#MWC10: Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Series is official; first phones coming in late 2010
By Ilinca Nita on 15 Feb 10Today, as expected, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has unveiled the company’s next generation mobile OS, officially called Windows Phone 7 Series.
As Microsoft puts it, Windows Phone 7 Series is a “new beginning” offering “a fresh approach to phone software, distinguished by smart design and truly integrated experiences that bring to the surface the content people care about from the Web and applications”. The new OS integrates Xbox LIVE games and Zune music and videos – for the first time into a mobile platform. Reportedly, “every Windows Phone 7 Series device will be a Zune.”
Windows Phone 7 Series features dynamically updated live titles on the Start screen – these provide real-time content from various sources (including your contacts).
All Windows Phone 7 Series handsets will feature a Bing dedicated hardware button for one-click access to Microsoft’s search engine.
Important: for the beginning, there will be no Adobe Flash support in Windows Phone 7 Series.
(this is just a reference design, not a real Windows Phone 7 Series device)
An important novelty that Windows Phone 7 Series includes is represented by Windows Phone hubs, which “bring together related content from the Web, applications and services into a single view to simplify common tasks.”
There will be six Windows Phone hubs: People, Pictures, Games, Music + Video, Office and Marketplace.
The first Windows Phone 7 Series smartphones will be available in time for the 2010 holiday season.
Microsoft announced a list of manufacturers and carriers that will support Windows Phone 7 Series: HTC, Samsung, LG, Sony Ericsson, Dell, Garmin-Asus, HP, Toshiba, Qualcomm, AT&T, Deutsche Telekom (including T-Mobile USA), Orange, SFR, Sprint, Telefónica, Telstra, Telecom Italia, Verizon and Vodafone.
Interestingly, Microsoft said that it would work very closely with AT&T and Orange – which will probably be among the first operators to launch WP 7 phones.
Microsoft didn’t say anything about Windows Mobile 6.5.3 during the announcement of Windows Phone 7 Series, but we already know that WM 6.5.3 will be available simultaneously with the 7 Series OS – new WM 6.5.3 have actually been announced today (Acer neoTouch P300 and neoTouch P400).
The official Windows Phone 7 Series website can be accessed here.
More details about WP 7 Series will be unveiled soon, so stay tuned.
Via Press release
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- Confirmed: HTC HD2 won’t be upgraded to Windows Phone 7 series
- Windows Phone 7 Series to lack copy and paste functionality at launch
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