After trying windows 10 mobile I can see why it's a dead OS

[n_K]

So to preface this I had always thought W10M was a joke OS. I have a lumia 635 which was running WP8.1, I decided to upgrade it to W10M since WP8.1 is now a paperweight OS and to my surprise the update shocked me in many ways...

• Firstly, and this is the only positive point I found, there is little difference in the speed of how the OS feels of WP8.1 and W10M, which is a nice touch considering iOS and android always gets slower with newer releases. The ability to have the weather application update your lock screen is a nice touch.
• There is something iffy with Wi-Fi: I have a raspberry pi acting as a wireless soft-AP for many devices and it works fine with them, throw in this device though and it's OK until you try using edge... After that it seems to screw up the AP in some magical way that all currently connected devices remain connected but no new devices can connect and devices that are already connected are unable to do anything (connections all time out). No other wireless device manages to do this.
• Also something iffy with bluetooth: I paired with a keyboard, guess what happened? The whole phone OS locked up and froze requiring a soft reboot. I tried again because quite frankly I couldn't believe my eyes and would be in shock that they would release an OS with such a broken feature - same result. Next time you want to show a W10M user how bad their purchase is, pair it with a bluetooth keyboard.
• Skype is useless, and probably other applications too, because screen scaling is broken and you can't scroll: if you open the skype application it gives you some text and, what I assume, is a button at the bottom... Good luck pressing the button though because it's off the bottom of the screen, so skype is a write off. Also tested an application I've created on W10 which has web views and allows scrolling... Well, you can't scroll on W10M in web views for reasons that are not known. So much for being the same as W10
• The app store seems to be full of WP8.1 applications, this isn't a problem but it truely highlights how dead it is. Also the UWP applications which I tried didn't seem to work at all on it, one listed bluetooth devices... Yeah, it listed nothing, requested no permissions, some right quality there.
• Like W10 there is telemetry which you can't disable, I'm not going to get into the specifics of telemetry that's for another discussion, however who the **** in microsoft thought it was a good idea to force telemetry on mobile phones where some users pay for the amount of data they use? So I've got to pay more for my data usage because some overpaid ###### at microsoft didn't think this through (or just didn't care) - great.
• The upgrade advisor application seems to have been removed off the UK/USA store but is still present on other stores like the new zealand one - why? Who the heck knows!!!
• You lose features by downgrading to W10M, on your WP8.1 device you had access to office applications (word, powerpoint, excel), yes you still have those on W10M but guess what, without an active office 365 subscription you're locked out of using them... Speechless, absolutely speechless
• You can't upgrade the store application with it open, OK so why doesn't it close it for you then upgrade? Instead it gives you a stupid 'install failed' error, yet more bad design decisions
• During some upgrades going to the windows update option crashes the application. Also so does changing individual permissions for some applications
• Permissions are wildly incoherant and just outright bad, maps by default has access to place phone calls - why? microsoft store has access to your camera, wtf, so does wallet and here maps/here drive? Microsoft store, wallet, word, excel, powerpoint all have access to your microphone - why?
• Automatic time update doesn't work... This isn't even a hard feature. In fact since setting the time last night this phone seems to be 7 minutes slow... In less than 24 hours? What a complete joke
• You can't lock the screen, or if you can then it's some mystical hidden option. There's an option of using a pin which it says 'will be used instead of passwords', but there is no password support! Yet more awful design
• It's 2017, and you still can't use a static IP in microsoft's world.
• Updates seem to be per-device still (so much for that 'windows 10 mobile will prevent carriers from holding you back' promise, now it's microsoft holding you back), I'm on the anniversary update and can't get the creators update or fall creators update, so yes the fragmentation issue is real and still kicking
• And last but not least, the security of W10M devices which for a long time has been the only 'sticking point' of these devices over other devices seems to have been entirely bypassed by WP internals without needing to unlock the phone

So in all honestly I'm at a loss for words as to why anyone would touch or even think of touching this awful OS. Everything about it is bad and I'm not surprised developers have stayed well away as have mobile phone users too.

