Many companies have launched phones based on the Windows Phone 7 platform. Moreover, the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace is getting richer with apps, with all-purpose applications suited for various kinds of users. Most of the major manufacturers have already come up with a lot of Windows Phone 7 devices in the market.

Some of the best Windows Phones available in India are listed below:

1.  Nokia Lumia 800

Nokia has proved its inclination towards Windows Phone 7 by launching a few phones under its Lumia series of smartphones. Nokia Lumia 800 is one such phone. Nokia has kept up to its standards in terms of build quality. The phone body is made up of one single piece of scratch-free polycarbonate. The phone runs on a 1.4Ghz Qualcomm MSM8255 single-core processor coupled up with 512MB of SDRAM. It comes with a maximum onboard memory of 16GB with no memory expansion capabilities.

Lumia 800 has a 3.7” AMOLED Clear Black (Gorilla Glass) capacitive touchscreen which has a resolution of 800×480 pixels. The 8 MP camera with Carl Zeiss Optics take nice pictures even under poor lighting conditions. It is also capable or capturing 720p HD videos at 30FPS.

The phone runs seamlessly on Windows Phone 7.5, a.k.a Mango, providing a very intuitive and easily usable UI. Lumia 800, though it lacks latest technologies like NFC and Bluetooth 3.0+HS(no file transfers not allowed), it is still one of the best Windows Phones available in the market especially owing to the reputation of Nokia

2. Nokia Lumia 710

The small brother to the Lumia 800, the Lumia 710 has a 3.7” antiglare Gorilla glass touchscreen with ClearBlack technology. The phone is powered by a 1.4GHz Scorpion processor on a Qualcomm MSM8255 Snapdragon chipset with and Adreno 205 GPU. It has 8GB of internal storage.

It has a 5Mp camera which can capture videos at a resolution of 720p at 30FPS. Apart from this, the phone has all other basic connectivity features like WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1(no file transfers not allowed) . The only catch is the absence of a secondary front camera.

3. HTC Radar

The HTC Radar is a good-looking Windows 7 Phone from HTC.  Radar has a 3.8” S-LCD capacitive touchscreen with brilliant display quality. It sports the latest Windows phone 7.5 Mango which runs on a 1GHz Scorpion Processor on a Qualcomm MSM8255 Snapdragon chipset coupled with an Adreno 205 GPU. Internal storage capacity is 8GB. The pretty average 5MP camera with geo-tagging capabilities can record 720p videos at 30FPS.The phone is also DLNA Enabled so you can stream your favourite videos and music directly to your DLNA enabled devices. GPS based navigation is based on a very intuitive HTC Location application. The special features include the sound enhancement features like SRS.

4. HTC HD7

The HTC HD7 is a monster Windows Phone from HTC with a 4.3” touchscreen and is the oldest phone in the list. It runs an older Windows Phone 7(without Mango update). It has a 1GHz Scorpion processor bundled on a Qualcomm QSD8250 Snapdragon chipset with an Adreno 200 GPU an internal storage capacity is of 8GB(Europe version) and 16GB(Asia version). The phone has enormous multimedia capacities.

The display is crisp showing vivid colours. Audio enhancements like Dolby Mobile and SRS Sound Enhancement are present. The phone has a pretty nice 5MP camera with video recording capability upto 720p @ 30FPS. Covering the camera is the kickstand which allows you to watch movies and pictures without holding the phone in your hand.Usual connectivity features like Wifi, Bluetooth(no file transfers not allowed), and GPS are present.

Even though the HD7 is around 1.5 years old, even then it gives strong competition to the newer Windows 7 Phones most because lack of major Windows Phone launches. The only problem with the phone is that it carries an outdated version of the Windows Phone OS.

5. HTC 7 Mozart

HTC7 Mozart is another Windows Phone from HTC. HTC Mozart is more inclined towards being a music phone especially owing to the special sound enhancement features. This phone runs on a 1GHz Snapdragon chipset with a 3.7-inch sharp SLCD screen (pretty much better than the HD7’s screen) protected with Corning Gorilla Glass. It comes with only 576 MB of RAM and 8 GB of internal storage capacity.

