Windows 8 Phone

[VinceL]

Someone kindly responded to my inquiries elsewhere on the internets and spake thusly:

It would seem (and I would like the input of those on here with older windows phones to confirm) that windows phones never used the MAP profile. They weren't linking up with MFT for texting, but merely reading them through it. The phone was doing all the work and just using a bluetooth audio link to read the texts through the car's speakers.

EDIT:

Okay, after some experimenting, I have the low down. Windows Phone doesn't have the Bluetooth MAP profile. Never has from the official Microsoft documents. The way it is implemented is that the phone receives the text and then initiates a "phone call" that MFT answers automatically. The phone then does all of the heavy lifting, and all that MFT is left to do is allow the phone and driver to use the speakers and microphone. The phone does the rest. The advantage to this is that I have the choice of listening to the text or canceling. If I listen to the text, the phone reads it to me and then asks if I would like to reply, call, or cancel. If I say reply, I can then dictate a text message. No being forced to use canned messages. It is awesome! I find it a much better, and ultimately more useful and flexible solution than the MAP methods utilizing MFT more.

I hope this clears up any confusion. As a result of finally figuring out how it works, and just how useable this feature implementation is, my original irritation for what feature I thought was lacking has gone. I really like my HTC 8X. Great battery life, fast, awesome screen, slick interface, and great looking phone.

 

[VinceL]

My settings that make it all work:

In SETTINGS > speech

I have the following check boxes checked:

Use Speech when the phone is locked
Play audio confirmations

and most importantly to get the 'Reply' functionality,
Enable Speech Recognition Service

Under 'Read aloud incoming text messages', select "Bluetooth and headsets"

Those settings should get you texting

 

[LONO100]

i would advise against it, i have a windows phone and its by far the worst phone ive ever had in 13 years of having cell phones. im not sure how well it works with the ford MFT technology, but it sucks in so many ways as a smart phone. the touch screen keyboard is designed for a gnome to type on, its not recognized as an external storage device when connected to a computer, you have to install and can only use the ZUNE software to manage content on your phone, pandora wont work on it, the apps suck, many other apps that it does have like tunein and iheartradio all run super slow and inconsistent, it bogs down over time, and so on, and so on.

trust me, you dont want a windows phone. it has no support. i do engineering work for nokia's 3D mapping division and nokia is giving me the new lumia 920 for personal use. that phone has the best camera on the market, but once i found out the lumia ran the windows OS, i just went and bought the new galaxy S3 for 50 bucks on black friday.

TRUST ME, YOU DONT WANT A WINDOWS PHONE! and that's coming from a guy who's company develops technology for that phone!

 

[VinceL]

LONO100, I'm not sure why you've had such a bad time with WP8, but I share none of your experiences.

The keyboard is just like every other smart phone keyboard crammed on a small screen, my phone shows up as a portable device on Windows 7 (and on Windows 8 there is an app for it), I can drag and drop pictures, music, videos, and Office and other files into the respective folders on the phone from my computers, while Pandora hasn't been ported yet you can use your Pandora account on the Metroradio app, iHeartRadio works fine every time I use it, my phone is fast, has yet to bog down under tons of use, and so on.

It does need some work in the app department, though more apps are added daily. Not all of the major airlines have apps and more bank apps are needed, but that is all I can find that is lacking for my usage. Some of the bigger heavy hitter apps need to find their way to the Windows ecosystem.

Trust me, you should give a Windows Phone a look, and that's coming from a person who owns and uses one (and prefers it to his wife's new Droid phone).

 

[LONO100]

which phone do you have vince? i have the htc arrive i think its called. that thing sucks bad. ive never had a smart phone with this many bugs, and ive been using smart phones going back to the super buggy pocket pc. i do like my camera on my phone, but everything else blows on it. im not anti-microsoft one bit, my company develops technology for windows and is in direct competition with the likes of google and apple so im by no means some droid or iphone fanboy. i thought the windows phone would be a good move when it came out, but i havent had any success using it. it just has so many bugs and design flaws. maybe your phone is newer than mine and the bugs have been worked out, but dang, when i turn my phone landscape, the damn tiles dont even follow the orientation even though my physical keyboard faces landscape, so whenever im using my keyboard i have to read everything at a 90 degree angle. its interface is so ridiculous to navigate through, the icons are so damn tiny, and the bing search button is on a hair trigger it seems. my galaxy S3 is on back order, but i cant wait to get it so i can throw my windows phone in the ocean.

