Founded in 1974 by Paul Allen and Bill gates, Microsoft is among the largest computer technology companies in the world. Microsoft's first major operating system was DOS (Disk Operating System). They released Windows 1.0 in 1984. In 2000, Bill Gates retired and Steve Ballmer became Microsoft's new CEO. Microsoft has since created such products as Bing, Office, Windows Live, Internet Explorer and their latest mobile smartphone OS, Windows Phone 7. Read our Microsoft coverage for the latest Windows Phone 7 news, reviews and videos:
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by Stephen Schenck | May 23, 2012 12:10 PMThree months ago we heard a story claiming that Microsoft was working on a version of its Office suite for Apple's iPad. A picture accompanying the rumor (above) sure looked how we might imagine the app would appear on a tablet, piquing our interest and suggesting there might be something to this news. While a company like Apple might have been content to let the rumors play their course, Microsoft decided to address the claims, first outright denying the picture's legitimacy, but later retreating to a softer position where it claimed the news was based on "bad info". Well, Microsoft might wan...
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by Anton D. Nagy | May 23, 2012 2:09 AMYou really shouldn't be surprised! It's not that there were no warning signs along the way. Microsoft made it very clear that you will not be able to use the Windows Phone Marketplace once the changes are in place and your phone is still running a version of Windows Phone below 7.5. So, as of recently, if you can't download, buy, update, or review apps in Marketplace -- both on the phone and on the web-- it's because you didn't update to Windows Phone 7.5. Of course, you might be running an earlier build of the platform and still be able to access the Marketplace; this will soon change as t...
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by Anton D. Nagy | May 20, 2012 2:43 AMMicrosoft and its OEM partners (especially Nokia, but not only) knew that China is a market to aim for, not just because of the fact that it is now the world's largest mobile market, but because of the specifics of the country. Windows Phone was launched in China on March 21 this year and it is already, according to reports, outselling Apple and its iPhone. Of course we need to be fair and consider that this might have less to do with the platform itself and more (everything) to do with the difference in price between Windows Phones and iPhones. However, Microsoft's platform is now accounti...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 18, 2012 7:03 PMSoftware patents are the absolute worst. Instead of rewarding innovation, they've instead become a kind of ammunition used by the smartphone heavyweights, trying to chip away at each other's success. If you're wondering why you don't have an HTC EVO 4G LTE at the moment, you can blame just the kind of legal shenanigans these sort of patents enable. The latest unfortunate victim is Motorola, which just got slapped with an import ban on its Androids which violate a Microsoft patent. The United States International Trade Commission has now backed-up an earlier ruling which found Motorola in vi...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 17, 2012 7:29 PMA little over three weeks ago, Microsoft advised Windows Phone users about a few changes that were going to be coming to the Marketplace. Those included removing Windows Phone apps from the PC Zune client, making you do your searches on your phone or through your computer's browser, as well as new restrictions on accessing the Marketplace. Today, with those changes almost ready to go, Microsoft is giving users another heads-up on the steps they'll need to take to ensure continued Marketplace access. Once these changes go through, only phones that have been upgraded to Windows Phone 7.5 will...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 17, 2012 12:28 PMAs a bit of an underdog in the smartphone OS game, it's important for Windows Phone to attract as many new users as possible. Some of those could be people who are making the plunge with smartphones for the very first time, but a large fraction of potential Windows Phone users are smartphone owners currently using other platforms. That can make it tricky to entice them to try out something new, but Microsoft has an idea cooked-up that might go a long way towards convincing some to give it a shot. Microsoft sees apps as a major stumbling block in getting users to switch to a new smartphone O...