The front of the phone has touch sensitive search, back and Windows button. All other physical buttons have a matte silver finish. The 8 Megapixel camera with Xenon Flash makes it a perfect photo capturing device. It can also capture 720p HD videos@30FPS. Other basic connectivity features like Bluetooth(no file transfers not allowed), Wi-Fi, GPS, 3G are present.

The phone comes in a unibody chassis which gives the phone very nice build quality and a premium feel when held in hand. The bottom part of the detachable back cover serves as an antenna. The presence of a notification LED is rare feature in Windows Phones.

6. Samsung Omnia W

Omnia W is a sleek and stylish Windows Phone 7 smartphone from Samsung. It has a3.7”Super AMOLED display providing stunning display features. The OMNIA is powered by a powerful 1.4GHz QualcommMSM8255Snapdragon CPU, Adreno 205 GPU coupled with 512MB ofRAM.

It runs the latest Windows Phone 7.5 Mango. Inbuilt storage capacity is 8GB. The 5 MP camera of the phone fails to deliver crisp quality pictures under dim lighting conditions. The main drawbacks of the phone is the lack of flash and Silverlight support in the web browser. Overall it is a pretty nice phone and totally justifies its price.

This Android version of Google Chrome is focussed on two primary aspects: speed and simplicity. You can download this application here(read below for availability).

Chrome for Android: Features

Compared to the previous native browser of Android, WebKit, a lot of new features have been added. Navigation is fluidic and is best suited for using on small screens like those of smartphones or tablets. Some new features include:

• Accelerated page loading, scrolling and zooming.
• An “omnibox” is present which allows user to search or navigate to a URL from the same box, similar to the omnibar present in the desktop version of Google Chrome.

• Unlimited number of tabs with easy to switch stack interface.
• Chrome Sync to enable users to synchronise Chrome data, including bookmarks, passwords, etc., from their desktops to the mobile phone and vice versa.
• Incognito mode to browse the web secretly.

Apart from these one more feature is present which allows you to send the pages from the desktop version of Chrome to the mobile version allowing users to view those pages anywhere on their mobile, even when they are offline. This page sync feature works in both directions, allowing the users to automatically resume the pages they were viewing on the last device.

Some other special features include the loading of the top results, while you scroll through the results of the Google search.Search suggestions are also available. The password manager is also a boon for people having a lot of passwords to remember.

No support for Flash

If you’re a fan of Flash support on mobile devices, especially android’s native browser then you may be disappointed to hear that Chrome for Android does not (and will never) support Flash. The same has been officially confirmed by Adobe. But as support for Flash in mobile browsers is hardly being endorsed by Adobe itself(due to poor performance) and also with fast growth of HTML5 compatible versions of websites and web apps, Flash support on mobile phones will not be missed that much.

Availability

This release of Chrome for Android is available as a beta version. It is available in the following countries only: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Australia, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Argentina and Brazil. It will be made available worldwide very soon.

Moreover this release is only meant for Android 4.0+(Ice Cream Sandwich ) devices, so you can see it working only if you have a Motorola Xoom, Galaxy Nexus, Nexus S or ASUS Transformer Prime. There are very less chances that a version compatible with the older versions of Android OS will be released, though there is no official word on this.

Conclusion

Launch of Chrome for Android is great step by Google. Users have ever since been requesting for Chrome for Android because of the ease of use of the desktop version of Chrome. If Google releases a version compatible with the earlier version of Android then it will be a win-win situation for all.

It would not be surprising if this version of Chrome takes over all other mobile web browsers available for Android. We just hope that the future versions of Chrome for Android will have support for plugins.

1. Apple iPhone 5

This will undoubtedly be the most anticipated mobile phone of 2012. Though the iPhone 4S was a pretty refurbished version of iPhone 4, even then, only a few improvements like an 8MP camera and Siri were not able to convince the world’s hunger for technology. Most people were disappointed to see the iPhone “4S” when they expected to see the iPhone “5″. People want the iPhone 5 to be totally different from the iPhone 4S.

