Windows Phone 7.5 Defines 'Intuitive' for New Breed of Smartphones

Microsoft's Windows Phone 7.5 (also known as Mango) launched recently with nearly 500 new features that on the whole make it the most intuitive smartphone I've used. I've had an HTC Radar to try out the last couple of weeks and the whole family's had a ton o' fun taking it along with us over Thanksgiving weekend and for holiday shopping.

While Windows Phones have a leg up on work/life balance integration through Microsoft Office compatibility, calendaring, and Xbox gaming portability, I've written about those aspects of Windows Phones before - and they actually weren't even the main reason I so enjoyed the phone. Yes, the Kiddo enjoyed playing Kinectimals in the car while we ran holiday errands, but the HTC Radar wiggled its way into everything we did, in large part thanks to Bing.

Bing Really Shines
The search junkie in me LOVES all of the Bing integration in Windows Phone 7.5, and I credit it with being the driving force behind the intuitiveness of the upgraded operating system. I use my phone to stay in touch with others, but also to be productive while I'm away from the computer. I search for trivia or info at the drop of a hat. Who's singing this song playing at the coffee shop? What time's the next train home? When's the latest school fundraiser money due?

What Bing does is eliminate my need to have various apps on my phone and puts pretty much all of the info I'm looking for at my fingertips in one place. It seemingly intuitively knows what information I'm looking for and what I'm trying to do when I search for a simple term, giving me all of the possible info I need without being overwhelmed.

Forget having to type on the keyboard, now you can just say what you're searching for with Bing Voice, or better yet use the built-in camera to scan text, bar codes, QR codes and of course Microsoft Tag codes.This has been infinitely helpful while holiday shopping. It's actually become a game with my son to scan everything we look at in a store. Are the reviews positive? Is it available anywhere else for less money? (it's so easy to use, literally our six year old recorded this video showing how it works)

Hear a song on the radio but can't remember the name, use music search - built into the phone; not a separate app! Scan the song, and in a matter of seconds you see the name, artist, links to reviews and more details of the song to share or buy the song. These aren't apps doing all this work, this is functionality that's already built into the phone.

Tracking Conversations Made Easy
Socializing and communicating with others happens across so many platforms and devices these days: Twitter, Facebook, texting, or messaging that keeping track of conversations - or where someone told you something to reference back to it - can be a mind-bending memory game. However on the new Windows Phone 7.5 you can now track all these messages together by individual, so while you may start a conversation on Facebook, you can continue it through text messaging.

Another sign of the phone's intuitiveness, is that when you search your contacts for someone, it shows your latest conversations, or status updates for that person. So without having to log into a Facebook app to tease my Buckeye-loving friend in Chicago about the OSU vs. Michigan game, I can see that she's actually at the Northwestern vs Michigan State game and razz her about cheering for the wrong team in both instances. ;-)

Battery Saver
This is a neat feature that you generally don't find on any phone. At the click of a button, your phone will automatically go into power saving mode and limit power consumption by restricting automatic email retrieval and preventing programs from running in the background. You can activate this as a "permanent" feature, or only when your battery starts to run low so you can eek out some extra life.

The HTC Radar with Windows Phone 7.5 worked along the lines of how I think, and it anticipated my needs as I used it, with helpful information lying in wait for the swipe of my finger. It was like an indispensable butler or assistant quietly standing nearby holding the information I needed for my next step if only I'd ask, without overwhelming me with too many options, reminders or busy screens. I hope that people considering an upgrade to a smartphone check this one out as they phone shop.