In advance of Remembrance Sunday,  a nice little installation is in place at St Mary's, in Bishops Lydeard, in the UK, and I attempted to get a shot of this (unlit) piece against the traditionally floodlit church at night. I succeeded, but I did an iPhone too, as I'll explain!

My series 'Anatomy of a Lumia photo' (here's #1) has proved popular, even though I cheated with the HP Elite x3 instead for #2. #3 had a lovely clock, #4 was all about framing, in #5, I got down and dirty with nature, in #6 I had a rosy dilemma to solve, and in #7 I took a satisfying low light snap in appalling weather. In #8, I got extremely close to an impressive moth, in #9 Andrew Elliott was in Budapest at night, in #10, I was shooting in early morning sun, in #11, I shot 'wide', with a little help from Panorama mode, in #12 I kept repositioning and zooming until I got a water fountain just right and in #13, Jeff Appleton got a good look at The Northern Lights. Then, rounding off the series for its previous run (in 2017) was #14, looking at a glowing tower. Resuming in 2019, here's #15, looking at framing a waterfall and pond, and #16, steaming to the seaside with angles and perspectives.

For 'Remembrance', the challenge was to get the soldier silhouette, cross, and poppies, but to get them at night, both for atmosphere and to get the incredible floodlit church as backdrop.

As you might expect in late 2019, I'm experimenting with other camera phones, in this case, the latest iPhone 11 Pro, so my first attempt was with this:

The attraction here was the three second multi-exposure HDR Night mode of the iPhone, and the colours are rich and the church incredibly crisp in the background. But I'd framed it wrong, the soldier isn't visible in the darkness to the left and it's clear he needs to be silhouetted against the church itself. 

So I moved left a couple of metres and tried again:

We're getting there, but there's not enough light in the foreground. Heck, there isn't really any light, to my eyes, though the iPhone's 3s exposure manages to get some of the red of the poppies.

What about if I used the iPhone's LED flash? No dice. Using this disables the Night mode, understandably. Terrible results which I won't bore you with here.

Let's try the Lumia 950 XL. It has a Dynamic Flash feature, whereby you can change the mix of natural and flash-illuminated light after the fact:

This shot is about as good as I could get the balance between lighting the poppies and gathering light from the background. It's a functional shot but nowhere near as striking as I'd like.

So I was stuck. 

Or was I? How about if I took the photo with the iPhone 11 Pro, as above, in its multi-exposure 3s Night mode, but used the 950 XL's bright triple LED flash to illuminate the foreground? So, with the latter in 'flashlight' mode and pointed towards the cross, I knelt down and tried one last time:

I was pretty pleased with the result and have shared it on social media and with friends. It's a little bit of a cheat, but then isn't taking good photos often a case of thinking laterally?(!)

PS. Could the photo have been improved further? In retrospect, I think I'd have framed it 10 degrees to the right, to position the soldier and church tower on the rule of thirds line, to the left, while also getting all the poppies in. Oh well.

Whether you're wiping a Lumia to give it to someone else, or to sell it, or you're just being super-cautious about which devices have your data on, there will be occasions when a phone needs a full factory reset. Yes, there's a finnicky button sequence to do this on a Windows 10 Mobile phone, but don't worry, there's also an official way, through Settings. Here's a walk-through...

Now, if - as is likely as an AAWP reader - you already know all this then just move on. But I thought the full reset steps would be useful to others, if only for people looking this operation up on Google!

Firstly, if you're planning on setting up a replacement phone afterwards (whether Windows or Android/iOS) then it's worth scanning through the applications list and making a note of things you'll want to install on that; (right) Plus, if you are indeed switching to another Windows phone then head into Settings and look for 'Update & Security' and then into 'Backup', as shown above, right.

Go into Backup, and then into Backup Options, where you can check your last automatic backup and also kick off a new one. Bear in mind that this can take a while, so leave it going while you do something else (and I'd suggest plugging the phone in, just in case); (right) Now, on with the reset itself. Start in Settings (again) and then into 'System'.

Tap on 'About' and then swipe up (i.e. scroll down the pane) to reveal...

...a 'Reset your phone' button. Tap this and you'll hit the first warning dialog, shown above. If your phone was provided by your work then it's worth ticking the box, to make sure that the phone is fully reset, and not just 'ready for the next employee'!

There are more checks, of course! There's another button to tap and then (right) a final biometric or PIN/password step, depending on your phone, to prove the person doing the reset really is you and not some miscreant in your office! In this case, I'm resetting an Alcatel IDOL 4 Pro and so I can use my fingerprint on the back of the phone.

Following the sequence above, gears will 'spin' on the screen and five minutes later the phone will be asking which language you want to set it up in, etc. Job done!

Just a quick thing, but after four years of the Lumia 950's existence, I only just realised something - and I figured that if it were new to me then it might be to you too. You see, I knew that when shooting video on the 950, going to 4K (2160p) capture would scotch any digital/software stabilisation since there's just too much data for this 2015 phone's hardware to handle. But I always assumed that the (optional) digital stabilisation would work at 60fps - and it seems not. Maybe this too is too much for the Snapdragon 808/810's chipset to handle?

Oddly, the Lumia 950's Camera application lets you toggle 'digital video stabilisation' to 'auto'/on (see comments in Disqus below!), regardless of the resolution and frame rate chosen:

Surely it would have been better to automatically disable this option at non-supported resolutions and rates? And have an explanatory pop-up if you try and re-enable it again?

Here's a quick video demo, anyway, for your general edification(!) As usual, click through to see original 1080p quality, etc.

Did you know this already? Was it just me being a bit stupid?! Comments welcome below...

My gut feel on most phone cameras is still to shoot at 1080p/30fps anyway, since this gives the maximum chance for digital aids to leap in, while staying within the comfort zone for the vast majority of people likely to watch ths video. For example, I did the video below for iPhoneHacks the other day, comparing stabilisation and zoom for the new Pixel 4 XL and iPhone 11 Pro, both of which are probably on your 'to consider' list when replacing a 950:

The Lumia just about keeps up with both of these at 1080p/30, but once you go to 60fps, you lose the software stabilisation, while the Pixel 4 XL and iPhone 11 Pro have chipsets that are magnitudes more capable in terms of pixel processing and can stabilise digitally even at 4K.

Just a case of technology moving on, really. Just as the Lumia 950's camera was easily class leading in 2015, four years of chipset improvement plus the possibilities for exposure stacking and other computational techniques have means that it's now falling behind in both stills (though less so) and video capture.

Oh well. I hope the short video samples are interesting to you anyway!

PS. I did shoot the P4/iPhone test sequences above with the 950 too, but at 1080p/60fps, which is.... where I find out about the stabilisation limitation! Which means I've not got to go back and do more testing but staying at 30fps!

In my video stabilisation feature here, I was asked in the comments to do a test of audio capture in video mode - i.e. how good are modern microphones in smartphones? The short answer is: very good. Gone are the bad old days of Nokia being the only manufacturer that cared enough about audio to put decent high amplitude microphones in its smartphones. See below for video and audio proof.

As I've said before, two years ago, whether you're videoing some live music in front of you or just shooting video at a party, the louder, clearer and higher quality the better - audio is often more important than picture quality, I contend*. Here's a quick test of five contenders, back to back, play along at home and let your own ears decide!

Out and about with the new (and diminutive) iPhone 11 Pro (i.e. the smaller variant), I get the same feeling as when I used to carry the Lumia 1020 - a desire to take photos. The idea that every time I see something that I'd like to snap I know I'll be able to get the shot, quickly and comfortably. No precarious perching of a phablet-sized phone, just a pocket-sized smartphone with the best camera in the world doing what it was born to do. 2013 to 2019 should mark a lot of progress in image quality, so let's try and quantify that with some challenging 1020-esque test shots. I think you'll be surprised.

The 1020's camera was famous for two things back in the day - absolute purity, with OIS plus (roughly) seven to one PureView oversampling, ensuring zero artefacts in almost all light conditions. Plus truly lossless zoom to 2.5x. Yes, the Nokia 808 that preceded it had the same zoom feature, but with no stabilisation and an older sensor technology, so the 1020 was the champion here.

And it remained the champion at almost everything to do with imaging (shot to shot speed was its Achilles heel) until about 2015, when the newer Lumia 950 used some of the first multi-exposure technology alongside PureView oversampling to deliver higher resolution, higher dynamic range results, albeit with lower zoom capabilities.

But we're now talking a further four years on, so almost seven years since the 1020 was announced, an eternity in the world of mobile phone technology. And you won't be surprised to know that late 2019 phones are out gunning the 1020 in several ways. Now, I do have the Pixel 4 XL and Huawei P30 Pro here, but they're large phones and when using them I feel a lot less inclined to whip them out to take a scene or person or moment. It's hard to explain, but a compact-camera-sized phone is just more... pleasant to use. That's yet another reason why I loved the 1020 from 2013 to 2015 (and beyond), and it's one of the reasons why I love my iPhone 11 Pro today.

The other reason is sheer, unadulterated image quality, of course, which is why we're here, looking at my usual variety in test subjects under often challenging light conditions - let's pitch these two phone cameras, six and a half years apart, head to head.

Note that I already did a short initial comparison of photos from these two camera phones, back in September. But since then we've had the iPhone acquire its 'Deep Fusion' software update, giving better AI-inspired detail in low to medium light conditions, plus other improvements worth testing. And this time I'm also going to test the wide angle camera, to let the iPhone stretch its legs a little more, as it were.

In terms of tech specs:

The iPhone 11 Pro isn't unique in having three cameras in 2019, but it arguably uses them better than other high end phones - the three are locked in terms of white balance so that you can zoom in and out and there are no unpleasant surprises. In real terms the 11 Pro can go from 0.5x zoom (i.e. ultra-wide) to about 4x zoom (digital interpolated from the telephoto) with very useable results. And all with a 'z-depth' (thickness) of less than 1cm, which would have seemed science fiction even five years ago.

Note that I experimented a bit with 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios when shooting these tests. And there's nothing I can do about the differences in resolutions, so the 1:1 crops below will always show more of the frame from the Lumia 1020. But the subject area will be similar enough that you can still compare the two crops visually.

Let's use our Famed Interactive Comparator (FIC). All 1:1 crops are at 900x500 for comparison, though I've put up the originals on my own server, for you to download if you want to do your own analysis.

Test 1: Sunny landscape

Looking in particular at the detail in nature and the blue of the sky (the 1020 loved blue skies!), here's the overview shot from the 1020 (and note I was tilting both phones upwards to get the tree and sky, so don't worry about verticals!):

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images. Note that the iPhone produces modern HEIC files rather than JPG, but both Windows and Mac can now handle these formats, so you should be OK.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Slight differences in framing notwithstanding (caused mainly by the difference in resolutions of the two native photos), the iPhone image is immediately lighter and clearer - part image processing, part larger aperture, perhaps. The amount of actual detail in each photo is similar. I was impressed that the iPhone didn't use too much edge enhancement, this is an area where the likes of Huawei would go over the top and the foliage would be a sharpened mess. The Lumia is still arguably 'purer', but it's hard to tell for sure because of the resolution difference.

Test 2: High Dynamic Range

Trying to get an arty shot into brightly sunlit leaves on the ground, here's the overview shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images. Note again that the iPhone produces modern HEIC files rather than JPG, but both Windows and Mac can now handle these formats, so you should be OK.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Although the Lumia 1020 does a good job of bringing out some 'zing' from the brown of the leaves and the green of the grass, it also gets blown out sections where the sun is reflected, while the iPhone 11 Pro does a phenomenal job of using HDR techniques here to keep all the original leaf detail and colour, with no blow out at all. Very impressive, and another iPhone win. 

Is the iPhone cheating? Not at all, it's using modern technology to throw computing power at shooting and then combining many separate very short (under) exposures. (The Google Pixels, plus Samsung and Huawei and others, do a similar thing, though in general the bigger the company then the more software resources they can throw at refining the system.

Test 3: Macro time

An orange flower standing out in full bloom despite the near-zero temperatures here in the start of the UK winter. And a little bug to boot! Here's the overview shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The story's the same again - the multi-exposure HDR on the iPhone 11 Pro works wonders with the subject, producing high detail, better colour, and no blown out petal reflections. The Lumia 1020's Achilles Heel has always been a tendency to blow out highlights, whether it's petals here or (as often happened to me) sunlight glinting from metal on steam trains or cars.

Test 4: Sunny zoom

A real world subject, an example of where zoom comes in handy - and a rare example of a topless lady on AAWP(!) Here's the overview, unzoomed, shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original zoomed photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Now this is interesting - although the iPhone's HDR and telephoto lens clearly win out in terms of detail and managing the sunlit subject, the iPhone seems to have acquired the trademark 'Lumia yellow tint'! The statue was lit by a warm sun, yes, but it was clearly white/grey to my eyes, and not gold! Even with the white balance issues, I'd still give the iPhone the win though. And remember that the 1020 has no oversampling when at the limit of its PureView zoom, as here, so its results are compromised.

Test 5: Wide angle requirement

A real world example of where only wide angle will do, the Herald on display at my local aviation museum. Wide angle lenses are becoming more common on smartphones in 2019 and, while I'd hardly call them essential, they can occasionally - as here - get the shot where there's literally no other way.

You can grab the original (wide/normal) photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Here are scaled images for the web, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

I did mention above that the iPhone 11 Pro's three lenses were kept in lock step in terms of white balance, and it's quite impressive that one can just take the standard view and casually zoom out as much as needed, with novisible change in appearance or quality. In this case the iPhone's wide angle shot does lose some fidelity and detail, to the extent that centre detail is worse than the 1020's regular angle shot, but then this is to be expected and is one of the usual tradeoffs when choosing to shoot 'wide' in the first place.

In practice, when faced with such scenarios and a 'wide' shooting phone camera, I always capture a regular shot as well - belt and braces etc. But it's nice to have the 'fun' wide option at my disposal.

