I’m a Mac. And I’m a PC. And for nearly five years now, I’ve used an iPhone. That’s about to change.
Listeners to Entertainment 2.0 may know that I recently “lost” Microsoft’s Windows Phone Challenge—which means I’ll be getting a new Windows Phone soon. For well over a year I’ve talked about just how impressive (and important) Microsoft’s reboot of Windows Phone has been, but I’ve also been concerned that they’re late to the game.
I’ve been using an iPhone for nearly five years now, and that platform has served me (and a few million more) quite well. It’s my phone, it’s my instant camera, it’s my calendar, notepad, and address book. It’s my media (and, perhaps more importantly, podcast subscription) player, it’s my social tether, it’s my bank. It’s more things to me than I ever imagined one device could be.
At home, I use Mac desktop and laptop computers (I switched about five years ago), and I have an iPad that I use every day. I use Airport Express and AirPlay to channel audio and video to different speakers or TVs around the house, and my iPhone integrates tightly with both cars. I’m clearly deeply invested in Apple’s hardware, software, and media ecosystems.
At the same time, I’m not a complete Apple geek. I have a Windows Media Center home theater PC in the den and other PCs around the house. A Windows Home Server backs everything up and hosts my complete music and photo libraries.
Nonetheless, integrating a new phone/camera/calendar/… into my daily life is going to be tricky at best, so I’ve been doing a little up-front research, and here’s what I’ve learned:
- Microsoft released a Windows Phone 7 Connector app for the Mac to sync media from iPhoto, iTunes, and other sources.
- I’ll need to rely on cloud services to sync calendars and contacts.
- I’ll have limited connectivity options in the cars—an auxiliary input cable at worst, Bluetooth at best. Neither is ideal.
- None of the financial or travel institutions with which I do business have apps for the Windows Phone platform.
So here’s how this is going to work: I plan to use my new Windows Phone for two weeks after completing the initial configuration and data transfer. If I’m satisfied, I’ll go for another two weeks, after which I’m going to ask myself the big question: should I switch?
This is not going to be about divorcing the Apple ecosystem but instead an experiment in blending ecosystems. Can a Windows Phone exist in symbiosis with the rest of my digital life? I expect I’ll rely more heavily on my computers, my iPad and other devices around the house for media consumption and distribution…and that’s OK. What’s more important is whether the Windows Phone can live up to what I need and expect to carry around in my pocket.
Amazing how Connected to the iPhone we’ve all become, but why change now? I’m currently not impressed with any of the Windows Phones, Apple in my humble opinion is much more advanced
I respectfully disagree. It just has more apps and a proprietary connector.
I absolutely love my Lumia 900 (upgraded from a Samsung Focus), but the lack of semi-major apps (banks, airlines, …) is hard to ignore when you are advising people on upgrading phones/ecosystems. Richard, which phone are you going to choose/or which phone did you choose?
He’s using the Lumia 710 on T-Mobile that he “won” in the Smoked by Windows Phone challenge
[…] device. But when I “lost” Microsoft’s competition and received a Windows Phone of my own, I decided to try an experiment: I’d use the phone exclusively for a few weeks to learn first-hand how it would fit into my […]
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