News - Samsung first to unveil Windows Phone 8 smartphone

[cptwhite_uk]

Wouldn't it be refreshing to see a phone come out advertising 400Mhz speeds "we've made it so efficient in both hardware and software that we can improve the performance from out previous 600Mhz device, while tripling battery life and reducing weight"

.....we can but dream

[TheAnimus]

You know, you're the first person I've heard complaining the N7 has poor responsiveness. Most reviews etc I've seen have been very complimentary about how smooth it is. But I digress...

Everyone I know who has one, shares the same view, the iPad is smoother UI.

[Jingee]

Not too keen on the chrome around the edge of the front; reminds me too much of the ugly iPhone 3GS...

[killer7xx]

Samsung finally decided to use metal and not thin plastic for the battery cover.

[McPhee]

Liking this whole 'Ativ' brand thing. Samsung actually seem to understand how to name a product/product range; Ativ Tab, Ativ PC, Ativ PC Pro and Ativ S. It's consistent, and if it works they'll no doubt carry on with the Ativ brand for years to come.

Compare that to the competition; HTC seem to pull a new name out of their collective arses every week, working product-by-product; Asus and Acer have a habit of being too technical - their product names regularly read like a mini spec-sheet; Dell and HP spread their ranges too widely and the distinction between individual models just isn't there (What is an Inspiron, an XPS, Pavilion or Envy?).

[Funkstar]

I see what you mean Gallaxy for Android based devices and ATIV for Windows based.

But when you have 127 different devices under the same brand umbrella, things start to get a tad confused

http://www.gsmarena.com/results.php3...e=0&sFreeText=

[crossy]

Dell and HP spread their ranges too widely and the distinction between individual models just isn't there (What is an Inspiron, an XPS, Pavilion or Envy?).

Sorry, don't agree. Dell's naming used to be very clear: Inspiron=home laptop; Latitude=business laptop; Optiplex=business desktop; etc. Now I'm not so sure, it seems to be that Latitude=business; Inspiron=home; Vostro=cross-over (so-ho?) and XPS is still the entertainment/lower end gaming.
Likewise HP - Pav's are the bread and butter, Envy are the "designer" models, etc. (not that I'm claiming any special knowledge - even though I work for one of those two companies)

Agree that "Galaxy" = Android and "Ativ" = Windows is a great idea since it makes it crystal clear what you're getting. Similarly Galaxy Tab and Ativ Tab, which leads me to wonder if there'll ever be an "Ativ Note" - I wouldn't like to bet against it.

[dangel]

Everyone I know who has one, shares the same view, the iPad is smoother UI.

Personally I think my wife's nexus 7 is smoother than my iPad 3..

[Kushan]

Damn, what am I then (I'll give you a clue, I sorta am!).

Ummm...ok.

Not when we're talking about how a JIT is running for indevidual apps, and also the model for the shoddy kernel implementation, simple things like GPU interaction are piss poor.

See while I'm not one to generally just outrightly call someone a liar or a fraud, the things you're saying don't make a lot of sense. For one, "a JIT is running for indevidual(sic) apps"? I don't think you know what "JIT" means? It stands for Just-In-Time and refers to compiling the Java bytecode into native instructions at runtime. This is a good thing - it increases performance dramatically (approximately ~3x), which in turn increases efficiency (Better battery life as the CPU doesn't have to work as hard).

I presume what you actually were talking about is the fact that each application runs in its own Virtual Machine (Called the Dalvik VM on Android). This is a design decision for numerous reasons (Such as separating each application from each other) and Dalvik is designed specifically with this in mind.

These are all eased by throwing more thread workers at the problem.

Once again, I'm not sure how you're making that broad assumption. That will only work to a small degree, but getting to your point about "lazy programmers", for this to work then they'd have to parallelize their code in the first place, something no "lazy" programmer would do. The "easy" way of fixing this is to throw higher-clocked threads rather than more of them.

Or if your using say iOS the cheaper (not thats its bad) form of co-operative multitasking used, rather than pre-emptive.

