Windows Mobile 6.5 vs 6.1 – Added features
So the question on many peoples lips is it worth the upgrade???
For me the answer is YES absolutely!
While I know its still beta for many phones, I like many other WM enthusiasts have been able to get our 6.5 ROMs from http://xda-developers.com, So we have first hand experience with WM 6.5.
I have now been using WM6.5 full time now for a few months, while I see Microsoft have made some necessary changes in order to keep up with the ever so popular Iphone, some of these changes include:
- Most menus are now finger friendly for those with fatter fingers (like myself)
- Scrolling throughout the whole WM platform is now fluid like the Iphone.
- They have removed the start menu where it would drop down like the current windows platform (W7, VISTA, XP etc), where it appears in a honeycomb effect, again this if finger friendly.
- Windows Locking, they have taken a leave out of apples book here, and they now also have the slide to unlock function
- They have now incorporated widgets with this release (further blogs to come on this)
- It also appears that customisations to the phone skin / theme are easier than ever, and now your able to incorporate images within the taskbars with transparency. this give the phone a 21st century look about it!!!
- And last but not least the biggest change is the home screen, now referred to as titanium, this is one screen that allows you to manage almost everything from the one screen, The Idea is similar to HTC’s Touchflo, in a round about way.
- Battery life has been increased
they say pictures are worth a thousand words so less talk and more pics:
While I have given it praise there is still a major down side I think…
It looks and works the same way, its RAM and ROM hungry, Microsoft have only bandaid the old interface.
However combined with HTC’s great new TouchFlo 3d (TF3d)version 2 (not officially release either) it seems they have fixed pretty much every menu that is commonly used to be very finger friendly, while they did this with the basics on TF3D v1, in V2 they have gone way beyond, fixing most menus. So with TF3D2 combined with 6.5 its not at all a bad package. I will be looking forward to both TF3Dv2 and 6.5 come out of beta.
(All new devices with 6.1 shipped will be eligible for a 6.5 upgrade, older phones while you might find a copy of 6.5 on http://xda-developers.com, don’t expect it to fly, also your vendor will not support it!)