Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

I think that I finally understand what is happening here and this type of confusion. Earlier this year (April/May) an article came out that said WM 6.5 was released to manufactures. I took that as phones were coming out shortly to us afterward, being Oct and the phones are FINALLY hitting our hands is why the 2 dates are throwing people off. The first date, lets say Feb '10 is probably to give the WM7 RTM to the carriers so they can test the phones with WM7 software and hardware, then months later actually release a true date which puts the phone in our grabby little hands in Nov/Dec...

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

What's the benefit to WM7 ? The TP2 with Mobile Shell 3 is extremely finger friendly. I guess I'd be OK with 6.5 and the Marketplace (App Store)
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

its not just about the User Interface...the O/S dictates how your device operates...what it can or cannot do...blah blah blah. Spb MS 3 is just a skin that lays over WM6.1 or 6.5. The skin makes the O/S more finger friendly.

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

There's always something better, even if it's unimaginable now. I'm sure someone once said in 1993 "What's the benefit in getting Windows 3.1?" :)

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

mobile shell is extremely ugly, just my opinion.

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

And I told my neighbor in March 1996, that I would never need more than two 4gb HDD's. Now I have 2 1Tb HDD's in a NAS enclosure. In 1988 I never thought I could get a phone cord to follow me all the way to work either. I can't wait to see what the future holds but I won't put up with yesterday's Tech while I wait.

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

I'd say by 2030, we'll see full true holographic phones, like in Star Wars when they communicated.

http://startswithabang.com/wp-conten...s-hologram.jpg

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

You mean like this patented idea from Samsung? Ok, not quite the same, but...

2030, maybe. Maybe sooner!


Samsung phone with holographic 3D projection display

Patents, patents, patents… There’s so many of them. It seems that we are getting at least several new mobile phone designs patented every week.
What it is about the mobile phone industry, that makes the R&D departments of cellphone vendors churn out patent applications, like no other electronics/gadget maker does?
I have no idea. But the thinking process, and the ideas that are revealed in these patent applications are fascinating to watch.
Some of them are pretty stupid, and will never se the light of day, others are so out there that it may take years to get to the market, and some of them become a real product even before we hear about them.
Here’s the latest interesting patent application from Samsung, that I would put somewhere between the “far out there” and “may become a real product soon” categories.
A mobile handset with projection display and/or 3D holographic screen.
Yep. You heard it right. While the big rear projection TVs are becoming extinct, the projection technology may get a second life in a mobile phone displays, and even usher in a whole new 3D user experience.
The reasoning is simple – while they might be thin enough for the TV sets and PC monitors, the LCDs that are commonly used in the mobile handsets, are comparatively thick. Also, due to the production techniques, they have standardized horizontal and vertical sizes, which significantly limits phone design possibilities.
But optical projectors are becoming small enough to put them into a mobile phone.
Then, all that’s missing is a “panel type waveguide” (basically a refractive plate that spreads incoming light waves evenly throughout the surface), to pick up the projected light and transform it into an image on the phone display.
And it’s just the thing that Samsung is describing in it’s patent application. There are numerous advantages to such set-up.
Since the panel type waveguide involved is just a piece of solid material, it can be sliced and diced to any size and shape you want. It will be much thinner then any other display technology. It will be much less prone to breaking.
And it gets better. In Samsung’s own words:

Although it has been assumed in the above description that the panel-type waveguide according to the present invention is used as a screen, on which source images emitted by the optical unit are two-dimensionally displayed, the panel-type waveguide may be replaced with a three-dimensional hologram screen so that source images emitted by the optical unit are three-dimensionally displayed on a plane spaced from the hologram screen by a predetermined distance.

Did you catch that? Mobile phones with holographic 3D optical displays may be just around the corner http://www.unwiredview.com/wp-includ.../icon_wink.gif

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

Sorry, had to add this info as well. I'm done going off-topic now. Pretty interesting, maybe we're closer then we think to projection mobile devices.


A new ground-breaking holographic 2D projection technology could result in a new generation of pocket-sized digital video projectors and miniature projection displays incorporated into other handheld devices. Digital video projectors produce large, high quality images are becoming increasingly popular as they grow cheaper with mass production, but the technology is limited in its miniaturisation, preventing projectors from being incorporated mobile device markets. Holographic projection of 2D (rather than 3D) images represents a compelling alternative to conventional image projection. Video projectors based on this holographic technology can be made very small so a projector could be integrated into a laptop, a PDA, or even a mobile phone.
Light Blue Optics of Cambridge (UK) has developed ground-breaking holographic technology which could result in a new generation of pocket-sized digital video projectors and projection displays incorporated into other handheld devices
Digital video projectors that produce large, high quality images are becoming increasingly popular, but there are limitations in the technology that make miniaturisation very difficult, preventing projectors from making inroads into the potentially lucrative mobile device markets.
Holographic projection of 2D (rather than 3D) images represents a compelling alternative to conventional image projection. Holograms are efficient: they work by routing light to the places where you want it, and away from the places you don't. Video projectors based on this holographic technology require very few components, which means they can be made very small - and the smaller you make holograms, the better the image that results. So a projector could be integrated into a laptop, a PDA, or even a mobile phone. The concept of a holographic projector is not new, but up until now technical issues have prevented development of an actual product based on this technology.
Holograms are extremely complex objects mathematically, and calculating them fast enough for video applications is very difficult; even the most powerful computers would take minutes to generate a hologram to project just a single video frame.
The projected images produced by holograms tend to be speckly and of very low quality.The lasers that are required to illuminate the holograms have, until very recently, been very expensive and limited in availability.
In the Photonics and Sensors Group at the Cambridge University Engineering Department, several major breakthroughs have been made, together making possible the generation and display of high quality holograms at video frame rates, using just a single custom chip.
A hologram pattern, which to the naked eye looks like a collection of random dots, is displayed on a small liquid-crystal-on-silicon (LCOS) microdisplay - a tiny, very fast liquid crystal display built on top of a chip.
The hologram patterns are calculated by Light Blue Optics' proprietary "hologram chip" so that when the microdisplay is illuminated by laser light, the light interferes with itself in a complex manner through the physical process of diffraction which, when carefully controlled, results in the formation of a large, high quality projected image on, for example, a screen or a wall.
Unlike a conventional video projector, heavy, bulky lenses are not required: diffraction does all the work for you, and the projected image is sharp and in focus at any distance.There are a huge number of applications for this technology in fields including business, home entertainment, aerospace and advertising.
At present, the focus is on 2D applications, in particular tiny personal projectors for business and home use. The illustration shows an artist's impression of a potential early product - a personal video projector, which you could download movies to and then play anywhere, using a wall as the screen.
In the future, the same technology could be extended into 3D applications - while we're some way away yet, this new technology could bring the holographic video displays of science fiction one step closer to reality. "One thing I would stress is that although this holographic technology could in the future be extended for 3D applications, the current focus of the company is to make ultra-compact 2D video projectors," said Light Blue Optics' Dr Nic Lawrence.
At present, Light Blue Optics has a lab-based demonstrator, which converts a standard composite video signal into high-quality 2D holographic video, in real time. The hologram generation engine runs in a commercially available FPGA (field-programmable gate array) chip, whose design extends naturally to cheap mass production. Other processing platforms including low-power digital signal processing (DSP) ICs are also under development.
Light Blue Optics is working with several strategic partners to further develop this technology into real products. It is envisaged that devices based on this technology will be in the shops in the next two to four years.

Re: WM7 on Pro2
 

irregardless ... not a word.