I would suggest (respectfully) that those have a much higher barance on the 'feel performance' of a device than the number of cores,

I honestly cannot comment on how iOS does things as I am not an iOS developer (I have some experiencing developing for iOS but it's rather limited)

however andriod feels to have this all wrong, and as such throws more cores at the problem.

See here you're making another generalisation/assumption about Android but really what you're speaking of has nothing to do with the platform but rather the device manufacturers. In fact as far as I'm aware, Android isn't particularly well optimised for multi-core devices yet. I'm sure that has changed somewhat with JB but only last month did Intel come out and say it themselves: Android isn't "ready" for dual/quad core processing. That does sort of go against everything you've been saying, yet ultimately it does highlight what I think we can all agree on - multi-core devices are somewhat "pointless" for the moment .

Depends what you mean by highlight, because ultlimately it can hide, if one device is using as much of a thread as it can, having an extra core allows that bad pratice to go by un-noticed

That is true to a degree, but Android (And in fact most modern OS's I'm aware of?) keeps track of thread usage and will warn you if an application is not responding quickly. I know on my android devices, if certain applications take too long to respond then I'll get a warning to close them, even though the rest of my device is running smoothly.

but I'm not talking about 3rd party apps here, I'm refering to the shell and the kernel, and the fact that out of the box, my Nexus 7 feels sluggish.

Everyone I know who has one, shares the same view, the iPad is smoother UI.

Like the other people here, I find this also hard to believe -

You know, you're the first person I've heard complaining the N7 has poor responsiveness. Most reviews etc I've seen have been very complimentary about how smooth it is. But I digress....

Personally I think my wife's nexus 7 is smoother than my iPad 3..

In my office, I was the first to get a Nexus 7 and the very same day it arrived, 2 others ordered theirs - both of those people own iPads and both agreed that the Nexus 7 was an incredible little device (mostly for portability reasons). I've not seen either of them complain about sluggishness or poor responsiveness. I think you might have a faulty Nexus 7.

Half of Andriod is running a broken Java implementation, the other half a broken kernel implementation that clearly never thought about graphics interactions.

It's as if we can't say that it is so broken.

Once again, this is definitely a misunderstanding regarding Java - Android's API is based on Java, but it is not Java. This is the whole reason Oracle went to court with Google, Oracle tried to claim that Android copied Java but it was determined that it simply doesn't. The Dalvik VM is a Virtual Machine, but it's not a Java Virtual Machine. You could call it a "broken" Java implementation, but it's like saying that a Motorbike is a "Broken" car missing 2 wheels. A lot of your criticisms of android are actually things that are by design and have reasoning behind them or are vastly out of date (especially since Android 4.0).

To get back to how this began, you may be a programmer but you're certainly not very familiar with programming on Android.

[TheAnimus]

First off, just to clarify when I say 'Andriod' I mean everything that comes loaded on my Nexus 7 by google. The OS, the poor java copy, the stock apps.

See while I'm not one to generally just outrightly call someone a liar or a fraud, the things you're saying don't make a lot of sense. For one, "a JIT is running for indevidual(sic) apps"? I don't think you know what "JIT" means? It stands for Just-In-Time and refers to compiling the Java bytecode into native instructions at runtime. This is a good thing - it increases performance dramatically (approximately ~3x), which in turn increases efficiency (Better battery life as the CPU doesn't have to work as hard).

I really don't think you understand what I'm talking about. I'd suggest going to read about say DirectX architecture. Learn about Domain Sockets and IOCTRLs just general ways in which usermode talks to kernel mode.

I've written my own pre-emptive real time OS in assembly on a series of microchip PICs with working TCP/IP stack on a RT8139. I know a little bit about OS design. Try doing that with only 1 available timer register.

The Andriod JIT/JVM is a piss poor copy of Java, I've said this before, its not hard to see this in action:
http://www.koushikdutta.com/2009/01/dalvik-vs-mono.html
http://marakana.com/forums/android/examples/96.html

Now, for every process that is running, if it has more CPU time if you have more cores. This allows the apps to feel more snappy, and makes up for, the shoddy piss poor programming.

