I feel like Nokia is trying pretty hard with the Microsoft partnership (at least in the US). They've issued firmware updates and are quickly addressing problems. So I believe they are making their best effort with what they have.

Do I think it was a good idea to partner with Microsoft, probably not. Should have waited until at least Windows 8 for features that are more on par with other OSes.

As for Symbian and Meego being let go, I don't see it as a bad thing. The company was spending way too much money developing for those platforms. They had to develop the core OS and on top of that they spent money developing applications for it because hardly any third party developers chose their platform. What they probably should have done is cut back on application development and focused just on the core OS and increase spending in advertising like they are doing with the Lumia in the US.

Symbian IS great. It is the greatest mobile OS ever to have existed. It is being surpassed right now by - Android. By any definition of greatness (commercially) Boy there are some dead enders here, who still profess that symbian is great. Yes, it was great, 5 years ago. 5 years is a lifetime. Move on. Symbian IS DEAD. there have been two mobile OS'es: Symbian and Android. Everything ELSE is crap.

And how is that working for them???

They could have cut staff for Symbian, and then moved some over to Meego to speed things up - China mobile was throwing their support behind Meego. This is one of, if not, the biggest markets in the world

What makes no sense is this thing of ecosystems. Elop said they were moving to Windows Phond because it could be the 3rd eco system. But WP8 will use a different Kernel, and hence everything will need to be rewritten - so essentially, the eco system will be starting from scratch

THIS, makes no sense at all. Should have stuck with Meego

Lumia 610 still won't be a turning point even if it is priced the same as low end Androids or Symbian phones. The OS is inferior compared Android or Symbian. There is too much dependence on having a PC with Zune and a data connection to do daily stuff. Zune cannot even be installed on a PC or laptop with no internet connection.

Nokia doesn't control the hardware or OS of WP7. Hardware specs are set by MS. Nokia is trapped once they embraced WP7. What's hard to understand is why they chose to tie their fate to WP7 in the first place.

Word is getting out, people are at least talking about it. I see them promoting it on the Today show, Extra, throwing tons of commercials out. The onslaught of commercials and advertising (from what I noticed) just started about 3 weeks ago. I'll give them some more time to see how their advertising blitz worked out for them, in the meantime I won't say it's a success or a failure.

I feel like they didn't advertise Meego or the Nokia smartphone brand at all. I saw no mention of tech blogs picking it up. It was basically all word of mouth, which is never a successful way to promote something.

Thankfully, Android already has excellent built-in support for multiple screens--you just need the hardware and the software to take advantage of it (there's already a few dual-screen devices and programs out there that take advantage of that). You CAN use game controllers--that's already been the case for a long time (I've been using a Wiimote myself, my brother prefers his PS3-like BT game controller made especially for Android/iPhone).. the power supplies aren't a problem, though. These 4/5-core Tegra 3 processors use less power than previous generations (that was the BIG selling point for Tegra 3 in particular, remember? That's why it can even claim a 5th core--the 5th is specifically for idle, slow apps to sip ever-so-slowly in the background) and the power supplies tend to come with the device, if you wish to remain plugged in. It would appear that you have been out of the loop a little, probably, yes.

As the article linked above states: "As to how a quad-core processor ends up with lower power consumption than a dual-core chip, this is because the quad-core will typically finish the task earlier and hence go into power-saving mode sooner. This results in a lower overall power draw." You should especially read the section titled, "It's even better for gaming." It's hardly new info, this stuff, and upcoming processors for Androids appears to be only faster and more efficient--enough that ARM's are starting to become attractive for servers, now. Check the buzz on it. It's getting pretty interesting!

Unless the whole point is for Elop to get in, ruin the company and then start selling off the valuable assets to Microsoft in the name of trying to help keep Nokia afloat. Then, once the company is stripped of all its valuable assets, finally let it just die off quietly and in that barely-remembered obscurity of brands that people sometimes mention and people react with a 'OH YEAH! I remember them! Wow! What ever happened to that brand/company/etc?" Just my theory, mind you.

People are at least TALKING about it the way they TALKED about everything from Zune HD to previous Windows Mobile devices all the way to Microsoft Bob (anybody remember all those horrible MS Bob commercials and those free fake Bob glasses they used to hand out as a promotion back in 1995?). Paying people to talk about it isn't the same as people liking it and it's especially not the same as people BUYING it with their own money. So far, the Lumia in the US has only managed to "sell" in decent numbers by effectively being free or nearly free right at launch day. If Microsoft or Nokia would release actual numbers of activations or end-customer purchases so we can see how well it ACTUALLY sold and how it's been trending since release day, I'm pretty confident that those numbers wouldn't look good. We'll probably never see those numbers. For that matter, far more people are talking about Android EVERY DAY (since there are a LARGE number of manufacturers constantly putting out another awesome new device every month). With that rapid pace of evolution, the talk about Lumia fades pretty fast and it had already lagged behind on specs on release day already and it's looking worse every day.

Just to point out the obvious, I said that calling Microsoft irrelevant was premature. It doesn't mean that it's absolutely wrong, it means that it's too early. It's too early because the desktop market is still important, and it's too early because Microsoft has more money than ever to throw into research and marketing. Yes, it's true that the mobile market is growing like crazy, but Microsoft still have resources to turn things around and cannot be called irrelevant.

Neither could Nokia, up until suicide day.

It's a shame that Nokia didn't take advantage of the far more technical, enthusiastic and hopeful Internet Tablet Talk crowd that formed here and the community that formed about Maemo by releasing an actual OPEN SOURCE operating system.

It's amazing what a company can achieve when it fosters true participation without deceiving their community about the potential for openness the way Nokia treated the Maemo community, customers and partners.

This entire discussion is getting quite old in the tooth. Every second thread just ends as another rehash.