User Manual

27
Picking a Phone
photos); volume up and down; and power/sleep (with brief and full press sup-
port for dimming the screen, waking up the device, and so on).
the BaCk Button
The Back button is particularly interesting and useful because it works in dif-
ferent ways throughout the phone. You can use it to go back within an applica-
tion (to a previous screen or experience), go back between applications (return
to the Home screen and then “go back” to the previously-used application),
close an open virtual keyboard, menu, dialog, or search experience, navigate to
a previous page, and more. This button, completely absent on the iPhone, is in
fact one of Windows Phone’s best features.
Camera: 3 While smart phone cameras haven’t quite caught up to dedicated
digital cameras from a quality perspective, your Windows Phone should come
pretty close. Microsoft requires hardware makers to include at least a 5 mega-
pixel camera with ash (and, as noted above, a dedicated camera button). You
can already nd devices that exceed these requirements.
takIng WIdesCreen photos and vIdeo
The Windows Phone camera must take pictures in a 4:3 aspect ratio, which is
non-widescreen. Some phone makers offer enhanced cameras with 16:9 or
16:10 widescreen photo (and video) capabilities. Some even ship devices with
a second, front-mounted camera for video conferencing. Note, however, that
this second camera is not natively supported by the Windows Phone OS, so the
phone maker will need to ship special software for that purpose.
Capacitive multi-touch display with four or more contact points: 3 Like the
iPhone, Windows Phones are primarily touch-based devices with virtual key-
boards, or Soft Input Panels (SIPs), that work in both portrait and landscape
modes. The screens offer touch and multi-touch, of course, with up to four
contact points. That means you could theoretically place four ngers on the
Hardware

makers are
free to optionally
provide a hardware
keyboard as well,
and since some users
still prefer these
physical keyboards
to onscreen virtual
keyboards, that may
be an interesting
option for you.
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