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Pebble CEO choses NOT to team with Microsoft due to personal bias

pebble-watch

So Pebble reaches out to Microsoft with a partnership in mind, to favor Windows devices with their smart watches. They challenged Microsoft to develop a prototype app that proves the phone could support the watch. If so, they may be interested in partnering with them–including the option of highlighting the watches at Microsoft stores and offering them as part of bundles with Windows Phone devices.

Originally, the relationship between such devices and Windows devices was limited due to the fact that Microsoft hasn’t allowed access to certain APIs/features within the OS. This limited access prevents a company like Pebble from fully developing an app. However, if Microsoft helps, then all of those problems are history.

Microsoft not only agreed to play ball, but they

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Windows Phone 8.1 Updated Coming

wp-8.1Microsoft will be launching the update process for the new Windows Phone 8.1 update to all of the carriers. That means for those of us with Windows 8 phones, it won’t (hopefully) be long. As long as AT&T, Verizon and everyone else doesn’t make us wait months again after Microsoft launched this kind of news. The new Cortana will be coming with it, and I know I can’t wait (assuming it’s everything they claim it to be). Plus, the inner Halo geek in me just wants to be able to talk to Cortana.

There are some really nice updates coming though. The Nokia Icon (Verizon) already has Windows 8.1 installed on it which is really nice. I haven’t played with the phone yet since I am on another carrier but so far there has been cluster of great feedback and news in regards to it.

Here is hoping that the 8.1 update is everything it seems to be.

 

 

Windows Phone – Not Being Able To Customize All Alerts (Email, SMS, etc) With Tones

A lot of us have spoken about this with each other and there are a lot of online discussion in regards to it as well.

Why doesn’t Microsoft allow Windows Phone users to customize the ringtone for things other than calls.  Text messages, emails, and voicemail simply offer you a drop down menu of the limited built-in tones. Phones have usually always offered a complete array of custom features for ringtones and alerts, but this feature just doesn’t seem to want to find itself on Windows Phones.

YOU can actually do something to help (as well as voice your opinion for other features you with the phones had) by visiting Microsoft’s feature suggestion site where you can vote for the features you would like to see.

Visit http://windowsphone.uservoice.com/forums/101801-feature-suggestions/suggestions/2281201-custom-sounds-for-sms-mms-email-notifications-e#comments

(or http://windowsphone.uservoice.com in general to see what else there is to vote on)

Thankfully the votes have grown a lot over the last year, so hopefully Microsoft may start to pay attention soon. So cast your vote(s) and let your voice be heard!

As for Microsoft…PAY ATTENTION!!!! 🙂

Xbox Live Needs to Upgrade It’s Friends List

It’s great. I have said this so many times before and probably have posted it here but I was reading the Xbox official forums and ran into someone else requesting the thing once AGAIN. It’s mind boggling that Microsoft hasn’t done anything about it.

I’ve wanted more friends as you can never have enough people you like to play with. The ability to sort them in groups…I’ve brought this up so many times as well. I’d like to create a group and call it Family…so I can remember who everyone is compares to my group of friends who kind of play together like a clan….or friends for a specific website/community that like to play together. I really wish MS would get up and do something about this. They claimed they would years ago…that was one of the reasons why they nixed support for orig xbox games (the orig games didn’t support a change in the friends system which was preventing such from evolving). Come ON Microsoft!! We have all complained so much over the years. You took away support for the original games yet you didn’t give that upgrade in return your promised. Now you make it appear you only did it so that you can *RESALE* us those old games with “newly enhanced” digital download versions or total revisions. It wasn’t so you can upgrade..it was so you can make more money and take from us.

I don’t know how many times I have compared Xbox Live with something like an instant messenger. AOL, Yahoo, whatever…..we can have unlimited friends, grouping options and so many other features….and the service is free. Xbox live you can only have 100 friends and we have to pay every year just to be able to use it, and get no grouping features of any kind of enhancements. Instead of getting what the customers want…all we get is silence with no improvement…course we still have to keep paying.

They keep adding external stuff like TV an everything which is great but lets focus on the foundation of what Xbox Live IS. This is a GAMING SYSTEM and Xbox Live is for ONLINE play. So let’s enhance that before adding all this other crap into it that even our cellphones can already accomplish.

 

CES 2011, Day two…I was there, I survived proudly

Well, at CES there was a lot to see. A lot of great people to meet, a lot of great tech to drool over, and a lot of great information learned. I demoed the MS Xbox Kinect and got TKO’s in boxing by a Google employee heh. It was funny to see a Google employee having so much fun with a competitors product.

Out of the entire day, there wasn’t a person I regret talking to outside of the man showing off the Sony 3d camcorder. His words were kind of rude and insulting…I didn’t care much for that. I had asked him a reasonable question and he responded like I was an idiot. Now if the question was an idiot question…I would take full credit for it, but all I asked was what the highest resolution it shot in. He was a little sarcastic to that point but at that point he got a little aggravated and explained it shot in HD. Ok….there are various levels of “HD”….back down buddy…take a breather.

