Microsoft Working on FaceTime Competitor

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theuerkorn

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Like it or not, Microsoft business as usual: "Copy and conquer." Besides every phone should have the capability regardless of OS and Skype already does video call over 3G network with the potential to be independent from OS. Does MS really need their own niche?
 

marcob24k

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You must be using Office on a Mac because it is hardly slow on a PC. I have had some time to test out a Win Phone 7 and and it runs pretty fast and responsive. With that said MS needs to start moving faster if they want to compete with IOS and Android. There are to many features missing that the Market leaders already have. The mobile market moves at an unbelievable pace and if you move to slow you will find yourself in the back.
 

eaw2539

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These companies need to work together if they want video calling to become anything more than a marketing gimmick. I have the iPhone 4, and FaceTime is useless because I don't know many people with an iPhone 4 or new iPod Touch.

I imagine that Windows Phone 7 users will find the same issue when this gets implemented. If these phone manufacturers and carriers were to create a unified video calling interface and network that any phone could access (given that they had the right hardware), people might actually buy into it. That's as long as there were no extra fees associated with it, which I imagine would be far too much to ask.
 

gogogadgetliver

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Ok all the haters that come in blabbing about "they copy, not innovate" or "it will suck because it's microsoft" need to realize a couple things:

1. They've had video chat for what over a decade? Live messenger, Video Kinect, and all the way back to netmeeting.
2. Their commercial offerings already dominate the competition and everyone is playing catchup.
3. MS Doesn't show any signs of trying to do "lock in" like you see with facetime. Their IM offerings already work across: google, lotus, aol, msn, yahoo, and facebook. Lync uses a proprietary codec internally because it's better but licenses it for 50k onetime. Externally Lync uses 100% open codecs including many that suck just for the sake of openness.
4. MS had voice/video over data ready for phones since LCS 2005...blame the big three carriers lawyers for not letting you see it.

@mayankleoboy1: get a computer man. Office is highly threaded and efficient. Blame it for feature bloat if you want, but don't try to make me believe some performance issue exists when I can tell with my own eyes it doesn't.
 

rohitbaran

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Well, MS office 2010 is not fast if you run it on a P4. MS Office 2003 is. The point is that MS added features but they increased the size way too much and also caused performance loss which ain't visible since people have upgraded their computers. Yeah, but Macs are already 2 years behind in hardware so....
 

gogogadgetliver

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Office 2003 was the fastest version unless you go all the way back to Office 95 where you just simply didn't have any features. 2007 was substantially slower. 2010 is faster than 2007 across the board. Excel (the actual engine, not UI) is an exception to all of the above..it's so multithreaded and optimized now that it's a monster. The better the hardware the bigger the gap.

note: you can easily pick at the above..benchmarks are few and far between and vary wildly depending on the task. Office 2010 is pretty darn snappy though with video hardware acceleration, tons of threads, etc.

But back to the on-topic point: I've faith MS will produce a great FaceTime competitor. They've got tons of experience doing this...far more than Apple and if you look at MSFTs other video products it's obvious facetime is in no example of "apple just perfected it". MSFT also already has all the backend infrastructure in place because of other products. Their #1 stumbling block: no mandated front cameras in the WP7 hardware spec.
 

pharge

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[citation][nom]gogogadgetliver[/nom]. Their #1 stumbling block: no mandated front cameras in the WP7 hardware spec.[/citation]

I am afraid that their #1 stumbling block is not selling enough WP7/WP8 phones to make their new standard useful. If it is only good for PCs and Xbox then the new Video chat standard is no different than the current windows live.
Of course if MS can make the new standard an open standard and convice Google to include it into the Android... but do you think is will be possible?
While I do notice that Facetime does have better video quality than Skype.. but it is no doult that Skype is much more useful than Dacetime at this moment.
 

alextheblue

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[citation][nom]mayankleoboy1[/nom]its bound to be bloated and slow, no matter the hardware ........just like ms office[/citation]
MS Office runs great, even on fairly weak hardware. Unless you're using 2010 Office software on a 2000 machine. Hate to break it to you, but even OpenOffice is slow as balls on really old junk machines. We use OpenOffice on our thin clients at work, and it is pretty agonizing sometimes. That's not a fault of the software... it was designed with all sorts of nice features, designed to take advantage of semi-modern hardware.

