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Under Ballmer, MS dropped the ball on mobile. They had Windows CE, Windows on every desktop, and Xbox on the set top. And with all that, they couldn't put tog

Under Ballmer, MS dropped the ball on mobile. They had Windows CE, Windows on every desktop, and Xbox on the set top. And with all that, they couldn't put together a viable mobile product? They had the chance to make a holistic ecosystem that would span desktop, laptop, smartphone, tablet, TV, and everything in between. And they dropped the ball. Now we have to deal with a Duopoly between the largest advertiser and the largest media merchant. UGH.

tonyedgecombe 6y ago
They really messed that whole thing up. They were complacent before and after the iPhone was released, they should have ported it to their tablet instead of ruining Windows desktop and they wasted billions buying Nokia. The funny thing is everyone I spoke to who used it loved Windows phone.
sumtechguy 6y ago
No kidding... WinCE should have been a stripped down NT. Instead it was this 'other' thing that they drug along that was 'windows' but not quite 'windows' and a pain to dev for. They were stuck in this weird spot where they had to create a build system that took into account of every BOM every crappy cell phone the ODMs could come up with. Then married to cell phones that would forget everything you setup on the drop of a hat. Apple did something different that changed the market. They put an unlimited plan on it, decent amount of NAND, a good touchscreen, and a straight forward GUI that worked in the small screen market.
- projektfu 6y ago
  It’s an example of the company trying to avoid kneecapping the cash cow when experimenting. I really liked the Workpad z50, which was really the first netbook. Its windows CE runtime was light and useful, and booted instantly with execute-in-place. Its flaws were, in my opinion, entirely due to Microsoft not wanting to let CE become a viable alternative to NT. (That, and using a mask ROM instead of flash).
- ThrowawayB7 6y ago
  > "They were stuck in this weird spot where they had to create a build system that took into account of every BOM every crappy cell phone the ODMs could come up with." Well before Windows Phone existed, they already had to deal with that for Windows CE 1.0 to 6.x and all the PDAs/phones that used them. Android has to deal with the same thing. Nothing was new about that for Windows Phone. Aside from that, Microsoft had to deal with that already anyway because of Windows CE Embedded / Windows Automotive and all the miscellaneous gadgets people wanted to use it with.

tonyedgecombe 6y ago

They really messed that whole thing up. They were complacent before and after the iPhone was released, they should have ported it to their tablet instead of ruining Windows desktop and they wasted billions buying Nokia. The funny thing is everyone I spoke to who used it loved Windows phone.

sumtechguy 6y ago

No kidding... WinCE should have been a stripped down NT. Instead it was this 'other' thing that they drug along that was 'windows' but not quite 'windows' and a pain to dev for. They were stuck in this weird spot where they had to create a build system that took into account of every BOM every crappy cell phone the ODMs could come up with. Then married to cell phones that would forget everything you setup on the drop of a hat. Apple did something different that changed the market. They put an unlimited plan on it, decent amount of NAND, a good touchscreen, and a straight forward GUI that worked in the small screen market.

projektfu 6y ago
It’s an example of the company trying to avoid kneecapping the cash cow when experimenting. I really liked the Workpad z50, which was really the first netbook. Its windows CE runtime was light and useful, and booted instantly with execute-in-place. Its flaws were, in my opinion, entirely due to Microsoft not wanting to let CE become a viable alternative to NT. (That, and using a mask ROM instead of flash).
ThrowawayB7 6y ago
> "They were stuck in this weird spot where they had to create a build system that took into account of every BOM every crappy cell phone the ODMs could come up with." Well before Windows Phone existed, they already had to deal with that for Windows CE 1.0 to 6.x and all the PDAs/phones that used them. Android has to deal with the same thing. Nothing was new about that for Windows Phone. Aside from that, Microsoft had to deal with that already anyway because of Windows CE Embedded / Windows Automotive and all the miscellaneous gadgets people wanted to use it with.