Windows Phone 8 to support popular apps and new features

Computerworld - Windows Phone 8 smartphones, which officially launched Monday and will ship in November on three U.S. carriers, will support 46 of the top 50 most popular smartphone apps with a Data Sense app for more efficient data usage that will first be supported by Verizon Wireless.

CEO Steve Ballmer described the Windows Phone 8 mobile operating system as offering personalization that other smartphones don't have through the use of live tiles and other features.

"People all over the world are about to fall in love with Windows Phone," Ballmer said in a Webcast presentation. "It has killer hardware and is the most personal smartphone available."

Ballmer made a mild dig at Apple with its successful iPhone, which hasn't varied much in size or shape until the launch of the larger iPhone 5. "We have a different perspective on what a smartphone should be ... and didn't want just a single phone for all of us but wanted to build a phone that could be personal for each of us."

Verizon will carry the Windows Phone 8X by HTC for $199.99 with a two-year contract and the Nokia Lumia 822, exclusively, for $99.99 with a two-year contract. Both will ship by Thanksgiving. In December, Verizon also will have the Samsung ATIV Odyssey smartphone.

AT&T will carry the Nokia Lumia 920, the Lumia 820 and the Windows Phone 8X by HTC, all going on sale in November, with precise pricing and launch dates coming later.

T-Mobile will have the Windows Phone 8X by HTC starting at $149.99 for the 16GB version and the Nokia Lumia 810 from $99.99, starting Nov. 14.

Joe Belfiore, the head of the Windows Phone effort at Microsoft, described the Data Sense feature in WP8 as providing 45% more Web browsing on a data plan than without it. Data Sense conserves a data plan's allowance by compressing images, deferring data tasks to free Wi-Fi and automatically adjusting a person's usage as he or she gets closer to a plan's limits, Microsoft said. Verizon will be the first carrier to offer Data Sense in the U.S.. Other details weren't available.

Both Ballmer and Belfiore stressed that the 46 top apps in Windows Phone 8 will include Pandora, with an ad-free version for a year. There are 120,000 apps to choose from in the Windows Phone store.

Other features announced Monday in WP8 include a concept called Kid's Corner. With this feature, a parent can lock the phone so a child can use it without fear the child will access sensitive information from a parent's employer.