Anyways, the 3d TV’s look nicer (the LEDs at least). Very little to no flicker at all (LG was good), and clear as day with light glasses that didn’t bother you while on the face. Personally though I will still wait till it looks that nice or better WITHOUT having to wear glasses. Regardless….it was nice.

Viewsonic has a few nice monitors. Their latest series are LED but 2ms response time (2x the 1ms response time of their past LCD version). Made me want to snag one though….27″s of ……mmmmmm.

Hercules has a nice DJ/mixer usb combo that fell into a somewhat decent price, Triton/MadKatz had a nice 5.1 pair of Triton headphones for the Xbox/PS3, Skype’s on all the major TV’s and the AR Drones are back as usual. Audi has some nice cars to show off, pioneer has a new deck for the car coming out (Navi series) that looks fun, Sony has one hell of a widescreen 3d display for everyone to enjoy.

Did I mention the Kinect was fun?

Well that sums up a lot I think. I’d go deeper into detail and cover all sorts of things with images but this isn’t really a tech news blog. Go to CES!! It’s well worth it.

TheSa|nt

Windows Phone 7…….sucks?

Is it just me or does it seem like it’s going to suck? Microsoft doesn’t even know what it will or will not support. They say “it won’t support multitasking”…then “Windows 7 to support multitasking”, “Windows 7 won’t allow apps”, “well…..sortof….ok maybe it will”. Really?

It sounds like MS is simply trying to create a locked down version of Windows Mobile so that it pisses users off the same as the iphone. Well…that’s one way of looking at competition against Apple.

Windows phones have always been popular for being open, file friendly, and fully customizable. Yes a nice UI is cool looking, but will Windows Phone 7 still perform like a miniature laptop in your pocket? If not, I know I won’t be using it when it comes out. I use mine Windows 6.5 phone for both play and business. The things I use it for when it comes to business…no other phone seems to be able to accomplish.

If it turns out that the new Windows Phone 7 OS turns into a new iPhone wannabe, I will be converting over to Android. At least it is still open (for the most part) and pretty much becomes plan B. Not to mention, more developers choose to write apps for iPhone and Android before even remembering that Windows phones exist.

That Android Incredible is starting to look pretty nice :/

What do you think? Are you for or against a more locked down/limited Windows phone? Or are you hoping for a more versatile version of whats already there?

UPDATE: 01/18/2011

Hey everyone! I wanted to offer a quick update. I have spent a great deal of time messing with Windows Phone 7 and have realized it’s really not that bad. It’s a bit of an adjustment and they are indeed focusing on the general public vs the business community…but the interface is fluid, fast and filled with fun things to poke away at. The amount of apps for the phone is growing through the roof (finally a Windows Phone with a great selection of apps).

Personally I do not own one yet, but after playing with the phone in the stores, CES, etc…I have learned a lot. After keeping an eye on things online, you can see people are finding new ways to unlock, modify and/or improve the phone through various ways. As long as MS adds a little more support for the business community on top of the wonderful entertainment it currently has to offer….I might be willing to look at my options for an upgrade.

We need more phones with full qwerty keyboards though. More of an HTC selection would be nice as well but for now, the Samsung Focus takes the cake on what’s available. The screen is large, and so far has the best quality screen among them all. Second best would have to be the HTC Surround. I would like to say the HTC HD7 takes the cake there but it’s screen is quite dull compared to these other two models.

The OS is by far the best thing MS has ever done in the Mobile Market. Like Windows 7 is to the PC world, WP7 is to the mobile. Congratulations MS, and keep your promise with the painless OS updates and future features.

UPDATE: 03/23/2011:

My new review can be found here: http://www.animevortex.net/blog/thesaint/general/my-updated-windows-phone-7-review/

Exclusive Steve Ballmer iPad Review

A great review by Steve ^^

Is Bungie Selling Out?

I really hope not, but Bungie announced that although the beta for Halo Reach is running on their own servers, the finished product will be launched in partnership with Activision. Does this mean they are heading down the same road as Infinity Ward?

The beta has been out for a week now, and so far it looks like we have a lot to look forward to (keeping in mind that what they are showing us now is only a taste of things to come). The finished product should prove to be a very interesting game. I just hope That they won’t ruin things like Infinity Ward by jumping over to Activision.

I guess we will find out soon (well, September at least)

Xbox Live down! (for those using the preview dashboard)

At 8:15PM PST, xbox live went down officially for all users using the new dashboard (previewing it).

Talking about another big “oops” for Microsoft. Within minutes there were dozens of posts/topics about it on xbox.com’s forums in regards to the outage. Based on everyone’s findings…only those using the new preview were affected (friends & neighbors using the old dashboard are/were still online playing perfectly fine.

In fact so many people accessed the xbox website, it has brought to entire site to a slow crawl (or for some people, timing out).

You go Microsoft!

– TheSa|nt