S60 vs. Windows Mobile

When doing this comparison, you need to think about what you are comparing. Seeing as its S60 in question, you have to really compare it to WM5 for smartphone (pocket pc is completely different). Most people know this, but does need to be mentioned.

From experience, I'll compare my SPV C600 vs N80 - the N80 simply wipes the floor with it from an operating system perspective. Its quicker, easier to use and looks a lot better. I'd say that WM5sp is better for games, but thats about it.

You couldn't, for example, compare an N80 to an SPV M3100 (which I'm about to get) - the operating system is WM5 for Pocket PC, which is far more powerful than S60. Granted, the N80 will do most of what the M3100 does, but being a pocket pc it gives you so much more.

Bottom line - the better operating system will depend on what you use your device for.
 
For my purposes and usage habits, WM 5 on the 8125 worked just fine. Yes, Outlook loaded slow, but that was about it. I saved files to the mini sd card, and used a memory manager to delete temporary files which kept my device running smoothly and with no stumbles or crashes.

I like the e62 also, but it is certainly not a speed demon, either.
 
I don't have an S60 series phone, but I do make my living programming, among other things, Windows Mobile and CE. Quite frankly they suck. Stability isn't there, elegance isn't there, clunkiness is.

So which is right for you depends on what you really want. Do you want a miniature computer, complete with blue-screen-of-death equivalent but also with the normal apps? Or do you want a PDA that can stretch to the app stuff? Or do you want a phone that can stretch to the PDA and app viewing stuff?

The Windows phones are getting better, but really they're best viewed as tiny PCs with a bit less power. The Nokias are phones with a lot more power than phones. For me, a phone should first be a phone... but if this is primarily a work-extension device, and it sounds like it might be, the Windows system might be the better choice.
 
yea, emotional fits really increase credibility, I'd think twice before asking any1 "sensible" enough to have an iPOD for any technical advice. course if you do have an iPOD too, then you might as well wait for the iPhone, won't have any registries, installations, files, settings or even buttons to worry about, the only button on the entire phone called iTalk will do.
 
I've had both S60 and Pocket PC 2003. S60 for Nokia 6620 and WM2003 on HX4700 (VGA scr, 624Mhz CPU) I find Symbian pales in comparison to WM, it's basic system functions are lacking. Simple things like file manager in weak, copy and paste is almost non existent. Can't manually hack anything in S60, no registry for modifying things beyond default design in S60, while WM obviously does. Unfortunately ppl count this as a weak point in WM, they claim that one MUST edit the registry to use WM properly. Well I have many friends with the popular JAM and Universal phones, and they seem to receive and make calls to me and their contacts without registry edits just fine. But if they felt the personal WANT to further customize things, they have that option. This option (as opposed to a LACK of) is (for some reason) perceived to be a disadvantage to WM where as the LACK of such option in S60 isn't..... Sounds just like the case of ppl complaining about the supermarket containing too many types of cerials for them to choose from in time for work to me.

As for crashes, to be statistically correct one must take into account the many MORE 3rd party types of applications one can and does install in to WM compared to S60. As one installs more in to WM, WM gets used more often and chances of crashes increase proportionately to amount of use. On the S60 I only had a handful of useless games and document readers, so I hardly use resulting in less chance of crashes. This overall creates an illusion that WM crashes more often, only cuz one uses it more often, increasing the chance of encountering a crash. I've had both devices and if I were to compare number of crashes between both systems (fair statistically ) I'd have to say they are equal.

Programs I have on my HX4700 (not a phone but other phone devices use WM2003 as well) The HTC Universal has VGA screen (even Nokia N95 is 1/4 of this resolution) and WM5

Internet:
IMPlus (Yahoo, MSN, Google Chat, AOL, Jabber)
MSN Messenger
Netfront (full desktop internet broswer, with Java and flash)
Opera Browser (full not mini)
Ping utility
Pocket IRC (IrC)
Terminal Services (GUI for remote control my PC from internet)
WinMobile Download manager
WinMobile Torrent manager (BitTorrent on PDA BABY !!!!)