Test 6: Mid-light detail

Inside the Herald's cockpit, here's the overview shot from the 1020, all those dials and numbers are a superb test of captured detail:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Both photos are essentially perfect in this regard, with no untowards edge enhancement making a mess of the details, as so often happens, and with noiseless surfaces. Top notch, though obviously if I were awarding points then the iPhone would get extra because of the higher output resolution.

Test 7: Mid-light, zoomed

The same test scene in the cockpit, but this time zoomed in using telephoto or PureView zoom, as appropriate. You can grab the original zoomed photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Noise and impurities are creeping in now, of course, with the iPhone having to make do with a smaller aperture telephoto lens with smaller sensor and the Lumia having to abandon all PureView oversampling. But still, both photos are commendable, though the increased punch, clarity and exposure in the iPhone 11 Pro help it win - again.

Test 8: Mid-light, going wide

The same test scene in the cockpit, but this time seizing the opportunity to 'go wide' with the iPhone. You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are scaled shots, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

In addition to the extra cockpit detail around the frame in the iPhone wide angle shot, note also the extra HDR detail through the ancient windscreen. It's a win all round here.

Test 9: Mid-light texture

Playing into Apple's Deep Fusion claims, here's a cream and greeen cushion shot at 30cm in mid-level indoor lighting. Here's the overview shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Apple's claim is that Deep Fusion algorithms detect - in this case - a known texture and then optimise the pixel-level processing for it, resulting in greater detail. The stitching is indeed impressively captured, though the result is again too 'yellow' - the iPhone trying so hard to beat the Lumia 1020 that it's aping the Lumia yellow tint issues we've seen in the past! [joke]

The 1020, in contrast, nails the actual colour of the cushion, though in warm incandescent light I'll acknowledge that the true colour to my eyes is somewhere in between the two renditions. Still, I guess what this shows is how much simple things like colour can vary wildly from different phone cameras!

Test 10: Night time landscape

Dead of night, but the local golf club is floodlit, so making an excellent test subject, here's the overview shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The 1020 was one of the very first smartphones to have an OIS camera and it's as crisp as usual as a result, despite the 1/4s exposure, handheld. However, the Lumia's single shot approach and dated sensor tech also mean that it can't cope with bright highlights - reflections and light sources, whereas the iPhone 11 Pro does far, far better at managing light, with several shorter (under)exposures, all combined to produce the faux 1/8s shot you see here. And in this case the 'yellow' in the scene is real, generated by the warmth of the floodlights. 

Test 11: Darker still...

Dead of night again, down at the retail park, just the light from the store and a couple of weedy lamps. Here's the overview shot from the 1020:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Lumia 1020, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the Lumia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The iPhone 11 Pro definitely kicked in its Night mode here (ignore its EXIF data if you grab the original - the exposure time is faked by Apple!), capturing this scene over a couple of seconds, but the result is worth it. Look at the definition inside the shop (the soldier cardboard layouts on the wall), look at the number plate in deep shadow on the blue car, for example. Just very, very impressive.

By comparison, the Lumia looks like it's underperforming, though in reality if you put its result here against other phones from 2013/2014 it would have blown them away. We're in a new era, I tell you. One where camera phones have multiple stabilised lenses and take multiple compute-aligned exposures.

Verdict

I didn't bother with scoring this feature since it's all a bit artificial in terms of timescale - almost seven years between the two pieces of tech! What I wanted to show is that the latest iPhone 11 Pro can not only compete with the classic Lumia 1020 in the purity and zoom stakes, but can go significantly beyond it. All in a similar diminutive form factor that's very comfortable to hold and carry - and to break out in an instant to 'capture the moment'.

So - comments welcome. Any other 1020 super-fans who are convinced to start saving up for the £1000+ iPhone 11 Pro?

PS. I also have the equally small Google Pixel 4 here, though this is currently crippled by biometric issues and awaiting updates over the next few months. But its camera is also excellent and results aren't too different from those here. I'll return to the Pixel 4 if there's enough demand as we get closer to Christmas.

Most Lumias were produced under the Nokia brand, of course, with the final generation under 'Microsoft'. But I still find it interesting how the Nokia name has risen back up into the public consciousness under the seemingly capable hands of HMD Global, still based in Finland. I've covered the (disappointing) Nokia 9 PureView here before, but I now have in for review something that sits at the budget end of the spectrum (£230), yet is robust (plastic chassis, think Lumia 1520) and capable. And still has a 48MP camera. Here's my first look at the 'Nokia 7.2'.

Although there's a little life left in Windows 10 Mobile in terms of updates and support, new hardware is non-existent, plus repairs and spares for older hardware are heading the same way - so it makes sense for everyone to be aware of the best of the rest from other platforms.

As usual, I've shaded in green an obvious 'win' for either device. Any row where a winner would be totally subjective is left uncoloured. Or, where all devices are utterly excellent but in different ways, I've given each a 'green'(!)

[By the way, if you're viewing this feature on a phone then the table may well cause you problems. Try viewing in landscape mode? Failing that, go view this on a laptop or tablet!]

Verdict

Adding up the green 'wins' (for fun?!) gives a 12-8 win for the Nokia 7.2, which is pretty good at this diminutive price point. Shop around and you can get this for under £200 soon, I think. So, while the 7.2 might not be a viable Lumia replacement on the camera side, if you're looking for something with which to dip your toe in the world of Android then you can't go far wrong with this. 

As I say, given the 48MP main sensor and ZEISS optics, I'm inclined to do an imaging comparison too. What do you think? Your comments welcome.

Something a little different here, in that we're not talking about a 'flagship' device. The Nokia 7.2, despite being the first Nokia-branded phone to have a 40-plus Megapixel camera since the Lumia 1020, is unashamedly a budget smartphone, £230 RRP or less than £200 if you catch it on offer. It's pure Android, updated for three years, for an absolute song - see my head to head here. But what about that 48MP camera? Time to test it, I'll use the Lumia 950 XL, since that's close in form factor.

On paper, the Lumia, despite its 2015 heritage/age, should win out because of the presence of OIS, which will help a lot when light gets low. But I'm curious as to whether the 48MP sensor here will help with zoom. And I'm curious as to whether the ZEISS name on the Nokia 7.2's rear matters.

As before, I've deliberately thrown in some tricky shots in the scene selection, to test the USPs here, all photos were taken on full auto and handheld, as a regular user would do. No tripods or RAW editing sessions needed!

Notes:

• I've also shot at the default output resolutions on each, leaving headroom for some lossless 'PureView' zoom into the sensors and also getting the advantages of oversampling and noise reduction.
  

Let's pit the results against each other, using our Famed Interactive Comparator (FIC). All 1:1 crops are at 900x500 for comparison, though I've put up the originals on my own server, for you to download if you want to do your own analysis.

Test 1: Sunny detail

A graveyard, shot in a brief (hazy) sunny moment in the late UK Autumn. Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The main difference here is the artificial sharpening. I JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND why Nokia, with a giant 48MP sensor to play with and Quad Bayer to keep noise down, has to then apply amateur sharpening. As it is, the Lumia 950 is about as sharp as I'd like an image to get without it not being 'natural' anymore. The Nokia 7.2 follows the image processing example of the likes of Huawei and Samsung in dialling sharpness up to add more impact when viewed on a phone or PC screen perhaps, but the JPG image is so degraded that you can't really do much with it in terms of cropping or further twiddling.

Now, the good(ish) news is that the Nokia 7.2 can save RAW 48MP images if needed, and you can then edit these (50MB+) files on a desktop later, and this sidesteps the sharpening routines. But that's a subject for another day and way beyond what most people would attempt or appreciate.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Nokia 7.2: 8 pts

Test 2: Bright detail (zoomed)

With some - but not a lot - of sun, here's a clock tower with 2x zoom. The Lumia 950 XL will be using some PureView zoom into its 20MP sensor, and some digital zoom, while the Nokia 7.2 should in theory get lossless zoom from its 48MP sensor, but then there's the crude Quad Bayer colour system to work around. Here is the unzoomed scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

I have to say that I was disappointed by the Nokia 7.2's showing here. In fact, I still haven't found a SINGLE phone that uses the Sony 48MP sensor that manages to get 'smart cropping' zoom right. Given how poor the Lumia 950 XL is at zooming (relatively), the Nokia 7.2 should have easily won this test and... it easily lost. With exposure and detail issues that you can see above. Can this be fixed in software? Maybe. We'll have to wait and see, though the 7.2 has already been out for a couple of months, so I'm not holding my breath.

The Lumia does add a colour cast, as usual. So neither shot is remotely useable, in this case. Where my iPhone 11 Pro when I need it?(!)

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 7 pts; Nokia 7.2: 5 pts

Test 3: Overcast landscape

A plane at the aviation museum. Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Look closely and you can see texture on the plane's fuselage in the Lumia shot - this is washed out by the combined noise reduction and sharpening from the Nokia. I feel like bashing the Nokia product team's head against the wall and shouting "YOU DON'T NEED TO DO ANY OF THIS!!" What is the point in putting in a giant Quad Bayer sensor and then doing the same trite processing as if it were something tiny and much less capable?

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Nokia 7.2: 8 pts

Test 4: And now going wide...

The same scene, but this time allowing the Nokia to shoot with its wide angle lens (I've got to throw it a bone, I think):

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

So yes, having a wide angle lens is fun and - here with a very large subject - rather useful in getting more or less the whole thing in. So, let's call it five bonus points to the Nokia 7.2. I'm feeling generous!

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: n/a pts; Nokia 7.2: 5 pts

Test 5: Dim, dim, dim

Some remembrance wreaths in a dimly lit part of a church, with no direct lighting. This should be the first real test of the 48MP sensor's ability to collect light. Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Interestingly, both phone cameras opted for a 1/8s exposure - and yet the Lumia does SO much more with the gathered light. I really can't explain the difference in terms of physics. Lack of OIS wasn't an issue on the Nokia, since there's no motion blur here - it's simply bad software. For example, you could take the Nokia shot and 'adjust' it in an imaging editor (e.g. Photoshop) and end up with the Lumia result - but then why can't the software on the phone punch up colours and brightness automatically? Yet again, it's a question of waiting for updates from (the new HMD) Nokia - and they're typically not quick. If ever.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Nokia 7.2: 8 pts

Test 6: Night scene

A rather impressive industrial vehicle, lit only by a number of street lights. Loads of low light detail! Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Detail is a little fuzzed out by the image processing on the Nokia, but it doesn't do badly here. There's no OIS, yet in all my tests, 1/8s was enough to produce a decent result. And is quick enough that as long as you stand still and brace the phone (as I did) then there should be no motion errors. The Lumia 950 XL does excellently, as usual, with PureView oversampling and great OIS (1/5s exposure) to make sure things are kept crisp.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Nokia 7.2: 8 pts

Test 7: Illuminated sign

A colourful Christmas advert, shot at about 2 metres. Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The Nokia 7.2 isn't terrible here - the sharpening produces crisp results, which suits the text and textures. But ultimately the Lumia 950 XL camera brings out better dynamic range, exposure, colour, and so on. The image is simply... richer.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Nokia 7.2: 8 pts

Test 8: Challenging light extremes

Specifically tapping on the lit up sign to set exposure, I was curious to see how the two phone cameras did! Here is the scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Nokia 7.2, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Nokia 7.2 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The first signs here of slight motion blur caused by the lack of OIS, with the Nokia 7.2 going for a 1/15s exposure. Again, anything with a camera that's being shouted about by a manufacturer needs to be stabilised. Even at this price point. My low light tests are only the tip of the iceberg though - real world tests indoors with family will see motion blur - and worse - even more, I think - especially as the auto-focus isn't that fast on the Nokia 7.2.

Your own eyes will deliver the most damning verdict though - the Lumia 950 XL delivers better exposure, higher dynamic range, super crisp detail even in this low light, all its usual strengths. 

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Nokia 7.2: 7 pts

Verdict

For the record, the scores add up as:

1. Lumia 950 (2015): 64 pts 
2. Nokia 7.2 (2019): 57 pts (including the bonus points for that wide-angle lens!)

So yes, even though I gave the Nokia five bonus points, it still lost by some margin to the venerable '20MP' Lumia. And this is something of a common factor with other phones that I've tried with this particular Sony 48MP sensor - the Quad Bayer system just doesn't live up to the claims and promises. The 'old Nokia' PureView system based on full Bayer sensors with sophisticated oversampling are streets ahead. In my opinion.

My overall verdict on the Nokia 7.2 hasn't changed much though - it's a cut-price pure Android phone with a camera that's OK, but no more. Maybe software updates will in fact save it? Who knows!

Yes, yes, this is being cross-posted on AAWP and yet there's no Windows Phone component. But in the AAWP comments on Lumia 1020 stories I've had a mountain of people wondering what the original Nokia 808 PureView would have made of the test shots. That 1/1.2" sensor, for a start, plus the most sophisticated oversampling system ever seen in the phone world (still). So here goes with some challenging shots and crops. [Updated]

The Nokia 808 PureView's raw imaging specs are a mixed bag, seen from seven years in the future. Yes, the megapixel count is still impressive, yes, the oversampling system has never been bettered, yes, the sensor is a whopping 1/1.2", and yes, there's a proper Xenon flash.

But on the other hand the sensor is 2012 vintage and not even BSI (BackSideIlluminated), so all fairly primitive in terms of electronics. Plus there's no attempt at OIS, with the lenses being too large to stabilise mechanically. Heck, the 1020 had smaller optics and still had to use a proprietary ball-bearing suspension system!

And in the meantime, sensor tech has been improving. Most of all though, the amount of computing power has gone through the roof, with the test Apple iPhone 11 Pro here (the best camera system in a modern phone, arguably) able to shoot multiple exposures for a test shots, combine them in a number of clever ways, apply AI to recognise textures and details and apply appropriate pixel-level adjustments. It's all very clever.

But, a fair few readers wanted to know, how would the Nokia 808 PureView fare in a tough fight with the best of today? So I rustled up some (mainly low light) scenes, gave the 808 the assistance of a tripod (which I think is fair, given the lack of OIS), and the results are below. Note that I used the 808's '8MP' oversampling mode (found in 'Creative') so that the crops would match more closely with the iPhone's.

