On June 6th at Computex Taipei 2012, Microsoft Steven Guggenhimer demoed Xbox Companion app using Samsung Taylor in his keynote.

Samsung Taylor isn’t commercially released device. It was distributed to developers before launch of Windows Phone 7 RTM in 2010.

You can see both Back button and Search button have old style icon like below.

As Joe Belfiore demoed Mango at MIX11, Microsoft tended to use “zero” generation phones before 1st generations. The primary reason is likely that it has unique USB feature to output screen image to VGA.

The another reason is flashing ROM image. Microsoft seems to distribute developing Windows Phone build as a ROM image in house and they are flasing it by themself. Old phones are useful to flash ROM images because of well matured tools.

Anyway I cannot understand why Steven used Taylor, because the demonstation just showed ordinally Windows Phone 7.5 feature and apps published on the Marketplace.

A few days ago, Microsoft has released Windows Phone SDK 7.1.1 Update. Now you can explore the latest build 8773 Windows Phone OS on the emulator at your home.

One of the most interesting features of Tango is that supporting ‘budget’ phone. Both 1st and 2nd gen Windows Phones have approx 512MB RAM, but Tango adds to support for 256MB phone.

The following screenshots of Windows Phone Emulator show differences between 512MB phone and 256MB phone.

About screen

On About screen, you can confirm the version number of the ROM, 7.10.8773.98. It also describes limitations of 256MB phone, app selection and features may be limited.

Upload pictures to SkyDrive automatically

One of the interesting relationships between Windows Phone and SkyDrive is uploading pictures to SkyDrive automatically. Unfortunately, 256MB phone doesn’t support it, so there is no switch about the feature in Pictures+Camera settings.

Local Scout

While Local Scout is an important weapon for Microsoft people working for “Smoked by Windows Phone”, 256MB phone doesn’t support it. There is no Local Scout button in Bing search page on 256MB phone.

Local Scout is available only in United States and United Kingdom, so if you aren’t logging in your phone with those countries’ Live ID, it will have no impact on you.

High memory usage apps

Microsoft has announced that 95% of apps on the Marketplace work fine on 256MB phone, but the rest 5% may have problem because of high memory usage.

When you open the page of those 5% apps on Marketplace Hub with 256MB phone, you should see a description about the limitaton.

When you touch ‘Tap here for more info’ area at right-above screen, it shows more detail.

Video podcasts

256MB phone has limitation about podcast related features. I didn’t know the detail, but when I opened the video podcast “Windows Weekly” on 256MB emulator, I received an error message. In contrast, it works fine on 512MB phone.

Other features

In addition, Tango has more interesting features. You will be able to choose asian languages, Malay and Indonesian as display language.

MMS is also updated. It allows you to attach multiple pictures in a MMS message.

photo credit: sergekuznetsov, joyosity

Shinobu Takahashi, Developer Evangelist of Microsoft Japan, has posted that how to make your app Kanji-friendly adding one line.

As the picture below shows, there are some differences between Chinese and Japanese Kanji characters. While they are relatively little for those who are familiar with English or European languages, Japanese users cannot get awesome experience from Chinese font.

The character shown in the picture is ‘忍’, first character of ‘Ninja’ in Kanji. Unfortunately, Windows Phone runtime uses Chinese font to draw Kanji characters if you do nothing. But the Mango champ in Japan found an easy way to solve this. Add the following code in your constructor of App.xaml.cs.

using System.Globalization;
using System.Windows.Markup;

public partial class App : Application
{
        :
    public App()
    {
            :
        RootFrame.Language = XmlLanguage.GetLanguage(CultureInfo.CurrentUICulture.Name);
    }
}

If you do this, your app will draw Kanji characters using Yu Gothic Japanese font on the phone configured with ‘Japanese’ display language. It has no impact in English and Chinese environment.

I believe this is one of the most effective ways to make your app pinworthy in Japanese market. It’s already implemented in some of popular apps in Japan including Evernote.

Source: The Blog of Shinobu Takahashi

At the KDDI designing studio, in Harajuku Tokyo Japan, six IS12T handsets are displayed. They are all hot (powered-on) and network connected. Everyone can try to use it freely, but both hardware and software aren’t final.

IS12T has three colors, Citrus (yellow green), Magenta and Black.

The Start button gets red light by connecting USB cable. They are all red.

Build number of the ROM is 7716. It’s newer than Beta 2 Refresh (7712), but not RTM (7720).

These displayed phones are configured with a Live ID for Japan region. It’s not same as English markets, especially about Bing and Zune Marketplace features.

These pictures are showing about bootup sequence of IS12T.

First, it shows caution about waterproof. Second, it shows the logo, au by KDDI. Third, it shows Windows Phone logo with red-square icon.

These pictures show Settings menu of IS12T.

IS12T supports lots of display languages. Germany, English (UK), English (US), Spanish, French, Italy, Porugal (Brasil & Portugal), Chinese (Tranditional & Simplified), Japanese and Korean.

There is “Add Wi-Fi network” feature in Wi-Fi setting. You should see a plus button in Wi-Fi setting. Clicking on this button, you can type SSID to add hidden Wi-Fi network.

Beta 2 and Beta 2 Refresh build don’t have this feature, because this feature depends on Wi-Fi hardware and driver provided by OEM.

Each phones have an “original” accent color. The accent color of Citrus is different from default “lime” color. Magenta’s original color is also different from default “magenta” color.

Black’s original color, light gray, will be the first monochrome color for Windows Phone.

“Camera shutter” option in ringtones+sounds setting is one of 500 new features of Mango, but IS12T doesn’t have it. Any smartphones for Japanese market including iPhone 4 don’t have the feature. In Japan, taking pictures without sound is often considered bad manners or spy photo.

There is an unfamiliar setting, “Sound Quality Settings”. This isn’t a new feature of Mango. It’s sound enhancer for phone call, an unique technology of Fujitsu. Turning Clear Voice On, you will be able to get more clear voice in loud environment.

Using 13.8MP 13.2MP camera, you can take a picture in fantastic resolution. It’s 4128×3096 pixels.

Here is a picture taken by IS12T (original JPEG file) with sepia tone effect. Unfortunately, it’s resized to 1630×1222 when I send this to my mail address, but the Exif data of the picture shows original resolution, 4128×3096.

The Exif data also shows that “Make: TOSHIBA”, “Model: IS12T”, “Software: Windows Phone 7.5”.

One more thing, camera app of Windows Phone 7 add a messege “Hello from Seattle” to Artist tag, but IS12T doesn’t.

Turning on the phone with Vol-down + Camera shutter + Power, you will enter System Loader Menu. While IS12T datasheet describes its processor as MSM8655, it shows “MSM7x30”, more cheap Snapdragon. I don’t know the reason, but the hardware isn’t final, the firmware isn’t also final.

“FFU Method” has two options, MTPz and TFTP. It seems that it’s firmware related feature.

Comparing IS12T with Samsung Focus. It’s very similar weight, Focus is 115g and IS12T is 113g.

Comparing IS12T with HTC HD7.

Comparing IS12T with LG Optimus 7. It’s very similar size.

If you have any question about IS12T, send it to @tezawaly or comment to this entry.