Originally Posted by GadgetFreak
Interesting. Ive always been pretty pleased with the WM family, going even back to the first generation. I have always just used a few apps. In addition to the Mobile Office stuff that comes on it; couple calendar programs, Microsoft reader and an outliner maybe. I even took stuff off my HP38xx that came on it to make it run smoother. That could be why I have a more positive view of it in general than a lot of people I suspect.
I should have been more clear. I dislike WM5; WM2003 was pretty decent.
They changed far too many things in WM5 and didn't make it clear to developers that these changes would be happening, because a lot of applications simply do not work in WM5, just last week I downloaded the 27kb file "visicalc.com" onto my XP desktop, and it worked perfectly. If they can do it with the desktop, why not with the handheld. I am also annoyed that they removed WiFi local syncing; I understand that they thought it was a security risk, but at least make it optional...
The OS itself has evolved very little since the first version of the PPC, you still have to add far too many little apps and tweaks to make it fully functional and on the phone editions there are so many missing features that it makes the phone look like a 1996 Nokia. On my MDA I can't even select profiles, the caller picture is 30*20 pixels, I can't setup filtering on calls without a third party app, MMS is very poorly implemented and the Microsoft Bluetooth stack doesn't work well with many brands of Bluetooth carkits. In WM5 Microsoft doesn't even provide a backup application. They claim they don't have to becuase WM5 provides persistent storage, but seem to have overlooked the fact that there are still some applications out there that will render your device unusable requiring a total wipe (like SOTI pocket controller).
It can be made to function decently, but as I said, you need to install and purchase several third party applications, make some registry edits and spend a few hours messing with it.