In terms of tech specs:

Let's use our Famed Interactive Comparator (FIC). All 1:1 crops are at 900x500 for comparison, though I've put up the originals on my own server, for you to download if you want to do your own analysis.

Test 1: Daylight nature

Before delving into tricky low light shots, I wanted to test the purity of the two devices capturing nature - and under daylight conditions - I couldn't manage sunshine, this being the UK in winter! You can tell a lot about a camera phone's image processing by looking at how it captures nature, and in particular grass, leaves, etc. Here's the overview shot from the iPhone 11 Pro, though the actual scene to my eyes was 'gloomier'!:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Nokia 808, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images. Note that the iPhone produces modern HEIC files rather than JPG, but both Windows and Mac can now handle these formats, so you should be OK.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

All very interesting. The iPhone 11's image processing is very much on the 'lighter' side when compared to phone cameras from Samsung, Huawei, (the new) Nokia, and others, yet there's still significantly more sharpening than the 808's (by definition) 'pure' output. Having said that, there's so much more dynamic range and general light gathering - and I think that even here at the pixel level most people would pick out the iPhone crop as 'better'.

From a purist's point of view, there IS more natural detail in the Nokia 808 image, and some work in Photoshop or similar could bring out something brighter and with more 'pop'. But at the same time props to the iPhone 11 Pro for enhancing detail without going too far overboard.

Hard to score this one, but I'm giving the 808 the win from the point of image quality.

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 8 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 9 pts

Test 2: Indoor detail

At the end of a fairly typical living room (lights on at the other end), an antique clock, with loads of detail. Here's the overview shot from the iPhone 11 Pro:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Nokia 808, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images. Note that the iPhone produces modern HEIC files rather than JPG, but both Windows and Mac can now handle these formats, so you should be OK.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Side note: don't worry about the red splodges on the right of the 808's crop - these are, believe it or not, splashes of candle wax that I hadn't noticed with my naked eye! Both phone cameras do a good job here, I'd again give the edge to the 808 for a more natural, less 'processed' look, but the iPhone 11 Pro does pretty well at - again - not overdoing things. Yes, it tries to bring out texture where there is none (the wall), yes, it adds contrast a bit too vigorously and perhaps sharpens things again. But the small numbers on the ring of the clock face are much more visible than from the 808 and - again - a casual viewer would instantly pick out the iPhone's image as clearer and more useful.

A score draw overall. Natural look versus clearer and punchier. Take your pick!

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 9 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 9 pts

Test 3: Party time!

My typical 'moving human in low light, but with flash enabled' mock-up/test! It's a common real world scenario and phone cameras always struggle. Here's the overview shot from the iPhone 11 Pro:

Looking in this case at cropped and scaled image, there's - as usual - no point in looking at the pixel level on 'social' mock-ups of people, as here. Firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

I should point out that I wasn't posing at all, I was deliberately mocking up a subject moving in low light - and this shows that the iPhone 11 Pro does well, but there's still some motion blur in its 1/4s exposure. In fact, you'd see a lot more, except that the phone shoots multiple shots in this period and then tries to eliminate movement. Not 100% successfully, but it does better than most other phone cameras in my experience. 

Meanwhile, the Nokia 808 PureView's (cough) Xenon flash floods the scene with light in 10 microseconds, and as a result the shot is perfectly frozen - a little extra work in Photoshop or similar to brighten the shot up and you'd be done.

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 7 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 9 pts

Test 4: Night time

A church at night, with parts floodlit, shot at about 30 metres. Here's the overview shot from the iPhone 11 Pro:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Nokia 808, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images. Note that the iPhone produces modern HEIC files rather than JPG, but both Windows and Mac can now handle these formats, so you should be OK.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The seven year old Nokia 808, stabilised on a tripod, does pretty well, at least looking at this central crop, but even here you can see how much more light and information the much more modern iPhone is gathering. A win for the newer device, I think. The colouring's interesting though, with big differences in how the flood lights are represented. To my eyes, the 808's is too pale and the iPhone's too yellow!

However, there's more to this scene than just a central crop, so see below!

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 9 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 8 pts

Test 5: Night time, whole frame

The same photos, but this time looking at exposure and dynamics across the whole frame, since there are significant differences.

Here are scaled versions, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

The wider aperture, plus the newer sensor and multi exposure technology, all play a part in delivering a scene with more light, more colour, and a ton more atmosphere for the iPhone 11 Pro. A definite win.

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 10 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 8 pts

Test 6: More night, more mood

Further back in the churchyard, some moody graves and another floodlight. Here's the overview shot from the iPhone 11 Pro:

You can grab the original photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Nokia 808, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Maybe the iPhone tries just a little too hard on the light gathering front - and there are a couple of spots which are blown out, but on the whole it manages to bring items from the dark scene which just aren't visible in the Nokia 808's rendition. In particular foreground elements which aren't even lit at all - the multi-exposure system allows for almost infinite dynamic range and night time HDR.

However, again there's more to this scene than just a central crop, so see below!

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 9 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 7 pts

Test 7: Night time, whole frame

The same photos, but this time looking at exposure and dynamics across the whole frame, since there are significant differences.

Here are scaled versions, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Again, almost unbelievable quality, dynamics and colour from the iPhone 11 Pro. It's amazing how far phone camera tech has come. When the Nokia 808 came out, its rendition above would have been compared to 'almost completely black' from other phones of the time. And now it is itself outclassed. 

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 10 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 7 pts

Test 8: Addendum: Zoom!

I'd held off doing this because the weather's been appalling. But it's brighter as I write this (though not full sun), so I'm slipping in an extra zoom test, by request from the comments. Here's a 2x zoomed shot across the garden, from the iPhone 11 Pro:

You can grab the original zoomed photos here from my own server, from the iPhone 11 Pro and the Nokia 808, for your own analysis, just click on the phone names to grab their images.

Looking in this case at the pixel level, here are 1:1 crops from the zoomed photos, firstly the iPhone (top) and then the old Nokia (bottom) - just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Of course, using zoom on the Nokia 808 means doing without any PureView oversampling, with the result that everything looks a bit indistinct - this is what the tiny pixels in the 41MP camera are really putting out, as it were. Still natural, but not as stunningly pure as when not zooming.

The much more modern iPhone's 2x telephoto lens does better, but mainly just in the image processing, in terms of enhancing sharpness and colour. Does the iPhone go too far? For zoomed shots like this, perhaps yes - I'd have liked a middle ground between the ultra-raw, unprocessed look of the 808's zoom photo and the more artificial version from the iPhone 11 Pro. Honours even though, there are aspects of each approach which I like.

Scores: iPhone 11 Pro: 8 pts; Nokia 808 PureView: 8 pts

Verdict

Adding the points together, just for fun(!), we get:

1. Apple iPhone 11 Pro (2019): 70 pts (/80 maximum)
2. Nokia 808 PureView (2012): 65 pts

None of which should be too surprising. Though it's worth noting that I was utterly cheating in that the Nokia 808 PureView was on a tripod for the low light shots here, to compensate for its lack of stabilisation, while even the night shots on the iPhone were taken casually, handheld, no tripod needed. Making the results even more remarkable. If I had been made to shoot all the 808 shots handheld, presumably standing as still as possible or resting the phone on a wall or rock, the 808 would be another 10 points back, I estimate.

Comments welcome from AAS and AAWP readers. It's true that we still don't have a really 'pure' modern camera flagship, but the iPhone 11 Pro comes as close as we can currently get, with the added advantage of wide angle and zoom lenses (not tested here), plus stunning captures through sheer computational power in all light situations.

PS. Credit to the Nokia 808 overall, mind you. The very fact that I'm able to meaningfully compare a seven and a half year old phone's camera to a current flagship is a mindblowing concept and shows how far the 808 and Lumia 1020 were ahead of their time.

PPS. I also have the equally small Google Pixel 4 here, though this is currently crippled by biometric issues and awaiting updates over the next few months. But its camera is also excellent and results aren't too different from those here. I'll return to the Pixel 4 if there's enough demand as we get closer to Christmas.

A few years ago I rounded up ways to view (and edit) PDF files under Windows 10 Mobile, prompted by Microsoft's Edge browser failing at the time to read these (usually) reference files. Happily, Edge has been sorted out in the meantime, plus some of the third party options have changed, so here's a more up to date round-up!

Before getting started, note that there are several scam PDF viewers in the Microsoft Store, with fraudulent ratings and laced with ads and pop-ups. Shame on Store Q&A yet again. In the meantime, stick to AAWP's links below and you won't go far wrong.

I've also stuck to UWP apps - I know that there are some old Windows Phone 8.1 viewers that still work, but I do try and only use native Windows 10 (UWP) applications on my phones and I'm pretty sure you'll be the same.

Microsoft Edge

Built into every Windows 10 Mobile (native or upgraded) phone, of course. I'm testing this on a Lumia 950 and Edge has been reading PDFs just fine for a while now. There's no easy* way to open a local document from Edge's menus, but if you use the supplied (in the OS) File Explorer utility then tapping on a PDF file in your user folders will result in it being loaded up into Edge (yes, even if you have other PDF readers, as here, installed).

* In fact, you can do this, but only with lots of convoluted typing, i.e. constructing a 'file:///' style URL!

As you'd expect when retrofitting PDF reading into a web browser, as Microsoft did (the impetus was apparently its ill-fated drift into using Edge for e-reading), the interface doesn't change much and you don't get many bells and whistles. However... it's reasonably fast (renders of pages within very large documents can take a couple of seconds, but it's easily bearable), there's an easy 'go to page' number box (top left), and the search function is very fast and easy to use.

Pinch zooming in and out is intuitive and responsive. Overall, top marks apart from the file opening double act with File Explorer! (It goes without saying that if you encounter PDFs online then Edge handles them 'inline', as it were!)

Perfect PDF Reader UWP (soft Xpansion, free)

This has it all and is free as far as I can see (the developer does a number of other commercial PDF apps for company use), though it's not the fastest at rendering PDFs from the options here. Zooming, navigation, searching, it all works very well, if slowly for longer documents. Although there's no page number 'goto' function, the always-accessible thumbnail 'Pages' view has page numbers, so it's still easy to get to a specific place in a document.

Terrific software, though again I have to point out that it has got slower with updates over the last two years and I wonder whether the developer has the will to do some optimisation. Note also that this application works for printing and searching XPS, OXPS and text files, EPUB, MOBI and FB2 eBooks.

PDF Reader - View, Edit, Annotate UWP (Xodo Technologies, free)

Another full UWP solution for all Windows 10 devices, this is fast and powerful. It's more than just a reader too - though it does have search, zoom, navigation and other essential reading functions, as you can annotate PDFs too. Amazingly full featured considering the price.

There's so much here, from a dark theme to filling in PDF forms to interpreting stuff like embedded javascript (which idiot at Adobe thought letting PDF attachments run javascript was a good idea??!)

Another one to definitely try, though the interface is at times wonderful (dark theme - including document pages(!), moving through search results and previews) and at times quirkily annoying (general use of white space and panels). A very different approach to a user interface.

When I first tried this app a couple of years ago it was very unstable and kept crashing - it's quite a bit better now, though I still had the app freeze up on me when asking it to open two PDFs at the same time.

PDF Assistant (Pro) UWP (Roxy, £2.49)

This tool is a good, fluid, and very fast option, especially if you have a powerful W10M phone. It's rather over the top for the use case on this page though, and the full range of editing features aren't needed here, though toggling on the edit mode with a top-left tap is the way to access the 'go to page' jump field. And then toggle the mode back again for straightforward browsing.

The interface is again a little odd in places - coders go out of their way sometimes to avoid using standard interface conventions! Most curiously, I couldn't find a search option - in long PDFs it's the best way to find things. Am I missing something, Roxy?

There's a free non-Pro version as well, with adverts, but as the Pro version is on sale at the moment, at only a few quid, I'd like to see the developers, Roxy, get some sales and earn them a beer or two for their hard work!

PDF Viewer Plus UWP (GSnathan, free) 

This works really well as a simple PDF browser - it's fast and easy to adjust views, jump around, and so on. I particularly liked the thumbnail view, letting you get to where you want to go graphically if there's a particular image or element that you're looking for.

On the downside, this hasn't had any updates since my first article, and so I still couldn't get the search function working, but that's a small point for many documents. Well worth a shot, considering the price (free).

Foxit Mobile PDF (free)

Another great option with hooks through to a more extensive online file exporting and conversion service, this offers searching, thumbnails and navigation, annotations and content copying, a dark theme for content as well as UI and, somewhat experimentally, a 'reflow' mode, which comes in handy when trying to read A4-formatted pages on a small phone screen.

Foxit has been around for years, but the UWP version for Windows 10 is well done and also well worth a look if your PDFs aren't too huge (reflowing the book-size test PDF was beyond it). Foxit says that the app has been replaced by 'PhantomPDF', seemingly a complete rewrite, but this requires a version of Windows 10 that's beyond where Windows 10 Mobile ended. So we're stuck with the slightly buggy app here. Still worth a try though, as it's slick and fast.

_______

Notably, all of these solutions are either free or with a free version, so there's zero excuse for trying them out and seeing which one suits your PDF documents and needs best.

PS. If you're wondering about the 'Elop' PDF being tested/viewed here, it's this. A cracking read!

Exactly two years ago I presented my own 'Top 5', but the ecosystem is about to start winding down, the last branch of Windows on phones is about to receive its final update, so now would be a good time for a massive update to the idea. This time going with crowd-sourced data and not just my own prejudices! You might still not be surprised at the no. 1 below, but at least it's not just my own PureView love affair - several hundred others voted, with results below.

Methodology note: I used Twitter to gather votes, using its 'poll' feature, because I have enough followers that I could gather a lot of data very quickly(!) Mind you, when selecting 'Other', people often didn't just pick one phone, confusing the counting somewhat. The other three options I chose to present (because I figured they should be somewhere in the Top 5) were the Lumia 800, the 1020, and the 950/XL, all of which are indeed below. Would as many people have remembered the 800 without my prompting? Who knows. Anyway, it's in the top 5 and even got as much as a third the number of votes as the 950/XL (two models, counted as one for the purposes of this feature).