[adrynalyne]

Cool story, bro. 

[theyarecomingforyou]

I'm not sure I agree with the tone of the criticism, though there are elements I agree with.

• I haven't had any of the issues you describe with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth.
• It's disappointing what Microsoft has done with Skype. I used to use it a lot but updates to the client have made it unbearable for me. For video I tend to now use Discord, Facebook or Google Duo.
• The Microsoft Store is a mess and I too avoid it
• Telemetry is an issue for some people, though there are ways to disable
• You can lock the screen using Ctrl-Alt-Del and selecting Lock or simply Win+L

For me the biggest issue I have is the user interface, which is dated and lacks proper scalability. Metro was an attempt to address that but it created more problems than it solved. There are still too many core legacy apps that haven't been updated and the Settings app replacement for the Control Panel is horribly designed. It's bizarre that Microsoft has opted for icons that are just one colour outlines - they are unintuitive and aesthetically unappealling. It's like the entire operating system was designed by engineers without any input from graphic designers or user experience experts.

 

I was hoping that Microsoft's pledge to constantly update Windows 10 would amount to something meaningful but so far all the additions have been completely underwhelming. I'd happily pay for a proper successor to Windows 10 but Microsoft really has to put the user experience and visuals to the forefront. Heck, Microsoft had some bold plans about a decade ago but all of that ended up being abandoned:

 

 

[Pishaw]

That's funny. I haven't experienced ANY of the problems you describe. I've had the 520, and still have the 640 and 950. Your problems sound like operator error to me.

[n_K]

2 hours ago, theyarecomingforyou said:

I'm not sure I agree with the tone of the criticism, though there are elements I agree with.

• I haven't had any of the issues you describe with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth.
• It's disappointing what Microsoft has done with Skype. I used to use it a lot but updates to the client have made it unbearable for me. For video I tend to now use Discord, Facebook or Google Duo.
• The Microsoft Store is a mess and I too avoid it
• Telemetry is an issue for some people, though there are ways to disable
• You can lock the screen using Ctrl-Alt-Del and selecting Lock or simply Win+L

For me the biggest issue I have is the user interface, which is dated and lacks proper scalability. Metro was an attempt to address that but it created more problems than it solved. There are still too many core legacy apps that haven't been updated and the Settings app replacement for the Control Panel is horribly designed. It's bizarre that Microsoft has opted for icons that are just one colour outlines - they are unintuitive and aesthetically unappealling. It's like the entire operating system was designed by engineers without any input from graphic designers or user experience experts.

 

I was hoping that Microsoft's pledge to constantly update Windows 10 would amount to something meaningful but so far all the additions have been completely underwhelming. I'd happily pay for a proper successor to Windows 10 but Microsoft really has to put the user experience and visuals to the forefront. Heck, Microsoft had some bold plans about a decade ago but all of that ended up being abandoned:

 

 

!? I'm not sure we're on the same page, I'm referring to windows 10 mobile, not windows 10 desktop... There is no ctrl, alt or del on mobile.

 

2 hours ago, Pishaw said:

That's funny. I haven't experienced ANY of the problems you describe. I've had the 520, and still have the 640 and 950. Your problems sound like operator error to me.

Oh really, wow, so how have you managed to avoid a massive security vulnerability that affects all lumia devices? Did you even read the list or did you just ignore it? Your windows store magically have a completely different list to mine too?

[theyarecomingforyou]

2 minutes ago, n_K said:

!? I'm not sure we're on the same page, I'm referring to windows 10 mobile, not windows 10 desktop... There is no ctrl, alt or del on mobile.

 

Oh really, wow, so how have you managed to avoid a massive security vulnerability that affects all lumia devices? Did you even read the list or did you just ignore it? Your windows store magically have a completely different list to mine too?

My mistake. Apologies.

[Pishaw]

You don't like it. That's you, not the phone. You can't make it do the same things I can make my phone do. That's you, not the phone. Next you'll start complaining that it's not pretty enough.