As there are no updates about what new features the iPhone 5 will carry, we can only tell you what to expect from it. The iPhone 5 will be having an entirely new design and not just a refinement of the the 4S’s design. It will have a metal back. It will also have a larger screen of around 4.3” with a resolution of 720 x 1280 pixels.

The aspect ratio will also change which will result in the screen being a bit wider. It is also possible that the screen used in the iPhone 5 will also be curved, like the ones we have already seen on the Galaxy Nexus. Word is that Sony might be the manufacturer of these screens this time. Though the camera will be the same 8MP one as we saw in the iPhone 4S.

It also might turn up that this iPhone 5 will have a Quad core A6 chip with Nvidia’s Tegra 3 processors. A lot of quad core processor phones are already scheduled to be launched in 2012, so Apple wouldn’t want to lag behind. The iPhone 5 would also have 4G LTE support. Featuring iOS 5 and iCloud, the iPhone 5 will also have NFC support. Software updates will be over the air and you’ll just receive the changed features of the OS rather than the old, full 600MB downloads.

These are just the features which are being expected to be included in the iPhone 5. iPhone 5 is rumored to be launched in June 2012. Till then, keep checking our websites for further updates on specifications and features.

2. Samsung Galaxy S III:

Samsung Galaxy S III, the big brother to one of the most powerful phone of today, Galaxy S II, is also scheduled to be launched in 2012. The best thing about Samsung Galaxy S phones is that, they obey one rule: they are the most powerful phones of the world at the time of their launch. No other phone can beat them in terms of performance and computing power. Samsung Galaxy S III would be no exception.

Samsung Galaxy S III will be sporting a quad core 1.8 Ghz Exynos 4412 chip, instead of Nvidia’s Tegra 3. Samsung has decided to go with the Exynos because it is a 32nm chip with 50% greater graphics performance and 30% less power consumption then its older sibling, the Exynos 4410 which featured in the Samsung Galaxy S2.

Galaxy S III will also carry a graphics chip which would be 500 times faster than the Mali-400 MP chip found on the Galaxy S II. Apart from this the Galaxy S III is rumoured to have 2 GB RAM. It is going to run on the Android 4.0 ICS unless Google rolls out a newer 4.1 or 4.2 update.

The Screen of the Galaxy S III will be a heartthrob. This time it will be 4.6 inch, 720 x 1280 pixels HD FOLED(Flexible Organic Light Emitting Diode) curved screen. The 12MP camera of the phone will also be a novelty in itself. The camera is rumoured to have a 1/2.3-inch sensor which will allow the phone to take amazing pictures without even using the flash.

Samsung Galaxy S III will not be launched before the third quarter of 2012 because the Galaxy S II and Galaxy Nexus are selling like crazy as of now. So Samsung will launch it only after other companies release their products like the much awaited iPhone 5 and the HTC Edge.

3. HTC Edge

HTC Edge will be HTC’s first phone with a quad-core processor and also might the first quad core phone to launch in the market. It will be having a 1.5GHz Nvidia’s Tegra 3 processor with 1GB of RAM, 32GB of internal memory and will be running Android 4.0 ICS with the HTC Sense UI. It will have a 4.7 inch screen with a resolution of 720 x 1280 pixels.

Some exciting features include HSDPA speeds of up to 21MBps and Bluetooth 4.0. It will have an 8MP camera with support of 1080p HD video recording. An LTE enabled version of this phone might also be launched in 2012. Along with this phone, HTC might also bring in a new range of HTC specific services.

4. Nokia Lumia 900

2012 will not only be the year of launch of quad-core Androids only, some Windows Phone  smart phones might also turn up the heat. One such anticipated launch will be of Nokia’s latest Lumia series phone,the Lumia 900. The Nokia Lumia 900 will run Windows Phone 8 Apollo OS, on a Snapdragon chipset, featuring a single-core 1.4GHz CPU and 1GB of RAM.