OS note: I guess I should acknowledge the original 'Windows Mobile' smartphones as well, which were around, with a totally different underlying OS and interface, from the early 2000s to around 2008. But they're outside the scope of AAWP, so.... Quite a number of respondents did name check the classic HTC HD2, a large screened Windows Mobile phone that then got flashed to run all sorts of alternate OS, so a shout out to that too!

The first Windows Phones were produced in 2010, made by HTC, LG and Samsung - and we finish the operating system's run, eight years on, with HP and Alcatel being the ones making the new hardware. Yet in between there were (literally) dozens of Nokias and then Microsoft-branded Lumias. With around fifty different models to choose from (depending on how you count), here are the ten that most impressed respondents to my poll, the ten that are perhaps worthy to be counted as classics and retained even today, and used with pleasure, with the usual 2019 service caveats!

Anyway here goes with the (voted) top 10 'Windows phones' - and yes, note the small 'p', since this covers the Windows 10 Mobile era too, so we're not just looking at 'Windows Phone' per se. With increasing detail as we head to no. 1(!):

10. Alcatel IDOL 4 Pro (2017)

Already picked as my favourite Windows phone of 2019, the IDOL 4 Pro has so much to recommend it in terms of hardware that keeps pace with the Android phones of its era - 2016/2017. And it still looks super today. But it was ultimately let down by lack of TLC from Alcatel in terms of fixing camera and fingerprint sensor issues - and it was left to me, yours truly, to micro-manage Microsoft into updating it to W10M branches 1703 and then 1709. Oh well.

9. Nokia Lumia 925 (2013)

Back when this launched, the aluminium frame and svelte looks were groundbreaking. Allied to the futuristic Windows Phone 8 interface, the 925 was a breath of fresh air in terms of cosmetics. Add in the 920's OIS-equipped camera and an AMOLED screen, for a clear favourite among users. Fun fact: AAWP never reviewed it - Rafe unboxed it and then loved it so much that he never lent it to me for a full review! I think I was the one who missed out.

8. Nokia Lumia 830 (2014)

Along much the same lines as the 925, but launching with Windows Phone 8.1 and, despite the slim lines, with a replaceable back and battery! The 830 did so much right, but it was ultimately underpowered in terms of chipset and RAM (only 1GB, at the end of 2014, was looking a little light), plus there was a design flaw that caused the Qi charging coil to make discomforting noises when in use. And don't get me started on how great the camera was before Microsoft ruined it in the Lumia Camera 5 update...

7. Microsoft Lumia 640/XL (2015)

Ah yes, the 640 and its XL sister were 'classic Lumia', in that they were cheap and cheerful yet pretty fully functioned. Decent screens, replaceable batteries, very durable, affordable for a teenager, both my units ended up with family members and were last seen, still working, years later, despite all sorts of bits of plastic being chipped off from numerous drops.

6. Nokia Lumia 930 (2014)

 A rare Lumia made from cast and machined aluminium, it still feels a million dollars in the hand, but it had a number of obvious flaws. Firstly, despite the gorgeous AMOLED display, there was no 'always on'/glance display, an oversight which Nokia later acknowledged. Secondly, the battery life wasn't great and the heat management terrible, with the Snapdragon 800 making the rear plastic often too hot to touch. Oops. Happily, much of the 930 is reimagined, more successfully, in polycarbonate form in the no. 5 pick below!

5. Nokia Lumia 1520 (2013)

This was an outrageous phablet from Nokia in 2013 - the 6" screen looks quite normal these days, but the Lumia 1520 was released when most phones had 4" displays. Only the stylus-centric Samsung Galaxy Note range on Android dared to venture into 5" territory, and the Lumia 1520 made the Samsungs look like toys. But here's the thing. Not only was the phablet concept in the 1520 future-looking, the internals have held up well too, with the Snapdragon 800 and 2GB RAM still powering Windows 10 Mobile along nicely for all those lucky users who did the official upgrade and who then did our '950 hack' to get branch 1709...

I say 'lucky' because the 1520 as never distributed anywhere near as widely as the budget Lumias - so 1520 units today are prized, almost collectors' items, the 6" 1080p LCD display with CBD still looks fabulous at the end of 2019.

The camera's the same as the one in the Lumia 930 (that followed) and set the 21MP pattern for the 950 and 950 XL that followed a couple of years later. In fact, you could say that the Lumia 1520 set the pattern in many ways for the whole of the smartphone world (even though it's Samsung and Google who will be remembered most for introducing 'phablets', as they were called at first).

4. Nokia Lumia 920 (2012)

The 920 was notable for three things. Firstly, its design, with a polycarbonate 'monoblock' feel. Very much like the no. 3 below, but taken to a whole new level. The 920 is just so... solid. Rugged, heavy (for its size), it's a dense mass of tech that never fails to impress in the hand. The curved back extends round the sides and onto 2.5D front curved glass, just beautiful design for 2012.

(publicity shot for the 920, showing off the Nokia/HERE Maps augmented reality view, something which Google Maps is just getting in 2019, seven years later!)

Secondly, the first use of OIS (Optical Image Stabilisation) in a phone, I believe. This enabled super crisp low light shots and paved the way for just about every mid range phone upwards for the next seven years. To this day 920 fans claim they can take better shots on the phone than on Android or iOS competition. I suspect they're wrong, but the zeal is impressive!

Finally, the first use of Qi charging in a phone (again, I believe, feel free to correct me!) Wireless charging is now utterly ubiquitous in flagship smartphones, from iPhone to Samsung to Huawei - but the Nokia Lumia 920 started the trend and, yet again, was ahead of its time.

I still own this, though I stopped using it soon after release because, well, the no. 1 phone below got launched!

3. Nokia Lumia 800 (2011)

Ah yes, happy days. Nokia World 2011. The cream of the world's journalists... plus myself, David, Ewan and Rafe! The last event that all four of the team were employed and in the same place at the same time. Here we all are, working hard crafting words for AAS and AAWP(!):

Nokia finally launched its take on Windows Phone (7.5), with the Lumia 710 that had 'functional' design and replaceable battery, plus the futuristic Lumia 800 that mimicked the Nokia N9 with all-curved 'ship in a bottle' design. The idea of a Nokia that was sealed, with no memory cards, no way to change the battery, was unusual, but history has shown that such 'sealed' designs won out in the end, just look at 2019 flagships.

(No, not the 2001 obelisk, but close - the Lumia 800...)

In use, the Lumia 800's camera was decent for the name, but not ground breaking, plus it didn't have a front camera, infamously. With the fairly primitive Windows Phone version and very few applications available, even for 2011, the 800 was never going to be a chart topper, but it still won plenty of fans. Today, with the N9 (running Meego), it represents a futuristic high water mark in terms of design.

2. Microsoft Lumia 950 XL (2015)

It's hard to actually love the official Microsoft flagship from late 2015 onwards, and not just because you can't really buy it anymore. The relatively flimsy plastic is improved slightly with the addition of an (also plastic-based, but covered in real materials - leather, bamboo, etc.) Mozo replacement back, but you still never get the impression of this being a serious tool for serious activities. 

Camera excepted. The 950 XL still has a competitive camera even in the phone world of 2019, with very few weaknesses. Maybe over-blocky digital zoom and very low light focussing could be picked out as minus points, but most of the time the 950 XL camera is still right up there.

What also helps tip the 950 XL up into the number 2 spot in the poll is its super display, one of the best in the Lumia range, and the flexibility in terms of being able to swap out the battery, expand storage with a card, and generally get your hands dirty with its internals. This isn't an all-sealed unibody device wherein you're at the mercy of the manufacturer's design choice - here you get to see what's inside and have an influence. Compare and contrast with iPhones, Samsungs, etc.

1. Lumia 1020 (2013)

No Nokia/Lumia has engendered as much love before or since, I suspect. Perhaps the sister device on Symbian, the 808 PureView comes close. It's perennially 'most people's favourite Lumia', and deservedly so. A perfect size, an almost perfect camera, a range of interesting accessories, so much to like.

But the 1020 did have an Achilles heel or two, as longstanding users will attest. The reliance on doing 38MP oversampling down to 5MP without a dedicated Image Signal Processor (ISP, as on the Nokia 808 predecessor) meant that each photo taken on this classic camera smartphone would take around three seconds to process and save. This is an eternity by modern phone camera standards and seriously got in the way of taking rapid bursts of photos of kids, pets and general action. Yes, there was Xenon flash, and this sometimes helped by freezing the subject, but you didn't usually get many 'bites at the cherry'. And then, even for flash-lit shots, there was often the distinctive Lumia 1020 yellowish colour cast.

But take all this with a pinch of salt, because for many of us the 1020 was a way to get much of the classic Nokia 808 camera functions plus OIS (for those arty night shots) plus the party piece of dual capture and 'reframing later' (or not) plus an OS designed for this decade (now nearly over as I write this!) rather than the previous one. As it turned out, the 1020 wasn't that future proof, since the old Snapdragon S4 processor made something of a meal of Windows 10 Mobile and it was omitted from Microsoft's official upgrade program. But on Windows Phone 8.1, its native OS, the Lumia 1020 still runs smoothly, albeit with applications that have mostly not now been updated for a couple of years and which can't now be reinstalled from the Store after a reset. Oh well.

The yellow 1020 was the one chosen by Nokia to promote the model and it was by far the most common, with its garish colour and huge circular camera island (now heavily back in fashion on 2019 Android flagships!) Which of us hasn't glimpsed a Lumia 1020 in a TV programme or film and thought 'Hey, I've got one of those, good choice Mr Director!'

A worthy top of the poll here, with as many votes as the rest of the top 6 put together(!) - but your comments welcome on all of the above.

With the Store for Windows Phone 8.1 stopping working in a couple of weeks, users of the very popular Lumia 1020 have a problem. Yes, being love-smitten on the 1020 is an issue in itself, though you might also now consider the iPhone 11 Pro. But if you want to give the 1020 (or 920) a little more life in terms of applications then force-upgrading it to Windows 10 Mobile is about the only option, since the W10M Store is 'good' until at least 2021. My own 1020 has flip-flopped a few times between 8.1 and W10M, I always got put off by the latter's restrictions for the 1020 hardware, but it seems like Microsoft is now forcing our hand for good.

I've been asked privately whether Microsoft could be persuaded to officially add the 1020 to the official Windows 10 Mobile compatibility list, but this won't happen - effectively downgrading the capabilities of the hardware just isn't something that could be allowed for regular users. For the record, taking the 1020 'up' has the disadvantages of:

• Losing stereo audio capture (this is huge).
• Losing HERE Maps/Drive and with a cosmetically crippled Windows 10 Maps as a 'replacement'.
• You can't always use the camera in Skype UWP - the camera hardware is usually somehow locked to other camera applications, even if not running still.
  
• Brightness is stuck on 'Auto' - not a huge deal, since most people leave it on this anyway, but.... 
• Glance screen is gone, since all the registry keys that the older phone hardware need are moved competely for Redstone. Potentially another showstopper for some?  (I know there's a very geeky registry hack to re-enable it, but that's outside the scope of even AAWP!)
• Battery life won't be great, as W10M is hungrier in terms of power than 8.1

That's far too much for Microsoft to even think of allowing the transition. Is it conceivable that a Lumia 1020 owner might just opt to stay on 8.1 and stick with currently installed applications and damn the presence of a Store? Well, yes, but it's a fragile arrangement in that if the phone ever gets factory reset (troubleshooting, selling, etc.) then there's literally no way to bring applications back. So sustainable in the short term, but not very satisfactory in the long term.

On the other hand, for the cognoscenti who decide to go all in on Windows 10 Mobile, even on such old hardware, there are some upsides, having:

• access to a working Store again for 2020 and beyond.
• Skype work - mostly. 
• a proper Telegram client, in 'Unigram'. This is probably the number one competitor to Whatsapp, which is exiting all Windows phone support at the end of 2019.
• the full suite of Windows 10 UWP applications available, including Office, OneDrive, and OneNote.
• access to the fairly large pool of still-supported and in some cases still actively developed UWP applications.
• Bluetooth keyboard support.

Regardless, given, the Store position, the move for the 1020 (and 920) from Windows Phone 8.1 to Windows 10 Mobile is definitely worth a little pain for the enthusiast.

In the instructions below, I'm leaning on my own articles from two or so years ago. I've worked through all the downloads and steps, double-checking everything, adding steps for branches 1703 and 1709, and adding new screenshots where needed. The aim is to take you (and myself) from 8.1 through to the very latest Windows 10 Mobile 'Fall Creators Update'. Yes, yes, the last branch that's getting it's last security update next week. But still better than a two-years-unsupported OS...

The prerequisites (if you're considering doing the same as me, here, though do read right to the end for loads of caveats) are:

• an older non-W10M-approved Windows Phone 8.1 device, ideally with 1GB RAM or more (e.g. Lumia 920, 1020)
• a Windows 7, 8 or 10-running PC
• knowledge of files, folders, how to use a command line tool like Powershell, what to do with ZIP files, and so on. If ANY of these sound scary to you then consider not proceeding!
• unlimited free time and patience - really! In real time, allow up to 24 hours for the steps and (often) hanging around. Is this way too much time for a 'phone' upgrade? Of course it is, but we're talking enthusiasts here, so it's your hobby, eh?

I also want to emphatically emphasise that I'm not going to be tech support for anyone else following in my footsteps. Try the steps I used and see how you get on, but if something comes unstuck and you hit a problem then sorting it out is part of your own learning curve!

If you're happy to proceed then read on. The steps are expanded hugely from the overview steps on this XDA Developer page. See the link for the downloads needed though.

1. Download and open the main package, see the source link, which may be a 'mega' URL string that needs pasting into a browser tab, as shown below:

2. Open the archive in 7-Zip or the ZIP utility of your choice (Windows' own ZIP handling is less than perfect, so I'd advise going third party here). Extract the exact folder from it (in this case the named folder '768x1280'). (Again, see the source link for exactly which folder to extract for each phone, if you're confused.)