I presume what you actually were talking about is the fact that each application runs in its own Virtual Machine (Called the Dalvik VM on Android). This is a design decision for numerous reasons (Such as separating each application from each other) and Dalvik is designed specifically with this in mind.

I am not, in any way criticising it for having virtual protection.

I am mearly saying, for the reasons above that multiple cores are been used to hide bad programming and bad architecture on Andriod.

Once again, I'm not sure how you're making that broad assumption. That will only work to a small degree, but getting to your point about "lazy programmers", for this to work then they'd have to parallelize their code in the first place, something no "lazy" programmer would do. The "easy" way of fixing this is to throw higher-clocked threads rather than more of them.

You make it sound as if everything is just one thread, its not. The issue is they can't really get higher clock speeds but they can have cores. More cores means more of the seperate one process per task thing. Often the 'feel' of the OS is not due to the 'active application' going slow, but due to all the background services taking up time. A classic would be my friends orginal HTC Desire, he installed some app and then couldn't awnser calls, jab at the button nothing happened. If there had been more thread workers available, and assuming there wasn't some deadlocking going on, he would never have noticed this problem.

I honestly cannot comment on how iOS does things as I am not an iOS developer (I have some experiencing developing for iOS but it's rather limited)

I've never written an app natively for iOS, but I read how the OS works because you know, its interesting. I also hate 'software developers' who know nothing outside of their bubble that is their chosen technology.

See here you're making another generalisation/assumption about Android but really what you're speaking of has nothing to do with the platform but rather the device manufacturers. In fact as far as I'm aware, Android isn't particularly well optimised for multi-core devices yet. I'm sure that has changed somewhat with JB but only last month did Intel come out and say it themselves: Android isn't "ready" for dual/quad core processing. That does sort of go against everything you've been saying, yet ultimately it does highlight what I think we can all agree on - multi-core devices are somewhat "pointless" for the moment .

I'm not saying its optomised, but due to the shoddy performance on a single core 800mhz device, what option do manifacturers have? Also on the intel comment, you have to take it with a massive pinch of salt because their 'improvements' are for their horrible CPU design. But then again I don't need to explain this, because I'm sure your aware of how say a VirtualAlloc or a context switch will work on an x86 vs an ARM9 right?

That is true to a degree, but Android (And in fact most modern OS's I'm aware of?) keeps track of thread usage and will warn you if an application is not responding quickly. I know on my android devices, if certain applications take too long to respond then I'll get a warning to close them, even though the rest of my device is running smoothly.

You contradict yourself there, you use a quote from Intel talking about how the thread scheduler isn't any good, then say how it will work.

My issue is, any everyone agrees pre andriod 4.0, but I still think its true after 4.0, its process management is piss poor, its background task management is leaky and it is very easy to make the device slow down to a crawl. Just look at how popular 'App Killers' are for andriod, never hear of that for iOS or WP7.5 (well no one uses that to hear about it from ).

In my office, I was the first to get a Nexus 7 and the very same day it arrived, 2 others ordered theirs - both of those people own iPads and both agreed that the Nexus 7 was an incredible little device (mostly for portability reasons). I've not seen either of them complain about sluggishness or poor responsiveness. I think you might have a faulty Nexus 7.

People suggested I had a faulty iPad regarding my complaints about it. I still like the device, even thou yesterday I picked it up, switched it on (lock screen) saw the battery was 80%+ or so by the graphic. Switched off, coat pocket, get on tube, start to read book (a friend has my kindle) and oh, whats that, only 20% battery. Hmm the notification, or the pooling thread, or however the lockscreen battery indicator works wasn't working. I've never had something as shoddy as that happen on my WP or iOS. That happened just yesterday evening/night.

Once again, this is definitely a misunderstanding regarding Java - Android's API is based on Java, but it is not Java. This is the whole reason Oracle went to court with Google, Oracle tried to claim that Android copied Java but it was determined that it simply doesn't. The Dalvik VM is a Virtual Machine, but it's not a Java Virtual Machine. You could call it a "broken" Java implementation, but it's like saying that a Motorbike is a "Broken" car missing 2 wheels. A lot of your criticisms of android are actually things that are by design and have reasoning behind them or are vastly out of date (especially since Android 4.0).