It will have a large 4.3-inch AMOLED screen with ClearBack technology. It will also feature an 8MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics. This phone will also feature NFC, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0  and will come in two models with a choice of internal memory of 16GB or 32GB.

5. HTC Elite/Congressional, 4G LTE Windows Phone

HTC has also got a few more phones lined up for the next year. These include the HTC Elite, a 4G LTE Windows Phone and  HTC Fireball. The HTC Elite, sporting Android ICS 4.0, will be launched in February 2012. Apart from this the phone will have a Quad-Core Processor and will also feature Beats Audio from the Dr. Dre’s Audio Company. HTC Elite will be sold under the name Congressional in the United States.

It will remain HTC’s flagship for the Android segment while the Windows Phone segment will get a new phone having 4G LTE capabilities. Nothing much is known about this Windows Phone, all we know is that it will share much of the specifications of HTC Titan, but with a superior processor. Apart from these phones HTC might also bring up a few other phone in the later half of 2012.

The phone is pretty much similar to the Motorola Droid Razr except that it has s physical QWERTY keyboard and a slightly smaller screen. The phone has a 4” qHD Gorilla Glass display and is powered by 1.2GHz dual-core Cortex A9 CPU with a PowerVR SGX540 GPU, on the TI OMAP 4430 chipset. It has one GB of RAM and 16GB of internal Memory.

The phone also sports a 8MP camera with 1080p HD video recording capability and a front facing HD camera. 4G LTE connectivity is also offered.

Click on the image to see the full specification sheet(Courtesy: Droid-Life)

The best thing about the phone is still its physical QWERTY keyboard. This time it has a full QWERTY five line edge lit keyboard which will provide PC-like experience while typing. One more possibility is that the phone might be compatible with Motorola’s Lapdock 100, Lapdock 500 pro and might get a few other dedicated accessories too.

Droid 4 Release Date

The phone is expected to launch on December 8 in the United States and will be available with Verizon on contract. Let’s see how much time it takes to hit the international shores. Who knows there might be another global version of this phone that might hit the international markets.

By the way, the rumor mill is buzzing that the Galaxy Nexus is also slated to launch on the same date as Droid 4′s. We suspect that Galaxy Nexus might launch in U.S. in the same week when Droid 4 may launch and that will ensure that it will be all about Android superphones this Christmas.

This exact open-source approach is what gained a huge momentum for it, and today, Android OS is one of the topmost OS powering devices. Currently, Google Android’s version is Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) for phones and Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) for the tablets.

Android 3.0 developers have not yet released the source code for this OS to be delivered on phones, citing that it still needs more work before it can be made available to the masses.

Currently, Android 3.0 phones exist only in conceptual forms, garnering huge public interest. Currently, Honeycomb is present only for tablet and other “big-screen” devices. But the design details and concept phones released, especially by joyStudios have emphasized the fact that Android 3.0 phones might not be far away in the future.

HTC Honey is an Android 3.0 phone (concept) released by joyStudios, and shows excellent features, including Bluetooth 3.0 and 4G. The device also hosts an 8 megapixel camera which can capture full 1080p videos, Wi-Fi, GPS and a 3.7 inch AMOLED display. Available just as a concept, this Android 3.0 phone just might see the light into this world.

Motorola Bee also developed by the same developers, this is another concept Android 3.0 phone. In fact, it is amongst the very first few. This device offers 3G+ data connectivity, and is fully compatible with a HD multimedia dock. The phone also offers a 4.3 inch Super AMOLED screen, an 8 megapixel camera capable of full HD capture, and even a 5.0 megapixel camera in the front for video-calls; an Android 3.0 phone worth looking forward to.

The Sony Ericsson XETA is a state-of-the-art, Android 3.0 phone developed by Frank Tobias, and offers smooth Honeycomb interface and usage. Very less has been revealed about this phone, but what we know is that the phone offers an 8.1 megapixel camera (full HD), a 4.2 inch touchscreen display, and the inside of the Android 3.0 phone being powered by a 2GHz dual core processor, supported by the revolutionary Bravia engine.