3. Using Win(Command)+R, in the run command dialog, type "control printers" and then run this. It's the familiar Devices and Printers pane, but you apparently need to bring this up in order to remove the phone manually. I'm not 100% sure why this step is needed, but I guess it forces the OS to re-recognise the phone below?

4. Download and extract the 'iutool' package (again, see the source link above). Started a new command (PowerShell in my case, on Windows 10) window and head into the iutool folder.

5. Plug the phone into your PC, wait a few seconds, and then type: '.\iutool.exe -l'.

The PowerShell console (or similar) will then confirm that 'Nokia 909' (the Lumia 1020's original model name) is connected and available.

6. Type this command: 'iutool -V -p D:\768x1280' (or whatever (relative) path you put the phone CAB files in!)

7. After about 20 minutes (with minimal activity on the PC screen - make SURE your PC doesn't time out and go to sleep!), the Lumia should start spinning cogs, cue another long wait, up to an hour! Again, if you're following all this, make sure the PC stays on, the utility is still in control! After all this the 1020 should boot into Windows 10 Mobile 10586.107, i.e. Threshold, one of the earliest W10M branches.

If the phone hangs late in the update process (e.g. at the 'Migrating' stage) then it's safe to disconnect and power the phone off and then on again. It should finish the final migration steps and then you'll be booted as 'normal'!

8. As with any other new or newly reset Windows phone, it's best to wait half an hour at this stage, while all the applications re-install from the Windows 10 Store.

9. You may find at this stage that the on-screen keyboard doesn't work at all! Which is a right pain because you can't then type in (for example) a Wifi password or similar (though if you're upgrading in place then it should remember the Wifi settings from 8.1). The source link does mention this, though it means another download and side-load. Download 'Internal_IME.zip' and extract the cab file for 'en-gb' (or similar, see the source link for extra instructions for other regions and languages), renaming it to '123.cab' (or any file name, the 'cab' bit is the important one).

10. Connect the phone again, if needed.

11. Install this language pack with '.\iutool -v -p D:\123.cab' (again, change the file path as needed - ignore the '8024a110' error, that's expected.

12. The Lumia will reboot after about a minute and start updating itself again, with the usual cogs and 'migrating' steps. Patience is again needed...

Following the update, your keyboard should be working fine again, for example to set up the phone on Wi-fi and verify that Windows 10 Mobile (10586 branch) is now in place and working.

13. On the 1020, go to 'Settings/Update & Security/For developers' and select 'Developer mode'. Say 'Yes' when prompted.

14. Grab the old Windows Phone 8.1 SDK application deployment utility, filename WP8.0 SDK Tools Lite Setup Av1.20.zip on your PC. Once downloaded, extract everything to a folder and run the .bat file supplied. This will take a while (loads of components are involved) and you'll need to approve permissions every so often.

15. Still on the PC, download the vcREG registry editor. It's a file ending in '.xap'.

16. On the Start menu, run the Windows Phone 8 Application deployment tool. Select 'device' and then pick the registry editor .xap file that you grabbed just now:

17. With your phone connected and the screen turned on and unlocked, click on 'Deploy'. Nothing will appear to happen, but the status will show as 'Complete' after a few seconds and then 'vcREG' will appear in the apps list on the phone.

18. Run vcREG, tap on the '...' menu and then on 'templates' or 'classic unlock' (depending on which version of vcREG you have). Check 'Live Interop' and 'Restore NDTKsvc' and then on 'Apply'. The old Lumia 1020 is now 'jailbroken', to use (old) iPhone jargon. And the registry is unlocked:

19. Back on the PC, download 'Interop Tools' from here, I recommend the linked older v1.7, since I had issues with newer versions (v1.9 of the app or above would crash with no useful information). 

20. Using Explorer on your Windows PC, copy this Interop Tools folder tree into a suitable area on the phone, e.g. 'Downloads'

21. Back on the phone, run (Windows 10) File Explorer (in the Start apps list), navigate to /Downloads and then tap on each of the 'dependency' files in turn. These are libraries needed and they install silently in the background. I suggest waiting a minute between each install tap, to be sure, and then finally tap on the main Interop Tools application installer - and, again, wait a minute for the background installer to do its work - you'll know it's done when you see the new application appear in the apps list!

22. From the Start menu, run 'Interop Tools' and head into the Registry Browser.

23. Navigate through (in turn, i.e. 4 taps) the registry key hierarchy:

1. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
2. System
3. Platform
4. DeviceTargetingInfo

24. Change the phone's ID so that when the phone update routines come calling, it reports itself as a device that's most definitely 'allowed' to get the latest OS updates. I suggest the Lumia 950 XL for the ID. NB: write down on a piece of paper the values you replace at each stage!!

• Set 'PhoneManufacturer' to 'MicrosoftMDG' (capitalisation is important). Tap on 'Write' and then 'Write' again.
• Repeat along the same lines for  'PhoneManufacturerModelName', to 'RM-1085_11302' (or RM-1116_11258 has been suggested for dual SIM devices, again mimicking a Lumia 950 XL)
• Repeat for 'PhoneModelName', setting this to 'Lumia 950 XL'

25. Head to 'Settings/Update & Security/Phone update', and then tap on 'Check for updates'. With a little luck, Windows 10 Mobile OS branch 14393 will already be downloading, as the next step for the Lumia 950 XL. This is the (so-called) 'Anniversary Update' and you'll have to wait the usual hour or two while this installs, the phone restarts and 'migrates', and so forth. You know the drill by now!

26. Your Lumia 1020 (or 920) is now far more up to date. But we need to go further. Wait half an hour (yes, really) while all your third party applications update themselves from the Windows 10 Store (which still works and which still serves up old 8.1 applications where needed).

27. Head back to 'Settings/Update & Backup/Phone update' and you should see the Creators Update downloading and then installing. Manage it through the same install/migration/app-update process. So that's another hour!

28. Rinse and repeat, to get the first build of branch 1709, the 'Fall Creators Update'. Another hour (at least)!

29. And again, though perhaps slightly quicker, to get the latest (November 2019 as I write this) security patch and OS update for '1709'.

30. Go back into Interop Tools and revert the model name to '909', the manufacturer to 'NOKIA' and the model number to 'RM-875' - refer to the values you noted down earlier for your specific model. This step isn't essential, but well, you never know... You don't want any application to think you really are using a Lumia 950 XL!

31. Once all migrations are done, do a final restart of the phone, to make sure everything's loaded cleanly.

32. Head into the Store and check for application updates. I strongly suggest pausing everything except the Store client itself, i.e. update that first, as it's better at handling multiple updating items that (potentially) the old 8.1 Store application which is what you'll have been left with if you've updated everything in place. Then queue up and wait while everything else updates.

You're essentially done, though do see the extra notes below, which may help.

Notes

a) If you don't see Lumia Camera already in the Apps list, you'll need to install the classic original app from the Store. I wrote this up here, back when it re-appeared.

b) Although the whole 'Open in Lumia Camera' to reframe an image from the underlying 34/38MP image does work (yay!), I've found that Photos crashes after an edit. The photo is saved properly first, but you do keep having to re-open the Photos app.

c) Windows 10 Maps is still broken, in that the map rendering code was updated in the later versions to use hardware-accelerated graphics in the newer chipsets - using Maps on older x20 Lumias on branches 1703 onwards results in road outlines not being drawn properly. Navigation still works fine, including voice, but it's disconcerting to see much of the familiar Maps interface 'missing', including the visuals of upcoming junctions!

d) Especially now there's a viable app store onboard again, what about doing a factory reset/wipe and rebuilding the 1020 (or 920) with just the applications you need? After all, you've just taken the phone through about four major OS versions, so surely you'd want a clean system folder underpinning it all? Well, yes and no. I do approve of such a step because I find setting up a phone 'fun' and there will be some benefit in a clean slate across the board. On the other hand, Windows Phone and Windows 10 Mobile  are pretty good at keeping user data, applications and the OS separate, and there's some cleaning up as upgrades happen. So I don't think there's as much benefit here as you might think. In summary, I'd not spend a few more hours doing a factory reset and rebuild. Just consider this if you hit unexplained errors and brokenness beyond what I've written about on the page here.

__________________

Other caveats

Let me confirm some of the other caveats to taking an older phone like this through to Windows 10 Mobile '1709':

• You can't always use the camera in Skype UWP - the camera hardware is usually somehow locked to other camera applications, even if not running still - it seems as if this is Skype being over-fussy!
    
• Brightness is stuck on 'Auto' or 'Brightest', as you'll find out - not a huge deal, since most people leave it on this anyway, but.... 
   
• Bluetooth is stuck 'on'. Again, not a showstopper, but worth noting.
   
• Lumia Camera, as mentioned above, now only records its audio tracks in mono - a bit of a major downgrade for one of the 1020's major USPs. Oh well.
   
• Glance screen is gone, since all the registry keys that the older phone hardware need are moved competely for Redstone. Potentially another showstopper for some?
    
• Skype is indeed broken in terms of camera, but audio and messaging work just fine.
  

The 4.5" 768p screens of the 920 and 1020 do seem small by today's standards, yet consider the use of capacitive controls - these mean that you never have to live with virtual, on-screen controls, and so the effective interface is equivalent to a 5" screen with the latter.

Comments welcome. I'm sure I've only just scratched the surface of the caveats to be aware of, so do please chip in with more data points!

Miscellaneous screens

Windows 10 Maps has errr..... street rendering issues on the older phones. Navigation still works though, as do all other views, including traffic and aerial views here.

Going through the process of updating loads of built-in apps in the Store client; (right) of course, being on Windows 10 Mobile means that all the latest UWP apps are available - here with 'AAWP Universal' in action.

Groove Music works just fine too, of course, though now restricted to just local music files

PS. Thinking laterally, I noted from experience that some of the caveats above stem from the upgrade to branch 1703, the 'Creators Update'. I do wonder what would happen if one stopped immediately after the 14393 ('Anniversary Update', branch 1607) stage above and changed the registry values back. With 14393 as the base, you'd miss out on some of the more subtle OS fixes, but you might have less day to day issues, in particular with Maps, Skype and Bluetooth. Me? I've just spent 48 hours minding the 1020 through everything above, I can't face yet another update round. So if you're thinking of emulating me, consider stopping at AU and reporting back, pretty please!

When the 108MP (Samsung) sensor was announced for the new Xiaomi flagship, it got everyone's attention. Was this a new high water mark in phone imaging? Or just another bullet point to pull in buyers without any real world benefit? A bit of both, as I discover below...

Let's start with a few specs, obviously favouring the far newer device, but worth noting anyway:

I have to say upfront that, despite the impressive numbers for the Mi Note 10, the specs make little sense. The whole point in having a giant 108MP camera, I'd have thought, would be that you can do lossless zoom up to at least 3x - so what's the point in the dedicated 2x telephoto above? The 5x telephoto is more obvious, though even here there are compromises in terms of the upscaling and smaller aperture. And don't get me started on the 2MP macro lens.

Now, it's possible that Xiaomi is combining the output from multiple cameras above, applying the appropriate parallax corrections, and therefore getting higher quality and better zoom. And, I've no doubt, it'll zoom better than the 950 XL here, for which zoom beyond 1.5x is an Achilles heel. But I can't help but think that Xiaomi is just throwing different camera hardware at the wall in seemingly random fashion - and I just can't see the point in a 108MP camera outputting 27MP only (there are no lower options at 1x zoom). 27MP is way too high for normal usage - not for the first time, what I'd like to have seen would be a 16:1 Bayer pixel binning scheme, giving even better low light shots, with almost zero noise. Oh well.

Anyway, on with the tests. Can Microsoft's 2015 Lumia flagship/camera champion get close to the 'state of the art' in Android high end imaging as we head into 2020, almost half a decade later?

Notes:

• I've shot at the default output resolutions on each, leaving headroom for some lossless 'PureView' zoom into the sensors and also getting the advantages of oversampling and noise reduction. Though the mismatch between the (sensible) 8MP of the Lumia and the (insane) 27MP of the Xiaomi make it hard to do direct comparisons, so I've had to cheat a little on non-zoomed shots for web viewing here and downsample them from the Mi Note 10 to 12-16MP (4:3) territory. I think that's a fair compromise, leaving some of the extra resolution* evident without causing such a mismatch that comparisons can't easily be seen. And don't worry about matching aspect ratios either - I'll handle all that for you in the comparators. If you think that my downsampling is arbitrary then you're right - except that the output resolution of the Mi Note 10 is all over the place, depending on zoom and light levels. It varies wildly and non-obviously between 27MP, 12MP and 8MP. So... I'm just doing my best here.
    * [What's that? You wanted me to shoot in the 108MP mode? Get out of here, that's just CRAZY! I'm struggling to think of ANY use case for such images, other than crowd scenes that you want to examine individual faces later on?]
  
• As usual, I've deliberately thrown in mainly tricky shots in the scene selection, to test the USPs here, all photos were taken on full auto and handheld, as a regular user would do. No tripods or RAW editing sessions needed!
  
• The Mi Note 10 photos mostly have an applied watermark, bottom left. This is optional but on by default. I discovered it (ahem) after shooting my samples in the rain, when back at base!
• The weather wasn't kind to me - gloomy in the day and raining at night. Regardless, I still have samples for your interest!

Let's pit the results against each other, using our Famed Interactive Comparator (FIC). All 1:1 crops are at 900x500 for comparison, though I've put up the originals on my own server, for you to download if you want to do your own analysis.

Test 1: Gloomy greenery

A garden shot in winter gloom, with rain incoming. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Exposure aside, there's not much difference here. But I have to give the 950 the win for the brighter result and the slightly purer details. It's a margin call, but the Mi Note 10's 1/1.3" certainly gets close to the 1/2.4" PureView sensor on the Lumia. 