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by Michael Fisher | May 11, 2012 1:33 PMAt the moment, the wireless world is dominated by three major players. Google, Apple, and Microsoft have all built arrays of services and features around their respective platforms: Apple's iTunes, Google Play, and Microsoft's Marketplace are the mainstays. Secondary offerings also play an important role, like Apple's iCloud and AppleTV integration, Google's comprehensive set of web-based productivity apps like Gmail, and Microsoft's Office and Xbox suites. The landscape is awash in brand names and service marks. These company-specific sets of features have come to be referred to as "ecosys...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 3, 2012 8:13 PMWe've heard some rumors already that Microsoft had been testing current builds of Windows Phone 8 Apollo on Lumia-series devices. We didn't want to get too excited, and assume that meant that current-generation Windows Phone hardware would necessarily be seeing upgrades to WP8 (a contentious issue at the moment), but if true, it would certainly be interesting news. Today, we get to take a look at a picture purporting to show just such an arrangement, but is it all it appears to be? Supposedly, what we've got here is a Lumia 900 running an in-development Windows Phone 8 build. If you're init...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 2, 2012 8:09 PMBack at the end of March, we heard from Microsoft that it was adding support for a number of new countries to the Windows Phone Marketplace. While Zune support was going live nearly straight-away, at the time the company indicated that these countries would get access to the web-based version of the Marketplace within about a week. The entirety of April has passed in the time since then, and that web-based support never happened. Microsoft hasn't forgotten about things, though, and today announced that the Marketplace is now accessible in twenty-two new nations. All told, Windows Phone user...
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by Adam Z. Lein | May 2, 2012 5:35 PMWe just got a "Save the Date" email for a Windows Phone Developer Summit that will happen June 20-21 in San Francisco, CA. We can't help but wonder if this may be when Microsoft decides to announce Windows Phone 8 and of course detail all the new bits and API's that developers will need to know in order to make great apps for the next version of Windows Phone. The graphic in the email is obviously a mockup of a fake generic Windows Phone, but we definitely notice a heavier font treatment of the word "apps" in the screen image of the Windows Phone Marketplace there. That's about all we ca...
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by Adam Z. Lein | April 30, 2012 7:03 AMIf you look at user reviews for any Windows Phone available today you will be hard pressed to find any with less than a 4 star average rating. The majority of users who buy these phones rate them very highly. Only once in a while you'll find some one that returns a Windows Phone and rates it poorly because it doesn't do something esoteric like Bluetooth file transfer (which may have been useful in 2005) or because they didn't take enough time to learn how to do something. Even though sales of Windows Phones do not come close to other smartphone platforms, we still see an increase in fanaticism...
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by Stephen Schenck | April 26, 2012 2:26 PMPaul Thurrott is pretty darn plugged-in when it comes to Microsoft, and when he comments on current rumors, speaking with authority, it's likely because he's been privy to some insider information. Recently, we heard him discuss the possibility for currently-available Windows Phone handsets to receive software updates in the future which would upgrade them to Windows Phone 8. There had been rumors on both sides of the issue, but according to Thurrott, it just wasn't going to happen. Now, a rumor out of Russia attempts to second-guess Thurrott, claiming that Mango phones very much will be recei...
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by Adam Z. Lein | April 26, 2012 9:08 AMThis week, some new upgrades to SkyDrive were revealed just before Google revealed their "Drive" cloud storage service. Many sites gave the Google Drive service a lot more coverage than the SkyDrive upgrade, but most users and commenters were able to realize that SkyDrive is much better than Google Drive, DropBox, and many other cloud services. Sure, there are a few things that it doesn't do as well, and those may be deal-breakers for a few people, but lets start by talking about what it does do well. First off is the pricing. If you had ever used SkyDrive before, you still get the option t...
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by Stephen Schenck | April 25, 2012 12:21 PMMicrosoft's no stranger to music sales, and just as the audio hardware it's offered has evolved from stand-alone Zune players to full-fledged Windows Phone smartphones, the way it provides access to music is continuing to adapt and offer new services. The next may be a slightly larger undertaking than Microsoft's been used to, with rumors suggesting that a streaming service being developed under the codename Woodstock may defy platform boundaries and offer its music to users on both Android and iOS, in addition to Windows Phone. From the sound of things, Microsoft would be able to reach so ...
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by Stephen Schenck | April 24, 2012 7:36 PMWindows Phone users should be noticing a couple changes to how Microsoft's Marketplace works, going into effect today. While ultimately, everything Microsoft's doing is just removing existing functionality, it doesn't seem like the changes involved will have a negative impact on the vast majority of users. You may have to adjust your habits a little, but it should be pretty painless. Just what's changing? Right now, you can browse through apps right from your smartphone, using the Zune software on your PC, or by going to the Marketplace website. Microsoft is trying to simplify Marketplace u...
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