Entertainment:
Resco Photo Viewer
Conduits Pocket Player
Core Media Player TCMP (divx, xvid, WMV @ DVD resolution)

PIM:
eWallet
Pocket Informant (powerful as MS Outlook)

Reference:
Adobe Reader PDF
MS PowerPoint Reader
Lextionary (open source dictionary )
Pocket Street (street maps, GPS tracking)
Text Speech Pro (reads everything in text aloud)
xConverter (converts units)

Office:
HiCalc (full 3D graphing and scientific calculator)
TimeKeeper (stop watch)
TextMaker (word processor with 90% of the features in MS Word)
Office Excel
Bluetooth Printer
Notepad

Utilities:
....u dont wana know that amount of tweaking u CAN (not HAVE to) do here

Games:

Ancient Evil (Diablo)
EverQuest
Metalion 2
Skyforce
Online Poker
about 10 more.....

If Symbian can do all of this, and it's software is as powerful, you bet ppl like iPOD users would be complaining about it just as much.

As for my Nokia 6620 before I dropped it on the train last month....

from what I can remember there was:
Answering machine
units convertor
file manager (I had to manually buy this one in order to see all the partitions containing all the files inside the phone) (a decent file manager is included in WM)
Notepad
Pocket Counter
nothing much else

I really expected a lot more from the Nokia 6620 as a smart phone (granted it's better than dumb phones) but the purpose of smart phones is customizability, and Symbian as an OS lacks the degree of fexibility of that of WM by far(surprisingly some perceive this as an advantage (which contradicts the point of getting a "smart" phone in the first place as dumb phones are even more straight forward and crash proof)). Never the less, S60 is still very much a PHONE navigation system, not much more.
 
There's a whole stew of devices that run the full WM, O2 atoms, HTC Jam, K-Jam, TyTN. At the prices ppl already pay, >$600 I'm not sure why ppl choose anything less. basically if it has a touch screen it's full WM.
 
They probably didn't mention it because they don't realise that there are two versions of WM. The trouble is, the PocketPC devices tend to be large, PDA style devices that just so happen to have phone functionality. As S60 is a mobile phone OS, it's only right to compare it with WM mobile phones such as the QTek 8500, HTP Mteor etc. These deivces all run WM Smartphone. Should Nokia make a PDA device with S60, only then is it right to compare it with WM PocketPC.



All of these devices you mention are large PDA devices, not mobile phones. Please compare S60 with phones such as these...

http://www.gsmarena.com/o2_xda_orion-1373.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_mteor-1658.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/qtek_8500-1483.php

ie, a normal sized mobile phone.
 
unless my eyes deceive me, many WM devices are small as well. O2s, Jams and K-Jams, even the latest TyTN is a size quite comparable to E61, if not smaller (E61 is not a small phone by any stretch)
 
the thread starter listed E61 as a possible device, this device is not small, therefore implies everything atleast up to that size is permissible. the devices you've kindly listed are smaller, but such size may not be necessarily to qualify in the field of comparison .
 
my Samsung SGH-D900 is about a normal sized phone, albeit a lil smaller but not by much in todays standards. If you look at phones on a display at your nearest dealer you'll see quite clearly, if they carry the E61, that it is clearly a large(larger than "normal") size phone compared to the majority.
 
the only way to clearly disqualify these phones is if you were to limit the size to something smaller than E61, then THAT would take PPC Phones out of the picture. But thats up to the thread starter to change the comparison bases.
 
Certainly anyone who is prepared to get the E61 should consider a PocketPC phone, but you should also note that the TyTn is still considerably larger than the E61 (remember the E61 has a thickness of only 14mm). Most S60 devices are considerably smaller than the E61 though, as the E61 is an unusually big phone with S60 OS. N73 is more the standard size for S60, so you then have to compare WM devices that fit into the same physical envelope. Basically the gist is this... if you want a more powerful device with PocketPC, you have to sacrifice phone size, and put up with a much larger device. Most people are not willing to do this. For the size of the phone you can get (look at how tiny the E50 is), S60 is VERY powerful. As soon as we start getting phones with PocketPC on that are the same size as the E50, I would get one. There's no way you'd get PocketPC phone the same size as E50 though.
 