Although the above mentioned Android 3.0 phones are mere concepts, not available to the general public, but they very happily assure that the myth regarding Android 3.0 for phones not being a reality may just be at an end.

Some features worth looking forward to in Android 3.0 phones are:

• It has been a complaint by many Android 2.3 users that the general UI layout gets cluttered at times, offering little space for widgets and icons. Android 3.0 phones would be featuring a totally customizable UI.
• People will be in for a treat with the latest browser enhancements on offer. Google Chrome bookmark synchronization, private browsing, auto fill are just some new added functionalities worth looking forward to.
• New APIs are under development for both Bluetooth A2DP as well as HSP.
• The Android 3.0 phones would be offering support for both single as well as dual-core processors. This essentially means that all applications, either single-threaded or multi-threaded are in for some performance boost.
• Android 3.0 phones are to be designed on a new OpenGL hardware platform, offering better 2D graphics support.

Android 3.0 OS was designed for tablets, and Android 3.0 phones basically means shrinking the huge tablet screen onto a small phone screen. Maybe not all features would be available, or perhaps more than usual features would be made available. No one can predict with certainty. But we can safely say that Honeycomb is sure to be a sweet gift, pun intended.

The highly criticized ‘antenna-gate´ or ‘death-grip’ issue saw even the most dedicated Apple- fan boy say not-so-nice things about Apple. For the issue to be resolved, Apple announced that all future buyers of the iPhone 4 would be given free bumpers to solve the fluctuating signal issue.

However this was only a temporary fix, as the issue is with the phone’s hardware. And amidst all this hue and cry, the rumors regarding Apple iPhone 5 surfaced. We take a look at the specifications and features, a true iPhone 4 vs. iPhone 5 showdown.

But before going further that the comparisons we make below regarding the iPhone 5 are mere rumors and expected features, and nothing official has yet been announced.

1. Next-Gen calling: The iPhone 4 supports data transfer at 3G data network support, whereas the iPhone 5 is rumored to be able to take it up to 4G.
2. A new design and more memory(finally)?: iPhone 5 is said to be thinner than the iPhone 4, even including the curved glass display like that on the iPod. The iPhone 5 will also feature memory support of upto 64GB, opposed to a maximum of 32GB on the iPhone 4.
3. Facetime calling: Facetime, though very well received, yet the hassle of it working over only an active Wi-Fi hotspot is a problem. iPhone 5 is rumored to be featuring Facetime support over cellular services.
4. Better battery-life: The iPhone 4 had 40% more battery life than the iPhone 3GS. If the trend continues, then we could expect more battery.
5. 3D on the phone: Better 3D capability, the iPhone 5 would hopefully be having PowerVR SGX543MP (announced last year) as that on the iPad2 compared to PoweVRSGX535 chip on the iPhone 4.
6. Dual Power: every new smartphone being launched is offering a dual-core processor. Apple acquired PA Semiconductors last year, and a very possibly hint at a new dual-core architecture compared to the A4 single core architecture on the iPhone 4.
7. Say cheese: Sony is said to be manufacturing a 8-megapixel for the 5th generation of the iPhone, while the iPhone 4 has a 5-megapixel camera with LED flash.
8. HD support: the iPhone 4 supports true 720p HD recording. The iPhone 5 is rumored to be having full 1080p support, with a micro-HDMI output on the side.
9. NFC enabled: Rumor has it that the next-gen iPhone 5 will act as a Near Field Communications device, and thus may be acting as your payment device, or a car key.
10. Cloud support: Apple announced iCloud recently. Although the iPhone 4 is set to support it, still, the iPhone 5 will obviously have a better synchronized functioning with it.
11. New iOS: the iPhone 4 had Apple iOS 4 on it, whereas the iPhone 5 is set to feature iOS 5, with a plethora of new features.
12. Price tags: In the end it will be the prices which will make the final call. iPhone 4 has an Indian selling price of Rs. 34,500 for its 16GB and Rs. 40,900 for its 32 GB variant. The iPhone 5 has yet not been quoted, but we expect a price of around Rs. 40,000-45,000 INR.