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 9 pts

Test 2: Gloomy greenery, now zoomed

The same scene, but with 2x zoom applied. So 1.5x PureView and 0.5x lossy on the Lumia, but using the 2x telephoto on the Mi Note 10 etc.(as there's enough light.) You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

What a mess. From both phone cameras. The Lumia's is blocky and ugly, as we'd expect, but I did think the 2x telephoto on the Mi Note 10 would do batter. There's so much artificial sharpening that the photo is ruined, in my eyes. Clearly, this is something Xiaomi can fix in updates, if they have the will. But even with the sharpening, the image is several notches better than the lossy zoom on the Lumia, so the Mi Note 10 gets its first of many wins.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 6 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 8 pts

Test 3: Bonus points for more zoom

The same scene, but now with 5x zoom applied on the Mi Note 10, since it would be unfair of me not to show what it can do. For dramatic effect, I'll compare this to the unzoomed PureView Lumia shot. You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Although 5x optical zoom in a phone is still an achievement, the Xiaomi image processing is still a mess, with way too much sharpening here, I contend. I'd have liked to have seen a much more natural look, rather than something that looks like it's been photocopied ten times!

Still, 5x is worth an extra point or two, I think. Fair's fair.

Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 2 bonus pts

Test 4: Indoor, clock detail

It's now raining outside, so here's an indoor close-up shot, about 30cm from an antique clock with lovely face detail. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

A clear win for the much more mature image processing on the Lumia - despite the cover glass you get the lovely colours of the decorative inside border, plus you also get the real gold of the hands. The Xiaomi image processing handles the detail (as you'd expect with 108MP to draw from), but the colours are pale and cold by comparison.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 8 pts

Test 5: Low light interior

Inside an unlit church, with feeble daylight from small windows - and loads of detail. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL, made to look lighter than it actually was:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

This is an example of where a little sharpening helps, of course. Masses of detail (also helped by that 108MP sensor) and some image processing creates an image that's pretty stunning considering how gloomy it was inside. The 950's photo is very 'natural', butin this case I'm plumping for the Mi Note 10's enhancements.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 10 pts

Test 6: Stained glass

Always a testing subject, given the distance (raised up) and extremes of light, colour and contrast. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Detail is similar - the quality here from both phone cameras is astonishing, but the Lumia has to take the win here by a nose, with richer, more vibrant colours. As befits stained glass!

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 9 pts

Test 7: It's that plaque again...

This plaque is high on the wall in the church, unlit and almost impossible to read with the naked eye. Which is why phone cameras are a way to go - and impressively so! Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL, again making the scene far lighter than it was to the eye, thanks to the OIS and a long exposure:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Astonishing detail from the Mi Note 10 here, its image processing is, perhaps, optimised for artificial/textual detail? Even with the slight downsampling here for the web crop comparison, the detail in the text is very impressive. Larger sensor, higher native resolution, and so on. It's paying off for Xiaomi here.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 8 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 10 pts

Test 8: ...and zooming in...

Of course, with the plaque high up, it's a natural thing to want to zoom in a little in the phone's UI. Say by 2x again. You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Even more so than the grass in the zoom test shot above, this shows that Xiaomi is in real trouble with its image processing from its telephoto lenses. Coming from a world of Lumias, which don't zoom elegantly, but at least you can recognise what you're looking at, and from the world of the iPhone 11 Pro, which shows incredible fidelity and balance when zooming, this effort from the Mi Note 10 is very disapoointing.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 7 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 4 pts

Test 9: Night time

A shop front in light rain at night - loads of detail, but a real challenge to shoot. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Very impressive from the Mi Note 10's main camera - back in the day Nokia struggled to put OIS on a camera unit with a 1/1.5" sensor, saying the optics were just too big, and the Lumia 1020 shipped with a kludge of a ball bearing mechanism as a result. Xiaomi/Samsung have managed to put OIS into the optics of this 108MP unit with even larger 1/1.3" sensor, and you can see the results for yourself above. You can read ALL of the text on the A4 sheet inside the window. Even the mighty Lumia 950 is struggling here, so we have a new high water benchmark for single shot night photos, I think. Then, to blow your mind further, remember that this Mi Note 10 photo was downsampled by about 50% for this comparison. So it actually had twice the detail, potentially. See the original JPG linked above!

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 8 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 10 pts

Test 10: In the rain

Night time still, and in light rain, here's a street-lit corner building, a test shot I've used before because of the signs and other interesting detail. Here is the overall scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Interestingly, the Lumia 950 XL does as well here. And it shows what a lottery night time shots can be. I use them because they show what the raw hardware can pull out in terms of light gathering, but you can see why most flagships (including the Mi Note 10) also have a separate 'Night mode', in which many exposures are combined.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 9 pts

Test 11: Night zoom

One last night test, trying 2x zoom to an illuminated church tower. Here is the overall zoomed scene, from the Lumia 950 XL:

You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10, for your own analysis.

To look at the images in more detail here, here are fairly central 1:1 crops, from the Lumia 950 XL (top) and then Mi Note 10 (bottom), just wait to make sure the page has fully loaded and then use your mouse or trackpad pointer to compare the images:

Again, there's not much to choose between the two crops - the Mi Note 10 drops back to 'PureView' lossless zoom on its main 108MP sensor when light is very low, as here, meaning that the fairly ropey processing from the 2x telephoto (see above) isn't an issue. So the lossy 2x zoom on the 950 XL's camera is more or less matched by the lossless PureView zoom on top of the quad-Bayer system used on the Mi Note 10. Both phone cameras did better than I thought they would though, zooming at night, etc.

Microsoft Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Xiaomi Mi Note 10: 9 pts

Verdict

For the record, the scores add up as:

1. Xiaomi Mi Note 10 (late 2019): 88 pts (/110)
2. Lumia 950 XL (late 2015): 86 pts 

So a pretty close run thing overall, which is a compliment to the Xiaomi Mi Note 10, since I don't think a phone of their has ever even got close to the old Lumia champion, let alone beaten it. What's hidden in the totals though is that the star feature of the Xiaomi imaging system is - not surprisingly - that giant, stabilised, 1/1.3" 108MP sensor. This is treated fairly well in terms of image processing and shots taken with this come out with immense detail and possibilities. I even shot a test at the full 108MP, for your interest and analysis. 

In fact, I'd love to have seen just this sensor, combined with wide angle, perhaps, a much simpler imaging system overall. Because it's putting in the much smaller 2x and 5x telephoto lenses that devalue everything - the results from these currently have poor image processing and they're just not worth it. Of course, Xiaomi will put out updates, so let's hope for the best. The Mi Note 10 camera system has the potential to rival the best in the world (Pixel 4, arguably, or iPhone 11 pro), but it's going to need work by Xiaomi to make results consistent whichever camera is being used at any particular time.

In short - as with the Pixel 4 series, to be fair - wait and see. This phone camera will get better!

With some social applications, comms apps and Microsoft services being phased out through 2019 and beyond, I thought a ready reference table of where Windows 10 Mobile stands would be useful. And I'll revisit this every few months to update each section as needed. In summary, there's likely to be little disruption to 'normal' activities this year but a few more caveats in 2020, when Windows 10 Mobile will be out of official support. [This is the December update, two months on from the previous one.]

Yes, we're in an odd phase of the OS, where most of the stuff that ever works still works (and is supported), but things are falling off the edges, as it were. Which means that it's hard to keep track of it all - hence the table below, which I'll keep updated every so often. [last update 15th Dec 2019]

Note that some dates are approximate, since even we at AAWP can't see into the future with certainty! I've colour coded table cells, with pale red for 'on the way out, with workarounds and caveats' and red for 'no hope!'...

Do please let me know, by email or in the comments, if there are any inaccuracies in the above table or if you have information to update it. Thanks.

Delivering a 'report card' for the status above is tricky. I'd say that the OS is viable still, with the obvious omissions (tap to pay, IoT support, online banking apps) that have been there for a while now. There are certainly enough workarounds and alternative applications for most people.

But your comments and updates welcome! This is an update to the original story, so I've left previous comments in place.

PS. Another valid question might be what will happen to AAWP itself in 2020 and beyond? Rafe and I are chatting about resources, of course, but a) do please join the occasional guest writers if you have something to say/review/discuss, email me at slitchfield@gmail.com, and b) well, you know where my tip jar is...(!) 

With Facebook having stopped their first party (OSmeta-based and very bloated) applications for Windows 10 Mobile months ago, users have had to look elsewhere for their fix of family news and jokes. So what options are still working and what about Facebook Messanger and Instagram (also now part of Facebook's empire)? I investigate, in this last feature before Christmas. (AAWP will be back on December 27th.)

Messenger is particularly important for many people, especially for intra-family communication - I've lost count of the number of times a member has said 'Did you not get my message?' and it turned out they'd got confused and sent it by Facebook Messenger rather than Messages or iMessage (or whatever). So it does perhaps pay to keep an eye on Facebook messenger too, even if you're not a heavy user!

Instagram is totally separate, mind you, effectively a fairly recent Facebook acquisition. In theory, there's the excellent third party Winsta UWP, though it's currently a bit unstable and I'll report more on that in the Flow columns here on AAWP. Plus there's a new Instagram PWA incoming from Facebook, which will hopefully work as well as the one Twitter put up online and in the Store.

By the way, you may have thought I was kidding about the bloat of Facebook's old first party clients for Windows 10 Mobile, but I'm not. The 'Facebook' app in the Store was a whopping 168MB and took about 15 seconds to launch on a Lumia 950. Which is ridiculous. And good riddance.

But Facebook does have its uses. It's still loved by non-techy relatives, typically - we all have a cousin or grandparent who will only use it and it's our lifeline to what they're up to. For this reason, and also because lots of lesser web sites let you 'log in with Facebook', saving you having to make accounts for everything, I'd advise not leaving Facebook altogether.

Which leaves the issue of how to access Facebook in 2020, especially under Windows 10 Mobile. Happily, Facebook has to provide a low bandwidth way into its content via the Web and this can be used, either directly, or via a number of 'web-scraping' applications.

1. Directly, in Edge(!)

Facebook is basically a web site (with added apps for convenience), so it's easy to access the main content in a web browser, even a mobile one here. Go to 'm.facebook.com'.

In fact, you can get just a bit more screen real estate and convenience by turning the URL into an 'app' yourself with PAWA or just pin it 'as is' on your Start screen. Or just add it as a 'Favourite'. It's up to you.

Facebook in Edge and (right) Edge via PAWA - in the latter you get better fonts and more screen real estate.

So that's two views of the basic Facebook site with full access, but you can go further (with just one caveat) with a hack of sorts.

In Edge, go into '...' and Settings and then pick 'Desktop version'. Note in particular that you're still going to m.facebook.com, but it's being interpreted in slightly more sophisticated fashion because Facebook's server knows that you're using something (in theory) higher end. So you then get:

So less clutter at the top, a cleaner layout overall, plus a lot of lesser navigation functions on the hamburger menu, shown on the right here.

I'm calling this latter mode 'Desktop-Mobile-Hybrid' (DMH, for short), by the way, for want of a better name/acronym!

Facebook Messenger needs addressing next, since sending and receiving messages is all handled in the interface here, whether you're looking at the ultra-basic or DMH mode. There's no notification support outside of Edge, mind you, so it really isn't a good idea if people try to contact you urgently in Facebook Messenger and you're using Windows 10 Mobile!

Still, messages are here, all your Messenger chats to your contacts in the past, new messages have notification bells pop up on the top toolbar, and you can drill in to read and reply as needed:

Well, with one major caveat. The DMH mode has a javascript glitch (either at Facebook's end or in Edge locally, it's not clear, but it certainly hasn't been tested in this combination)! So, when you send a new message/reply, it doesn't appear in the message list, even though it has been sent. Worse, when the other person replies, you don't see that either! See the comments in the screenshot above!

You're forced to refresh the page to check, or - easier - just move away from this Facebook pane/tab and then move back to load it again. This is a pain because, apart from this glitch, this DMH mode works really well for Facebook on the go under Windows 10 Mobile. It's not a showstopping bug but... it is a nuisance.

2. LightSocial Pro (or similar)

Now, if the DMH panes look familiar, it's because they're the basis for what I'm calling DMH+ applications. LightSocial Pro is one such, featured here, though SlimSocial and Likebook for Facebook do a very similar job (though their 'Messenger' presentation isn't quite as neat IMHO). In each case, the application presents itself to Facebook as a Desktop browser going to m.facebook.com and then the HTML returned is subtly modified, perhaps setting the background dark (to save power), perhaps media detecting and local saving are made possible, you get the idea. As I say, I'm calling this DMH+. Here's a brief walkthrough using LightSocial Pro:

Here on the (light) page, LightSocial Pro's dark mode is really, really dark, but you can see the dark blue control elements on the physical phone screen, don't worry! Here's the start of my Facebook timeline and, by tapping on the hamburger control bottom left, up pops LightSocial Pro's own 'helper' menu (shown on the right, above)...

Of particular interest is LightSocial Pro's own Settings pane, with helpful toggles to hide ads, go full-screen, go dark, lock the top Facebook bar, and (shown on the right here) require Windows Hello authentication to stop little Johnny from accessing your private Facebook stuff...(!)

When viewing a Facebook post with an embedded video, you can grab a local copy if you want by just starting it playing and then using the 'Download Video' function on the LightSocial Pro helper menu...

...the download is started, you're notified by toasts, including when it finishes, and then you can find it later (as shown right) in your 'Facebook Downloads' folder in your internal storage on the phone.

Facebook Messenger looks snazzy in dark mode here, but behaviour is sadly (and understandably) the same as in DMH mode above, so you get the oddity of firing off messages successfully but you can't see them or any replies until you move away from this conversation and then back into it! #facepalm

Two main - and related - approaches then, each more satisfactory than you might think overall (not least in terms of not having to endure the original bloated Facebook code) but each flawed in terms of Facebook Messenger operation. It would be nice if Facebook opened up its APIs to allow third party clients, but I'm not holding my breath. Plus it's late in the day for UWP apps for Windows 10 Mobile now...