 

I wasn't aware of a security problem with Windows Mobile. So I Googled it. I am still not aware of a security problem, but the first result was this:

 

https://betanews.com/2015/06/11/windows-phone-security-is-top-notch-says-kaspersky/

 

19 minutes ago, n_K said:

Your windows store magically have a completely different list to mine too?

 

It's true that Apple and Android have more apps available by volume. But when you have 30,000 titles that are suitable only for a 13 year old girl to waste her time, that's worthless to me. My 950 is a portable computer in my pocket, not a game of finding imaginary animals or sending funny selfies to my friends. I am not a child, and the apps I have on my phone do the things I want the phone to do. The reason Windows Mobile failed is because of incompetence in Microsofts management. Lumia was doing just fine when Nokia was making them.

 

The fact that you can't make the phone do the things everyone else can doesn't mean the phone sucks. It means you can't operate it. Like I said, operator error.

[n_K]

You can't disable telemetry - if you can feel free to post the steps for the whole world to see, so therefore it eats up your mobile data.

Regarding the joke of security you must have been sleeping recently, https://www.neowin.net/news/windows-phone-internals-allow-for-installation-of-custom-roms-on-any-lumia

When did I mention about the number of applications? I said pretty much every single app listed on the w10m app store is a wp 8.1 app and the w10m apps I did try didn't work - this isn't a user error just incase you don't know enough to understand how APIs and libraries work

How did you get office to work fully without an office 365 account - just as it did on WP8.1?

Post pictures of your permission allowance list that clearly shows the permissions I've mentioned not existing on your phone.

Post these mystical settings of how you configure your screen lock timeout and screen lock password (not a pin number - password)

Regarding the static IP: https://forum.xda-developers.com/windows-10-mobile/static-ip-t3213406 lol at having to hack the phone and edit the registry to enable this basic feature... Even with this it's one static IP for all connections, so you can't have a static IP for one connection and dynamic for another. Useless feature why even bother.

The rest of the questions I'll let you off with because they're not something you can reproduce, that doesn't mean they aren't issues just because your different setup doesn't have them. Once you've actually addressed a single criticism I've posted (thus far you've just said W10M works for you... Err, great? But I don't care, I didn't post this topic asking 'how do you find W10M?') let me know.

 

And regarding the time issue, the phone is now 18 minutes behind my PC.

Edited December 10, 2017 by n_K

[goretsky Supervisor]

Hello,

 

Can you disable telemetry for the operating system on Android OS or Apple iOS devices?

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

[Tuskd]

I was pumped up big time for Windows 10 Mobile. I felt that with the OneCore, same UI and all the other promises made, Microsoft had a winner. With leaks of Android Twitter working on Windows, I felt WP would be saved. But what came out was a piece of crap with none of the major promised updates. I know I am exaggerating, but to the end user there was hardly any difference than streamlining the UI with W10. I felt it was more WP 8.2 than the leap to 10.

I too have felt many of your issues with W10M.
That MS Office needing O365 in W10M should up at exactly the one time I needed to make a presentation on my phone.
Skype is the worst app on W10M. My image is upside down in portrait mode but works fine on landscape. Attend a call with earphones and unplug it, yet the audio doesn't resort to the speakers. When attending a call, it takes 1 full minute to unlock the phone, wait for Skype to launch and get to see the other person's face.

An app got an error while installing. I had the app on my app list but it shows as not installed on the Store. I could neither launch the app, nor reinstall it without wiping the phone.

My 640XL is used by my mom. She somehow likes the interface and she never connects it to the internet. So its marginally better than a feature phone.

I have, like many others, moved to the world of Android with MS apps and feel no regret for making that decision. It was hard to emotionally detach myself WP but once I got myself set up, I realized I had wasted my time, effort and money on a useless OS.
 

[n_K]

6 hours ago, goretsky said:

Hello,

 

Can you disable telemetry for the operating system on Android OS or Apple iOS devices?

