Windows Phone 7 launches in the US

After launching earlier in Europe, Microsoft is bringing it's Windows Phone 7 goodness to the good ole US of A. At the moment, you can get only get a Windows Phone 7 device on T-Mobile and AT&T, but we're sure we'll see more carriers getting on board soon. Sure there's no multitasking or copy and paste at the moment on these phones, but that's the kind of stuff you have to put up with if you're an early adopter.

[Microsoft]

Rumor: Two Window 7 phones headed to T-Mobile

TMO news has gotten ahold of an internal accessory list document, and it's got some pretty interesting tidbits about quite a few phones. Besides an updated Blackberry and some Dell phones, two standouts are the HD7 and the LG Optimus T, which are both Windows Phone 7 devices. No word on release date or pricing, but it looks like they'll be out in time for the holidays. Looks to be a pretty exciting holiday for our friends from Germany.

[TMO News]

Microsoft shows first Windows Phone 7 Teaser

So it begins. At an event in London, Microsoft showed this teaser for Windows Phone 7, claiming that "the revolution is coming." Don't read too much into the phone that was shown, it looks like an unbranded generic phone, Microsoft is clearly focusing on the OS here. Check out the full video below.

[Engadget]

Windows Phone 7 browser speedtest

The fine gentlemen over at pocketnow have posted a video of the latest build of Windows Phone 7 pitted against the iPhone and Android browsers. While Windows Phone 7 came in last most of the time, it was still close, and it should be noted that Windows Phone 7 wasn't running on finalized hardware. It does, however, look a lot faster than the last time we saw a comparison like this. Check out the video below.

Windows phone 7 vs. iPhone browser speed test

Windows Phone 7 is in the works, and based on what we've seen so far, it's taking a slightly different approach to the smartphone OS than the other major players have been taking. One area where they've done this is in their browser. Most modern smartphone browsers are WebKit based, but Microsoft has chosen to use a version of Internet Explorer for their phones. Hearing that will make some people happy, but also annoy a lot of people, but we haven't really seen it in action yet against any competition. Well Redmond Pie just posted a video pitting the Windows Phone 7 browser against Safari on an iPhone 3GS running iOS 4. Judging by the video, the Windows Phone 7 browser renders pretty good, but is a little on the slow side.



It should be noted that the Windows Phone 7 browser is running on pre release hardware, and the phones are on different 3G networks, however, they are both on 3G, and on the first couple of pages tested the Windows Phone 7 looked painfully slow. But hey, Microsoft does have some time before launch to pep things up a bit. And if they want their new OS to compete, they're gonna need to.

[Redmond Pie]

Windows Phone 7 getting cloud-based backup similar to MobileMe

Hot on the heels of Blackberry announcing a cloud-based backup solution, Microsoft announced with Windows Phone 7 they will have a similar service that will back up contacts, calendars, OneNote files, and photos, which will all be available to view at the Windows Phone Live companion site, much like the now deceased Kin. In addition, users will have 25GB of SkyDrive storage space, and access to a new Find My Phone service, that will find, lock, or remote wipe the phone, just like what Apple currently offers with MobileMe. The best part of the announcement is that everything is completely free with the purchase of a Windows 7 phone. Let the Apple making MobileMe free rumors commence.

[Windows Phone Blog]