Microsoft Windows Phone 7 technical preview: A definitive guide

Welcome back into the smartphone arena Microsoft, it looks like you have a serious challenger entering the ring and I will definitely be purchasing a device as soon as I can. I spent an hour with the Windows Phone 7 team and was then given a Samsung developer phone (looks to be something like the i8910 Omnia HD device) with the latest Windows Phone 7 Technical Preview to use for about 3 weeks. As Terry Myerson posted on the Windows Phone blog Microsoft hit this Technical Preview milestone and is sending out thousands of prototype phones loaded with this “Technical Preview” to let developers test out their applications on functioning devices and get their applications ready for launch. The Samsung hardware this is running is not what you will see at launch so I won’t focus on the hardware in this hands-on detailed look at the current version of Windows Phone 7.
We saw the official announcement of WP7 in February at Mobile World Congress and have seen various details revealed at events since that time. I was still skeptical of the functionality and capability of the new operating system and after the recent Kin disaster I honestly wasn’t expecting much from Microsoft. After using the Technical Preview version of Windows Phone 7 in an up close and personal way I can honestly say that I am quite excited for the holiday season when we will see these devices launching from Microsoft. Check out my extensive image gallery (about 90 photos), several embedded YouTube videos, and detailed experiences below and through the next 8 pages.

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