Then perhaps the question in comparison should be Power VS Size. We can basically define about 3 sizes in the phone market. 1(dumb phone) 2 (S60/WM-S) 3(WM-F) Tho to be honest the extra power you get from moving up in size from a dumb phone (ie: D900) to a general S60 device (size 1 to 2) is marginally limited. Moving from 2 -3 is quite substantial. Taking into account the extra cost of an equalivant Symbian OS embedded device (for example, N73 = $500 / D900 = $400) the extra cost for marginal increase of power in addition to increase in size makes choosing a device from "size 2" category rather questionable. Thus the key question for one buying a phone should perhaps be less OS vs OS but rather more about size vs power.
 
I'd have to disagree. The step from 1 - 2 is massive, it couldn't be clearer. It's simple really, you start at the bottom, and work your way up. First look at stage 1 devices (dumbphones). If they do all you need, get one of them. If they don't, move up to stage 2, smartphones. If you find that a smartphone does everything you need, get one of them. If not, move onto step 3, PDAs. You'll probably find that most people find what they want in a phone from either stage 1 or 2, and that very few have to go as far as stage 3 to get what they need/want.
 
Actually a S60 is more along the lines of a direct competitor of MS-Smartphone. Not MS-PPC. Sure the S60 shell is stepping (rather leaping) ahead as such solutions as Moto Q or a HTC S620 (Dash) or a P990. But to compare it to a the TyTN? Come on. There are things the HTC and others like it (read: functionality, speed, etc) can do that completely trample any current S60 offering except perhaps for Camera quality. I mean have you seen what the TyTN has got running under the hood? It is not about just size. That is just silly.
 
most of those apps you mentioned are available on the S60... you just have to search more... including terminal services, and torrent, MS Office compatible app had always been there for the S60, as far as i can remember... S60 even have an internet server now...

as for games, there are also a lot, even emmulators for old game consoles...

still, basically S60 is priced half of the cost of the WM PDA and basically cost as much as the WM smartphones....

the only thing S60 dont have much is that we do not have to spent soo many hours (err, days) tweaking it to make our BT voice dial works, tweaking it so dont it doesnt have to have a mind of its own, i mean random reboots... what else, oh i know that some of the WM smartphones dont have a dedicated reset button now, so they have improved, but with S60 we never had, it... in fact i have not rebooted my E61 for at least 5 months now, and it is my work phone, and yes i can make calls, every time, i dont have to coax it...

there was a time when the PDA2K was the greatest among the WM PDA and i almost bought it the 1st week it came out... it was like buying the Mercedes-Benz S600 of the PDA world... imagine my disgust when, almost all the WM PDA forums i went through was saying you have to goto the registry and do this and do that, so that it will run smoothly!!! can you imagine, buying a an M-B and as soon as you got it, you have not even driven 5miles and they will ask you to take it to the shop coz we need to tweak it so that you can drive it smoothly and fast!!!

after that i never looked again at WM, perhaps i should look at it again to be fair, but apart from the TyTN and the K-JAM, there is nothing i can consider very interesting...

i would like to give WM5 a try, but with the E90 coming, it will be very hard to divert my gadget savings to a WM device, perhaps not untill they have removed the dedicated reset button, have great cam, a full working BT, and i can use it out of the box...

hacking is great dont get me wrong, customizability is even better, but it should not get in the way of out right useability... S60 is very much customizable, and hackable as well, WM PDA are more hackable, yes! but too much hacking eats away too much time, geeks do have a social life too....
 
I agree with everything you said. And yet I still dislike Windows Mobile and WinCE on phones, based on a lot of experience using and developing for them. It really does depend on whether he wants a portable computer, in which case things like a file manager matter, or a phone that can stretch a bit, in which case phone-elegance matters more.
 
Here if you want to compare a E61 to a MS-PPC phone then here would be a more apples to apples comparison: http://msmobiles.com/news.php/5741.html
 
Back
Top