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< Esato Forum Index > Sony Ericsson / Sony > Symbian phones > "UIQ is going nowhere, Sony Ericsson are done with it" Bookmark topic

The history of problems started long before the P990i. The P800 was delayed several times before it eventually came out. The first two firmware releases were quite unstable, and it took some time to get the device perfect. It still had low RAM though, and SE forced users on to the P900 to get support for MS >128mb (which they could have easily added to the P800). Problem now was that the P900 had the same RAM (32mb) and apart from larger MS support and better looks was exactly the same phone.

This was then followed by the P910i which had 64mb RAM and was perfect for multitasking. Camera was pants (but sort of OK for when it came out) but SE were never ahead of the game the way they were when the P800 came out. It was still fundamentally the same unit with more RAM.

Then came the P990i and the rest is history. I sold both my P990i and P1i (both units on early firmware) then went through a succession of phones and then came back to the P990i. Apart from lack of RAM and the odd occasional crash it's a bloody great phone. Why did SE kill UIQ?, because they lost the plot. Their profits are now showing the results of their bad decisions.

No sympathy whatsoever!
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Posted: 2008-10-28 14:05:17
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I think the real turning point was the releaseof the P990 but it's true problems went back further.

I always thought P910 was a weak effort. The P910 should have been more like the P990. I mean it had could have had a better camera, more than 1GB storage limit, it could have been a little smaller and neater.

P800 though was a legend, though off to a slow start.
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Posted: 2008-10-28 14:11:38
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The P910i supports up to 2gb MS Duo. I have one that works fine however it does not support the 4gb M2 from my P990i.
SE have never given their smartphones good cameras. The P990i one is OK, but some of the P1i and W960 ones suffer from a green tint on the right. Looking at some of the snaps from the G900 thread show that the camera is still not as good as it should be!

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Posted: 2008-10-28 15:05:00
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Same here. UIQ is really refreshing with its colours, icons and functionality.
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Posted: 2008-10-28 15:05:41
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yeah sorry, I knew that!! D'oh I meant the fat16 issue. They should have anticapated the need for fat32 support to allow 2GB plus memory expansion.
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Posted: 2008-10-29 13:42:57
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Motorolla has ditched Symbian as well. Good for them
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Posted: 2008-10-30 10:22:53
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the old symbian is a sinking ship. Nokia will ditch it too once Symbian Foundation OS is developed.

But imho, there is no guarantee this will be anytime soon. Nokia has bought out all the other Symbian members (or is in the process of doing so).
Nokia pledge to gift all the rights and intelectual property to the new Symbian Foundation. But there are also no guarantees that the Symbian Foundation will actually go anywhere.

Time will tell.
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Posted: 2008-10-31 14:00:16
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Is it possibly the hacking of UIQ3 that has pushed SE to abandon UIQ and let Nokia deal with it?

It must be a little frustrating trying to sell new phones with new features - only to find that the enthusiasts are grabbing them all for free to put in their 'old' phones rather than purchasing new...

Just a thought...
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Posted: 2008-10-31 14:24:00
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That sort of "hacking" has been rife in the Windows Mobile community for many, many years, and never bothered Microsoft or the WM phone makers - if anything they probably enjoyed extra custom because of it.

No, I think UIQ's problems pretty much stem from the slow and botched transition from UIQ2 to UIQ3. They had something really great with the P800, but the total lack of any innovation between that and the P910 (the same phone, re-released for a second time in drag) really threw all that away. The P990 - the first real change in UIQ since the P800 released about four years previously - was the final insult in many ways.

I really believe UIQ3's problems extended much further than just the stability problems that plagued the P990 - it just wasn't a very good interface, at the end of the day. It was ok, but not ok enough to spark off the same sort of support and eco-system that the P800 originally inspired. Back in 2002, Steve Jobs was (alledgely) a big admirer of the P800. In 2006, when the P990 eventually limped off the production line, Apple would already have been testing early versions of the iPhone - just compare and contrast.

For whatever reason, be it lack of funding, lack of support from SE and others, mismanagement - I think UIQ as a company completely fumbled the ball. They were leading edge, but they let themselves fall behind, to the extent where they could simply never catch up again.
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Posted: 2008-10-31 15:19:21
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had the P990 been equiped with 50% more RAM, and the story would be other...analyse the complaints about it, and you will see...
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Posted: 2008-10-31 15:31:30
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