Anyway, I'm hoping this will interface with the existing MS video chat on Windows and Xbox. That would certainly make it more useful.
 

jsmith1085

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I have been researching a Microsoft Lync solution for our company for the past year or so. I recently attended the Lync launch event and had a chance to speak with and confirm with a presenter that there will be a -DEEP- integration in the Windows Phone platform. There will be your "promises promises" that you're so sarcastically going on about.

Contrary to the mindless herd's belief, Microsoft ALREADY supports real-time HIGH DEFINITION video chat provided you have 1.5 megabits of solid bandwidth kicking around. It's present in the Microsoft Lync solution which isn't a consumer market which is why there isn't any press coverage. There isn't any existing IM or video network which can make that claim, Microsoft is truly in a league of their own. Now, the problem here is hardware and bandwidth requirements on both wired and wireless connections. Once our country's infrastructure matures we will start seeing MS bring this tech to the forefront.

The reality is that we will see Microsoft perfect their technology in the corporate market first, then release it in the consumer market as a Lync hosted solution(labeled as Windows Live) which will incorporate HD video, E-mail, IMs (which will federate with public IM networks such as AOL/Yahoo/Facebook/etc.), and presence all in one platform. This will be a complete solution with Windows 8 on PCs/laptops, Windows 8 tablet once MS gets around to finishing it, Windows Phone 8, and the Xbox. One E-mail, one screenname, one profile all usable on all endpoints seamlessly without any fuss.

The problem that MS created with Windows Phone 7 is really just a marketing mistake. Teens and anyone that is tech savvy don't want to say, "Hey guys, check out my Windows Phone 7", they want to say, "Check out my _____". For many it's "iPhone". For others it's labeled "Droid". For others, it's labeled "Blackberry" If MS had called this the Xphone, there would have been a heck of a lot more hype and excitement. Even with that being the case, we are seeing developers get behind the platform with enthusiasm which is a great sign.

Of these 4, which doesn't fit/sound right?
"Dude, check out my ________"
A) iPhone
B) Droid
C) Blackberry
D) Windows Phone Seven

My point exactly. It's a shame really, considering how MS has all this amazing tech just waiting to be used.
 

gogogadgetliver

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@jsmith: Yeah man Lync rocks. Its one of those technologies that if *fully* deployed can give you an advantage over your competitors.

And to answer your multiple choice... WP7 aka "whippy seven" or just "windows phone". When someone asks its because they've watched me do something cool on it. By that time I could call it dog turd heronimous plex 12 and they wouldn't care. :)
 

gogogadgetliver

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[citation][nom]alextheblue[/nom]MS Office runs great, even on fairly weak hardware. Unless you're using 2010 Office software on a 2000 machine. Hate to break it to you, but even OpenOffice is slow as balls on really old junk machines. We use OpenOffice on our thin clients at work, and it is pretty agonizing sometimes. That's not a fault of the software... it was designed with all sorts of nice features, designed to take advantage of semi-modern hardware.Anyway, I'm hoping this will interface with the existing MS video chat on Windows and Xbox. That would certainly make it more useful.[/citation]

I think the lack of sales would hurt someone else, but not Microsoft because they already have big penetration in related markets. Facetime requires two people have an iPhone. Windows only requires one...the other endpoint doesn't need to be a phone.
 

mayankleoboy1

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MS Office runs great, even on fairly weak hardware. Unless you're using 2010 Office software on a 2000 machine. Hate to break it to you, but even OpenOffice is slow as balls on really old junk machines. We use OpenOffice on our thin clients at work, and it is pretty agonizing sometimes. That's not a fault of the software... it was designed with all sorts of nice features, designed to take advantage of semi-modern hardware.

i used office 97 on a then hot system and i use office 2010 on a i7-950 now. believe me, they both run at the same speed. whatever advantage the hardware brings, the software instantly bloats/becomes feature rich to the point where the extra speed is nullified.
 
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