Whatever features iPhone 5 eventually comes packed with, there’s no denying that smartphones are going to be drive the exponential growth of technology sector during next couple of years and Apple iPhone 5, 6 or probably subsequent successors are certainly going to play a significant role in this growth.

While we’re discussing Vodafone iPhone 4s and upcoming iPhone 5 but if you’re still stuck up with old generation phones then it’s high time you recycle mobile phone that you carry along and grab one of the latest smartphones in the market.

Since the disruptive arrival of Android, there have been some drastic alterations in Mobile space composition. As of now, the state of Mobile OS is as follows:

• Albeit being persistently declining Mobile OS, Symbian is still the largest controller of the market. However, future of Symbian is pretty bleak.
• Apple’s iOS controls a large chunk of Mobile OS market share, holds a dominant position in smartphone business
• RIM(which makes BlackBerry mobile phones) still controls a big market(largely corporate) but is currently on a decline, finding it tough to contain loyal Blackberry users anymore.
• Android is the ace of current smartphone era. Showing the sharpest growth in all possible regards(sales, dev. support, hardware prevalence), Android is now being touted as the future of mobile OS and going by industry analysts, Android will outperform all other smartphone Operating Systems to become the most popular Mobile OS platform by 2015.
• ‘Windows Mobile’ is a buried OS. Microsoft long dumped their crappy mobile OS, in order to start from scratch and build a compelling experience for mobile users, competing head-on with leading smartphone OS platforms such as Android and iOS.

And the last point brings up the latest OS platform to enter the smartphone wars , Windows Phone 7, WP7 in short.

With Windows Phone 7, Microsoft is placing a risky bet but it’s also leaving no stone unturned in getting its smartphone OS noticed. With over $500Mn of advertising budget reserved for promoting WP7 platform during Christmas season, over 1100 platform evangelists working hard to convince large number of developers across the globe for building mobile apps for WP7 platform and over 10 WP7 smartphones, ready at the launch of Windows Phone 7 launch event, says enough about Microsoft’s aggressive intentions.

And after hearing plenty of stuff from tech fraternity and viewing several product demos of WP7 powered phones, I have a feeling that Windows Phone 7 platform will certainly be a disruptive Mobile OS for Microsoft, even if first day sales don’t appear too encouraging to most of us right now.

Here are those 7 major key points that makes Windows Phone 7, a healthy competitor to leading Mobile OS platforms.

Novel User Interface: The User Interface of WP7 OS is refreshing and unique. One can still  figure out similarities among Android and iOS but novelty factor in WP7 makes it stand extremely meticulous and distinct from everyone else. The best part here is that WP7 platform derives nothing from Windows Mobile, the rusting predecessor to WP7.

Non-fragmented OS approach: It’s always good to learn from other’s mistakes and that’s exactly what Microsoft has done. Google’s fragmented OS is annoying to many of its users but mobile carriers/hardware vendors, in an effort of keeping a distinct branding, coat officially released Android versions with their own custom skin. That hinders the OS updation process of Android smartphones as Google releases the update to mobile carriers but carriers take enormous time to update their custom skins for all their handsets. On the contrary, Microsoft has clearly defined various parameters for hardware compliances and strictly condones any changes/modification to its Mobile OS by carriers. That’s a big win for WP7 platform. Such a setting is also convenient from developer standpoint.

Xbox Live: That’s one big difference between WP7 and every other smartphone OS platform. Microsoft sells Xbox and there is no need to explain how popular the gaming console has become since its launch. With the launch of Kinect, Xbox is reinventing how games are played and the excitement for Xbox is only going to get better with time. With ‘Xbox Live’ seamlessly integrated in WP7 phones and simultaneous launch of some of the most desired gaming titles on WP7 phones, gaming freaks are sure to have a reason for buying WP7 phones.

Better Hardware: One thing that’s consistent with almost every WP7 powered smartphone during launch event of Windows Phone 7 is higher benchmark of hardware capability. Almost all smartphones have over 3.7 inches capacitive/AMOLED touchscreen, faster processor, higher RAM(over 512MB) among other things. As this is just the beginning, the first range of WP7 phones are obvious to define a minimum standard for future hardware for WP7 phones.