Oh, as noted in the comments below, there's also 'Messenger for UWP', which takes the glitchy Facebook Messenger web view data above and puts a complete new UI/skin on it, along with detecting new messages and throwing up Windows 10 notifications:

A confusing UI - in theory you swipe down the left to a contact and there's the chat, but in practice it's all so slow and unpredictable; (right) you do get notifications though (albeit in duplicate - here I've swiped away half a dozen to just leave one from each contact!

What's not to love about this? Well... it's slow to start, slow to work, produces duplicate notifications, and is impossibly hard to navigate in terms of finding anybody, in my experience, with notifications not actually directing you to the appropriate chat. Maybe the developer can leap in with a major update here? 

________________

Do you use Facebook? If so, how often, and how do you access it under Windows 10 Mobile (or Windows Phone)? Data points welcome!

Microsoft warned Windows Phone 8.1 users, AAWP warned them/you too, so the final closing of the Store wasn't unexpected. After all, the 8.1 OS itself has been unsupported in terms of updates now for over two years. However, I was curious as to what would happen if a user tried opening the Store app on a phone running Windows Phone 8.1 after the 19th December deadline. Surely a friendly message explaining the situation and pointing users back to the Windows 10 Mobile upgrade or to a competing platform wasn't too much to ask? As it turns out, yes, this was too much to ask. Harumph.

I've been updating and installing applications on Windows Phone 8.1 phones through 2019 and, to my knowledge, the on-device Store has never put up an official notice for 'normobs', normal mobile users who don't geek out on AAWP. Yes, there have been several longstanding warnings buried on the web, for example here, but there's no way a regular user of Windows Phone 8.1 would stumble on these.

What's that? Regular users of Windows Phone 8.1? In 2019? Yes, and I'm not talking about AAWP readers holding on to much beloved Lumia 920 and 1020s. I'm talking about technologically unambitious people who acquired an 8.1 phone back in the 2013-2015 time window, usually from a network operator, as a 'fresh' and interesting looking smartphone (well, hey, it was, and still is, in some ways!) Or perhaps parents and young teenagers, accepting hand me downs? Either way, there are still millions of people across the world, of all ages, still using Windows Phone 8.1.

And, while they may not visit the on-device Store much these days (there's been nothing new in it since late 2018 and no new app updates since July 2019), if and when they do decide to tap on the icon in this latter half of December 2019, they'll see the screenshot, below left:

Oh come on. It's one thing presenting tech-savvy people with an error message if there's genuinely something wrong - you and I will Google/Bing search the code (screenshot, above right) and try to work out what's happened, but the normob here will be totally and utterly thrown. And, as you can see, even searching for the error code given offers no clues whatsoever - it's a genuine 'We haven't the faintest idea why things aren't hooked up' error.

I think Microsoft could have done better than this.

I get that the base 8.1 OS, which includes the Store app (unlike in Windows 10 Mobile, where the 'Store' can update itself), was effectively frozen in time in terms of coding mid-2017, so Microsoft couldn't easily patch Store to show something more friendly when it couldn't find its counterpart APIs on the servers anymore.

But a) couldn't the company have thought ahead and put this in two years ago? For example, the screenshot below, left, showing a pre-made message that would pop up after a certain date or when the appropriate flag was set on the server? And b) surely there was some way, some hack, some means to put a plain English (or whatever) message up high on the opening screen when a user opens the Store, as shown below, right, for example with some 'dummy' featured apps whose thumbnails get the message across without requiring Microsoft to have thought ahead in terms of coding or breaking the way the Store worked?

The answers, of course, are yes, this should have been done, by one means or another. As it is, I have to say, Microsoft, it's 'poorly done'.

____________

PS. I'd hope that most people affected would, as we head into 2020, have a family member or friend switched on enough technologically to realise the cause of the error and to personally point users to other platforms, even running the Microsoft applications they've been used to.

There comes a point when enough is... actually enough. For people relying on real time communications with other human beings, this point may have just been reached, with Windows Phone and Windows 10 Mobile. We've had the official Twitter client not supporting active notifications for a year now, ditto Facebook Messenger, and now the ultimate Whatsapp deadline is upon us. What happens to a communications device when it can no longer effectively communicate, I wonder?

Now, it's true that basic SMS will still work on Windows 10 Mobile, of course. That's the lowest common denominator. Ditto email, which works on just about anything and via multiple protocols. But add esoteric but popular communications channels like Apple's iMessage and Instagram DMs to the shortlist above and it's clear that as of 2020, Windows 10 Mobile is the platform that's rather out of touch - or rather you will be if you're using it.

And it pains me to write all this - I've maintained a Lumia or similar for years, despite Microsoft's increasing neglect of the platform, but the termination of Whatsapp support really is the last straw - my family tree RUNS on Whatsapp groups. No Whatsapp, no point in ever reinserting my SIM card etc. since I won't have a clue what everyone's doing or talking about. In other families, it's perhaps iMessage or Facebook Messenger performing the same purpose, both also locked away from Windows phones now, of course. 

Yes, yes, get everyone to switch to Telegram, you say, it's as good as Whatsapp (there's Unigram, a UWP client) and all will be well. But have you tried getting Uncle Ben and Auntie Maud and so on to all switch from an application they've been using for years, just so that you can carry on using an OS that's almost out of support completely? 

All of which rather relegates classic Lumias like the 950 to the role of what I'm going to call 'Camera+', they have a jolly capable imaging system and are connected in that you can still share such images socially, back them up online, etc. You can do the aforementioned SMS and email. You can browse the web - to an extent, since many PWA sites require more than 2017's version of Edge can support. And, in addition to Microsoft's built-in UWP applications, there are stil plenty of third party UWP champions. Just don't expect to be as connected to your favourite people in the real world as you used to be, or could be on other platforms.

Which brings us back to the age old question of how one defines a smartphone, i.e. what it's for, what it's expected to do. Yes, a Lumia 950 (or similar) is still an amazing slice of technology in your pocket and it can do around 100 different things. But if some of the things you really want a smartphone to do include the communications methods above and they're not in the 100 then it might be time to have a rethink.

Your comments welcome though - am I being too defeatist? I'm trying to view all of this from 'outside' - I do accept that within the AAWP bubble, with everyone Unigrammed up and mostly Facebook haters(?) a somewhat biased opinion might emerge. I'm just trying to be both realistic and honest!

It's... another head to head article for AAWP... with a difference. Because the smartphone here is different, a direct descendant of the Nokia E7 (2010, running Symbian) and N950 (running Meego, which ended up still-born). Now, a spec comparison between 2020 and 2010 would be farcical, so I'm still going to compare the f(x)tec Pro1 to the Lumia 950 XL, so that specifications are at least in a similar ballpark. But I'm throwing in plenty of Nokia E7/Pro1 comparisons in photo form too, hence the AAS cross-post(!)

For size comparison, the 2010 Nokia E7 and the 2020 f(x)tec Pro1 (with part of a Lumia 950 XL in the foreground). The E7 and Pro1 keys are about the same size, though the latter has extra punctuation and control keys either side. In practice, the Pro1 keyboard is more of a stretch for thumbs from the device sides, as a result. The layout is also staggered rather than in grid form, but muscle memory will develop with either.

Although there's a little life left in Windows 10 Mobile in terms of updates and support, new hardware is non-existent, plus repairs and spares for older hardware are heading the same way - so it makes sense for everyone to be aware of the best of the rest from other platforms. And this new niche handset/palmtop from f(x)tec is especially interesting to the old 'Communicator' crowd from the Symbian world, which is why there's a Nokia E7 in the photo too, for comparison!

Left to right, from the back, Nokia E7, Lumia 950 XL (with Mozo back), f(x)tec Pro1... Anyone else remember when the E7 was the biggest smartphone in the Symbian world and one of the biggest in the phone world, period? It's now dwarfed by everything!

So, back to the specs, and using the 950 XL as a data point here on AAWP (again, the E7 is too far back in time for specs to make sense). As usual, I've shaded in green an obvious 'win' for either device. Any row where a winner would be totally subjective is left uncoloured. Or, where all devices are utterly excellent but in different ways, I've given each a 'green'(!)

[By the way, if you're viewing this feature on a phone then the table may well cause you problems. Try viewing in landscape mode? Failing that, go view this on a laptop or tablet!]

Verdict

Adding up the green 'wins' (for fun?!) gives a 10-6 win to the much newer device, though in this case the form factors and use cases are so different that the scoring is somewhat irrelevant. Whereas you'd buy the Lumia (back in the day) for its camera system, you buy the Pro1 for the same reason why people bought the Nokia E7 back in the day - an always available flip-out QWERTY keyboard. 

Your comments welcome.

PS. See also my video review of the Pro1

Two months on, here is the January 2020 update (one addition, four apps removed, several links tweaked) to the AAWP directory of curated UWP applications, those with native Windows 10 UI and which support different orientations, Continuum and even use on laptop or tablet. Do please get involved in the comments to let me know of anything which has stopped working.

With regards to the 'curated' bit in the title, all of these titles have been personally checked or recommended by a trusted reader of the site. See below the table for some helpful notes and background.

NB. I've included (and marked as such) the new Store-packaged PWAs (Progressive Web Applications). While not UWP, they're in the same category in my mind, and install in the usual way, but working with the Edge engine on Windows 10. Note that I've also included a few PWAs which haven't been professionally packaged in UWP wrappers - they're usually here because they're so fully featured or are for a major service. But don't let that stop you seeking other PWAs out too, via our Flow stories and via portals like Appscope.

Directory updated 13th January 2020

General 8 Zip AppRaisin  CAS Preview Clipboard Cleaner Cloud Drive! Connected Devices  Cortrigga DailyPic Digicam Remote.test Disk File Searcher Download App Later Dropbox  Dynamic Theme edgeTile Feem v4 - Share Files Offline FieldWire File Cards Files&Folders Pro File Renamer GDrive.NET Hand Off Hopic Explorer Instabullet MEGA Privacy PAWA PDF Conversion Tool PDF Reader PDF Wizard Perfect Flashlight Perfect Tools QuickProfile Random Tool Rar Zip Extractor Pro Roamit Share 2 Print Share.it Share me Files Torrex Web Tiles Woopiti Zip Opener	Productivity/Office Action Note Choshim Diary Chronos Calendar Clipboard Manip Count-It CV Sampler Denna Diarium FileTag 2 Foxit MobilePDF Keep To Do Markdown Editor - Write Beautifully Microsoft To-Do Modern Flashcards Nimbus Note NotepadX  OCR Text Detection Tool Office Lens OneCalendar  One Task Paperly Power Planner PPT Sampler Project Studio Revent Scanner for Docs Pro ScribePad ShapeResume Share 2 Print SharePoint Slack  SMS to Excel Speech Central: Voice Reader Spreadsheet Conversion Tool Textnotes Tiles for Outlook Todoist Track Goals WorkingHours WP Message Backup
Commercial Travel/Movie Booking AirBnB PWA London Travel  SkyScanner PWA Travel Currencies Trivago PWA	Communications and IM FlowMail HipTalk Universal  Loadkit Download Manager  Read My Mail Skype TeamViewer  TeamViewer QuickSupport Telegram PWA Unigram X (Telegram) Viber  Video Optimizer for Whatsapp
News and Web AAWP Universal Ark View Coc Coc Browser Dailyhunt Daily Mail Online  FeedLab  Flipboard PWA GHub U GNews - Google News Reader Hypersonic iNi Reader Latermark for Pocket mAloud Monument Browser MSPoweruser Newsflow Newsreader for BBC News News Live Tiles RSS Live Tiles Shiye Browser Short.y Speech Central - Voice Reader The Verge News Vivid Windows Central	Reference/Language Anki Universal Astronomy Hub Binocleo CodeHub Collection Keeper Diccionario Dicionário Português Earthquake Watch Elements - The Periodic Table  Flights Radar FlowDict  GeoQuiz Hear it first! ISS Finder Kiwix JS Offline Wikimedia reader Mobile Studio U NASA Picture Galleries onePedia Perfect Dictionary Planetarium 3D Small Media Manager Reloaded Songbook Pro Speaking Recipes Star Walk 2 Terrae Motus UrbanDict WikiMed Wikini Yandex.Maps
Shopping/Banking AliExpress Shopping BitPay Boots UK PWA CryptoChart Flipkart i-bank pass Loyca My USPS (USA) My Giffgaff NBG Mobile Banking (i-Bank) Packages Tracker Tangerine Bank (Canada)	Social 6tum - Tumblr client Aeries  AIR for Facebook Baconit Disqus  Friendica Harvester Messenger  HipTalk LightSocialPro Likebook for Facebook MALClient Meme Generator Suite Ouga (Tumblr) Perfect 9GAG  Perfect Flicker Pinstar Piny Quarrel (Discord) Readit ReddPlanet Saver for Instagram PRO SlimSocial for Facebook Tik Tok TopicStack Tumblast Tweet It!  Tweetium  Twitter  Ouga - Tumblr Winsta (Instagram)
Personal Navigation/Travel AroundMe Backroads Cartograph Maps Pro Findery PWA Flights Info Flights Radar GeoMeterPro 10  GPX Tracker GPX Viewer and Recorder Just Buses (London) London Travel  Pocket Map (Norway) SG iBus (Singapore) Sygic GPS Navigation Traffic TripAdvisor TripAdvisor Hotels Flights and Restaurants Uber (PWA) Volvo On Call Wikivoyage by Kiwix WinGo Maps Yandex.Maps Zenit	Settings/Internals/Utilities 8 Zip Lite / 8 Zip  AIDA64 Battery Bar Graph CodeHub DataCounter DOSBox Interop Tools IP Network Scanner PRO Kirik Battery LAN drive Landiskape PhoNetInfo  Remote Desktop Specs Analysis Speedtest Wifi Analyzer Wifi Analyzer Tool
Sports/Exercise/Health Break Reminder 10 Diabetes Analyzer fitbit  Fitbit Coach Fit Timer Fitness Foundation GoodDoc  Insulin Buddy PWA Perfect Workout Mr Pillster Pillbox ScoreBall SofaScore LiveScore True Fitness	Privacy/Secrecy/Security 9Zen Universal Locker Bytewarden File Hasher Hacked? HideImages KeePassReader KeePassWin Keeper Password Manager Master Password Microsoft Authenticator Mobile Vault mSecure OneLocker  OTP Manager Passkey Password Hello Personal Files  Secret Mind
Weather-related/Lighting HueDynamic for Hue Huetro for Hue MeteoStation Suntime - Sunrise & Sunset Vieather Weather Notify Yandex.Weather	Time related  Break Reminder 10 Jack of time My Big Days Realarm Special Day Countdown Stopwatch Yokto Timer ++ WorkingHours World Time Clock
Calculators and (numeric) Converters Calculator2 Travel Currency	Finance (tracking/analysis) EtherWallet Money Lover - Money Manager Money Tracker Pro UMeter (Uber)
Camera replacements/aids 1Shot camera  Office Lens  Photo Scan  ProShot  QR Scanner  Scanner One	Music/Speech recording/tuning Airyware Tuner  Audio Media Conversion Tool Ax-Exp DIY Piano Chordle FL Studio Mobile 3  MeeDJ Metronome+ Music Stack My Piano Phone Perfect Recorder Piano10 Sound Recorder Hi-Res Talkinator Auvid Tuner
Music playback/streaming /downloading/FM 8 Soundcloud ABC Radio FTW! ACG Player Audiocloud  Deezer Music Duplex FM Radio Jiosaavn Media Player for gMusic Pro Media Tag Mini Radio Player Moodflow Musbox Napster Neutron Music Player Next-Player Playcast Songify Spodicast Music Spotimo (Beta) Tidal Unofficial Valve Player VLC YouTunes! Z Music Player	Imaging/Graphics 10Lapse Perfect 9GAG   Afterlight Auto Face Swap Backup for Instagram Colory DrawNotes  DSLR Camera Photo Effect Fliky Fresh Paint  Fused Double Exposure  GeoPhoto GDrive.NET  Image Raw Image Resizer  Imgur4Windows Inkodo Instagram  Likegram for Instagram Monocle Giraffe (Imgur) Perfect Flicker Photo Box Pro Photo Resizer Photo Scan Photo Shader  Photo Stacking Pic Collage ProGet QRafty QR Code Light Scanner Resize Image Saver for Instagram PRO Screenshot Join SketchMaster Spirality SpotBright  Tapershop Vector Conversion Tool Wallpaper Studio
Podcast related/Audio-book Audible  Audiobooked  BookListener Booxio BringCast  Grover Pro  MyPodcasts  Podcasted Podcasts (Beta) Podcast+ Pro  Podcast Lounge 2	Media (Video) and Entertainment Awesome Tube Best Player Cast To Crunchyroll Dailymotion Duplex File Downloader Movier myTube!  Perfect Tube  Playcast PushTV Scorpio Player Small Media Manager Reloaded TorrentPlatinum Trakter Tubecast PRO  TubeGet TVPlayer TV Show Tracker Unstream (Twitch) Video 360 Vime - Ultimate Vimeo Client VLC  zTwitch
Reading/PDFs/comics Comic Show Cover - Comic Reader Fiction Book Reader Limited Foxit Mobile PDF  Freda KNFB Reader LightReader PDF Assistant Pro PDF Reader PDF Viewer Plus Perfect PDF Reader Tankobon Xodo PDF Reader & Editor	Video editing/sharing Animotica - Video Editor Auvid Tuner