So your saying that Dalvik VM isn't in anyway shape or form a broken Java? Really?!

Hell I call .Net Java++ at times. (well C# is C++ ++).....

My point is that you can use java instead on a mobile device with better performance. On that note, I comment Andriod is lazy, shoddy and broken, with many device manifactures adding cores + RAM because its all they can do to address this problem.

[directhex]

Everyone I know who has one, shares the same view, the iPad is smoother UI.

That's easily done. The iPad's input layer can suspend ALL other activity, Start a web page loading, for example, then place finger on screen as if scrolling - the page will never finish rendering as long as your finger is on the screen. This means iOS devices are smooth - because they're designed to listen to user input above all else.

[dangel]

I little unfairly i'd like to cherry pick some responses to a little of what you'd said - forgive me if the context was lost.

Now, for every process that is running, if it has more CPU time if you have more cores. This allows the apps to feel more snappy, and makes up for, the shoddy piss poor programming.I am not, in any way criticising it for having virtual protection.

Not if the app is inherently single threaded. It is a very fair point that in order to use multicore effectively apps must be written with it mind and not all apps will suit the task anyway (not to mention all the caveats of multithreading). For the OS overall then of course more cores mean it can stay more responsive.

My issue is, any everyone agrees pre andriod 4.0, but I still think its true after 4.0, its process management is piss poor, its background task management is leaky and it is very easy to make the device slow down to a crawl. Just look at how popular 'App Killers' are for andriod, never hear of that for iOS or WP7.5 (well no one uses that to hear about it from ).

I would of agreed with you on Gingerbread (2.3) but since 4.0 (and now 4.1) I've specifically stopped using task killers because they do more harm than good and since doing so i've not needed one (ever). In fact, i'd happily say my GNex 4.1 has a far better OS than my iPad 3 (5.1) because it's less prone to being glitchy and tasks don't just do the 'magic pop disappeared' thing.

My point is that you can use java instead on a mobile device with better performance. On that note, I comment Andriod is lazy, shoddy and broken, with many device manifactures adding cores + RAM because its all they can do to address this problem.

I agree on specmanship but I'd also echo comments saying Android wasn't very good at using multicore hardware until of late. iOS and Android are quite different in their UI prioritisation as directhex points out - and until 'project butter' and 4.1 android still looked rather pants because of it. Now though i'd say they're easily on par and i'd easily prefer an android device with the iPad3's screen for the increased flexibility of the OS (ironically especially when task switching). I'm also completely open to the Win Tablet thing too. iOS feels pretty sucky compared to it's competitors for me and iOS 6 promises me nothing magical or exciting (AFAIK).
I really don't care who makes the product - just which is the best one for doing the sort of things I want to do with the device.

[TheAnimus]

I little unfairly i'd like to cherry pick some responses to a little of what you'd said - forgive me if the context was lost.

Go for it, hopefully allow me to explain my points better.

Not if the app is inherently single threaded. It is a very fair point that in order to use multicore effectively apps must be written with it mind and not all apps will suit the task anyway (not to mention all the caveats of multithreading). For the OS overall then of course more cores mean it can stay more responsive.

I'm more talking about if you've got 12 procs running, its easier for the foreground one to stay responsive the more cores are available. I think directhex has made a good point about interupt level response. Andriod devices don't seem to properly prioritise running apps from background.

So my point is if your app is 80% shoddy, and is only executing 20% of the time, been able to let it execute 40% of the time, makes it only 40% shoddy. I'm not talking about volatile vs non-volatile and cpu specific atomic safe operations, just the idea that the app I'm using, isn't competeting with the others as much.

I would of agreed with you on Gingerbread (2.3) but since 4.0 (and now 4.1) I've specifically stopped using task killers because they do more harm than good and since doing so i've not needed one (ever). In fact, i'd happily say my GNex 4.1 has a far better OS than my iPad 3 (5.1) because it's less prone to being glitchy and tasks don't just do the 'magic pop disappeared' thing.