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

Yes, for iOS under privacy you put 'do not send to apple', and for android you install a custom ROM without google play services. No such feature exists for W10M. I'm not talking about the good or bad of telemetry in this I'm talking about it sending telemetry using mobile data.

 

5 hours ago, Tuskd said:

I was pumped up big time for Windows 10 Mobile. I felt that with the OneCore, same UI and all the other promises made, Microsoft had a winner. With leaks of Android Twitter working on Windows, I felt WP would be saved. But what came out was a piece of crap with none of the major promised updates. I know I am exaggerating, but to the end user there was hardly any difference than streamlining the UI with W10. I felt it was more WP 8.2 than the leap to 10.

I too have felt many of your issues with W10M.
That MS Office needing O365 in W10M should up at exactly the one time I needed to make a presentation on my phone.
Skype is the worst app on W10M. My image is upside down in portrait mode but works fine on landscape. Attend a call with earphones and unplug it, yet the audio doesn't resort to the speakers. When attending a call, it takes 1 full minute to unlock the phone, wait for Skype to launch and get to see the other person's face.

An app got an error while installing. I had the app on my app list but it shows as not installed on the Store. I could neither launch the app, nor reinstall it without wiping the phone.

My 640XL is used by my mom. She somehow likes the interface and she never connects it to the internet. So its marginally better than a feature phone.

I have, like many others, moved to the world of Android with MS apps and feel no regret for making that decision. It was hard to emotionally detach myself WP but once I got myself set up, I realized I had wasted my time, effort and money on a useless OS.
 

Pretty much what I feel, it's not a complete OS/upgrade and needs a lot of work to be classed as finished.

[adrynalyne]

34 minutes ago, n_K said:

Yes, for iOS under privacy you put 'do not send to apple', and for android you install a custom ROM without google play services. No such feature exists for W10M. I'm not talking about the good or bad of telemetry in this I'm talking about it sending telemetry using mobile data.

 

Pretty much what I feel, it's not a complete OS/upgrade and needs a lot of work to be classed as finished.

https://www.techcrises.com/how-to/disable-telemetry-windows-10-mobile/

 

Now don’t come off all high and mighty about this being a hack when you justified such behavior by validating a hack as a method to turn it off in Android. 

[goretsky Supervisor]

Hello,

 

So, just to confirm I understand this correctly:  There is no option in the settings of Windows 10 Mobile or Android OS for disabling the transmission of telemetry to the manufacturer.  It can be done, through the use of editing the registry (Windows 10 Mobile) or jailbreaking the device and installing a custom operating system (Android OS).  Apple does provide an option in the settings of iOS for disabling the transmission of telemetry to the manufacturer.  Is that correct?

 

On the issue of device security, I'm not aware of any major issues surrounding Windows 10 Mobile.  The Windows Phone Insider 2.2 app mentioned in the Neowin article earlier from this month has yet to be released, as far as I can tell, and I've been keeping an eye out for anything such as malicious code for a while, but cannot recall seeing anything beyond low-quality apps which, while junk, aren't malicious.  A new jailbreaking app for iOS was released today, though, which I understand is a rare occurrence, especially compared to the world of Android.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

Edited December 13, 2017 by goretsky
fixed a typo

[n_K]

On 11/12/2017 at 1:18 PM, adrynalyne said:

https://www.techcrises.com/how-to/disable-telemetry-windows-10-mobile/

 

Now don’t come off all high and mighty about this being a hack when you justified such behavior by validating a hack as a method to turn it off in Android. 

It's not a hack, you have a choice of android phones - just buy one without google play services - no such choice exists with W10M. Not to mention that only really lumia devices work on the interop unlock so if you have a device from someone else it likely won't work.

 

11 hours ago, goretsky said:

Hello,

 

So, just to confirm I understand this correctly:  There is no option in the settings of Windows 10 Mobile or Android OS for disabling the transmission of telemetry to the manufacturer.  It can be done, through the use of editing the registry (Windows 10 Mobile) or jailbreaking the device and installing a custom operating system (Android OS).  Apple does provide an option in the settings of iOS for disabling the transmission of telemetry to the manufacturer.  Is that correct?