This then is a bookmarkable page of the top few hundred applications that should be a useful aide-memoire after a hard reset if rebuilding a Windows 10 phone from scratch or, perhaps more appropriately, a great place for a new Windows 10 Mobile user to start.

Some notes:

• FAQ: I don't mark new entries as 'new' in any way because there's no point - you already know what they are as we've featured them on the front pages of AAWP over the last month or so. These reference pages are just that - for reference. For newcomers and for people looking up recommendations.
• Thanks to the AAWP community for suggestions so far (e.g. in comments below and on previous pages), this is a crowd-sourced project!
• Not included (obviously) are games. They're here (for both 8.1 and W10M). Also not included are applications which come with every phone, such as the core Windows and Lumia apps.
• Yes, I know that a couple of entries are in two categories. Just trying to be helpful!
• Implemented as a table, I've kept the width right down, now with just two columns, in order to be phone-friendly. In other words, you can view this article on your phone and, depending on the link and the item, dive right into an app, its page and then download it. In theory!
• If you're after the original WP 8.1 app directories, they're here: Photo/Media/Reading and General.

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The question is a tantalising one. How would someone get on setting up a Windows 10 Mobile smartphone from scratch... in 2020? i.e. a starting point of up to date security but no more updates to come - ever, plus a patchy set of mainstream services. I keep the latter tabulated and up to date here, but I also thought it worth documenting how everything comes together (or not) on a freshly factory reset Alcatel IDOL 4 Pro, certainly the slickest and shiniest (and boy, is it slippery) Windows phone ever made.

The IDOL 4 Pro also made it as my 'favourite Windows phone of 2019', it's a stunning piece of hardware in several ways, let down mainly by its camera and slow fingerprint sensor. But I'd lent it out to a fellow podcaster and now it's time, in January 2020, to rebuild it with my favourite bits of software with just the apps that still work(!) As regular readers will know, a reset and rebuild can often have a big effect on performance and general operation. Fewer glitches, fewer issues, and so on.

And so to the rebuild. I thought it worth me documenting what I did - and didn't - put on the phone, given the 2020 context. (So no attempt at Whatsapp, for example.)

Going naked!

My first decision was to use the IDOL 4 Pro 'as is', i.e. no case. I did a round-up of cases for this here, but none of them were even remotely stylish, whereas the naked IDOL 4 Pro (IDOL 4S in the USA) is simply gorgeous. Oleophobic glass front and back, insanely thin, with those metal speaker grilles either end. Simply a lovely design. And, since I mainly use belt pouches, it's always going to be protected to a degree anyway!

Biometrics

Next up, after the usual account set-up steps, is to register my fingerprint. This is still something of a novelty under Windows 10 Mobile, since only this device and the HP Elite x3 had one. The IDOL 4 Pro's sensor is renowned as slow, but the Windows Hello code has been optimised a bit over the last few years and the delay while the fingerprint is recognised and actual access to the Windows 10 Mobile UI is now down to around a second. Which isn't a showstopper at least - unlike the glitchy iris recognition on the Lumias, which never liked my glasses, however much I tried the set-up with and without lenses. To this day, to get into my Lumia 950 I have to lift up my specs and carefully position my face so that the top of the phone can see my eyes properly. 

In fairness, without a case on, it's fairly easy to 'miss' the fingerprint sensor (i.e. only getting part of it under a fingertip) on the first try and in some cases, not get it right three times, in which case it's disabled until you've entered the phone's PIN! I do have a 'top tip' though - register your fingerprint twice, to give the algorithms more chance of finding a match when the time comes. When you head into 'Settings/Sign-in options' to do this, you'll initially be told to 'use another finger, this one is already recognised'. But just ignore this and keep trying your main finger, but at slightly different coverage or angles - after a couple of tries the phone will let you complete another round of biometric recognition, and thereafter the IDOL 4 Pro's finger recognition will be much more reliable.

The final update

As you read a few days ago, there was a final update to Windows 10 Mobile and this arrived after my reset, so this had to be applied. To be honest, there's been no noticeable improvement in battery life or performance of Windows 10 Mobile in the last few months and I do get the impression that it has been almost a version number-changing exercise at Microsoft, keeping up its commitment in terms of timescale without actually putting any work into it.

Regardless, I updated and the IDOL 4 Pro is now on build 15254.603 and feeling pretty slick.

Store, updates and apps

As ever, it took an hour for everything to install and update in the background, after the initial reset. But, with a little TLC in terms of keeping an eye on everything, I was ready to start adding software from the 'Microsoft Store'.

[I've excluded listing obvious Microsoft properties, most (though not all) of which are on any Windows 10 Mobile handset out of the box, so Word, Excel, OneDrive, OneNote, Outlook, etc.]

Here are my picks (and reasons), hopefully of interest, in alphabetical order (see also our full directory of UWP apps), and note that I'm explicitly avoiding any old Silverlight applications from the Windows Phone 8 days (even though they do run here) or even any old WinRT applications (ditto) - I wanted everything to be UWP across the board and working as well with Windows 10 Mobile as possible, including running with full dark theme on my AMOLED-screened phone!

• AAWP Universal - ahem, our own application, but I need to keep an eye on it interpreting the site correctly! Plus it's a jolly smooth app and a good example of what can be done with UWP (thanks Joe!)
• Awesome Tube (yes, yes, myTube! also exists, but that's in something of a state of flux, plus I wanted to try something different! This has also been recently updated)
• FeedLab (the best Feedly client for gathering my essential tech news!)
• KeePassReader
• LightSocial Pro (all the basics of Facebook with none of the bloat or waste!)
• News Reader for BBC News (my favourite news source, neatly packaged here, complete with working live tile)
• Office Lens (so useful when keeping a record of things, even with the IDOL 4 Pro's average camera system here - it's still good enough for documents)
• Podcast Lounge 2 (the Rolls Royce of podcatchers?)
• Spotimo (technically still in beta, but development is furious and it's already working so well for instant access to Spotify's music catalogue)
• Twitter (implemented via the PWA capabilities of twitter.com, but it all works really, really well, DM notifications aside)
• Unigram (ok, not many of my contacts are on Telegram... yet. But I do have a few!)
• Video X Player Pro (I do like to have a library of music concerts and documentaries with me, to enjoy on trains and in waiting rooms - with headphones on! This app - crucially - preserves my playback position in each video)
• Wikini (I originally loved onePedia, but it seems legal issues forced the developer to withdraw it. So this is the next best way to access Wikipedia in dark mode, easier on the eyes!)
• Winsta (yes, it's a little flaky, but it's also updated regularly still and is a good way into Instagram and sharing what your family and friends are up to)

Next job, pay to get rid of any in-app ads - I can't stand them, plus it's good to support developers. And, having gone to all this trouble, it would seem crazy to skimp on a few quid and have to endure pop-up adverts in applications!

Pruning the Start screen

A little sorting out here will clean things up. Cortana is now effectively dead - you can't even set a timer or reminder in the UK, so that's one to 'unpin'. Ditto 'Continuum', not because it doesn't work (it does), but because it's there anyway when I plug in an external display or lapdock. The People live tile always annoyed me, seeing people's faces revolving around, and now it doesn't even do that reliably, so it's down to an icon alone.

Ditto Outlook Mail, which used to show emails and now doesn't. Down to an icon. Ditto OneDrive and Alarms & Clock. Ditto Microsoft Store, if I'm honest, all that has ever shown me is Candy Crush (and similar) adverts! Ditto Groove Music, now no longer capable of streaming from OneDrive, sadly, but still functional as a local music player. Maps used to show... something... but I was never sure what, so this might as well be a single icon tile too.

More live and not so live tiles

Back when Windows Phone was launched, a decade ago, almost all the tiles were 'live' to some degree, but only about half are in 2020, i.e. with fresh content being pushed to the Start screen. Several of the third party apps listed above have live tiles and so get a double-wide Start screen placing, many don't, so they just get a standard 'square'. And, if it's something I won't use that often, the idea is to give it just the basic 'icon' sized space. Got to be ruthless. Here's most of my Start screen on the rebuilt IDOL 4 Pro anyway:

Finally,  offline maps

A final touch that I always like to get done is to head into Settings/Apps/Offline maps and download a few hundred MB of road data for my home country - or indeed wherever this phone will be taken around the world. The download can be slow from Microsoft's servers, so allow 10 minutes or so, but it's worth it when Maps loads roads instantly wherever you go and without needing a fast data connection.

Courageous

As Sir Humphrey would say, setting up a Windows-powered phone in 2020 could, at best, be called 'Courageous', but hey, I did it. And would welcome comment from others attempting the same!

It's an obvious trend that smartphone processors get faster with every year's new launches. True, their operating systems also grow in size and complexity, but usually at a slower rate. So, overall, things get snappier. Back in the day, Windows Phone 8.1 was itself very fluid and snappy, but the move to Windows 10 Mobile introduced a more heavyweight OS and a more sluggish experience - I wrote about all this here, back in 2015. We haven't had new first party hardware from Microsoft since early 2016 and then third party hardware later that year - so how does Windows 10 Mobile on 2016 phone hardware compare, speed-wise, with the best of 2020?

As a comparison, I'm using the Apple iPhone 11 (I have the triple camera-ed Pro here, but the internals are the same across the series), which has - arguably - the fastest chipset around. But I suspect results would be similar for any top Snapdragon 855 or similar Android flagship. It doesn't take Nostradamus to predict that the much newer hardware will walk all over the Windows phone in terms of speed, but I did want to quantify just how slow things are now with Windows 10 Mobile in relative terms.

I'd have guessed the iPhone 11 to be two or three times faster in real world, day to day tasks, but the results below were somewhat shocking - it's more like a factor of five. In real world operation, that's not just noticeable, that's night and day:

None of this is news to AAWP readers though. Even the Alcatel IDOL 4 Pro's Snapdragon 820 chipset and 4GB RAM pale in terms of user experience compared to the best of 2020. Yes, it's true that once things are in RAM, once applications are loaded up, you can multitask around at comparable speed to other top smartphones. And of course there are many smaller applications and use cases (Contacts, Calendar, Calculator, and so on...) where almost any smartphone or OS is fast enough, even today. But right now there are some frustrating waits every now and then with Windows 10 Mobile, whichever hardware you pick.

Would someone choose to stay with Microsoft and Windows for its independence from Google or Apple? Maybe - that's a valid approach for the slightly paranoid. Would someone stay on Windows 10 Mobile because they really love the Start screen and live tile interface? Again, maybe.

But never mind apps and services being withdrawn (e.g. Whatsapp), I'd also have to point to the (lack of) speed of the user experience as a major reason to leave Windows 10 Mobile in 2020. And that's just painful, in the light of Windows Phone 7.5 running rings around the iPhones and Android handsets of the time (2010) in terms of instant response and a fluid UI. Sigh.