Sprint's HTC Arrive smartphone with Windows Phone 7 will arrive with its cut-and-paste update installed.
Microsoft's
first major Windows Phone 7 update will arrive preinstalled on the HTC Arrive
from Sprint, according to a Phone Scoop report. The "NoDo" update includes
cut-and-paste functionality, along with faster application loading.
According to that report,
the HTC Arrive ships March 20. That would dovetail neatly with Microsoft's
current predictions that the update will push into the Windows Phone 7
ecosystem in the second half of March.
Sprint has
confirmed with eWEEK that the HTC Arrive will feature cut-and-paste, speedier
applications and games, and improved Marketplace search. "We've
streamlined Marketplace search to make it easier to find specific apps, games
or music," read an official document forwarded by a Sprint spokesperson.
"Press the Search button in the apps or games section of Marketplace, and
you'll see only apps or games in the results. Press Search in the music section
of Marketplace to search just the music catalog."
The launch of
the HTC Arrive is a particularly auspicious one for Microsoft and its
smartphone plans, as it is the first Windows Phone 7 device to appear on a CDMA
(Code Division Multiple Access) carrier. Previously, Windows Phone 7
smartphones had appeared only on GSM-based networks such as AT&T and
T-Mobile.
As with
Windows Phone 7 devices on other carriers, the HTC Arrive follows Microsoft's
stringently enforced minimum hardware requirements, including a 5-megapixel
camera and 1GHz Snapdragon processor. It features a 3.6-inch capacitive
touch-screen display (with 800 by 480 resolution), 16GB of internal memory, and
advertised talk time of up to 6 hours.
Sprint will
make the HTC Arrive available March 20, for $199 with a two-year contract.
Microsoft had
previously shifted the NoDo update from the first half of March to the latter
two weeks of the month. "After careful consultation with the team and our many
partners, we've decided to briefly hold the March update in order to ensure the
update process meets our standards and that of our customers," a Microsoft
spokesperson wrote in a March 10 e-mail to eWEEK. "As a result, we will plan to
begin delivering the update in the latter half of March."
In February,
Microsoft had introduced a Windows Phone 7 update designed to help with future
updates. Within a day of that update's rollout, however, a small number of
users began complaining it stalled their smartphones.
As those
complaints found their way onto online forums, Microsoft shifted into full
damage-control mode, claiming in a corporate blog posting that only 10 percent
of users' smartphones had stalled because of the new software. Nonetheless, the
company temporarily suspended the update for Samsung phones until it could work
out the underlying issues.
In the wake of
that snafu, Microsoft appeared more cautious about how it proceeded with the
subsequent software update. Despite the minor delay to cut-and-paste, though,
the company claims there will be no delay in later updates designed to bake
multitasking, Twitter, and a new HTML5-friendly version of Internet Explorer
Mobile onto the platform. Those updates are slated for the second half of the
year.
Editor's Note:
This article has been updated with a comment from Sprint.
Nicholas Kolakowski is a staff editor at eWEEK, covering Microsoft and other companies in the enterprise space, as well as evolving technology such as tablet PCs. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, Playboy, WebMD, AARP the Magazine, AutoWeek, Washington City Paper, Trader Monthly, and Private Air. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
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