 

On the issue of device security, I'm not aware of any major issues surrounding Windows 10 Mobile.  The Windows Phone Inspector 2.2 app mentioned in the Neowin article earlier from this month has yet to be released, as far as I can tell, and I've been keeping an eye out for anything such as malicious code for a while, but cannot recall seeing anything beyond low-quality apps which, while junk, aren't malicious.  A new jailbreaking app for iOS was released today, though, which I understand is a rare occurrence, especially compared to the world of Android.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

No it has nothing to do with 'jailbreaking' (which is iOS specific), it is not in the android source code, it is a part of google play services.

Yes it's yet to be released, however it defeats secure boot on all lumia phones, ergo there is no security at all. Jailbreaks exploit the OS, not the secure boot environment and I'm yet to see a flaw in iBoot (the iOS bootloader, which is equivalent to secure boot on W10M) like this posted.

[adrynalyne]

56 minutes ago, n_K said:

It's not a hack, you have a choice of android phones - just buy one without google play services - no such choice exists with W10M. Not to mention that only really lumia devices work on the interop unlock so if you have a device from someone else it likely won't work.

 

No it has nothing to do with 'jailbreaking' (which is iOS specific), it is not in the android source code, it is a part of google play services.

Yes it's yet to be released, however it defeats secure boot on all lumia phones, ergo there is no security at all. Jailbreaks exploit the OS, not the secure boot environment and I'm yet to see a flaw in iBoot (the iOS bootloader, which is equivalent to secure boot on W10M) like this posted.

If I have to switch my installed OS build, it is 100% a hack. The type of phone is irrelevent.  How can you not see this? Sure sounds like some bias going on here. As for your tirade against Lumia phones here, do you feel the same about Android phones with unlockable bootloaders? I’m guessing not...

[PGHammer]

9 hours ago, adrynalyne said:

If I have to switch my installed OS build, it is 100% a hack. The type of phone is irrelevent.  How can you not see this? Sure sounds like some bias going on here. As for your tirade against Lumia phones here, do you feel the same about Android phones with unlockable bootloaders? I’m guessing not...

He likely doesn't.  The devices with purely LOCKED bootloaders can still be hacked to an extent (Samsung Galaxy S7 and later) - they even now have customized - albeit based on stock - firmware available for them.  (My ex-VZW S7 is running version 2 of Project L - which is a semi-custom firmware for the Snapdragon-based S7 and S7edge; it is a *fusion* firmware with a mix of apps from both the S7 series and S8 - it has also gotten the de-odexing and de-bloating treatment and has no trace of Knox.  However, the bigger *hack* was earlier, when I took this same phone to the T-Mobile side of Tracfone - via a straight firmware swap; despite the locked bootloader, it's actually ridiculously easy to do - in fact, it's not any harder than installing a custom ROM on the Galaxy Nexus, (for example).)  So you prefer Android to Windows Mobile - that and $5USD will get you a venti-sized coffee at almost any Starbucks in North America. (I came to Android from feature phones - therefore THAT argument means very little to me.  For me, the more important debate is Android vs. iOS - and that is strictly from a user standpoint.)

[n_K]

17 hours ago, adrynalyne said:

If I have to switch my installed OS build, it is 100% a hack. The type of phone is irrelevent.  How can you not see this? Sure sounds like some bias going on here. As for your tirade against Lumia phones here, do you feel the same about Android phones with unlockable bootloaders? I’m guessing not...

It's not a hack, hence why most android phones offer an unlocked bootloader. Secure boot for W10M is broken, that doesn't mean they want you switching firmwares it means it's now possible to do that and more because the security mechanism was defeated. Android phones have an unlocked bootloader because you can change the ROM if you want, they're not going to give you support if you use that ROM but you're free to do it if they allow it. It isn't in the same league at all.