I think I need a simplistic benchmark app (of which I don't know, because I really don't use andriod enough!) run it from a cold start, then run it again after a fair bit of use. Actually that reminds me of another gripe, when first booting it, its dog slow for a while whilst stuff gets done, only 20 seconds or so, but still bad ux.

I agree on specmanship but I'd also echo comments saying Android wasn't very good at using multicore hardware until of late. iOS and Android are quite different in their UI prioritisation as directhex points out - and until 'project butter' and 4.1 android still looked rather pants because of it. Now though i'd say they're easily on par and i'd easily prefer an android device with the iPad3's screen for the increased flexibility of the OS (ironically especially when task switching). I'm also completely open to the Win Tablet thing too. iOS feels pretty sucky compared to it's competitors for me and iOS 6 promises me nothing magical or exciting (AFAIK).
I really don't care who makes the product - just which is the best one for doing the sort of things I want to do with the device.

iOS really does remind me of windows 3.1, I hated windows 3.1, I always prefered the Norton Desktop as a shell for it, because of how ineffectively it used the screen space. The spacing of dumb icons and things really is, well dumb. But at the same time I think its very easy to slow down a nexus 7, one of the things I wanted to do for the one for my gran was have it with some photo widgets that cloud sync, I added 4. That killed it's performance. Also there isn't an easy way to see this that I've found, the battery useage monitor is about the closest built in.

What I'm saying is I always think everything is crap, but in particular andriod stands out as badly designed, badly implemented software.

Not disputing its flexible.

[xdevildogs]

Awesome timing as the husband and I are looking to upgrade our phones in the very near future!

[freedomzero]

The front of the phone does look a lot like a...anyway, shouldn't Nokia be Microsoft's close partner? Where is their phone?

[dangel]

Go for it, hopefully allow me to explain my points better.I'm more talking about if you've got 12 procs running, its easier for the foreground one to stay responsive the more cores are available. I think directhex has made a good point about interupt level response. Andriod devices don't seem to properly prioritise running apps from background.

So my point is if your app is 80% shoddy, and is only executing 20% of the time, been able to let it execute 40% of the time, makes it only 40% shoddy. I'm not talking about volatile vs non-volatile and cpu specific atomic safe operations, just the idea that the app I'm using, isn't competeting with the others as much.I think I need a simplistic benchmark app (of which I don't know, because I really don't use andriod enough!) run it from a cold start, then run it again after a fair bit of use. Actually that reminds me of another gripe, when first booting it, its dog slow for a while whilst stuff gets done, only 20 seconds or so, but still bad ux.

Ah, sorry I think I read that as for a process, not all processes in which case cross purposes and all that. I rarely reboot my phone or her tablet so I can't say I worry about initial start up time too much (and to me it's fine anyway).

iOS really does remind me of windows 3.1, I hated windows 3.1, I always prefered the Norton Desktop as a shell for it, because of how ineffectively it used the screen space. The spacing of dumb icons and things really is, well dumb. But at the same time I think its very easy to slow down a nexus 7, one of the things I wanted to do for the one for my gran was have it with some photo widgets that cloud sync, I added 4. That killed it's performance. Also there isn't an easy way to see this that I've found, the battery useage monitor is about the closest built in.

Bad apps will be bad - and at least android does detect the nasty ones quite quickly but yes it's perfectly possible to install apps that hurt your device if you really want to. Should/could the OS do better? Heck, why not but as I said my experience is that I've stopped using task managers (for a long time now) and the OS does fairly aggressively prompt when apps become unresponsive. However, they do become apparent on play quite quickly via feedback which is something I look at before deciding to install something. It's been a long while since I installed something that did really slow down my device or eat battery significantly though. iOS feels like a big step backwards vs android - when I have to jailbreak to open an email link in a non-apple browser (which is just their browser with a wrapper to fix all the stuff that's borked or missing) I know it's not well suited to me.

What I'm saying is I always think everything is crap, but in particular andriod stands out as badly designed, badly implemented software.

Not disputing its flexible.

No sure if I agree but I don't think it really matters, but for what it's worth I find android to be flexible, smooth and stable and with solid improvements with each version. In other words I really like it but my experience of other platforms doesn't include WP8 so I can't compare.