 

[Helicopter]

I agree with you Vince. I've been a Windows Mobile user since its inception. I haven't moved up to 8 yet. I have an Arrive, and it's by far the best Windows phone I've owned. The hardware KB works just fine as does the on screen one. For banking I don't need an "app"... I access the web sites directly when needed. My banks also use email and text alerts as well as simple banking functions via text. If I want internet radio I'm usually at my desk either at home or at work. I don't need the phone for it. In the Explorer it's sat or terrestrial radio.

It syncs with the 2 Exchange accounts I have, calendar(s), tasks, contact groups and all the multiple POP accounts I have. Best yet, it works flawlessly (for what I use it for) with MFT.

Add in cloud support, and the ability to work on Office documents in a pinch... this phone has been a home run.

I also own various flavors of Android as well as a couple iPhones... they sit in the desk drawer.

 

[VinceL]

which phone do you have vince? i have the htc arrive i think its called. that thing sucks bad. ive never had a smart phone with this many bugs, and ive been using smart phones going back to the super buggy pocket pc. i do like my camera on my phone, but everything else blows on it. im not anti-microsoft one bit, my company develops technology for windows and is in direct competition with the likes of google and apple so im by no means some droid or iphone fanboy. i thought the windows phone would be a good move when it came out, but i havent had any success using it. it just has so many bugs and design flaws. maybe your phone is newer than mine and the bugs have been worked out, but dang, when i turn my phone landscape, the damn tiles dont even follow the orientation even though my physical keyboard faces landscape, so whenever im using my keyboard i have to read everything at a 90 degree angle. its interface is so ridiculous to navigate through, the icons are so damn tiny, and the bing search button is on a hair trigger it seems. my galaxy S3 is on back order, but i cant wait to get it so i can throw my windows phone in the ocean.

I have the new HTC 8X. I am by no means an expert with it, but I have been enjoying getting it all set up and tweaked. There are a couple of things I would like it to do, but they are not show stoppers, and things that some other phones don't do (namely a blinking light on the front to let you know you missed a call/email/text, and being able to easily select ringer/ringer+vibrate/vibrate/silent - the way WP8 has you doing it is a bit clunky). From what I understand, a number of things were changed from WP7 to WP8, one of which was losing the dependence on Zune (thankfully, I hate when a company makes you use another one of its products!). It's a great phone and I am liking the way WP8 does things. It is pretty slick. Like most things electronic though, it comes down to how you use it and what you need it to do that is ultimately the deciding factor

 

[LONO100]

on the newer windows phones, do the tiles orient themselves with how you hold the phone? on mine, it never did, so when i wanted to use the physical keyboard, i had to read everything at a 90 degree angle. thats my single biggest gripe with the windows phone. that, the inability to use it as an external storage device, its lack of pandora, and its reliance on zune software. i hope these have been fixed in newer versions, because i absolutely hated my phone. if i had it my way i would go back to my palm pre. that was a true multi tasking phone.

 

[VinceL]

on the newer windows phones, do the tiles orient themselves with how you hold the phone? on mine, it never did, so when i wanted to use the physical keyboard, i had to read everything at a 90 degree angle. thats my single biggest gripe with the windows phone. that, the inability to use it as an external storage device, its lack of pandora, and its reliance on zune software. i hope these have been fixed in newer versions, because i absolutely hated my phone. if i had it my way i would go back to my palm pre. that was a true multi tasking phone.

The tiles don't re-orient on the start screen or the apps list to the right. I'm not sure how that would be a problem, but maybe I guess on your phone if you keep the keyboard out and want to select a different app, I can see where that would be awkward. In the individual apps, the ones that take keyboard input have all rotated in my experience. I don't have a physical keyboard, so that's not an issue in my case

Let me know if there is anything you have questions about and I'll do my best to answer

 

[LONO100]

well on my phone for example, if im using the facebook or iheartradio app, or almost every other app i have except for twitter, the screen never orients itself when im using my physical keyboard which faces landscape, so i always have to read things sideways. thats on top of the actual tiles never re-orienting themselves which isnt as big of a deal as the actual apps never re-orienting themselves. so the physical keyboard on my phone is pretty much useless except for texting. i hope these issues were resolved in the newer windows phones because im a fan of windows, and was pretty bummed with the performance of my phone.

 

[Fredridge]

the more I use my windows 8 phone, the more I am liking it.....not perfect and not as good in the details as ios, but pretty good overall.

God the text thing working right now with MFT and figuring out settings and it is working well. Phone part is better than my iphone was and screen is much better.