol, I guess Windows Phone did not support this natively? Odd since this is supposed to be a smartphone platform.
Settings Menu
Microsoft allowed manufacturers to bundle their own settings applications
Extra Settings: Enable auto display intensity which reduces the brightness for the AMOLED screen when the display is mostly white. The second setting is to enable haptic feedback when you press the bottom navigation button (Back, Search) which are touch buttons, this provides haptic feedback when these buttons are pressed.
High-Fidelity Position: Enables the use of GLONASS for more accurate GPS tracking. These can be turned off to conserve battery power.
Call Blocking: Block specific numbers from calling or sending SMS messages. You can also block calls without caller ID (Caller Display)
Advanced Text Messages: Enables the use of CB broadcast SMS messages if they are supported by your network operator. Useful for nearby alerts though I’ve never seen this used in the UK.
SIM Applications: Access the SIM-AT Toolkit, if they are offered by your SIM card or operator. They are commonly used to access certain features of your operator.
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