[goretsky Supervisor]

Hello,

 

I'm fairly certain the term jailbreak was used before iOS was released, such as with video game consoles and the like.  It could be that the term got popularized with iOS, so that when people talk about a jailbreak for it, they mean they are somehow rooting their iPhones.  It might be a bit premature to say that the Windows Phone Internals tool jailbreaks (roots?) all the Windows Phone devices out there until it has been released and people have started independently confirming that it works.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

19 hours ago, n_K said:

It's not a hack, you have a choice of android phones - just buy one without google play services - no such choice exists with W10M. Not to mention that only really lumia devices work on the interop unlock so if you have a device from someone else it likely won't work.

 

No it has nothing to do with 'jailbreaking' (which is iOS specific), it is not in the android source code, it is a part of google play services.

Yes it's yet to be released, however it defeats secure boot on all lumia phones, ergo there is no security at all. Jailbreaks exploit the OS, not the secure boot environment and I'm yet to see a flaw in iBoot (the iOS bootloader, which is equivalent to secure boot on W10M) like this posted.

 

[adrynalyne]

1 hour ago, n_K said:

It's not a hack, hence why most android phones offer an unlocked bootloader. Secure boot for W10M is broken, that doesn't mean they want you switching firmwares it means it's now possible to do that and more because the security mechanism was defeated. Android phones have an unlocked bootloader because you can change the ROM if you want, they're not going to give you support if you use that ROM but you're free to do it if they allow it. It isn't in the same league at all.

Most Android phones do not have an unlockable bootloader. Source needed for th claim that most android phones have an unlockable bootloader. 

If it makes you feel better to say it’s not a hack, so be it. However, an OS doesn’t have a feature just because you can fundamentally  modify the OS at a rom level heh. That’s like claiming Android has “insert feature” because a developer programmatically wrote it into a custom rom. Obviously, that is false. So is claiming any os feature by changing the rom. 

Edited December 13, 2017 by adrynalyne

[Brys]

That's not why it's a dead os

 

I understand some of your concern and I don't think you're wrong. I haven't experienced some of this but I'm not saying it's not there (e.g. I just never paired a bluetooth keyboard so I don't know if it works or not - I'm ready to believe you that it won't, I wouldn't be entirely surprised).

 

But then I switched to android and I have a list of similar problems on my phone. I attribute most of them to my specific phone and some of the phone manufacturer's choices, but they're here. I also can't upgrade to the last android (at least from an official route, last time I checked).

 

What I'm getting at is, I think most people actually have a list of similar problems. Some people don't realize it or don't care - just like me with bluetooth pairing, I never even saw that it didn't work - some people just complain about it and forget because the bulk of what they want to do work. Now I don't know about iOS, but I don't think the average android user is in a way better situation. And yet I don't think the average android user cares. So I don't think that's why Windows Mobile is dead.

 

Here's why I think WM10 is dead :

Windows Mobile (since wp7) is dead because it came last to the party and to the general user - not the people you'll find on neowin because that's already a huge bias, not even the people a little bit interested in technology, but the really average user which is the biggest market - this is how you would chose your phone :

 

apple ? yeah everyone has an iphone so it must be a good phone right ?

I heard apple stuff is more robust and every time they release something it's a revolution !

Google ? Oh google is that free online search thing, it's free that means they're great guys right ?
there's a lot of android phones so I assume it's a good phone all right

microsoft ? I remember my nephew complaining about microsoft and saying windows is always buggy and full of virusses and stuff

oh they do phones ? i've never seen a microsoft phone... that's weird.

 

that's what the "normal" people think. So yeah, you can come up with your continuums and your uwp and whatnots but the "normal" person will not care. The "normal" person would be fine with a microsoft phone, actually, as long as you get their whatsapp or telegram or something in there. They just don't get a microsoft phone because why would they even care. So, low sales, low marketshare, pointless business for Microsoft, which leads to them not caring anymore, which leads to less updates, more bugs, more problems, and the fanbase feeling forgotten and jumping ship.