Launched last month in Paris, the Huawei P30 Pro represents in many ways the pinnacle of smartphone imaging. And appropriately so, since one of the original Nokia PureView leads, Eero Salmelin, has been head of imaging at Huawei for long enough that he's now into his second generation of imaging phones there. Which is why I wanted to draw an affectionate and illustrative comparison between his (and Juha Alakarhu's) masterwork from 2013, the Lumia 1020, my (and many others') favourite smartphone of all time, arguably.
Obviously, the Lumia 950 (and 950 XL) have replaceable batteries and these are trivial to physically replace (if not finding a 100% genuine source), but what about other components? It turns out that almost everything is very easily accessible, whether you're replacing an individual parts or merging two 'donor' broken 950s to make one working unit. In fact, this latter approach often works out simpler and cheaper, with Lumia 950s available on the likes of eBay at very low cost.
In this latest 'Anatomy' imaging feature, I look at ways to 'think differently', in terms of angles, framing and positioning, to capture memories and create interest. My subject this time? A steam train heading off to the sea-side, though I was hampered by overcast conditions - not that this put me off!
With some social applications, comms apps and Microsoft services being phased out in 2019 and beyond, I thought a ready reference table of where Windows 10 Mobile stands would be useful. And I'll try to revisit this every few months to update each section as needed. In summary, there's likely to be a little disruption to 'normal' activities this year and a few more caveats in 2020, when Windows 10 Mobile will be out of official support. Anyway, see below for details!
With Facebook apparently stopping their first party (though OSmeta-based and very bloated) applications for Windows 10 Mobile working after April 2019, some people might be worried that their Facebook 'fix' won't be available on the platform. Happily, anyone with any sense will have uninstalled the first party app long ago anyway - see the options below. This also applies to Facebook's (also bloated) eponymous Messenger and Instagram applications (for the latter, there's Winsta).
With all this talk of imaging, let's switch to a parallel track and something which I've never tested in depth here on AAWP: headphone audio, across a range of smartphones from all OS. Listening to music is something we all love to do and, while I've also been having some Bluetooth adventures (here, here, here and here), you can't beat the simplicity of just plugging in headphones. Nothing to recharge, no latency, whatever the application or use case - and, usually, the best audio quality too. But that's what I'm here to test!
At the risk of AAWP turning into 'All About Imaging', I conclude my Nokia 9 coverage here with some thoughts on RAW capture and a response to various comments on last week's mega-comparison. In short, RAW capture and processing is not the be all and end all, and the results may even be worse, despite all the time and hard work. Using extreme examples from the Lumia 950 XL as well, I show what's involved and the (usually) ultimate futility. In my humble opinion!
I've simplified the title slightly, of course. The Lumia 950 wasn't a 'Nokia' product, but a Microsoft branded one by the ex-Nokia engineers. Still... the last one, the Nokia 9, is named accurately, though it's the 'new' Nokia under HMD's management. Everything's 'bought in', with the imaging here licensed from Light, though HMD is keen to apply the old 'PureView' brand. Ensuring that yours truly resurrects the PureView classics of old to carry out a detailed camera (stills, video may come after) comparison. Let the PureView battle commence!
Twitter is a fascinating IT case study - started as a fully open social network focussed on very short status updates, it was destined to be 'the dial tone of the Internet', the way every person can contact and follow every other, with minimum bandwidth. But its openness meant that most activity was accomplished by third party clients and at some point Twitter woke up and wondered how it was going to make money, in order to survive. At which point its APIs started to contract - in 2019, the vast majority of Twitter access is via first party clients and the Web, meaning that it's in control of ads and sponsored posts and the like. But what of accessing Twitter from a Windows 10 Mobile phone after the API clampdown last summer?
For the last six months (at least) the Wileyfox Pro (WFP, for short!) has been the only Windows 10 Mobile smartphone that's still available to buy 'new' in an official capacity. It's still available today, in March 2019, amazingly, with a dozen or so kept in stock at any given time by Wileyfox, it seems. I was impressed by quite a few aspects of the WFP when I reviewed it, despite the budget specs - but the big question is how well does it perform with a year of Windows 10 Mobile branch and Microsoft core UWP application updates under its belt? I investigate...