The best of both Worlds(iOS and Android): WP7 takes the best things out of iOS and Android platforms. WP7 gives plenty of options to consumers in terms of phone hardware(this advantage had been exclusive to Android this far). On the other side, WP7 prefers keeping itself on the driving seat by condoning any modifications to its Mobile OS by any third party(hardware vendors/mobile carriers), thereby maintaining consistency across all WP7 devices(advantage of iOS) and having the ability to push software updates to every phone without any hindrance/delay from hardware manufacturer/carrier.

Fast growing Apps Marketplace: Developers are excited about WP7 platform, mainly because the platform is really well built. And when a Mobile OS platform is one of  Microsoft’s riskiest bet in the future of computing(mobile), the developers community(where Microsoft is already popular) is bound to fall for it. Many big names on Internet have already announced their(eBay, Twitter…) official apps for WP7. platform. Others will soon do the needful.

Immense Marketing: You talk about $500Mn of marketing budget for WP7 phones, massive promotional event at Times square, 1100 MS evangelists around the globe spreading more awareness/buzz about their new platform or its generous but strategic giveaway of WP7 devices to every one of their 89000 employees, only Microsoft can really afford to spend this much on bringing their Mobile OS into everyone’s notice.

From consumer’s perspective, the more the competition, the better the outcome…So, let’s hope WP7 pushes the innovation forward and makes Google, Apple, RIM, Nokia….work even harder to sell mobile phones to consumers.

This ruling comes as a major setback to Apple, which strongly condemns Jailbreaking of its ‘closed’ products such as iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad. In an effort of keeping the overall environment in its firm control, Apple always desires to let users run pre-installed apps or approved apps downloaded/purchased from App Store. That’s one reason why Apple keeps plugging software exploits unearthed by hackers/jailbreakers and keeps releasing updated iOS versions with software fixes.

But now when ‘Jailbreaking’ has gone legal in U.S., Apple might not discourage ‘Jailbreaking’ the way it used to do it earlier.

This is how Apple will discourage ‘Jailbreaking’ from now on…

“Don’t Jailbreak your iOS device because….”

• It will severely ‘degrade’ your software experience
• It will make your device unstable/error prone
• It will hamper hardware reliability
• It will violate warranty of your iOS device

Still, i reckon, Apple need not worry about this epic judgement as Jailbreaking won’t really shoot up, even after becoming a legal activity in U.S.

Here’s why….

• ‘Jailbreaking’ isn’t a child’s play. It requires decent programming skills or at least deep understanding of digging the software roots.
• Jailbreaking puts the device at the risk of ‘bricking’(permanent damage), if anything goes wrong while rooting your device.
• ‘Jailbreaking’ doesn’t offer huge rewards to any iOS device owner. It just enables you to run unauthorized third party apps on your hardware. To most of the iOS loyalists, 225000 approved apps are more than enough.
• So far, only 10% of iOS devices are actually Jailbroken. That’s a pretty small minority which mostly comprises of hackers and geeks.
• Majority of Apple’s cult is absurdly religious, willing to follow every word that Steve Jobs preaches and in this case, Steve Jobs/Apple discourages Jailbreaking and hence there are least chances for the cult to disobey their ‘God’(Steve!)

Rather i see a reverse-psychology happening with Jailbreakers and hackers. It might happen that ‘Jailbreaking’ may go down by itself, post this judgement.

Here’s why…

Jailbreakers/Crackers are defined by doing stuff that’s illegal. Doing illegal stuff actually brings motivation to Crackers as there’s no monetary incentive of doing stuff like that. Now that Jailbreaking is legal, hackers/jailbreakers may rather turn focus on doing other illegal stuff, not ‘legal’ Jailbreaking, which may appear rather ‘boring’ to them.

Hence Apple need not worry about this ruling. It just needs to keep releasing iOS updates with patches to latest exploits, something that Apple has been doing for years now.